Level 1 Fallen

Chapter 168: Strategy Meeting

A few minutes later, Ella caught up and arrived at the northern wall. She was flying through the sky, propelled by a jet of flame until she landed on the wall next to us. “Is everything settled here?”she asked, spotting the still-steaming rock that had pierced the now-repaired barrier.

Bella nodded her head, explaining the previous events. Hearing the summary, Ella pursed her lips in thought. “I see. I wasn’t expecting that they’d be moving so boldly this fast.”

“What are the odds that you can get a true expert from Evergreen?” I asked cautiously, unsure how much support the elves were really giving Ella’s nation.

However, Ella shook her head with a sullen sigh. “If this remains as a normal war, I probably won’t get anything like that. Our only hope for a true expert is if it’s someone with a personal investment, or if they decide to show up after the final war is declared.”

“Would there even be time for them to arrive after that?” Bella voiced her concern, but thankfully Ella responded with a nod.

“According to the system prompts, there is a two-hour ceasefire imposed by the system whenever a new war mode is declared. Two hours isn’t a lot, but it should be enough for an expert to rush over.” Ella smiled bitterly as she spoke, as if she didn’t have much confidence that she could win in this war.

Diane, meanwhile, pursed her lips, flipping through the system windows. Her actions caught my attention, so I looked over curiously. “Something’s bugging me with that two-hour ceasefire. Give me just a minute,” she said when she spotted my gaze.

After a few minutes of intense focus and incomprehensible mutterings, Diane nodded her head. “I thought so. There’s a way for them to cut off your reinforcements without directly capturing this rift.”

Ella’s eyes widened when she heard this, looking at Diane in shock. “What do you mean?”

“It’s easy, you just have to take advantage of the schedule. According to the schedule, the prime world connects to Petralith six times a day. After that connection ends, there is a dangerous period,” she began, before seeming to think how to explain it. “Let’s say that they declared a war of extinction right after that connection terminated. Knowing there is only a two-hour ceasefire, they would rally their forces to arrive at Pyrrhos as quickly as possible, correct?”

Ella and the rest of us nodded our heads, so Diane continued. “The natural course of action, then, would be to go to Aurin forty-five minutes later, because after that there is a direct connection to Pyrrhos. This means that they’d arrive an hour ahead of time, with more than enough time for an expert to reach the city.”

“However, if the Aurin path is unavailable, such as dragons securing it for that brief time period… the next shortest route is half an hour later from Chimeris, which would make it to Pyrrhos only fifteen minutes before the ceasefire would end.”

Ella blinked, eyes wide as she processed the information. “Fifteen minutes is still more than enough time to make it if they hurry, but that’s assuming that the Chimeris gate wasn’t secured, as well. If it was, the elven experts would need to defend the rift for a full fifteen minutes before the connection changed, and then make it out.”

“Worse than that,” Diane pointed out, lifting a finger. “If the Aurin gate is successfully defended, the dragons themselves can send their experts that were guarding it through. This will make the reinforcements face even more challenges on their way. And, from what we just observed, it would take a true grandmaster from the dragons less than five minutes to destroy this city, if unopposed.”

I silently agreed, thinking about the recast time the previous dragon had shown for the meteor strike. The two attacks were only about a minute apart, and I had no reason to believe that was the dragon’s limit.

Listening to Diane’s words, Ella crossed her arms in concern. “In your opinion, when do you think they would likely strike?” she asked, nervousness evident in her features.

“If it were me, I’d declare the war after the final shift from Petralith, a quarter past ten at night. It’s harder to mobilize a sudden response in the middle of the night, and this timing would set it up so that midnight’s Chimeris path would be their final chance to send reinforcements.”

Ella couldn’t help but grunt, quickly pulling up her menu to type out a message. “If you’re right, then we can’t afford not to have at least one elven expert stationed at the Pyrrhos side of the rift at all times. That shouldn’t be too much to ask, right?”

“From what we saw on the way in, when the dragons were attacking the rift, there isn’t a regularly stationed grandmaster at the rift,” Bella explained grimly. “Most likely, the bulk of their experts are kept on standby in Evergreen to defend against monster attacks whenever the rift connects to Abyssis. There are too many other gates for them to spare their true powerhouses to cover everything.”

Ella grunted again, confirming Bella’s words. “It seems that way… they said that they’ll take the situation under advisement, but they don’t have anyone free to station here.”

At this point, it was clear that the elves weren’t really willing to commit everything to the defense of Ella’s nation. That wasn’t too surprising, since Ella was ultimately an external party, and her loss wouldn’t cause immediate problems for the elves. And such high-level combat power probably was really rare, admittedly. Such forces that could be readily commanded by the military were probably even rarer.

That made me recall Kelly. Despite her residing in Fallcry, I had no confidence that I could truly order her to get involved in something that she didn’t want to do. If I tried to, she could very easily just leave the kingdom without me being able to stop her.  Other nations likely experienced similar difficulties, only having a few truly devoted powerhouses that they could mobilize at will, and these figures needed to be kept ready to defend their own nation.

With that in mind, I began typing out a message to Wisteria, informing her of the new developments. If we could erect a League of Assassins gate in Ella’s kingdom, that would give us a quick path for reinforcements from an organization that has a vested interest in Ella winning the war.

Those gate stones aren’t cheap, you know… Wisteria responded after a moment. Even just one of them costs five thousand platinum in the system shop. That’s why we don’t just make connections all over the place.

My eyes went wide at the price, but I clenched my fists. At the very least, we needed some way for extra defenders to show up. Can’t this be considered an investment to prevent a tragedy? I responded, and Wisteria went quiet for several minutes. Looking around, I could see that everyone was working on their own messages to various parties.

You’re in luck. The master proposed an agreement. He’ll void all of your current mission points as the down payment for the stone. However, if the dragons don’t declare a war of extinction, you will have to pay the full price of the gate stone out of your own pocket.

He said that you can pay in installments if you need to.My brow twitched when I read that. It was a risky gamble, given the debt I would owe if our hunch was inaccurate. However, I knew my old player fairly well. He was incredibly greedy. If he started this war, there could be no other reason than the fact that he wanted to grab Ella’s trait to help cover his own weaknesses, and open the path for him to begin conquering other nations.

Deal. I responded after a moment, agreeing to the transaction. It was sad to lose all of my points with the league, but I’d say that I walked away with a heavy discount.

Pretty decisive, huh? Even through the text, I could feel the smugness of Wisteria’s tone. I’ll mail the item to you. You’ll need to have your friend install it, since only the ruler of a territory can establish an organization’s gate connection.

With that taken care of, I let out a heavy sigh, lifting my head up to look at the others. “I got the League of Assassins to agree to create a gate connection here, so they will be able to respond immediately in case of emergencies, without needing to rely on the rift.”

“And I got in touch with Nuoda,” Bella beamed. “She said that she’ll send Sarah over. In the worst case scenario, we can have Sarah open a gate to call for troops.”

“Same with me and Charlie. He’s sending his space magicians over to prepare,” Diane reported, a proud smile hidden behind her facemask.

Finally, the last to lower their hands was Ella. “I just consulted with Killik. He reviewed the schedule you mentioned, and agreed that Aurin will probably be their focus. Even worse, even if someone is fast enough to cross the territory between portals like you guys did, the other rift to the east won’t have a favorable schedule for that time period, either.”

“In his opinion, they won’t strike tonight, because they will expect us to be on guard after having a grandmaster display their power earlier. But, in a few days, as soon as they believe that we have started to grow weary of the continued back-and-forth, they’ll strike.”

Diane listened to this thoughtfully, looking between Ella and myself. “They’re absolutely going to attack tonight,” she said with full confidence, catching Ella by surprise.

“What makes you think that?” she asked, and Diane pointed at me.

“Because he’s here. The dragon king is Drake’s old player, and has been after his trait ever since he realized how broken it is. If he already has a grandmaster willing to act for him, he’ll do everything in his power to get him to abduct Drake and put him in a death loop. If they thought your trait was worth waging war over, his is worth sacrificing most of their troops for a crushing victory.”

Ella’s eyes widened at that, looking up at me. I couldn’t exactly say that Diane was wrong about any of that. “It’s possible,” I concluded with a reluctant sigh. “If the dragons win this, they could potentially gain two new ten-star traits for their king, which will in turn empower the strong figures who serve as high-ranking nobles in the kingdom. Magic immunity, unlimited skill casting, and your fire mastery. Just imagining that trio on a single person is horrifying.”

“Don’t forget his racial trait that makes his skills even stronger,” Diane pointed out. “Getting the traits of you two would make him practically unstoppable among players.”

“In that case, we have no time to waste,” I said, looking at Ella. “Can you guide me to the mailbox? Also, start thinking about where you want the gate. They prefer if it is somewhere that they can set up a business and spread out various informants to cover an area, so any free shops would work.”

Ella hesitated, but ultimately nodded her head and turned to guide me down from the wall, and into the blackened streets below. “I’ve got just the place for it. Our blacksmith isn’t really able to keep up with the demands of a territory at this level, so I’m sure he would appreciate apprenticing under someone from your organization.”