The next twenty minutes are spent ferrying around a bunch of allies into the Necromancers Guild from all over the city. Daniel and I stop at the inn where Corvax and his family are at, along with Silth. Corvax and most of his family decide to join us, while the rest go to the house we’re renting with Silth.
The next twenty minutes are spent ferrying around a bunch of allies into the Necromancers Guild from all over the city. Daniel and I stop at the inn where Corvax and his family are at, along with Silth. Corvax and most of his family decide to join us, while the rest go to the house we’re renting with Silth.
We end up bringing back a bunch of water mages from various small water guilds that have formed into the Water Weavers Coalition and the members of House Trandemere, who are a martial-focused family based on all the melee-related classes. Our last stop is the one that I’ve been the most worried about. We are getting the members of House Valethryn, who have for some reason decided to back me, even after I killed two of their family members.
As I walk up to the group of seven men and four women who are waiting outside of the Valethryn compound, one of them quickly walks up to me, all smiles and good intentions based on his expression. They’re all dressed in fairly casual clothes with the symbol of their house, an open eye on a field of black.
“Ray Alder, I presume?” He asks me with a friendly tone.
“Uhh, yeah. Before we work together, is it going to be a problem that I killed some members of your family?”
“You’ll find no love for Helstin and Fenora here. They were both all but disowned by the main branch.” Gralden Valethryn tells me after chuckling, like it was a silly thing to ask.
I just shrug my shoulders and do my job, opening portals until I finally finish the list and enter the Necromancers Guild myself. Several hundred people have gathered in the street outside, our army, I suppose. The place is a flurry of activity. People from several guilds that I don’t recognize are carrying crates inside from a cart on the street, and several healers are setting up a makeshift hospital. Before Daniel and I even cross the room, I locate Duncan with my spatial senses and open a portal to the room he’s in, Mordak’s workshop.
Two other people are in the room, Mordak and Clark. As soon as I step out of the portal, Clark turns his head to me. He looks mostly the same as before, with a few small changes. They did a good job repairing his body. The first change is that his eyes are now… dull. There’s something that should be there, but isn’t. The second noticeable difference is that he’s not breathing. I suppose he really must be an undead, then.
“Ray?” He asks, slightly confused, before he turns to look at Daniel. “And the guy with the gun. You survived?”
“We managed alright.” I say as I walk up to him and reach out my hand to touch his shoulder. “Holy fuck, you’re actually back.” I pull him into a hug while at the same time I [Inspect] him.
[Level 25 Undead Bulwark]
“Fuck, this is such a bad time for you to come back to life. I kinda sorta may have gotten mixed up in a little war thing. The good news is that you don’t have to fight if you don’t want to.” I say after I release the hug.
“‘A little war thing’? I don’t know exactly how this came to be, but I can guarantee it will be anything but little. In damn near every city on the island there’s going to be fighting in less than fifteen minutes. Business is about to be booming for the Necromancers Guild. For the first time in centuries, we will be able to add space mages to our ranks.” Mordak says from the other side of the room, where he’s arming and equipping that skeleton with gems in its eyes in battle gear.
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“We already decided to fight for you, Ray. It’s the least we can do to repay you.” Duncan chimes in.
“Yeah, this new body is tougher than it used to be. I’ll be fine.” Clark says. He doesn’t seem to have changed much, but I’ll definitely keep an eye on him, just in case.
I give him a nod and turn to Mordak. “Where is Morah?”
Mordak slips a heavily enchanted black robe over himself after his skeleton has been armed and armored. “I’ll take you there now. They’re probably waiting for us.”
Daniel also follows me out, leaving the two brothers to continue getting ready. Mordaks leads us up a few staircases and through a few halls until we come to a room that is very heavily warded. Mordak presses some kind of badge to a box next to the door, and it pops open a moment later.
Inside is a round table with eight people sitting at it and two empty chairs. I recognize a few of the people at the table, as I ferried them here, but a few more are new to me. The water mage guy who taught me barriers is here as the representation for the Water Weavers Coalition. Gralden Valethryn is here, and so is Alene Trandemere, the woman in charge of House Trandemere in Barad, and of course, Morah and Merrick. The other three all look to be part of guilds rather than Great Houses. A fire affinity swordsman and two twins who both have the same class of [Artillery Mage].
They are all in the middle of discussing battle plans over a map of the guild district while the two twins are constantly communicating with someone else to update the map with enemy and friendly positions. They must have scouts out there right now, probably Halon and Elsine since they aren’t here.
“How’s it looking?” I ask as I take the seat next to Morah.
“Not great. The Spacers Guild has a lot of allies, and they seem to be favored to win this based on the numbers. They outnumber us three to two and have more of the combat-focused guilds on their side, but they lack any initiates from our initial reports.” She reports clearly and calmly, showing me on the map where they have been gathering their troops.
They have obviously set up their headquarters in the Spacers Guild and are gathering their troops there. I also noticed that pretty much every single guildhall in the city has some extra wards and barriers up now in preparation for the fighting.
“The main problem is that the Spacers Guild will be able to bring in more reinforcements once the Siege Barrier goes down in about twelve hours. We need to have control of their portal arrays before that happens.” Merrick adds.
“Ray, you will join the stealth infiltration team with Halon, Elsine, Daniel, and Merrick after the initial battle, where you will attempt to either take control of their portal arrays or destroy them completely.” Morah tells me.
She then continues to discuss battle plans with the war council while the timer slowly ticks down, until only five minutes are left, at which point she stands up and leads the entire room outside to the waiting army.
They are only semi-organized, which is better than I expected based on how fast this whole thing is moving. The main fighting will take place all over the district in small skirmishes and battles instead of one huge battle. People already seem to know what they’re supposed to do and are just waiting for the timer to end. Plenty of people seem nervous or worried, but I don’t see many with outright fear showing. I sometimes forget that people here are kind of just built different. They often lack a fear of dying, probably due to how often death happens here.
Morah stops us at the steps to the Necromancers Guild, standing over the army gathered in front of us. Looking over the sea of faces, it really starts to dawn on me just how big this is growing to be. Hundreds of people here, all seemingly fighting for someone else's grudge. But they don’t look at me with hate, or anger, or anything of the sort. They mostly look at me with curiosity and interest. It’s Morah that they look at with admiration and respect, as she is the glue that holds this army together.
“I’ve never been one for speeches, or glory, or wealth. You all know me. You know that everything I do is for the betterment of the city or the planet. This is no different. The Spacers Guild has been a plague on this planet for far too long. Letting the rich and powerful travel in safety while the rest of us are forced to fight and die in the untamed wilds between civilized lands. It stops now. Today is the day they will write about in the history books a hundred years from now. You are the people they will write about, the brave men and women who decided that enough is enough and took it into your own hands to make this place worth living in.” The crowd erupts into cheering at Morah's speech.
“Now, let’s go make them pay!” Merrick yells, causing the crowd to roar once again and split up to start the fighting just as the emperor makes another announcement.
“The timer’s up. Good luck and good hunting.” Booms throughout the city.