Siege and Wyverns

Watching the triumphant Dragonscale Marine, the dwarves seethed with fury. Brandishing their warhammers and battleaxes, they hurled venomous curses: "Damn him! The bastard's too arrogant!" "His mouth stinks worse than an orc's!" "Dragon minion, die!" A dwarven warrior, his face contorted in rage, raised his warhammer high and leapt into the air with a furious bellow—suffice it to say, a leap attack was forever a fighter's romance. Yet the Dragonscale Marine had long noticed the dwarf's ambush. His muscles bunched tight, fully prepared. The empire's genetic modifications endowed him with the neural reflex speed of a hummingbird, allowing him to perceive incoming danger within a mere 0.2 milliseconds. "*Haaah—!*" With a bloodcurdling scream, the dwarven warrior brought his warhammer smashing down toward the back of the Dragonscale Marine's skull. This was a heavy hammer crafted with dwarf mastery. If it connected, even hardened scale armor would struggle to absorb the blunt kinetic force. The Dragonscale Marine did not even turn his head. Anticipating the strike, he thrust his chainsword straight up, its tip aimed directly at the dwarf's chest. The dwarven warrior went pale with horror and twisted his body midair in a desperate attempt to dodge, but it was already too late. *Rip—* The tip of the chainsword pierced ruthlessly through the dwarf's chest, impaling him clean through. The dwarf hung suspended on the Dragonscale Marine's arm. Immediately after, the serrated teeth along the chainsword whirred at blinding speed, chewing relentlessly through flesh and bone. Blood sprayed in all directions. Skin, flesh, and even bone were shredded by the chainsword, spilling brain matter, viscera, and intestines in a sickening deluge. "Fuck, that's disgusting." The Dragonscale Marine spat and shook his hand with a sharp snap. The dwarf's corpse tore apart into several mangled chunks and flew outward, slumping onto the stone like a discarded, bloody rag. Completely unrecognizable as a humanoid form, the sight was nothing short of horrific. "Tyron!" "Y-you dare treat a brave, fearless warrior like that?!" The dwarves' voices trembled with extreme fury and shock. The Dragonscale Marine casually wiped the blood from his face and grinned again. "Want to avenge him? Then come kill me! Hahahaha!" Seeing their kinsman's gruesome death and the Dragonscale Marine's desecration of his remains, the dwarves' eyes turned bloodshot. They burned to hack the monster before them into a thousand pieces. A dwarven captain raised his heavy hammer and roared, "Clansmen, together! Crush his head to splinters!" "Kill the monster!" "Go to hell!" Rallied by hatred, the dwarven warriors banded into a tight formation and converged from several directions, attempting to envelop and overwhelm the Dragonscale Marine. "Come on, come on..." the Dragonscale Marine muttered under his breath. He had loaded his weapon and was merely waiting for these small fry to bunch up so he could test out his new ammunition. Seeing the dwarves clump together, the corners of his mouth curled into an increasingly savage grin. He slowly raised the boltgun on his right arm, leveling its gaping, cannon-sized barrel forward. *Bang!* A thunderous shot echoed across the ramparts. A specialized round erupted from the barrel, detonating just before reaching the dwarves and unleashing an expanding cloud of shrapnel. The densely grouped dwarves bore the brunt of it, their flesh mercilessly torn to shreds by the barrage. These were Metal Storm fragmentation rounds—ideal ordnance against clusters of lightly armored targets. They detonated ahead of impact to spray out shrapnel, tearing their victims apart. Short-range proximity explosives replaced high-impact reactive primers, and the adamantine penetrators were swapped out for bursting casings. The imperial military specifically issued this ammunition to Dragonscale Marines to counter massed enemy infantry, enabling these humanoid slaughter machines to mow through opposing ranks like gods of war. And now, its combat performance proved undeniably spectacular. *Bang! Bang! Bang!* Thanks to the empire's military engineering, this absurdly large-caliber boltgun could fire in rapid succession! Laughing maniacally, the Dragonscale Marine spun in place and squeezed the trigger repeatedly, firing in every direction into the surrounding dwarves. Even more outrageously, he tossed two metal spheres from his bag of holding. The spheres flared to life midair, unfolding into floating automated turrets that poured out a torrential hail of lead. Amidst a chorus of explosions and deafening blasts, the dwarves were reaped like wheat before a scythe, falling in swath after swath. Yet dwarves were a stubborn, brave race; death on the battlefield held no terror for them. Faced with such carnage, the dwarven warriors did not waver. Stepping over the corpses of their comrades, they charged through the dense hail of shrapnel and bullets. Even if they managed to close the distance, however, they had to face the whirring, gore-drenched chainsword. A single exchange was enough to cleave them in two. Dwarves farther back attempted to fell the monstrosity with hand crossbows and bows, but the Dragonscale Marine's body was encased in hardened scales and an exoskeleton, rendering him practically impervious. Arrows striking him produced only crisp clinking sounds before bouncing harmlessly away. "For Evindeldan!" A dwarf with bloodshot eyes rushed him from behind, swinging a heavy hammer. The Dragonscale Marine pivoted and brought the muzzle up. *Bang!* The tremendous kinetic impact hurled the dwarf backward, slamming him hard against the parapet. His body was riddled with bullet holes, crimson welling out in steady streams. "Evindeldan will never..." The dwarf slumped against the stones, gasping out the words, but drew his last breath before he could finish. "All done!" The Dragonscale Marine blew away the drifting gunsmoke from the barrel, wiped the blood from his face once more, and chuckled with relish. Dwarven corpses were piled high around him. The acrid stench of gunpowder mingled with the heavy reek of blood across the ramparts, turning the surrounding walkway into a shallow lake of red. In this brief span, he had slaughtered nearly a hundred dwarven warriors. Similar scenes were playing out all across the walls of Evindeldan. Dror had deployed more than a dozen Dragonscale Marines via wyvern drops to tear through the enemy's front lines and draw fire, allowing the main infantry force to scale the ramparts. The results far exceeded his expectations. These Dragonscale Marines acted like living bombs thrown into the fortress, shattering the dwarven defenders into complete disarray. As the pinnacle creations born of the Cinder Empire's fusion of genetic engineering and magic technology—costing an average of ninety thousand gold coins apiece—these Dragonscale Marines possessed unmatched offense and defense. By official imperial standards, their Challenge Rating hovered between 12 and 14, putting them on par with minor bosses. Even so, they were not invincible. In both scale and quality, they remained far behind Holy Fadlan's Godblood Legion—at least at their current stage. *Boom!* With a dull, rolling tremor and an eruption of shattered stone, a jagged spike of rock thrust violently upward through the flagstones like a colossal blade, skewering a Dragonscale Marine from groin to gullet. "*Ugh... argh...*" The Dragonscale Marine hung suspended upon the stone spire, his scalding, corrosive dragon blood hissing as it ate into the rock below. At the crest of the ramparts, King Ed held his warhammer aloft with one arm. Wearing a look of ferocious resolve, his gaze cut across the battlefield, locking onto another Dragonscale Marine who was hacking through the garrison. With another muffled boom, Ed vaulted into the air, leaping effortlessly nearly a hundred meters into the sky. He swung his warhammer down through the whistling air, crushing that Dragonscale Marine into a pulp with a single blow. The dwarven king surveyed his surroundings and shouted at the top of his lungs, "Everyone—Evindeldan faces a battle for its very survival! We must give everything we have!" "His Majesty Ed!" "Praise the mighty Lord of the Mountain!" Seeing two Dragonscale Marines perish in an instant, the dwarves rallied with thunderous cheers. Along the southwestern section of the walls, another renowned dwarven warrior, Bren Farrell, stepped forward and ran a Dragonscale Marine through. At Ed's call, the elite among the dwarves threw themselves fully into the fray: mighty runic champions, fearless berserkers, and seasoned battlemasters surged across the ramparts. Yet two fists could not hold back four hands. Even if the dwarven elites could dispatch Dragonscale Marines, stemming the Cinder Empire's tidal offensive was another matter entirely. Siege engineering wagons rumbled up behind the tanks to reach the base of the walls. The dwarves rolled boulders down and hurled barrels of burning liquor, but achieved little effect. By contrast, the imperial artillery seemed to possess eyes of its own, raining shells down from above to pinpoint and obliterate hidden dwarven defenses, leaving the defenders powerless. *Vrrr—* Massive assault ladders dozens of meters tall rose from the engineering carriages, latching onto Evindeldan's walls. Imperial infantry swarmed up the rungs in relentless waves to secure the outer parapets. The Dragonscale Marines ahead had already soaked the brunt of the dwarven firepower and carved a path of blood. All the infantry needed to do was systematically lock down the walls and capture Evindeldan. Above, Evindeldan's skies were dominated by the Cinder wyverns and flame drakes. Beating their wings, they showered the dwarves with torrents of dragonfire, occasionally diving down to seize dwarves in their talons, carry them aloft, and drop them to their deaths. The dwarves retaliated fiercely, shooting volley after volley of arrows into the air and sending wyverns tumbling from the sky one after another. "Take back our positions! These walls were built by our ancestors—never let them fall to the enemy!" Bren roared, brandishing his greatsword as he led a countercharge. *Bang! Bang! Bang!* The imperial infantry fired in rapid succession, but Bren brought the flat of his blade up like a shield to deflect the incoming rounds. In a single bound, the dwarven warrior closed the distance, swinging his greatsword in a wide arc. *Slash—* Blood sprayed. Several imperial soldiers were sheared in half at the waist. Spurred on, the dwarven warriors behind him surged forward with cries of "For Evindeldan!" Yet the imperial infantry did not panic. At their officers' barked commands, they shifted formation with cold discipline, dispersing into staggered lines to deliver crossfire from multiple angles. *Bang! Bang!* Dwarven warriors fell one after another under the hail of gunfire, their fates uncertain. Even bleeding on the flagstones, these tenacious dwarves clung desperately to their enemies' boots, using their teeth to deliver one final bite. *Hooo—* A clarion horn sounded as a troop of dwarven goat cavalry crashed into the imperial lines. They hacked and slashed with sabers and warhammers, shouting battle cries, only to be swallowed by the wall of gunfire and shrapnel. The walls of Evindeldan had become a veritable meat grinder, with both sides locked in brutal contention over every bastion and turret. One moment imperial soldiers would gun down the dwarves and seize a position; the next, warriors like Bren would rally their kinsmen to take it back through sheer obstinacy and bloodshed. The stones of the ramparts were stained dark crimson with the blood of both armies. Yet this war of attrition favored the empire overwhelmingly. The Cinder Empire had brought sixty thousand infantry, whereas Evindeldan had harbored barely over ten thousand dwarves before the battle began. Now, tested by blood and fire, the dwarven defenders likely numbered fewer than six thousand. If this continued, Evindeldan would become a city of the dead! "Clansmen, charge with me! Take back that tower!" Greatsword in hand, Bren spearheaded the assault, leading a band of dwarven warriors in yet another counterattack. His armor was battered and blood-spattered, covered in bullet holes and cracks. He had lost count of how many charges he had led today. Yet those frail-bodied imperial infantrymen, who relied solely on their firearms, showed no sign of breaking. They did not yield an inch, unbothered even when comrades fell dead beside them. "True... monsters," Bren spat through clenched teeth, forcing the words out from the depths of his throat. "For Evindeldan!" Gritting his teeth, he let out a hoarse roar and raised his greatsword with both hands, lunging toward the imperial soldiers. In that split second, a sudden dread gripped Bren's heart. Sure enough, the sky darkened. A colossal shadow fell over him, followed by a blast of searing, suffocating smoke. *Boom!* A massive talon descended from above, slamming toward the dwarven warrior. Bren threw himself down, rolling several times in succession to narrowly escape the blow. Wheezing for breath, the dwarf turned his head. Coiled atop the battlements of the tower was a wyvern of staggering proportions, glaring down at him. Its pale gold irises flickered with lethal intent, strings of dragon spit dripping from the corners of its maw. It was none other than the leader of the wyverns—Smaug! Tightening his grip on his greatsword, Bren felt a chill sink into his gut. By his estimate, the beast before him was fully twenty meters long, and it exuded a terrifying, suffocating Frightful Presence. Calling this a mere drake felt absurd; even a true red dragon would struggle to match such sheer majesty. *Roaaar—!* Smaug reared his head back, stretching his neck to unleash a thunderous roar. Only then did he lower his gaze toward the dwarf, crimson fire gathering in his throat. Bren's expression changed drastically. Scrambling to his feet, he sprinted with all his might—he knew all too well what that meant. *Fwoosh!* Instantly, brilliant flames filled the dwarf's vision. A deluge of dragonfire engulfed the walls of Evindeldan. Amidst the sea of flames, Smaug beat his massive wings and unleashed a deafening bellow: "I am fire! I am death!" In truth, these were not words the wyvern had come up with on his own—he was merely carrying out Cassius's orders, indulging a rather trivial, eccentric whim of the emperor's.