Abe the Wizard

“All the catapults, men! I want five rounds! Five rounds! Make it precise!”

The commanding knights screamed as hastily as they could. If it was up to them, they would’ve never gone with this decision. Every stone they launched took time to be carved into the right shape. It was rather wasteful to use them on regular orcs, but an order was still an order.

The catapult team became quite busy. Needless to say, the first round was always the quickest because all the ammunition was already loaded beforehand. All it took was a little aim for the shots to be fired.

Soon, multiple voices could be heard from the sky. The regular orcs didn’t know what they were. Their job was to carry rocks to the battleground, not to understand how catapults were supposed to sound. The black-hooded priests were different, though. They wanted to flee the battleground as soon as they realized what was being thrown at them, but the orders they received were absolute.

The stones that were shot were about 50 centimeters in diameter. Once they landed, they would roll for a bit and squash whatever that was in their way. Yes, everything. Orcs. Carts. Anything that was in their way.

If one was looking from the top of the miracle wall, they could see that sixty trails of blood were going outward. That’s sixty stones that were thrown at the oblivious orcs. The orcs were terrified with this, obviously. Many of them panicked. Some of them tried to shout. Some of them tried to run, but when the priests conjured the skeletons to slay the more rowdy ones, most of them were forced to calm down and face their fate.

Once the orcs accepted their fate, they prayed to the beastly god and continued to carry the rocks. This was when the second round of the catapults hit. Again, sixty more trails of blood. Miracle City knights got a boost of morales once more. They cheered and cheered, only to show their disdain of the orcs that attempted, then failed to invade their territory.

In the middle of the orc battleground, there was a white tent that served as the commanding headquarters of the orcs. Inside were many leading figures of the Orc Empire. There was Gerald, the leading commander of all of the Orc Empire’s army and the little brother of the reigning emperor himself. As a member of the holy lion race, the most royal of all within the Orc Empire, he was wearing a full set of golden armor and a very solemn look on his face.

Right now, Gerald was looking at the other leading figures that were sitting in front of him. There was Groat, the worgen, Carol the Tauren, Emory the Werecat, and Clarence the Vulpera. They were all supposed to be representatives of their own kind.

The first to speak was Clarence, the vulpera. As the possessor of the Orc Empire’s largest information network, it was his obligation to provide all sorts of high-level intel and strategies.

“General, ” Clarence spoke to Gerald, “It seems that the humans knew about our operation a few days early. As of now, we don’t know where the information was leaked, but from what we have found when it happened, the humans used everything they could to send reinforcements to Miracle City.”

“From that alone,” Clarence added, “Whoever was early enough to tell them about us, he must be someone very crucial.”

General Gerald seemed quite confident, however, “Rest assured, Clarence. Within a few days, we’ll guarantee the success that we have prepared for so long. The humans might have known about us a little early, but so what? We have years of dedication to this war, and what do they have? The time they’ve bought isn’t going to help them in the very least, and that’s that.”

Despite being one of the royal kins, Gerald preferred being called a general. Ever since he was young, he had been an avid researcher of war. While his noble blood got him to become a general at a fairly young age, the number of experiences he compiled did shape him into a fitting leading commander of the Orc Empire.

It was because of this that he was entrusted to lead this entire operation. It was his first time to have ever used this much firepower at once, but still, he was very confident about turning Miracle City into the “Orc’s Miracle City.”

General Gerald spoke to Carol the tauren, “It’ll be the taurens’ job once the stone platforms are done. I’ll leave all of our long-distance weapons to you, Carol.”

“You have my word, general,” Carol responded with a very deep voice, “The taurens will fight till the very end.”

As earnest as Carol appeared to be, he was actually pained to receive an order like this. The taurens were the most oppressed group out of all of the Orc Empire’s combative races. Not only were they forced to live at Rocky Ground, which was the most barren and poor region, but they almost always had to fight in the most dangerous positions whenever there was a major conflict.

Just like now. The taurens were told to climb on the stone platforms to fight against humans. They were told to face directly against the war machines that the humans had. The casualty was guaranteed, and unlike the pecker orcs, every tauren here was supposed to be a real warrior.

All of them took years of hardship to learn how to fight. All of them took years of nurturing to get to where they were. Worse yet, the number of taurens was never close to how many worgens there were. Most of it had to do with land. Since the worgens were free to use the wolf garden, they became the race with the most abundant food source. On the other hand, the Rocky Ground barely provided any land for agriculture, making it hard to increase the number of hands that could be used to grow food, and in turn, a shrinking population became a real threat to the taurens.

Now, Carol was a smart tauren. He knew why this happened. After all, the beastly god himself, too, was rumored to be a tauren. Many of his kind supported this belief. As a matter of fact, there were more stories about the beastly god among the taurens than within the temple of the beastly god.

The other races didn’t want a new beastly god. They were oppressing the taurens on purpose. They were trying to erase the fact that the beastly god was a tauren. To be specific, it was the worgens, the werecats, and even the behemoths. Even now, Groat, the worgen, and Emory the werecat were gladdened with General Gerald’s command.

Not Clarence, though. He was sighing with the discrimination that was going on here. Even as he thought of his own kind, the vulperas, there was no telling of how much power the Orc Empire would have if it had itself a new beastly god. It was true that exploiting the taurens would serve the vulperas, but that was not really all there was to it.

The day was still out. The clouds were still up high. The regular orcs were quickly at building the stone platforms. Soon, after the humans finished their five rounds of attacks, the orcs would have lost all resistance that was supposed to interrupt them from getting the building finished.When the platform got just about as the miracle wall itself, many of the regular orcs finally began to leave. The platform was a tall wall that was facing the southern face of the miracle wall. At its back, there was a slope that was supposed to be used to transport the war machines.

Soon, the quiet battleground was filled with noises of stuff rolling over the distance. About several thousand taurens were pushing twenty giant catapults towards the top of the stone platforms. To prevent the catapults from being attacked, there was a group at the front carrying a giant shield.

“How did the orcs learn to do this?”

Wizard Calder did not like to see this. He was very angry, in fact, because the orcs could only learn this if a human decided to make a deal with them. Of course, Wizard Dunn and Wizard Lorenzo were also very angry to learn about this. The wizards have always dedicated themselves to investigate human betrayal of humans, but this kind of stuff just never stopped happening.

Things did seem different this time, however. The catapults were a top-secret to the humans. There were only a handful of families that had access to the blueprints.

Wizard Dunn slammed his table, “I want a full investigation, you hear? Full investigation! If we don’t figure out who sold us out, the humans will end! WE WILL END!”

Wizard Lorenzo had the same fire in his eyes, “Don’t you worry, Master Dunn. I have told Liante City to use everything it has to look it up. I don’t care how influential this traitor is. I’ll make him and his whole family pay. I’ll swear it with my life.”

At the same time, everything that was happening on the orc battlefield was on live broadcast in Liante City. Every advanced wizard that was concerned was watching through the large screen. It’s not like they all could take part in this, but if they wanted to, they could always go out to kill any orcs that were within the fifty-mile radius of the human world. It was an agreement the humans had signed with the orcs. If one party was within a certain range of another’s territory, anything could be done to them with no consequences whatsoever.