Nah, clearly this is Sombra's theme!
... he finds the contrast while he kill people horribly hilarious.
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Who Needs Harmony?: An MLP Empire Quest
- Thread starter Questor
- Start date
- Location
- Detroit, Michigan
Huh, I didn't ever notice that I just clicked the first result on youtube when I searched it.
Edit: Okay fixed. Switched it out for the one you linked.
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[x] Blow the Charges and Bury Them!
- Location
- Space
Vote closed, but that option won.
That's what I get for just reading the last update and doing a tally.
- Location
- Italy
if you bring up Voltaire i have to answer with
Though i still prefer mercedes lackey's Oathbreaker
And, if inside Sombra there is still that cute, sad kid who only wished to go to the crystail fair with his friend (while, sadly, the crystal heart made him horribly sick every time there was the holyday)..
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The Winter War: Part 5
- Location
- Maryland
Your forces are exhausted and bloodied, but the end is in sight, and you've yet to play your two trump cards. You hurriedly instruct the Grandmasters to hurry to their units and prepare to lead the counter-charge. In the meantime, Gabriella sends up the signal flags instructing the volunteer demolition teams to blow the two remaining charges when they will cause the most damage to the attacking force. Orders are sent out to reform the line and to conserve the remaining ammunition for one last clash. Your forces catch their breath and steel themselves for combat against the enemy's elite.
A hush falls over your lines. Soldiers check and re-check their kit, or whisper prayers to the ancestors. Yaks quietly beseech the spirits or murmur war chants. The silence is only broken by the growing volume of the hostile army's cadenced hoofsteps...until a massive, muffled boom echoes through the mountain pass. The explosion is quickly followed by another on the opposite cliff face as a low rumble begins to build. Twin rolling waves of white slide down the cliffsides as hundreds of tons of snow and ice and rock fall towards the forces of darkness.
The enemy army halts, their advance ceasing as the sound of their marching is drowned out by the thunder of the artificial avalanche. Just before the powder cloud obscures the black-armored warriors from sight, you spot flashes of black lightning. Dark bolts of magical power strike the ground around the hostile formations, and spires of black crystal rise from the earth in an effort to shield the dark formation from the sudden onslaught.
(Avalanche: 77)
It's not enough. Hundreds of tons of frozen water flows over, around and through the hastily erected barricades, overwhelming and crushing thousands of the enemy. Your soldiers cheer as the enemy force is enveloped and buried under the snow that was at least partially created by the mad sorcerer at the head of the invading force. But as the dust begins to settle, movement is visible amongst the debris, and the cheers of your forces die down. It appears the avalanche did not kill all of the invaders.
A smattering of black-clad guards begin to emerge in small groups from the rubble, clambering over the massive snow pile and reforming their lines before the obstruction. An obstruction that promptly explodes in a flurry of crystal shards and writhing shadows, a roar of rage rising from the throat of the horned equine standing at ground zero of the avalanche, his fanged shadow creatures writhing in sympathetic rage around him. With a flare of red-tinged energy from his horn, the few thousand remaining southerners charge your lines, the mad king and his eldritch minions advancing behind them.
(Cannons: 44+10(Battle Engineers)=54)
(Ballistae: 34+10(Black on White)=44)
Your artillery opens up, cannonballs digging great furrows through the hostile formations as ballistae launch their bolts and skewer many of the advancing foes. Sadly, they only have enough ammunition for a handful of volleys. After taking a tithe from the ranks of the enemy, the last bolt is loosed, the last ball fired. The artillery crews unsheathe blades and hurriedly move to join their comrades on the frontlines. They may not be well equipped for melee combat, but there's no way in Tartarus they're going to sit on the sidelines of this battle while they can still contribute.
(Archers: 28+5(Fire Arrows)+10(Trying not to Ruffle Feathers)=43)
Closer still the enemy advances. Your archers loose the last of their arrows, a forest of steel-tipped projectiles launching skyward towards the enemy ranks. As they reach the apex of their ascent, the dark king's horn glows once again, and half the arrows pause in mid-air before being hurled back from whence they came. Screams ring out as many gryphons are pinioned by their own weapons. But the other half of the volley continues on, striking down several of the black armored aggressors and even setting alight one of the shadow-creatures. It's screams of agony rend the air as it flails it's multiple limbs and contorts it's body into impossible shapes before seeming to implode into a pile of black and red goo.
While this event reassures your soldiers of the creatures' mortality, the sight of one of his pets burning alive sends the sorcerer king into an even greater fury, charging towards your lines and shoving his own soldiers out of the way in his haste, the rest of his monstrosities following close behind him.
(Cleansing Flame:88)
Then the flamethrowers open up with the last of their fuel, jets of flame blasting outwards and incinerating many of the advancing enemies. The shadow king projects a shield before himself, but his soldiers and beasts are not so lucky. More eldritch shrieks reverberate and echo off the walls of the mountain pass as almost all of the demonic creatures are set alight, their violent death throes resulting in the impalement of multiple equines upon their countless shadowy tendrils.
But as the majority of the foul beasts burn, the fuel tanks of the flamethrowers run dry, and still the shadowed ones advance. Your knights stand ready to meet them, Gryphons-at-Arms arrayed in shield walls, Squires standing alongside their heavily armored mentors. Behind them, battered but unbroken, stands the remainder of your army, ready to follow the knights into combat with the mage that has wrought so much misery and placed their homelands in danger.
(Knights of the Empire: 85)
The surviving enemy forces slam into your lines, magically enhanced equines bringing down their bodies and weapons against the knights' shield wall. Spears and lances pierce their bodies to little effect, the dark power within them pushing them on despite wounds that would instantly kill any other being. Had the avalanche not killed so many of them, you have no doubt your forces would be overwhelmed and routed. But as it is, your knights actually have a slight numerical advantage over their foe, and no amount of foul magic can force a warrior to fight on in spite of a missing head or pair of legs.
The shadow-creatures prove a greater challenge. Though the flamethrowers eliminated a majority of the eldritch beings, a couple remain. They slide between gaps in the shield wall like water, only to sprout dozens of sharp-tipped tendrils that pierce the joints and weak spots of your elite warriors. Their movements are absurdly fast, and many a blade or spear-tip simply passes through their ethereal forms to no effect, even as their gaping maws eviscerate Gryphons, Dogs and Yaks with hundreds of needle-like teeth. Thankfully their rampage does not last forever. The last of the fire-cocktails, carefully conserved for this final charge, are expended at close quarters, the flames eradicating the last of the eldritch beings in bursts of heat and light.
But just when it seems like the battle is about to be won, the dark king, his form visibly pulsating with magical power, makes his presence known in the most dramatic way possible.
(Sombra's Sorcery: 3+15(War Banner of the Gryphus Empire)+15(The Duke's Court of Guaneto)=33)
The sun seems to disappear as the battleground is shrouded in darkness. Suddenly and without warning, dozens of shadowy, multi-jointed arms burst upwards from the ground.
Some grab fallen blades and hack away at your soldiers, others simply wrap their fingers around skulls and squeeze with unnatural strength. The sickening cracks of shattering bones and screams of pain echo across the battlefield as knights and militia alike struggle to evade the phantom limbs impervious to blade and bludgeon. Splashes of liquid flame take down one or two of the arms, only for four more to take their places, their summoner protected by a wall of dark crystal that begins to slowly creep forwards, impaling those too slow to escape on shards of solidified magic, all as blasts of shadow-magic erupt from the mage's red horn, bowling over even the weighty and strong Yaks.
Hundreds die in seconds, the line beginning to buckle under the strain of the arcane assault, a single sorcerer accomplishing what thousands of his warriors could not: breaking the back of the Imperial Army.
Before you can respond, before you can even open your beak to give an order, your Wife flaps her wings, lifting off and making a beeline for the front. You curse and hurry after her, but even with a physique enhanced by her fitness regime, Gabriella is still faster than you.
Your wife, a figure who many refer to as a goddess of war, soars over the frontlines, braving freezing winds and the the grasping hands of the dread king. Her voice rings out through the pass, audible even over the din of battle.
"Hold your ground, protectors of the Empire, warriors of YakYakistan! Remember what you fight for! No matter what the cost, this evil shall not taint our homelands, shall not threaten our families, shall not destroy all that we have built! Not one step back!"
(Rally!: 81)
With a rallying cry of "Not one step back!" The line stabilizes. Spear and shield walls reform, militia filling in gaps in the formation, your people furiously beating back the invaders, even as the shadow summons harass them at every turn. The flanks push forwards, the hostile elites there now on the defensive...but the center remains deadlocked against the dark king, his shadow hands and dark crystals forming an impenetrable batter against any assault against him. Hundreds of brave souls throw themselves against his defenses only to be cut down.
In the mad chaos of battle, your sword raised above your head in an attempt to rally a bloodied battalion, you manage to lock eyes with Gabriella and Konrad Hardbeak. A strange feeling comes over you, and you all nod to each other, reaching an unspoken agreement: if this battle is to be won, the king must die. In unison, the three greatest heroes of the Empire of Gryphus take to the air and dive bomb the sorcerer.
(Charge of the Triumvirate: 89)
Were your brain not overwhelmed by adrenaline and fight-or-flight instincts, you might question your current course of action. You are not a warrior. The last time a king had to be killed you sat back and let your knights deal with it on your behalf. Perhaps you can't allow your wife to face this demon alone, perhaps you feel you have something to prove. Perhaps, in a dark pessimistic corner of your mind, you want your children to know that their father and mother died bravely, fighting alongside each other in a duel against the greatest evil since Discord.
In the end the reasoning behind your actions is irrelevant, for the result is the same. You, Gabriella and Konrad fall in a controlled dive towards your foe, your wings and legs held flat against your bodies, the wind buffeting you as you fall towards your target like living arrows. Spires of sharpened crystal erupt from the earth, threatening to impale you, but you fly straight between them, the jagged mineral protrusions a hairsbreadth from your wings. Grasping magic hands pursue you, but their grips catch only empty air. The horned equine calls forth blasts of raw magic that sear the air like lightening, leaving behind the acrid scent of burning ozone, but still you three heroes of the Empire fly straight and true.
For a moment, it must seem as if you will not pull up at all, that all three of you shall plummet straight to the ground. But then, dangerously close to the earth and in perfect unison, your wings flare outwards and you bleed off speed while pulling up, placing yourselves on three direct intercept courses with the black-furred King.
(The Kingslayer: 87)
Perhaps due to his experience from years of aerial combat and sparring with his colleagues, or perhaps due to an unspoken agreement amongst the three of you, Hardbeak is the first to reach your target, his claws outstretched for a slice across his neck. The sorcerer ducks, talons raking and slicing through his mane as he fires off a blast of magic that goes wild, missing his intended target.
Hardbeak banks and makes a hard turn, even as the sorcerer dodges similar attacks from you and Gabriella, firing off wild blasts of magic all the while, cursing and ranting in a tongue none of you have heard before. This is the circling vultures maneuver, one of the most basic and reliable methods of group assault against a singular ground-bound target. One Griffon attacks while the others line up for their own strikes, so that the target in question can't properly focus on his assailants for more than a few seconds before being forced to dodge and switch focus, minimizing the time each Griffon spends under threat. It was originally devised to combat trolls. Now you're using it against a mage-king with enough magical power to take on an army by himself. ...You're not too sure how to feel about that.
The grandmaster comes in for another attack, catching the sorcerer off guard while he's busy firing away at you and Gabriella. Once again, the equine moves to duck...but the Grandmaster catches more than his mane. With the sharp blades greaves attached to his talons, the Kingslayer severs the king's horn.
For a split second, it seems that the entire world freezes, even the wind not daring to move as the magic organ of the shadow sorcerer tumbles to the ground. Predictably, it is your foe who breaks the silence.
Sparks of raw magic erupts from his broken horn, his entire body glowing and vibrating with raw magical power as he screams in pain that has nothing to do with his injury.
A great wind picks up out of nowhere, a gale centered around the wounded king, air rushing towards him from across the battlefield as the glow of his body outstrips that of the sun. Acting on instinct, you tackle your wife and move to shield her body with your own. It proves to be the right decision. With an enormous explosion that shakes the earth and sends debris flying, all the magical power contained within the body of the shadow king erupts like a volcano, the force of the blast wave flattening your palisades and knocking every soldier on the battlefield off of their feet.
(Duck and Cover: 79)
Being only a short distance from the source of the explosion itself, it seems to you like a second sun has been brought into existence right next to you. The force of the blast sends you and Gabriella flying, shards of stone and broken crystal pinging off of your armor. You land back on the ground with a painful thud, fragments of debris falling around you.
With a groan, you stand, pulling your wife to her feet...just in time for a smoldering Konrad Hardbeak to land only a few wingspans away from you. You hurry over, checking his pulse....and sigh in relief. Just unconscious...and burned, but nothing that a few weeks of proper care can't fix. You look over towards the spot where the dark king once stood...and see only a blackened crater, a whisp of smoke hanging above it.
A whisp of smoke that proceeds to fly South at breakneck speeds, cursing you in the same foreign language that the embodied king had used earlier.
You grit your beak and sigh explosively. No...of course it wouldn't be that easy.
Battle of Redstone Pass: Victory!
All Invaders Killed, Sombra greatly weakened and forced to retreat to the Crystal Empire.
Gained Yak Respect, Increased Spousal Opinion by +.5
Imperial Army of Gryphus
5840 Warriors
1960 Polearms
3800 Archers
490 Diamond Dogs
5 Mobile Ballistae
4 Cannons
2 Flame Projectors
Imperial Knightly Orders
The Knights Lion
1 Grandmaster Konrad Hardbeak, "The Kingslayer"
18 Knights of the Inner Circle
90 Imperial Knights
120 Squires
245 Griffons-at-Arms
The Knights Talon
1 Grandmaster Colombroni Pigeonio
12 Knights of the Inner Circle
105 Imperial Knights
155 Squires
290 Griffons-at-Arms
The Knights Panther
1 Grandmaster Adrian Dawnquill
14 Knights of the Inner Circle
120 Imperial Knights
210 Squires
350 Griffons-at-Arms
Mercenaries
The War Wolves
245 Diamond Dogs
The Wood Stalkers
32 Warriors, 225 Archers
The Black Pikes
95 Pikes
The Crimson Company
26 Gryphon Berserkers
The Troll Busters
4 Static Flamethrowers
Auxiliaries/Allies
8,465 Imperial Militia
7,610 Yak Chargers
You guys have no idea just how lucky you were. I know it looks like a curb stomp from this angle but trust me: you were so very close to needing a new grandmaster...or a new wife.
Also, I just realized the real reason Garrick never gets into fights himself: I'm shit at writing fight scenes.
As for the bit where Sombra exploded...remember that first battle in Lord of the Rings where Sauron's hand gets chopped off? Yeah, it's basically that.
And no, Sombra's not dead. You're not getting rid of a threat that big that easily.
A hush falls over your lines. Soldiers check and re-check their kit, or whisper prayers to the ancestors. Yaks quietly beseech the spirits or murmur war chants. The silence is only broken by the growing volume of the hostile army's cadenced hoofsteps...until a massive, muffled boom echoes through the mountain pass. The explosion is quickly followed by another on the opposite cliff face as a low rumble begins to build. Twin rolling waves of white slide down the cliffsides as hundreds of tons of snow and ice and rock fall towards the forces of darkness.
The enemy army halts, their advance ceasing as the sound of their marching is drowned out by the thunder of the artificial avalanche. Just before the powder cloud obscures the black-armored warriors from sight, you spot flashes of black lightning. Dark bolts of magical power strike the ground around the hostile formations, and spires of black crystal rise from the earth in an effort to shield the dark formation from the sudden onslaught.
(Avalanche: 77)
It's not enough. Hundreds of tons of frozen water flows over, around and through the hastily erected barricades, overwhelming and crushing thousands of the enemy. Your soldiers cheer as the enemy force is enveloped and buried under the snow that was at least partially created by the mad sorcerer at the head of the invading force. But as the dust begins to settle, movement is visible amongst the debris, and the cheers of your forces die down. It appears the avalanche did not kill all of the invaders.
A smattering of black-clad guards begin to emerge in small groups from the rubble, clambering over the massive snow pile and reforming their lines before the obstruction. An obstruction that promptly explodes in a flurry of crystal shards and writhing shadows, a roar of rage rising from the throat of the horned equine standing at ground zero of the avalanche, his fanged shadow creatures writhing in sympathetic rage around him. With a flare of red-tinged energy from his horn, the few thousand remaining southerners charge your lines, the mad king and his eldritch minions advancing behind them.
(Cannons: 44+10(Battle Engineers)=54)
(Ballistae: 34+10(Black on White)=44)
Your artillery opens up, cannonballs digging great furrows through the hostile formations as ballistae launch their bolts and skewer many of the advancing foes. Sadly, they only have enough ammunition for a handful of volleys. After taking a tithe from the ranks of the enemy, the last bolt is loosed, the last ball fired. The artillery crews unsheathe blades and hurriedly move to join their comrades on the frontlines. They may not be well equipped for melee combat, but there's no way in Tartarus they're going to sit on the sidelines of this battle while they can still contribute.
(Archers: 28+5(Fire Arrows)+10(Trying not to Ruffle Feathers)=43)
Closer still the enemy advances. Your archers loose the last of their arrows, a forest of steel-tipped projectiles launching skyward towards the enemy ranks. As they reach the apex of their ascent, the dark king's horn glows once again, and half the arrows pause in mid-air before being hurled back from whence they came. Screams ring out as many gryphons are pinioned by their own weapons. But the other half of the volley continues on, striking down several of the black armored aggressors and even setting alight one of the shadow-creatures. It's screams of agony rend the air as it flails it's multiple limbs and contorts it's body into impossible shapes before seeming to implode into a pile of black and red goo.
While this event reassures your soldiers of the creatures' mortality, the sight of one of his pets burning alive sends the sorcerer king into an even greater fury, charging towards your lines and shoving his own soldiers out of the way in his haste, the rest of his monstrosities following close behind him.
(Cleansing Flame:88)
Then the flamethrowers open up with the last of their fuel, jets of flame blasting outwards and incinerating many of the advancing enemies. The shadow king projects a shield before himself, but his soldiers and beasts are not so lucky. More eldritch shrieks reverberate and echo off the walls of the mountain pass as almost all of the demonic creatures are set alight, their violent death throes resulting in the impalement of multiple equines upon their countless shadowy tendrils.
But as the majority of the foul beasts burn, the fuel tanks of the flamethrowers run dry, and still the shadowed ones advance. Your knights stand ready to meet them, Gryphons-at-Arms arrayed in shield walls, Squires standing alongside their heavily armored mentors. Behind them, battered but unbroken, stands the remainder of your army, ready to follow the knights into combat with the mage that has wrought so much misery and placed their homelands in danger.
(Knights of the Empire: 85)
The surviving enemy forces slam into your lines, magically enhanced equines bringing down their bodies and weapons against the knights' shield wall. Spears and lances pierce their bodies to little effect, the dark power within them pushing them on despite wounds that would instantly kill any other being. Had the avalanche not killed so many of them, you have no doubt your forces would be overwhelmed and routed. But as it is, your knights actually have a slight numerical advantage over their foe, and no amount of foul magic can force a warrior to fight on in spite of a missing head or pair of legs.
The shadow-creatures prove a greater challenge. Though the flamethrowers eliminated a majority of the eldritch beings, a couple remain. They slide between gaps in the shield wall like water, only to sprout dozens of sharp-tipped tendrils that pierce the joints and weak spots of your elite warriors. Their movements are absurdly fast, and many a blade or spear-tip simply passes through their ethereal forms to no effect, even as their gaping maws eviscerate Gryphons, Dogs and Yaks with hundreds of needle-like teeth. Thankfully their rampage does not last forever. The last of the fire-cocktails, carefully conserved for this final charge, are expended at close quarters, the flames eradicating the last of the eldritch beings in bursts of heat and light.
But just when it seems like the battle is about to be won, the dark king, his form visibly pulsating with magical power, makes his presence known in the most dramatic way possible.
(Sombra's Sorcery: 3+15(War Banner of the Gryphus Empire)+15(The Duke's Court of Guaneto)=33)
The sun seems to disappear as the battleground is shrouded in darkness. Suddenly and without warning, dozens of shadowy, multi-jointed arms burst upwards from the ground.
Some grab fallen blades and hack away at your soldiers, others simply wrap their fingers around skulls and squeeze with unnatural strength. The sickening cracks of shattering bones and screams of pain echo across the battlefield as knights and militia alike struggle to evade the phantom limbs impervious to blade and bludgeon. Splashes of liquid flame take down one or two of the arms, only for four more to take their places, their summoner protected by a wall of dark crystal that begins to slowly creep forwards, impaling those too slow to escape on shards of solidified magic, all as blasts of shadow-magic erupt from the mage's red horn, bowling over even the weighty and strong Yaks.
Hundreds die in seconds, the line beginning to buckle under the strain of the arcane assault, a single sorcerer accomplishing what thousands of his warriors could not: breaking the back of the Imperial Army.
Before you can respond, before you can even open your beak to give an order, your Wife flaps her wings, lifting off and making a beeline for the front. You curse and hurry after her, but even with a physique enhanced by her fitness regime, Gabriella is still faster than you.
Your wife, a figure who many refer to as a goddess of war, soars over the frontlines, braving freezing winds and the the grasping hands of the dread king. Her voice rings out through the pass, audible even over the din of battle.
"Hold your ground, protectors of the Empire, warriors of YakYakistan! Remember what you fight for! No matter what the cost, this evil shall not taint our homelands, shall not threaten our families, shall not destroy all that we have built! Not one step back!"
(Rally!: 81)
With a rallying cry of "Not one step back!" The line stabilizes. Spear and shield walls reform, militia filling in gaps in the formation, your people furiously beating back the invaders, even as the shadow summons harass them at every turn. The flanks push forwards, the hostile elites there now on the defensive...but the center remains deadlocked against the dark king, his shadow hands and dark crystals forming an impenetrable batter against any assault against him. Hundreds of brave souls throw themselves against his defenses only to be cut down.
In the mad chaos of battle, your sword raised above your head in an attempt to rally a bloodied battalion, you manage to lock eyes with Gabriella and Konrad Hardbeak. A strange feeling comes over you, and you all nod to each other, reaching an unspoken agreement: if this battle is to be won, the king must die. In unison, the three greatest heroes of the Empire of Gryphus take to the air and dive bomb the sorcerer.
(Charge of the Triumvirate: 89)
Were your brain not overwhelmed by adrenaline and fight-or-flight instincts, you might question your current course of action. You are not a warrior. The last time a king had to be killed you sat back and let your knights deal with it on your behalf. Perhaps you can't allow your wife to face this demon alone, perhaps you feel you have something to prove. Perhaps, in a dark pessimistic corner of your mind, you want your children to know that their father and mother died bravely, fighting alongside each other in a duel against the greatest evil since Discord.
In the end the reasoning behind your actions is irrelevant, for the result is the same. You, Gabriella and Konrad fall in a controlled dive towards your foe, your wings and legs held flat against your bodies, the wind buffeting you as you fall towards your target like living arrows. Spires of sharpened crystal erupt from the earth, threatening to impale you, but you fly straight between them, the jagged mineral protrusions a hairsbreadth from your wings. Grasping magic hands pursue you, but their grips catch only empty air. The horned equine calls forth blasts of raw magic that sear the air like lightening, leaving behind the acrid scent of burning ozone, but still you three heroes of the Empire fly straight and true.
For a moment, it must seem as if you will not pull up at all, that all three of you shall plummet straight to the ground. But then, dangerously close to the earth and in perfect unison, your wings flare outwards and you bleed off speed while pulling up, placing yourselves on three direct intercept courses with the black-furred King.
(The Kingslayer: 87)
Perhaps due to his experience from years of aerial combat and sparring with his colleagues, or perhaps due to an unspoken agreement amongst the three of you, Hardbeak is the first to reach your target, his claws outstretched for a slice across his neck. The sorcerer ducks, talons raking and slicing through his mane as he fires off a blast of magic that goes wild, missing his intended target.
Hardbeak banks and makes a hard turn, even as the sorcerer dodges similar attacks from you and Gabriella, firing off wild blasts of magic all the while, cursing and ranting in a tongue none of you have heard before. This is the circling vultures maneuver, one of the most basic and reliable methods of group assault against a singular ground-bound target. One Griffon attacks while the others line up for their own strikes, so that the target in question can't properly focus on his assailants for more than a few seconds before being forced to dodge and switch focus, minimizing the time each Griffon spends under threat. It was originally devised to combat trolls. Now you're using it against a mage-king with enough magical power to take on an army by himself. ...You're not too sure how to feel about that.
The grandmaster comes in for another attack, catching the sorcerer off guard while he's busy firing away at you and Gabriella. Once again, the equine moves to duck...but the Grandmaster catches more than his mane. With the sharp blades greaves attached to his talons, the Kingslayer severs the king's horn.
For a split second, it seems that the entire world freezes, even the wind not daring to move as the magic organ of the shadow sorcerer tumbles to the ground. Predictably, it is your foe who breaks the silence.
Sparks of raw magic erupts from his broken horn, his entire body glowing and vibrating with raw magical power as he screams in pain that has nothing to do with his injury.
A great wind picks up out of nowhere, a gale centered around the wounded king, air rushing towards him from across the battlefield as the glow of his body outstrips that of the sun. Acting on instinct, you tackle your wife and move to shield her body with your own. It proves to be the right decision. With an enormous explosion that shakes the earth and sends debris flying, all the magical power contained within the body of the shadow king erupts like a volcano, the force of the blast wave flattening your palisades and knocking every soldier on the battlefield off of their feet.
(Duck and Cover: 79)
Being only a short distance from the source of the explosion itself, it seems to you like a second sun has been brought into existence right next to you. The force of the blast sends you and Gabriella flying, shards of stone and broken crystal pinging off of your armor. You land back on the ground with a painful thud, fragments of debris falling around you.
With a groan, you stand, pulling your wife to her feet...just in time for a smoldering Konrad Hardbeak to land only a few wingspans away from you. You hurry over, checking his pulse....and sigh in relief. Just unconscious...and burned, but nothing that a few weeks of proper care can't fix. You look over towards the spot where the dark king once stood...and see only a blackened crater, a whisp of smoke hanging above it.
A whisp of smoke that proceeds to fly South at breakneck speeds, cursing you in the same foreign language that the embodied king had used earlier.
You grit your beak and sigh explosively. No...of course it wouldn't be that easy.
Battle of Redstone Pass: Victory!
All Invaders Killed, Sombra greatly weakened and forced to retreat to the Crystal Empire.
Gained Yak Respect, Increased Spousal Opinion by +.5
Imperial Army of Gryphus
5840 Warriors
1960 Polearms
3800 Archers
490 Diamond Dogs
5 Mobile Ballistae
4 Cannons
2 Flame Projectors
Imperial Knightly Orders
The Knights Lion
1 Grandmaster Konrad Hardbeak, "The Kingslayer"
18 Knights of the Inner Circle
90 Imperial Knights
120 Squires
245 Griffons-at-Arms
The Knights Talon
1 Grandmaster Colombroni Pigeonio
12 Knights of the Inner Circle
105 Imperial Knights
155 Squires
290 Griffons-at-Arms
The Knights Panther
1 Grandmaster Adrian Dawnquill
14 Knights of the Inner Circle
120 Imperial Knights
210 Squires
350 Griffons-at-Arms
Mercenaries
The War Wolves
245 Diamond Dogs
The Wood Stalkers
32 Warriors, 225 Archers
The Black Pikes
95 Pikes
The Crimson Company
26 Gryphon Berserkers
The Troll Busters
4 Static Flamethrowers
Auxiliaries/Allies
8,465 Imperial Militia
7,610 Yak Chargers
You guys have no idea just how lucky you were. I know it looks like a curb stomp from this angle but trust me: you were so very close to needing a new grandmaster...or a new wife.
Also, I just realized the real reason Garrick never gets into fights himself: I'm shit at writing fight scenes.
As for the bit where Sombra exploded...remember that first battle in Lord of the Rings where Sauron's hand gets chopped off? Yeah, it's basically that.
And no, Sombra's not dead. You're not getting rid of a threat that big that easily.
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- Location
- Reno Nv
YES! Now on to rebuilding and conquest.
...
Does that mean that to get his full power back, he will have to send his minions to recover his horn?
- Location
- United States of America
HS glad that's over for now hopefully he is weakened enough were he can't turtle up and just freeze us to death with his storm making us have to invade him although we will have to do this eventually to beat him.
- Location
- Maryland
Oh no, you burned that damn thing to ashes the first chance you got, Garrick is taking no chances.
ConfusedCanuck
Where did it all go wrong?
- Location
- Neverland
I really hope there is an option next turn to build a Huge Fortress in Redstone Pass because we all know Sombra is coming back and he will have a much larger army next time as well. Heck it might be a good idea to reinforce the defenses of that city near the pass, it would be a perfect fallback point for us in case we lose round two.
Huh.
Not going to ask how quickly he could do so if it's the case (because that would be too much information for free, I think), but is Sombra permanently nerfed from this, or can he recover fully?
There are other mountain passes. Just forting up this entrance will not stop a second attack.
Finagle007
[Verified Great Old One]
- Pronouns
- He/Him/His
Well, that's the end of Sombra for a while. It will take him quite some time to recover his physical form and magical strength, not to mention replenish his army after losing 100,000 slave-soldiers, his crystal abominations and shadow abominations. Perhaps even enough time for Celestia and Luna to deal with him for us.
Still, as @ConfusedCanuck says, building permanent fortifications at the pass - and any other passes - would be a good idea, just in case.
This is almost certainly a permanent nerf. Sombra is basically unicorn Sauron, and Sauron was permanently nerfed when he lost the Ring. Even if Sauron had reclaimed the Ring, he still wouldn't have regained his full strength, though the West wouldn't notice the difference.
Still, as @ConfusedCanuck says, building permanent fortifications at the pass - and any other passes - would be a good idea, just in case.
This is almost certainly a permanent nerf. Sombra is basically unicorn Sauron, and Sauron was permanently nerfed when he lost the Ring. Even if Sauron had reclaimed the Ring, he still wouldn't have regained his full strength, though the West wouldn't notice the difference.
What are you on about?
That was excellent.
The most critique I could offer is in the fact that it slightly seemed like the royals were just buzzing around while the kingslayer did the slaying - maybe with a bit more focus on Sombra noticing the additional fighters and deciding to delay them with spell barrages so he wouldn't need to deal with three griffons in a melee? As it was, it comes out as him doing so completely trivially and without a thought beyond spouting expletives, which kinda feels demeaning of the situation and our PC.
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- Location
- MN
Well, now we need to quickly rebuild our army, fortify the south as soon as we can if for no other reason the to have a fallback point should our own push into the south fail, and solidify our friendship with the yaks.
ConfusedCanuck
Where did it all go wrong?
- Location
- Neverland
Huh must of missed that then I still believe it would be a good idea to fortify the region then even if its only some watchtowers and small forts and not full blown castles.
This isn't the only pass.
A fortress holding a single pass isn't going to protect anything.
Finagle007
[Verified Great Old One]
- Pronouns
- He/Him/His
Take another look. I said this pass AND ANY OTHER PASSES.
