Defiance of the Fall

Chapter 88: A day in the Wolf Horde

Zac intercepted the group of wolves some distance in front of the walls, not wanting to give them a chance to ruin his fortifications. These hulking things really looked like they could cause a dent it the wall. Zac really wished that the walls were inscribed with protective inscriptions like the whole Shipyard, since then he wouldn’t have to worry about this. Unfortunately, there was no one with the skillset to inscribe the wall among the demons.

It was a recurring problem with the non-combat class demons in Azh’Rodum. Only a handful possessed great proficiency or promise in their field, with the rest generally being assistants or simply untalented. Most of the more talented ones enjoyed almost the same level of reputation in the demon clan as the warriors and decided to head back as their punishment would be bearable. That left a large number of people fumbling around, kind of like Zac. Ogras had obviously oversold the competences of his people the first time they met.

A huge rocky maw approaching woke him from his thoughts, and he sidestepped a few meters with his movement skill. His normal axes were much too small to do any real damage to these massive things, so he swapped it out for his huge elongated axe. He didn’t want to use too much energy this wave, as he spent more than usual the last one.

Fighting the monster waves was a marathon rather than a sprint, and conservation was key. He jumped up a few meters and with a grunt decapitated the huge monster. Rock chippings flew all about as the head fell down, and Zac felt that the cut barely was enough. The axe took noticeable damage as well from cutting into the hard monster even though it had strengthening inscriptions.

Suddenly his Luck stat warned him of something approaching from behind and he immediately pushed to the side. It surprisingly was the head of the fallen beast. Or rather, it were a few smaller versions of the large rocky wolf that somehow was born out of the decapitated head. Zac was surprised but quickly killed them with a few swings.

He looked over to the main part of the body and saw that it was starting to squirm. Soon over ten wolves were born through its various parts, the transformation creating jarring sounds of rock scratching against rock. These wolves were apparently like some type of matryoshka dolls, containing more monsters inside. Even worse, he saw the smaller version he just bisected once more turn into even smaller wolves, these ones the size of medium-sized dogs.

After some deliberation, he chose to ignore these new smaller beasts and instead ran toward the next huge wolf. With a large jump he approached the next wolf from above, and at the last second he infused his large axe with the Dao of Heaviness. The swing contained the momentum and weight of a falling meteor, and not only was the beast cut in two but cracks ran all along its body.

A large surge of cosmic energy entering his body told Zac that the swing had destroyed a lot more than just a few beasts like his last swing did. It seemed he needed to do large scale damage to the rocks if he wanted to destroy the smaller versions along with the main body. Since most of the beasts in this one was dead, he proceeded to the next one. The large ones were the real trouble, as they might be able to threaten his walls. After they split into multiple smaller targets their threat lessened greatly, and the demon army could handle that.

Zac went from beast to beast and with large swings destroyed one towering beast after another. Every time he infused the swings with the Dao almost half the monsters inside died as well due to cracks forming all over from the impact. After roughly a dozen wolves his large axe was starting to distort from the force, and he could only helplessly tuck it away, instead bringing out a large mallet. It was reminiscent of the large hammer a demon used on top of the mountain, and Zac found it pretty interesting when he raided the Demon’s armory.

He still preferred using axes, but sometimes other weapons were simply more convenient. Blunt force was clearly the best tool against these beasts, and that wasn’t something axes excelled at. Unfortunately Zac had problems using his Dao of Heaviness with the large mallet, but with his enormous Strength he only needed his body against these wolves.

One by one the large wolves were decimated by Zac’s approach, and he actually managed to destroy 80 of them before they reached the wall. Left behind in his wake were broken rocks and smaller wolves who resumed the approach.

The demons on the wall had huge trouble destroying these large beasts, as it took them an inordinate amount of effort to destroy another 10 of them. Helplessly they could only focus on the smaller ones, as they began a methodical dismantling. The number of wolves was staggering by now, as most of the wolves survived after Zac switched to the mallet.

The last surviving whole wolves heedlessly ran into the wall, creating huge impact that could be felt to the bone. Worst was the area where the boss rammed the wall, as large cracks ran all the way to the foundation. The earth mages on top of the wall quickly stopped their attacks, and instead focused on mending the cracks before they spread any further. A few unlucky demons were even flung off the wall into the ground by the shockwave.

After the initial impact, the normal wolves couldn’t do too much damage. They scratched and bit the walls, and with every attack deep gouges were created. Still, it would take some time before they got through the thick walls, so Zac wasn’t too worried about that. The boss was another matter.

With surprising nimbleness, it backed away a bit and stood up on its hind legs. The monster was huge, reaching a fair bit over ten meters in height when it stood like this. It looked like bad news to Zac, forcing him to action even though he usually tried to ignore the boss as long as possible. He even swapped out the mallet for his usual axe, and charged up a [Chop] as he approached. With one quick motion he cut off one of the hind legs, but it was too late. The monster was already falling down toward the wall, and with a tremendous crash it slammed into it. Rocks from both the boss and the wall flew everywhere, and the shockwave forced even Zac back some distance.

Luckily the wall was sturdy enough that a single bodyslam wasn’t enough to destroy it. A section of the top wall was crushed though. Even worse, the boss created a sort of ramp up toward the other side, and it looked like most of the wolves were ready. They stopped their assault at the wall and charged toward the now unmoving boss.

The fact that Zac gained almost no cosmic energy when he lopped off the leg told him that the boss was still alive, and simply kept still in order to let its minions over the wall. This put Zac in a predicament, as he didn’t know whether to kill the boss or try to stop the invasion on its back. If he destroyed the boss the security breach would be fixed, but the next wave would spawn prematurely. Conversely, if he left it alive some demons risked dying from the onslaught.

After some hesitation he started chopping off parts of the large boss, making the walkway along its back a bit thinner. He quickly stopped after the walkway was only three meters wide at most parts though, as he was afraid the System would count it as a kill if he continued on.

After that he placed himself on the back of the wolf to meet the oncoming onslaught. Hundreds of stone wolves were converging on his location, and Zac destroyed them one by one as they approached. He once again took out a second small axe to dual-wield against the incoming sea of wolves. He was like a grinder where wolves entered and small chunks of rocks exited. Every now and then some of the smaller wolves slipped through the cracks and ran past Zac up toward the wall. A second line of defense consisting of a few melee warriors had already formed behind Zac though, and they were quickly dealt with.

The other demons weren’t idle either, as they bombarded the wolves below. Zac’s actions created a chokepoint, and the wolves trying to get up their leader’s back were packed tightly along the wall. Any attack was having great efficiency as it was essentially impossible to miss by now. A group of warriors also scaled the wall down to ambush the wolves from behind as they all tried to move toward Zac.

The number of wolves was steadily decreasing, and the battlefield was starting to fill with rocky debris. It was worst around Zac as most of the action was centered around there. It was actually starting to create a problem, as every death added onto their boss, and the wolf-ramp was growing wider and sturdier as the battle went on.

It was getting increasingly hard for Zac to kill everything that tried to get up without expending any cosmic energy, as he simply had trouble reaching both sides of the widening ramp. Every now and then he stomped the ground with a Dao-Empowered Foot, creating a small landslide of rocks and gravel. It helped to somewhat allay the problem, but it was only delaying the inevitable.

“Stash the rocks into Cosmic Pouches!” Zac shouted behind him, and a few demons moved forward to comply. He had actually attained the [Book of Babel] some time ago by using contribution Points.

The skill wasn’t available in his Nexus Node, so he was quite excited to see the skill in the temporary contribution shop. The shop was actually another crystal that spawned close to his camp, along with a huge monitor that listed the rankings of contribution. It only showed the top 10 though.

The skill cost a week’s worth of Zac’s contribution points, but he felt it was worth it. Communication was getting more important as the waves got harder and some teamwork was needed. Besides, he would need the skill soon anyway when he set out from the island. He had no idea who he’d meet when he left since the world had gotten randomized, and it would be quite frustrating if he finally met humans but couldn’t communicate with them.

The wave was finally starting to thin out, but the battle on top of the boss had continuously caused damage and cracks to the hulking beast they stood on. Finally, some threshold was passed, as Zac saw the portals start pulsating in the distance. Since there was no reason to be careful anymore Zac ordered the demons to back up to the wall again.

Next he charged up a huge fractal blade on each of his axes, and even empowered them with the Dao of Heaviness, turning the blades darker and giving them a palpable pressure. With a roar he swung down on the boss below, and the power from his swings completely decimated the beast and everything along with it.

The landing that had accumulated over time from the kills was completely destroyed as the strikes made debris fly in all directions, and even the closest wolves were thrown away. He immediately removed the Dao empowerment from the blades but kept them up for a few seconds as he completely destroyed any remainders of the siege. It would be impossible for the non-combat classes to pick up all these small pieces of gravel so he had to spread them out as much as possible.

Tens of the stone wolves were caught up in Zac’s wide swings, and along with the efforts of the demons less than ten percent remained. Finally content Zac let the fractal edges dissipate as he turned toward the next wave that was already approaching. These wolves had a washed-out cyan coloring, and the ground actually froze to ice where their feet touched as they ran. Zac sighed as he picked up one of the larger rocks from the ground and moved toward the incoming wave.

The day was far from over.