Reviews:
Guest 1: You dare insult Persion Midget pride, that be a grudging younglin. But yeah, the Chaos Dwarves will definitely want to retry thr Black Ork idea, because their whole society is in that catch 22 situation where they need their God and Slavery to survive surrounded as they are by Greenskins, Ogres, Chaos etc. but both of which are such dangerous endeavors that they're slowly eating away at the population so the Chaos Dwarves are slowly dying out.
Guest 2: You're right on all acount there but they only use them as ammo for the Hellcannons, they have other cruel tortures and uses outside those weapons they sell to Chaos Warriors.
Guest 3: Well the existence of Genetalia, particularly females, would have been a easy give away. As for the Empire's response, it really depends on when the whole thing took place. Because there are Emperors who would have gone either way, and some Emperors litterally it depended on how deep into their reign for the decision to be made. Thr Bretonnians would almost without fail gone full genocide, the Estallians...well Orcs would be going around as "not spanish" fops right about now, and Tilla would have sold the Horde off as mercenaries and probably been bitching to Sargeras that they weren't getting a big enough cut of the profits because 89% isn't as good as 99%.
Guest 4: No Mallus wouldn't be there, the year isn't yet right for him to be the Witch-king's favorite stooge. But thanks to the Geomantic Web Kraq-gar could easily be sent to lead an full on assault against them.
As for the cultural clashes, hoo boi you know those will get to be a issue as the Alliance is now getting the inadvertent "oh you can now go do as we please"
Guest 5: Well good news, the Dawi-Zharr are like the ONLY Warhammer faction with a population smaller than that of Stormwind so they at least have that going for them.
Guest 6: Ask not what your WoW can do for you, but what you can do for your WoW.
guest 7: Honestly I'd guess very dismissively. They deal with more threats and have just come off of beating their equivalent of the chaos gods. However they don't realize how far reaching and not "local"/"regional" most of the threats on Mallus are. Considering that the power disparity between the vast majority of threats on Azeroth and the Alliance are worse than the dispartiy of power between Star Trek TNG season 1 and 2s star fleet and...well pretty much the rest of the universe, IE "we can do whatever we want and we have to be borderline helping you for you to threaten any of us."
Then Warhammer is there going "we have strategic sense outside blindly throwing arms race development into a mosh pit hoping to come out the winner" and "Our Gods have competence rather than getting horney for the titanic threats we directly summoned them to fight, so they don't birth whole new highly destructive races as their honest to goodness attempt to actually help us...they only do that out of spite or a deliberate hate of us." Which then we then have to introduce Azeroth (and the fans of both universes) to the various Gods, and point out that the Vampire Counts in their 8th ed codex amounted to a Warhammer world regional threat...and considering Manfred played a fairly big role in the end of the world...yeah diffrent scales and metrics have to be used. Funny what a character can do when they don't just sit on their ass for 90% of a war and spend 8% more of it standing around waiting for someone to come and choose to do a mission for them *glares with vicicous intent through text at Blizzard* meh who am I kidding all I'm doing is glaring at a Slaaneshi cult.
Ironwall: *Dons the Captain America uniform* Language Motherfucker! learned that sentence enhancer from Nick Fury. *removes Captain America getup* but we'll just have to see where this goes, but things might not be too pretty out here.
Random Anon: What nah they'd never hurt poor innocent prisoners with jobs. And Prisoners with jobs never ever revolt.
ww1990ww: But-but-but this is the strategy that kills Gods without fail and rendered wars entirely irrelevant. But outside the game mechanics that removed most unit diversity and almost all military structure from the various factions entirely. With a lot of digging you can find elements of what their militaries could be or once were hidden underneath a Call Of Duty level of "we cannot possibly fight this battle so the PC will win it for us".
WarNob123: whaaaa, never Chaos dwarves dont have scary ranged weapons, them dwarves they melee folks. And slavery totally isn't bad, didn't you read the Southerners papers on the benevolence of slavery? geeesh the Horde totes should line up for their loving Dawi-Zharr masters, *tounge in cheek increases*
Hakuryuu: Nah Horde no face problems, Horde only have happy times. only happy good slavery! yeah!
But The Dawi-Zharr I'd say are easier to characterize than many other Warhammer factions/races...though thanks to my Spaniard friend getting their pompus "My street could murder your street" pride for Estallians would be easy for me.
and while Warcraft Zeppelins are purly the romatisized fiction, otherwise anything they'd try would turn out like the USS Akron a single gust of wind making its tail dip until it hits the ground then snapping in half killing the entire crew killing more people than the famed Hindenburg. Even then the darn things are likely to be as vulnerable to fliers and ranged attacks as the air ships of Cathay. AKA extremely vulnerable seeing how Chaos are the weakest to those and they are still able to drop Cathay's airships easily when they actually have the means to attack and aren't half nude monkie jokes beating their chests uselessly on the ground.
Dark of the Night
Sister Avenah continued to walk through the rather relaxing garden. Feeling releif to be away from the various Imperials who had been heckling her for the past several hours. These countless hours of parties and meet and greets had all more or less proven ineffectual as various nobles and busybodies had kept her from ever meeting the people she needed to meet.
Eventually official representatives from Stormwind and the rest of the Alliance would come and she likely would become even more unimportant as she'd have no means to help them.
Still at her side the human Captain Günther seemed to be rather enjoying himself. Even Gerunn had found his place among Nobles from the Empire city of Nuln, apparently avoiding this world's Dwarves after they had sent him away beaten and bloody after he started a debate. Relyea on the other hand had made, not exactly friends, but positive acquaintances with some Middenland nobility as well, though even that often turned into brawls or other odd challenges at one point a noble woman had even stripped down and challenged Relyea to a duel to the first blood with thin long rapiers.
And Avenah, Avenah had no acquaintances or inroads to speak of, treated far more like a exotic animal than a Priestess or a person. "Am I useless?" The question was just something she felt to ask, never intending to receive an answer.
"No, you're not useless. Look I might not be the best for, well a lot of political stuff, but I can tell you with certainty that you need to take charge and when you do you'll get results." Günther leaned on the railing over a flower patch near the Draenei.
"What do you mean." Avenah asked, suprised by the answer.
"Tell Gertrude to shut it, storm over to the Temple and demand to meet with Volkmar, don't leave until you do and use those hooves of yours to kick a could asses if you have to. And then, start making headway towards everyone else. Don't worry I'll be right there if you need me." The Empire Captain exained, giving a charming smile as his spoke.
"You know we Draenei don't 'kick' like that...at least not often."
"Eh. Couldn't hurt."
Dark Ranger Kitala Starshadow growled at the sight before her. What kind of state would be so willing to sacrifice their living forces so readily? Greenskins in their hundreds suddenly charged over the hills and past their wolf rider allies throwing themselves at the fortress. The Artillery was already firing and everyone with a ranged spell or weapon were busy striking down the roaring hoard who seemed entirely content with dying just for a chance to beat away at the walls with their weapons, some building crude ladders from scraps and trying to scale the outer wall.
Yet the Dark Ranger was shocked, not a single one of her men had died, and yet scores of the enemy were dead and these foes still happily threw themselves into the fight, some of them even cheering whenever a flaming shell from a Demolisher landed among their comrades with a firy explosion.
Still eventually they began to scale the wall and combat broke out on the battlements. Yet after nearly a hour of combat perhaps no more than ten of the Horde's defenders had fallen and the Horde's numbers had been reduced by half. At least until the arrows volleys began, toxic gasses, poisonous insects, even full pots filled with enraged venomous snakes were thrown up landing among the defenders as the wolf riders darted into the battle and then away, and blocks of odd looking goblins got into range to use their arrows only to flee the moment they felt they had the defenders attention.
Even so eventually the Dark Ranger made her decision. "Seal the gate entirely this foe will break themselves against our walls, we'll see if these slaver dwarves are even brave enough to join the battle after seeing their comrades slain to the last.
Finally the fortress was in sight, a depressingly shoddy peice of work, though still better than the work of Orks. Ghozul watched the unfolding battle with in, colorful attacks scattered arrows, and occasional Javalins rained down on the Orks though it was clear that at least ten Artillery peices were hidden within the fortress, likely on the second level, these peices rained down fire into the idiotic slaves sacrificing themselves eagerly for Ghozul's amusement and benefit.
Every explosion still hurt the Dawi-Zharr's pride as he imagined the expense reaped against him with each. But better to waste slaves than to waste good Dawi or their expensive equipment. Nearly his whole clan had been brought out for this battle, there was no way he would return to the Sorcerer-Prophet Gazaruth having lost valuable, if stupid, Dawi when there were slaves to throw away. So what if on the short term Ghozul would loose prestige among his peers, with these new slaves he was certain to be elevated to such a height only the Prophets of Zharr Naggrund could surpass him.
Still he would put up a front of rage, looming over the Hobgoblin Chieften. "You failed to even breach their outer wall with all this?" He nearly yelled at the Chieften.
"With all what? We have no tools with which to lay siege." Certainly both leaders knew the other was lying. The Chieften Snikthroaght lying to claim he had no tools when he had secretly been looting the ropes and ladder peices which would have made scaling the walls simple for hos Hobgoblins, and Overlord Ghozul in that he actually expected the Greenskins to attain anything more than what they had already.
Still holding his rage Ghozul stormed over to a box nearby pulling out a shovel and throwing it with all his might into a Hobgoblin at the chieftain's side. The shovel spearing the Goblin in the face killing it. If there are any slaves under your worthless selves left have them start digging! I want trenches worthy of Dawi-Zharr made immediately! Get us to those walls, zig zag the trench. If you dont get what that means, then make the trenches do this!" The Overlord made a zig-zag pattern with his finger over his palm.
The Hobgoblin stared for a moment before nodding, then he set to looting his dead comrade, handing the shovel off to another Goblin. The Hobgoblins then quickly set about grabbing shovels and pushing them off to lesser Goblin slaves and jostling and fighting over the overseer positions so they could avoid the labor and implied risks.
While the Goblinoids fought over who had to perform the hard labor, Ghozul cast an apraising eye over the fortress again before turning back to his army. He could only see a portion of it, but the Overlord knew he had just shy of three hundred Warriors and one hundred Devestators of the clan a near two thirds of his Clan's total membership, and then the one hundred of the Infernal Guard stood ready. One hundred Infernal Guard that Ghozul had taken great expense to ensure each was equipped with a fireglave. And then, Ghozul shuddered, there were the twenty Immortals making up his 'bodyguard', sent by the Prophet Gazaruth most likely, who were seeing to his 'protection'.
But most important to this siege were the special weapons. Two Inferno Guns, both of which had already proven themselves against these new Orks heavy cavalry, five Earthshaker Mortars which he knew would be vital for weakening the defenders before making a breach, five Bazuka which would certainly help making breaches as the battle became closer in. And then the Overlord's pride, a single Dreadquake Mortar was slowly being whelled up and once ready the Overlord already was figuring out the angles of fire to achieve the results he wanted. Also just in case he had secured three metal caskets each containing something of great power to unleash should things slow beyond the Overlord's expectations.
Until then, it would be up to the Goblins to die and work to set up the Dawi-Zharr's easy victory. And Ghozul knew it would be one, despite the rain of colorful attacks that must be magic tearing into his slaves the defenses were straight forward and easily spotted and easily dismantled by any skilled Dawi let alone a superior Dawi-Zharr.
Death took yet another of the Ork warriors who scaled the wall at the hand of Launchalot. The Ork had decended upon a Cryptguard soldier hammering the Undead and was preparing a killing strike before Launchalot had intercepted. The Undead Knight currently was thankful that he didn't feel the exhaustion of his living counter parts as even Gin was starting to show signs of tiredness.
The Greenskins had settled into a pattern, segments of their attack would suddenly break fleeing the fight shouting. Only to return to the Dwarven line where they would be stopped, reinforced with Goblins and sent back with ropes, ladders and other equipment to continue assaulting the walls.
This cycle however was starting to show the weakness of the enemy. The Goblin reinforcements were getting fewer and fewer, and the Goblinoid archers were slowly becoming more interested in avoiding artillery fire and hiding from Horde retaliation than they were. And certainly despite more of them being able to scale the walls each push, there were far fewer Orks now than when the fighting began.
Even so the battlefield now was only lit by the twin moons of this planet as night had overtaken the battlefield. In the distance a few small torches marked where the foe had begun to dig in establishing their battlelines. For the warriors of the Horde the move seemed quite strange, it was possible they planned to build seige towers, or had tanks, but so far instead it seemed they were just intent on digging in. The enemy hadn't even tried to encircle the Crimson Post instead staying as a single army.
Still that didn't bother Launchalot much as he found a Goblin trying to sneak past the defendeds after he had scaled the wall. The Undead Knight loomed over the Goblin, slowly chasing it as it slowly realized he was after it and then turning to run. Finally he gave chase and crushed the Goblin's skull with a single stroke of his mace.
"Overlord the Trenches near the walls, and your dwarves have made their 'battle pits' along the path. Your orders?" The Hobgoblin Chieften asked with a faux submission to his better.
Ghozul for a moment elected to ignore Snikthroaght, surely antagonzing the Goblin more.
"We wait. Call back the greenskins, I want full daylight when we next attack. Wake me when the sun rises." The Dwarf put forth a air of casual dismissiveness, as though this chore of a battle wasn't worthy of him. This was partially to antagonize the Goblin and enrage the Greenskins, having them edgeinng on battle for a entire night. But it was also because with his observers and map makers the Dwarf had come to resentfully disinterested with the defenders, all Ghozul had to do was make his army go through the actions and their victory was almost guaranteed by Hashut himself.
"We WAIT!" Snikthroaght cried in reply, clearly upset.
"Yes you heard me, or is it time a new Chieften of your tribe should have the Dawi-Zharr's support?" Ghozul turned away to hide his smirk from the Hobgoblin. "Oh but don't allow the enemy a chance to rest, have your Hobgoblins skirmish with the defenders, a rain of arrows should be enough to keep them on edge."
"Yess." The Goblinoid hissed in relucant, spite filled complaince. Ghozul couldn't wait to see the worthless Greenskin dead, just like it must secretly dream of sliting his throat.
But through the night the Overlord's orders were obeyed, the last fourty surviving Orks, and hundred Goblins stood on edge watching the fortress held back by their overseers, while Hobgoblins risked life and limb to close with the fortress to rain arrows on the defenders all throughout the night. Others beat drums and screamed at the fort unending throughout the darkness hours.
The Greenskins nearly looked on the verge of treason when Ghozul left his tent as the sun was rising, a smile graced the Overlord's face at the sight of the Greenskins so miserable. After a deep breath of the morning air the Overlord looked over to his Castellans and then to the Greenskins.
"Snikthroaght, you may charge now, take the walls for me." The order was simple but earned a look of near disbelief from the Hobgoblin. "Warriors of clan Gazaruth, Dawi-Zharr, lay this fortress low."
Gin yawned as the sun started to rise, a night of on and off fighting after a day of non stop combat, and worse the defenders could hardly afford to cycle troops as the Goblins tried to sneakily storm other segments of the defense forcing all hands to the defense.
Exhaustion aside Gin's moral was far higher than it had been when the sun had been setting. He knew and even witnessed that some fellow Horde warriors had been killed, but hundreds of enemies had died for maybe less than a hundred defenders killed, an entirely different battle than what had happened in the field. No wonder the Alliance had held off a army of perhaps more than a thousand with far fewer, these people seemed to lack any of the warrior's skill present in Azeroth. Still with his contributions Gin could hope to seen earn plenty of Glory and Honor to return home boasting about.
Gin continued to watch the enemy encampment even as the first rays of light stretched past the no man's land and into the camp. Initially Gin honestly could say he had been surprised by the zig-zagging paths they had dug towards the Fortress but only attacking from one way and no clear way to take the wall, these idiots didn't stand a chance, not without significantly greater numbers.
Suddenly a horn blew from the enemy camp, and a great shout rolled from the enemy army. "Waaaaaaagh!" Came from across the field as a tide of green bodies began sprinting in the open across the no-man's land. Immediately Gin sighted his gun and fired the round taking a Hobgoblin that was sprinting with a cruved sword and small stylized shield. The Goblin's chest plumed with red as it immediately dropped back and died.
As Gin fired his first shot shells from the Demolishers detonated among the enemy killing at least half the remaining Orks of the enemy. The lingering fires catching those Goblins unable to avoid running through the flames, soon adding their own charred corpses to the enemy's dead.
And then Gin's attention was stolen from the battle, as was that of several warriors as a small red sun suddenly ascended from the enemy camp. Riding on a cloud of steam it rose with what felt like a ponderous pace, then as the red sphere reached its apex it suddenly crash with the speed and force of a comet. Gin could barely track the course and just was able to witness the ongoing explosion from the impact of the horrific weapon. Within seconds fire bells were ringing, an entire section of hill nearly collapsed as the flaming wall atop of it crumbled, and five of the Fortress's Demolishers were permanently silenced along with their crews.
As the alarms rung Gin turned back to the still charging enemy snapping off another gun shot felling yet another Hobgoblin while the remaining demolishers fired a volley of shots overhead, likely their last before relocating to avoid that weapon. Now small groups of the charging greenskins stopped drawing out bows to fire, but Gin was ready for them and shot the first to draw his bow.
Let the Demolishers or the Headhunters deal with the weapon, he and the others were here to hold the line and maybe push forward as the enemy army faltered. Though frightening looking at the source of the attack it looked like there was only one of that weapon. Seconds later Gin regretted that line of thinking as the weapon, despite another Demolisher shot aimed at it, fired again. At first Gin hoped the shot was going into the Fortress's inner sections, magic could deal with the fires and once the enemy front line was broken charging the thing to end it would be easy enough. Instead as the heavy red shell ascended a horrible premonition flashed through the Mag'har Orc's mind and immediately he turned to the comrades at his side. "Move!" he ordered taking the first steps to get away from the wall, and then the shell struck with the force to match a blow from a Titan-keeper.
Gin and those around him were thrown away from the wall, some of the furs on the Orc catching fire as he flew. For a moment Gin cursed walls, every time he was on a wall it seemed to want to blow up. The Orc hit the ground and rolled, the dust and dirt smothering the flames as Gin finished rolling and landing back to his feet.
"Breach! Surround it, keep them from entering the fortress!" That was Launchalot's voice, which caused Gin to take a moment to sigh. They might stall the enemy but unless someone calls for a retreat to the second layer they were going to start taking unnecessary casualties.
"Quick grab some material, well make a barricade." Gin infirmed the others around him, fortunately one of which was hid Tauren Paladin, meanwhile a pair of mages were throwing spells through the still flaming gap at goblins who were making a haphazard attempt to fire arrows through the gap.
As Gin and several others worked on preparing a rough defensive line before the fires delaying the attackers died, a sudden whistle could be heard. Immediately Gin snapped his head up. "Mortar!" The Mag'har shouted, just before a shell landed among a group grunts detonating and removing one of their arms and making two of them disappear entirely in the explosion. Next a thick hail of the Hobgoblin arrows descended upon the Horde defenders, most were ineffective blindly fired arrows but a few scored wounds, and as far as Gin could tell even killed a elf.
Then the fire died leaving only a smoldering ruin where a segment of wall once was. Smoke rose from the still glowing earth making it difficult to see past, meaning the defenders now waited listening to their comrades on the walls. The defenders readied themselves and then another glowing red shell came crashing down towards the other end of the defensive line shattering another segment of wall. The moment this new explosion took place action errupted all across the defense.
"Their pushing!" echoed across the battlements onto to be followed by small explosions all across the walls and the echoing cracks of mass gunfire. Immediately Gin prepares to fire his gun into the breach, sounds or melee coming from further down the wall when suddenly the Tauren paladin to his side tackled him to the ground.
multiple cracks resounded and looking up confused as a multitude of small impacts ripped into one of the nearby Tauren braves, and crossbow bolts struck Grunts and Headhunters alike. This was almost instantly followed by the small hail of another arrow volley.
Once this ended the Paladin pushed off of Gin standing and the Orc hunter resighted his gun almost immediately snapping off a shot but this time his target didn't fall. Instead moments later a line of armored dwarves came running through the smoke shouting curses in their dark tongue. Behind these Dwarves a small wave of Hobgoblins came running throwing Bolas, darts, and small nets as they joined the charge. The makeshift defenses did little to aid the Horde defenders as their spells, weapons, and movements were fouled by the Hobgoblins weapons and with the crash of Dwarves against the defenders it took only moments but Gin quickly realized the failure of the defense and called for the retreat. While the Forsaken had initially been providing the greater number of defenders, now soon the dead would outnumber the living as Orcs holding the walls faultered.
Even as he and the others ran to the second layer Gin watched as Heavily armored Dwarves who shrugged off fireballs aimed pike headed rifles unleashing volleys of fire into exposed defenders while Hobgoblins chaoticly tore into the disrupted Horde killing, looting and taking prisoners seemingly at random. And as Gin ran small rockets were launched by tube carrying dwarves into the walls causing further damage, and causing portions of wall to collpase while crossbow weilding Dwarves and Dwaves with blunderbuss kept the wall defenders pinned. And another red meteor struck the Crimson Post reminding Gin of the horrific turn of the battle.
Kitala trembled with rage looking out over the battle. The moment that super Mortar had fired the tied of the entire battle had changed and vital supports of the Horde defense had been destroyed. More that weapon's every strike treatened to tear down the walls of the fortress reducing what should be defensive lines into narrow battlefields where the Horde was forced to fight these foes head on.
With the third firing of the enemy Super Mortar the Dwarves made their assault, not even waiting for the inferno to die out a mass of heavily armored warriors pushed through the second breach catching the disoriented Grunts and Headhunters unprepared, their guns tearing apart entire squads and their heavy blades cutting through even heavy armor.
On the other side a mixture of more recognizable Dwarven Warriors supported by Gunners and Crossbowmen and the lanky Goblins had clashed with her main line. Fortune probably had been with her then that Kitala had called back most of her Cryptguard to coordinate them into a potential counterattack, because now she needed their reserve to hold the line, and to man the five Meat Wagons that Sylvanas had ordered her to hold as reserve. The five wagons loaded with Blight.
Another red streek and another Explosion foced Kitala to shout a curse at these foes. Now she only had three Demolishers left to try and hold back the enemy.
"Pull the Demolishers back to the third ring, prepare to use the Blight, target to maximize spread on the first layer of defense. Prepare to hold the third line, tell whoever is in charge on Azeroth to get reinforcements here now or I'll personally kill them after this. I need to find Launchalot." The Dark Ranger ordered preparing her own Black Arrows and moving to descended the hill. And then another explosion and she could see more of the second wall colllapse, two Demolishers.
Overlord Ghozul Gazaruth watched the Dreadquake Mortar fire once again, this round would create the first breach of the third wall allowing the army to press forward. But now Ghozul could feel the icy gaze of the Eternal and his fellow Immortals behind him, despite his vastly superior skills with a siege engine than these lesser Dawi. Despite his plan's success and the near guarantee of victory, Ghozul's life was now just as at risk as when the battle first began, and that would not change until he lead from the front.
With a snort of contempt the Overlord took off, the Immortals all forming into perfect lockstep behind him. Ghozul grumbled and raged at the shoddy, nearly collapsed and burned work of the goblins as he marched down the trenches, kicking a charred corpse of one where their digging failed to save them from the enemy's flaming artillery. Venting his rage on every aspect of their inferior species so as to not consider the Immortals breathing down his neck. And then he was outside the walls of the fortress.
Just ahead of him struggling, unconscious, or despairing new slaves were being dragged by Hobgoblins back away from the safety of their fort and into the cold embrace of the Dawi'Zharr cages back at the camp. Ghozul considered cursing the Hobgoblins for being slow, but decided against it, he had a battle to win and Immortals to apease. The Overlord took a step forward but was stopped mid stride as several dozen yards ahead of him a green jar slammed into the earth shattering on contact and a sudden cloud of green smoke spread. As the gas creeped towards him, Ghozul stepped back already watching the outrage the enemy had comitted against him unfolding before him.
Like the poison globes of the petulent ratmen, the gas spread and immediately began to kill those it spread over. Slaves and Hobgoblins alike screamed, vomiting out a milky substance that was surely their own liquifying organs. fourty slaves and nearly a hundred Hobgoblins died within seconds before the Overlord. twenty slaves, one if which was a strong, proud looking minotaur, and most of which looked to be the new breed of Orc.
By Hashut he would pummel these worthless cretins, they dared deny him slaves by using ratman poison against him? They dared stop his advance with the lingering cloud of death? He had Hashut's blood in his veins, he was a Overlord, chosen to lead and superior to all his kin by virtue of birth and skill. And these wretched beasts dared embarass him infront of the Immortals and strip him of valuable slaves!
Ghozul grabbed a surviving Hobgoblin, trembling over a still living Orc captive, pulling the pathetic animal to his face the Overlord growled. "Go back and get me the Fireborn Caskets, leave the sacrifice here." And with that the Overlord shoved the Hobgoblin nearly into the lethal gas. The Hobgoblin leapt to his feet and ran to obey as quickly as his panicking feet would carry him.
Launchalot ran behind a number of Grunts, Headhunter and straggling Cyrptguard units as they filled through one of the secret hatches to the third layer of defense. The Undead Knight kept his mace and claw ready fending off the handful of Hobgoblins who assaulted the fleeing Horde forces. Fortune had it that the Dwarves had not chosen to press their offensive yet, instead they moved meticulously and in large groups.
As the last through Launchalot had to back through the passage, and once he was through Cryptguard quickly sealed the passageway. Launchalot offered a small prayer that the Graveguard could come quickly, without reinforcements the Undead wasn't sure how much longer they could hold the fortress.
He watched as various gunmen and archers clashed with the enemies down below, often they would expose themselves only for wave after wave of gunfire, and crossbow bolts to pour over the defensive positions. The Battle for Crimson Post had turned into one of attrition, and it was one the Horde was losing, and losing far to quickly for the Knight's liking.
"Launchalot! Follow me, I have orders." The voice of the Dark Ranger Kitala broke Launchalot from his musing. She sprinted past him and the Knight obeyed following her to the wall. Here the Ranger pulled out her Black arrows firing one with a quick snap that caught a Hobgoblin in the throat, seconds later the creature's corpse tried to crudely attack a Dwarf only to have its skull crushed quickly, but the distraction allowed the Dark Ranger to then put a arrow into the eye socket of that very Dwarf, however it took a second arrow to finally put this foe down. He then tried to attack his comrades but they began to fend him back shouting about Necromancers the entire way, and swearing cruel vengence.
"Listen, that artillery is killing us, their smaller mortars and their guns threaten us, but it's that main weapon that's doing us in." As the Commander spoke five trails of green smoke descended crashing into the first ring, and five small areas of green blight smoke appeared. With a few more volleys the dwarves would likely have their retreat and reinforcements cut off, hopefully trapping them between vengeful Horde and certain death.
"I've observed." The lifeless Knight stated, even as his superior fired off four arrows in quick succession turning four Hobgoblins into mindless Undead surrounding two of their comrades that they began to tear into.
"Shut up and listen. I need you to gather the Sunset Expedition, sneak out the side of the fortress and I need you to silence that damn gun." The Dark Ranger ordered angrily as she and Launchalot ducked back as a group of the heavy armored Dwarves fired their pike-gun hybrids, a series of individual shots each in succession of eachother and with such volume that they might as well been facing a slow firing machinegun.
"Go." Launchalot nodded at the order from his superior and took off. He'd first need to gather his men, or what he could of them. Then they'd have to begin their dangerous trek for this risky but vital mission.
Three metalic crates, each looking like a combination of cage and coffin were stood before the growing sea of green mist that was filling the area just behind the first wall of the fortress, next to it all an odd bowl was prepared next to three open pipes that lead to each of the three coffins.
The Orc Grunt Zald looked on at the Dwarves arranging this, whatever it was with a mixture of fear and interest. There was a sort of reverence in everything that was done, but the Giblinoid next to him seemed to tremble in fear, and Zald didn't know if he should count himself fortunate that he could understand what was being said or not.
"The Fireborn are ready, Overlord. All we need to do is complete the ritual." One of the robed dwarves working on the coffin structures stated.
"I-I've got em right ere boss...umm do yer thing I...I'll go let dem bombers know dat deys is headn up." The Goblinoid stated next to Zald, never in his sixteen years had the Orc heard someone sound so afraid of a block of metal.
The Overlord turned and stomped over to the Goblin. "Ahh, you did the children of Hashut good today little one." The Overlord put a hand on the Goblin's shoulder looking extremely pleased. "Allow me to reward you here and now before we forget."
"Aww shucks boss, iz isn't needing a re...uuhhgk, guuk, ehhh." The Dwarf drew a sudden knife across the Goblin's throat lifing the still struggling Goblin off the ground holding his bleeding throat over each of the pipes.
"Live, live longer damn you and bleed. There's no honnor greater than serving as sacrifice to Hashut's own children you worthless green shit." The Goblin's blood ran along the exposed pipes before slipping into the metal containers yet there was no reaction from inside. The Overlord then tossed the body into the pool of blight before them grunting in frustration.
"Damn Greenskins, always useless to me!" The Overlord then turned to Zald who shuddered in fear. "You better be as valuable as a sacrifice as you are a slave. Hold Him!" Two Dwarves lifted Zald off the ground holding him over the bowl and the pipes as the Overlord took place next to them with a dagger in hand.
"I'm not a very good as a sacrifice, hell I'm barely a Grunt." Zald pleaded for his life only for one of the Dwarves holding him to slap him hard.
"Blessings upon me Hashut your devoted child. Allow us to awake the tools you have given me." The Overlord cried aloud with hos dagger just before Zald's neck, and then he draw the blade across the Orc's neck causing Zald to bleed.
The pain was instense, yet Zald knew the blade hadn't cut his trachea, yet the Dwarves didn't seem to care allowing his generous flow of blood to pour into the bowl and from it, into the pipes. Zald watched his blood run down the pipes and finally into the containers. And then he felt a pull of some sort and then suddenly Zald was out of his body, his flesh lighting into sudden fire and the containers began to change. The cage like portions fell away, while the Coffin portions began to open. And then Zald was inside and all he knew was burning agony as the coffins exploded into the forms of armored massive Elementals, no Daemons of fire, each fighting over Zald's soul and sensing more, far more to consume, that their bindings allowed them to consume, deeper inside the fortress.
Zannae held off another Dwarven Warrior. The power of the Light leant itself greatly to Zannae's defense as multiple Dwarves were either sent away wounded or slain by Zannae. However their thick armor and skill at arms put them well beyond many of the young grunts and the Graveguard soldiers of the Cryptguard. The Sunsworn and the Blood Knights were the only soldiers here with the skills enough to directly best these foes, though the Tauren Braves were also great for holding these Foes their strength enough to beat them back or break their armor.
"Zannae!" The Blood Elf, freed of his foe who stumbled away bleeding from a deep gash in his arm, turned his attention to the clear sound of Gin's voice. There he saw most of the Sunset Expedition's remaining number, Gin and Launchalot approaching.
"Zannae! Thank the ancestors we found you. Listen we have a mission we need to take out that Mortar." Gin explained running up to Zannae, as he spoke smaller mortar shells landed near their position and a rocket from one of the tube weilding Dwarves colided with the fourth wall past the defensive line exploding and wounding one of the Cryptguard riflemen atop the wall. And almost as if to excentuate the point another of the powerful Red shells just missed the forth wall, yet still the wall was covered in flame.
"Right. I'm with you, what's the plan?" Zannae asked stepping away from his post on the battleline while another Blood Knight, casting a glare his way, took Zannae's place.
"We're slipping out the side of the fortress, and circling around to ambush the Mortar. We disrupt it, or disable the thing entirely, and we should have this battle in the bag." Gin explained with a cheer in his voice, the Blood Knight that took Zannae's place just rolling her eyes and muttering under her breath.
"Alright, We should g-" A sudden explosion grabbed the attention of all the Sunset Expedition looking down to the first layer of defense. Before Blight had been building, somewhat to the relucant, distrubed, acceptance of the living Horde members. Now a spreading wave of fire causing plumes of flame at where the Blight was thickest spread, and at the epicenter of the firey tide floated three horrific monstrosities of flame.
Zannae looked to the foul monsters a they started to approach floating through crumbled walls the wood igniting at their passing.
"We're going to need everyone we can here." Zannae reasoned.
"What? But the Mortar!" Gin countered.
Launchalot looked between the two. "Zannae agreed, Gin pick five and go. A team of five Troll Adventurers is holding the western breach, I suspect these things will turn North we will hold them there." Launchalot ordered, changing the mission.
Zannae grabbed Gin by the shoulder and pressed his forehead to the Orcs. "You have this. We'll hold here, and await your success."
Gin nodded and took off running after pointing to four others who took off after him.
The fires died out and the path now was clear. Knowing those plague launchers were still likely to fire again, Ghozul started hurrying after the K'Daai Fireborn and the Immortals followed behind.
"You're risking much for this battle." The Eternal stated.
"I was charged with wiping out camps that challenge our border. Besides if this investment pays off then it'll be worth it to both me and our Empire."