The Runesmith

“It’s trying to destroy the magical cannons, don’t let it finish that spell!”

A rain of arrows descended at a black-looking skeleton that was in the process of casting some type of spell. Before they could collide with it a large group of white skeletons appeared before it. Acting as a bone shield they deflected the projectiles even suffering destruction after their cores were either pierced or splashed with holy water.

The initial salvo managed to get the magic monster out of casting the spell but it soon resumed the same stance and continued. This time around however, a large skeletal monster with wings appeared to swat those arrows away. Its bones were tougher and it could generate a strong wind that altered the arrow's trajectory. This allowed the other monster to finish the silent chant and send a ball of flames toward the city walls.

This collision rattled the city defenses but didn’t manage to blast through the gate as it was intended. As the red flames subsided a thin blue glow could be seen on these walls. The skeleton halted the next spell to look for the reason for its blast not being able to blow a hole in the feeble walls. The mana sense it was equipped with made it focus on strange objects stuck in the wall that began vanishing after its spell collided with the wall.

“The mana wards are working but they won’t last forever, resume the defensive and don't let those monsters through the walls!”

Arthur Valerian looked at Sir Gareth, one of his knights, who was giving orders to the soldiers. The guard captain was next to him but was still an inexperienced soldier that needed to learn proper ways of directing his troops. Instead, the knight took over as he had actually gone through proper classes at a knight academy.

The city wall had been under attack for a while now but it had not fallen. Bringing the magical turrets to this place worked wonders as they were quite good at suppressing the monster’s suicide charges. They weren’t the only magical means of defending that they had.

Usually, only large cities or forts were able to augment their walls with magical shields. In a world, with monsters like that skeletal mage it was a necessity as only magic could go against magic. The walls wouldn’t last through many of those fire blasts and even with the magical shielding through various runic talismans and other implements wouldn’t last forever.

It was a patchwork of various items that were capable of producing shields. The best kind was something that their city Runesmith came up with. The runic parchment would be attached to a flat surface, then whenever this area was attacked by something it would activate a short-lasting shield. It was a one-off defensive measure that needed to be replaced but also wouldn’t be wasted until an attack occurred and didn’t need anyone to activate it.

Even now this city lacked a proper mage which were also rare among adventurer types. Usually, people of this class attended magical academies to make use of their high intelligence stat. It allowed them to breeze through classes that would give anyone else a headache. Thanks to this they were always sought after for employment in various fields. They didn’t really need to put themselves in danger as the regular adventurers.

When they decided to join up with a party, they were fought after by the other adventurers. Even Roland when he was younger was able to join up with one even though his level was low compared to others. People were willing to invest in a mage as having a portable magical turret around made defeating monsters a lot easier.

Then there was a second reason so few mages decided on that type of lifestyle. It was viewed as something barbaric and not as something a magical scholar should work towards. A lot of mages thought themselves to be better than the common man, they were the seekers of truth and magic was a tool to progress this world further. Most innovation was driven by magical research that was supposed to enlighten all the races towards the next step.

What Albrook was left with were magical items and weapons that were far more common. The ones that were able to fire off magical projectiles were all gathered here. The defensive bombardment with the arrows was finite thus after a few salvos the magical items came into play. Various mana arrows with different elements flew toward the white skeletons to hold them off from reaching the wall. It was a supportive measure to act together with the turrets that were working for the time being.

“Can we do something about those black ones?”

Arthur turned towards Mary while looking out to the battlefield. There he saw the black mage preparing another spell, only thanks to the ranged attacks were they able to hold that thing back from damaging their walls. Ordering his men to engage in combat before the walls were destroyed wasn’t something that he was willing to do yet. Walls and magical items could be replaced but the troops that he was bringing up couldn’t.

“We have assembled a couple of gold rank adventurer teams but we might not be able to isolate them from the white ones.”

“... Hm… carry on, for now, perhaps an opportunity will present itself to us.”

They were clearly outnumbered but had the advantage as the walls weren’t breached yet. For the time being it was a stalemate but sooner or later they would run out of mana wards and the magical items would lose their charge. The turrets were still prone to overheating and if they didn’t get to that mage then a breach would happen.

“Lord Arthur, we might have a problem!”

“What’s wrong?”

“The winged black skeleton… it's trying to get behind the gates!”

Just as he was getting comfortable with the defensive a problem arose. The large gargoyle-looking undead monster that was previously using his wings to protect the mage from getting hit by arrows started moving.

“The mage used some sort of protection spell.”

“Are they changing their tactics?”

This was somewhat surprising, monsters like these didn’t really have that much intelligence or strategic capabilities. They could follow basic movements or emulate human creatures to attack them. Normally they would stick to one tactic throughout the whole siege and for that they were mostly prepared for. They were using the fact that the creature capable of flying would stick around the mage just as it did down in the dungeon.

Instead, the two split off from each other leaving the mage alone. The arrows that had blessed water attached to it didn’t seem to be able to get through this ominous-looking shielding and this wasn’t the end of it. There were three black skeletons, one looking like some kind of beast that walked on four legs. Previously all three of those monsters were sticking together and letting the white skeletons attack but now all of them moved simultaneously.

The mage took care of the arrow rain while the flying monster moved out of the range of the arrows and magical spells. It shot through the air and headed towards the main gate while keeping its distance. Then the largest one of them, the one that looked like a beast charged forward in the same direction.

“The arrows won’t be able to reach the monster and if we turn the magic weapons away from the battlefield that other monster…”

Arthur moved to the edge of the wall to look at what was happening. In the distance, he could hear his knight shouting to change the target to the flying monster. If they could get it down before the monsters approached then it would be fine but it seemed that the enemy was convinced otherwise. It looked to be a diversion tactic to allow the beast-like monster to get to the gate or to lessen the assault on the mage.

The beast type was large and was also a tier 3. This put it above tier 2 class holders but this didn’t mean that it would be able to last through all the low-tier magical attacks. From Arthur’s standpoint, the tactic was easy to see through. If they focused on the gargoyle above then the mage and the beast type could become a problem.

The caster would be able to resume casting while the other tried to maul the entrance gate. On the other hand, if they focused on the mage and beast-type then the gargoyle would get over the gate. Whoever was directing the monsters was convinced that one way or the other the monsters would get through the gate. Either from inside or from outside with the city defenders not having enough firepower to stop them, at least without directly engaging them in combat.

“Sir Gareth, focus your attention on the mage and the black skeleton charging at the main gate, let the flying one through.”

“My lord?... Understood, you heard the lord, take aim.”

“Lord Arthur?”

“Don’t worry, that thing won’t be able to do much even if it crosses the wall.”

Mary didn’t press further as she was aware of what her lord knew. Instead of focusing on the flying monster, the city guard continued pelting the other monsters with their ranged arsenal. Besides the magical turrets various more conventional cannons had been placed there as well. The lighting mechanism was through magical means but the result was very similar to an older model cannon.

The charging monster’s approach was stopped by one of the cannon balls colliding with its skeletal form. Even though it was a tier 3 creature it could not just shrug off attacks like this, at least not too many as even after taking a few the black bones only showed a couple of fractures. These broken bones were quick to surround themselves with a strange green glow that started mending them back to health.

While the frontal attack was unsuccessful and the mage continued to be unable to cast a spell the flying monster made its way into the city. Even though it was made of bones it could generate a screeching sound that started shattering the windows to some of the homes. Its target wasn’t the citizens nor was it causing panic inside, what it needed to aim for was the gate through which its friends would be able to come inside and then the true battle would begin.

However, after landing on the ground and examining its surroundings the monster felt that something was off. It expected more of the little soldiers here but instead only one of them stood before it. This one was different, it didn’t radiate fear like the others.

“I hate doing things for three… your bones better be worth the hassle.”

A large bald man approached it, over his shoulder he was resting a gigantic-looking axe made of dark metal. It was clear that the man was not perturbed by the large monster before as a faint smile was forming on his face.

“Might as well enjoy this, haven’t been able to let loose in a while…”

The skeletal gargoyle spread its wings wide to intimidate its foe but it didn’t look like it resulted in any flinching. Instead, the bald man that was of similar size charged forward, cracks appeared in the spot that he started from and that massive axe made a clean arc toward the monster's head…

…

“If regular mana doesn’t work then perhaps…”

Roland’s attack continued as after the smoke had cleared the monster still remained standing. Usually, he would pick off a monster’s weak point and use it against them. In the dungeon where he lived next to this element was ice or water. There was a problem with this type of undead creature though as its nature made it immune to any cold effects.

With this element not being effective, there was no real advantage over using other elemental spells besides earth that was better at producing blunt damage. This however was a lot more mana-intensive which was why he first attempted an elemental-less approach that could potentially damage the monster's hidden core.

Normally in a spell caster battle, the one with more mana and intelligence would win. In this case, however, Roland had one advantage over the being of magic that he was facing, speed. The Lich was able to silently chant and perhaps even counter-spell interruptions but it could not produce these effects with the same speed as a person using Runic weapons.

At this moment the Lich’s lower jaw opened wide and began clattering. It was as if the monster was smiling while moving the boney staff covered with mana stones forward. This item surprised Roland slightly, it looked like it had gathered various mana stones and other gems together to fuse it to the skull. He didn’t fully understand the process but he could tell that it was amplifying the monster’s magic even more.

Roland didn’t wait for his enemy to perform the silent chant. Even though he couldn’t hear it, thanks to his own mana sense the tiny mana particles that were swirling around the monsters could be seen by him. This kind of process would always happen around a spell caster, even without being able to hear the spell it was possible for him to tell that one was being produced.

“Too slow!”

While the Lich could probably produce spells faster than the average magician he could not contend with something like runes. These marvels of magical technology could almost instantly produce similar effects. There were no interruptions unless the runic structure was damaged and a person could activate them whenever they pleased. In the middle of a battle where mistakes could be made something like this had a drastic advantage.

The spell activation was only affected by the quickness of injecting mana into the runic system. Even with this drawback, the Lich would not be able to contend with Roland’s speed. Just as the monster was raising his staff to produce some type of spell his opponent was doing the same.

Roland’s left hand which was not holding on to the large hammer started glowing. The coloring was ambiguous and blue lacking any unique elemental pattern. Only as the spell structure outside of the gauntlet started to condense could the Lich sense the earth elementals around the magical construct.

Many small bullet-sized rocks appeared before his hand. Almost instantly as they appeared they were already gone and traveling towards their destination. The mantle that the Lich was covered in contended with these high-speed rocks that were comparable to a machine gun. However this was all in Roland’s calculations, he knew that he wouldn’t be able to go through the shield with just this but the rocks carried a little bonus effect with them.

Through his visor, he could see the mana molecules slowing down. The Lich’s spell which would normally take a few seconds to condense began to slow down. Disrupting a mage's spells was a textbook way of disarming them. It was a tactic used by battle mages that used easier-to-cast spells to augment their fighting style. Without anyone to protect the spell caster from being interrupted their fighting prowess was diminished.

After successfully being able to halt the spell effect from taking shape he ordered the turrets to shoot forth to continue with the stalling tactic. He on the other hand gripped his magical hammer with both his hands and slammed it on the ground. This caused a strange brownish aura to appear over the spot that he hit.

This light spot shot out toward the enemy Lich which left cracked earth behind it. It traveled at quite a fast pace while zig-zagging in random directions. Soon the strange glow found its way under the monster that was still trying to launch a counter-offensive against the human it wanted to examine.

The brown radiance expanded around the targeted monster to around four meters. Soon after a bunch of rocky pillars shot out on the edges of the area the glow made. These quickly jolted down to fall on top of the monster burying it under a mass of hardened earth in the process. Then to finish the effect a large explosion shook the earth while being focused on the entrapped monster.

“Not enough…”

Even though the monster was still buried in the rubble of his combination spell, Roland was sure that it was still alive. The physical trauma probably rattled its bones but it was not enough to deliver a finishing blow just yet. Thus before the monster shook the rocky bits off he decided to retreat toward his home ground. There perhaps he would be able to finally end this whole confrontation once and for all.