The Runic Alchemist

[The Reinforced Defence Wall of Ice, Five Days After Damian's Ascension, Sam's POV.]

Sam walked together with high-ranking pigmen officers atop the big ice wall stretching far above the snow mountain range, checking all the checkpoints on the way.

They had many forts and temporary defence structures built far into the other side. Their effective troops kept their eyes peeled over 150 kilometres away from the pigmen city, all fitted with new laser hand-cannons and huge cannons mounted on high stone forts. Sam and the others had to regularly use waygates to relieve pigmen soldiers on duty and replace them with new troops.

"The scouts still have not noticed any signs of them?" Grace asked, walking beside him.

"They will soon enough. Estimating their march time compared to before, we barely have any time. I just wish that thing is not with them, otherwise we will lose before even starting," Sam replied.

They arrived at another checkpoint. He spoke with the soldiers on duty in his broken pigmen language, and then they moved on. He had to finish half the wall, then go back with Grace to control the waygates to relieve the advanced fort soldiers.

"What if they never come back?" Grace asked when they were alone, heading for the next checkpoint. Her voice had a tinge of sadness to it.

Sam looked at her. "Sooner or later we will go back home. Through the dungeon or other methods."

"What if we can't?" Grace knew she was asking useless questions, but her heart just did not let her calm down.

Sam just smiled and replied, pulling her into his arms, "Then we go abusing dungeons, forcing it to throw us out. We'll get to see many worlds like this one… Wouldn't that be fun?"

For a second, Grace froze on the spot. Then she punched him with quite a force behind it. "Boys are such a…" she mumbled, but Sam didn't hear it clearly under his pretend hurt sound.

Midway through to the next checkpoint, Grace was still lecturing him not to joke all the time when suddenly a loud siren went off in the distance. It was coming from the center of the valley. Both Sam and Grace froze mid-track. That was the first warning signal for enemies sighted.

Cold wind blew fiercely as Sam heard Grace mutter,

"They are here…"

***

[The Pigmen Main Army Camp, Five Days After Damian's Ascension, Lucian's POV.]

Lucian connected over ten thick mana threads to the waygate cube connected to a specific fort ahead of the main defence line and poured mana from her mana container, opening another waygate to send troops.

The second she closed the waygate after the transfer and was catching her breath, a loud siren started going off from the top of the stone shrine and inside the shrine too. The short warning sign.

So it was finally time.

Lucian straightened up. They were in the first warning period. Not much would change, but some things had to. No more new constructions—now they just had to defend. The time for preparation had ended.

Lucian had not seen or sensed Damian for days now. His room was empty, and the royal forge had only pigmen working, overnight in shifts. She could have gone to him… but she kept delaying. Now there was no time. She needed to focus and prepare herself—Damian had his own battles to fight; she had her own duties.

Lucian, along with her translator, headed straight for the emergency meeting to get her new orders.

***

[The furthest fort from the main defence line, Six days after Damian's ascension, Alex's POV.]

Alex, standing beside Maelor, stared at the never-ending stretch of darkness approaching nearer with each abominable step.

"Ready the cannons…" Alex heard Maelor whisper, though it was barely audible, his own eyes unable to believe what was in front of him. But he shook his head and shouted loudly, "READY THE CANNONS! GIVE THE SIGNAL FOR OPEN FIRE!"

They were in the biggest and most centered stone fort before the defence line. This one had the commanding pigmen officer who signaled and controlled all the forts on the frontline. They signaled through bright light runic tools, and soon the whole 30-kilometre-long first defence line—filled with laser cannons and pigmen teams—unleashed attacks on the black army that charged toward them and was finally in range.

Alex and Maelor were in charge of opening the waygate and wormholes to fall back when the advance line was overwhelmed by the black army. They still had their own laser cannons, though, and they operated them spectacularly.

Traps were activated all over the land by team captains; black army monsters died in the hundreds each second—but what was an army of 50 million? They were relentless and never-ending. The white sky and land had both been covered in pitch-black darkness, as if some enormous black deity had swallowed the world whole.

This was no battlefield. It was a one-sided massacre—even though the pigmen behind the stone walls killed fifty times their own number every few minutes, the charge was still without any effect.

And that was before the massive Legendary-class gigantic black pigmen had even reached near them. There were a lot of them—as far as Alex could see, he counted over twenty-seven. Fortunately, these monstrosities could not fly and moved slowly through the snow-covered land. Still, it was just a matter of time before the whole line of stone forts was broken like wooden toys by those monstrous things.

The main ice defence line was built specifically to keep these things out, but these small forts were not meant for that. Soon the pigmen commander called for retreat, and all over the stone forts, pigmen used their wormhole runic cubes to reach the nearby stronger forts. Alex and Maelor used their liquid-man-powered high-distance wormholes to gather as many of them as possible.

In the end, barely twelve teams out of the thirty managed to get back to the pigmen camp situated in the city. The enemy had torn through the first defence, and they were barely a million—or even less—short.