Chapter 658: Catapult Crisis
Sam was trying his best to make things right, but he is already a bit late, maybe he should have just become more determined and earlier too.
Because that night, while he and Philip are working on some armors, the Minotaurs made a first significant attack.
For the first battle at the town gate, the Minotaur's mainly damaged the town hall than the soldiers, that is because of their lack of long-range attacking methods and their lack of aptitude in taming beasts.
But now the situation changed. They have those catapults of various sizes. From small size that could through a medium-sized rock to target the soldiers on the wall and the larger size that could cross past the walls and land directly in the town destroying the residents. There are all sizes.
Not just that, the Minotaurs were joined with another batch of troops that are riding some flying beasts.
Dwarves are also not that great when taming, but that is not because of their in aptitude, rather they don't really care much for the support of beasts and always believed in doing everything themselves, but they know better than not having anything that could defend the airborne attacks.
They also have a flying squad. Their only advantage is numbers.
But the Minotaur's attack surprised them as they didn't expect the flying troops to not even stop at their base, rather they directly attacked.
As the two air forces are clashing, the thing that has the potential to break the balance turned out to be the catapults.
When they placed the rocks in and injected the spiritual energy into the catapult, the rocks are suddenly lit up with dark grey flames and even the force of the rock was increased as they shot the catapults.
The dwarven archers and the wall defenders all tried their best to shoot down the rocks that are shot towards them.
Some of the rocks only hit the wall and crushed. But the flame caught on the wall and it is burning continuously.
Even the ground that was filled with those rock fragments is still burning.
When Sam heard the explosive sound, he came running out of the house only to see a boulder burning with grey flames flying into the town and crashing into the wooden shacks.
Sam ran to that place as fast as he can and when he saw the scene, he couldn't help but suck in a cold breath.
The whole shack was in shambles and burning with grey flame. Even the people that are inside are burning as they writhed and rolled on the ground in pain.
Sam threw a jet of water at them, but to his surprise that didn't stop the flame. He used his eye technique to see what is happening and then only he noticed that the flesh is not burning off of them. But the vitality is running out. Sam has seen this before, but he didn't want to believe it.
If this is really true, then they are in deeper shit than he thought.
There are three people burning with flames and Sam ran to one person and started using light elemental energy to control the vitality.
He flame is sucking the vitality away as it burned brightly, so Sam tried his best to restrict the vitality from moving. After seeing some reaction, he extended his hands and did the same to the second one. He looked at the dwarves and humans surrounding them and yelled.
"Don't stay in groups, disperse, and don't touch the flames. If any of you are healers, try healing the third person, no matter what reaction they have just keep on pouring vitality quick."
Sam continued to restrict the vitality and he could see the flame burning less and less and finally, a person stopped writhing in pain and flames disappeared. He was about to move and focus on the third person too. But it was already too late.
The grey flame already disappeared leaving the person with pale skin. That guy stood up clumsily and jumped into Sam who is still focusing on the second person.
Sam dodged the attack and looked at the person. He is no longer living, he turned into an undead.
Sam clenched his fist as he looked at the second guy he was in the middle of saving, due to this small distraction, he was already burning more rapidly and the process only became faster. Sam could see him turning into the undead.
He aimed his hands at both of them as golden flames shot through. He just threw the flame in the form of a jet as he burned them until even their bone melted.
The surrounding people are looking at him in shock, but before they could say anything, the next wave of attacks already aimed at the town. Luckily even with the people behind them, Minotaurs are a little dumb and they don't seem to know about the true effects of the boulders and the flames, they are mostly attacking the walls and the doors to collapse them and the only a couple of boulders are flying into the sky.
He called out harbinger and zoomed into the air as he threw two energy cells towards the two boulders and aimed his golden flames at the third one.
He burned the stone until the grey flame disappeared and slapped the remaining into small pebbles.
The remaining two boulders were blasted by the energy blast and didn't cause much damage to the town.
By this time, all his teammates are running towards Sam's location. If not for the fact, that the beasts are not unsealed they would have come too. But now they are gobbling the middle-grade bread like crazy and burning the energy to digest it as fast as they can.
When he saw his teammates, Sam started issuing commands.
"Don't let a single boulder come past the walls and don't even touch them. No matter what the dwarves say don't stop."
By this time, some of the guards already came towards the scene, Sam looked at them and asked.
"Where is your commander?"
He asked in a rather domineering voice. They couldn't even answer with their mouth and just pointed the direction.
Sam looked at Chatur and Arman. "Try your best to control the chaos. If any boulder comes past, predict the trajectory and try to clear the people there and destroy the boulder."
Sam disappeared from the spot and in a few minutes, he met with the commander, who is guiding the archers to shoot down the boulders.
If it is in a normal world, it would have been impossible. But what shocked Sam, even more, is that some of the archers and guards are caught with some of the grey flames.
They didn't take the full brunt of the boulder and only some scraps and they are not fully caught and the flame is only burning on the armor.
He didn't even stop and ran to them and used his sword to cut through the armors.
But right after he did so for three people, the commander came running and halted his tracks.
"Commander, that grey flame is dangerous, it will turn people into undead. Half of the soldiers have grey flame burning on their armors, they shouldn't touch it with their hands, tell them to take those armors off, they are not useful anymore."
Sam said as he continued with this, the dwarves are startled by his movements and thought that Sam might be a spy from another side.
But only after listening to his words that they came back to their senses and started feeling panic.
The commander is still doubtful and when he was about to say something, Sam's voice was heard.
"Commander, I am still showing respect to you as hosts, but if you say one skeptical word about me, I am done with that. I am telling you that there is something wrong since day one, but you wouldn't listen, if you don't take action now, don't blame me for the consequences. I took an assignment from Veer and I will finish it no matter what and whatever the cost is. Even if it means killing you and the numbskull of a town head.
So, you either listen to me and do something about the situation or get ready to die."
Sam left those words and looked at the situation beyond the wall. He couldn't help but suck a breath of cold air.
There are more catapults than he thought and they are not active yet, but once they are all active, they wouldn't have anything else to do.
Sam took out two Javelins from his storage and started injecting his fire elemental energy into it. The two javelins are filled with fire elemental energy and he threw one of them at the Catapults.
As Javelin cut through the air and went to the Catapult a Minotaur with Pre-transcendent stage cultivation used his battle hammer to strike the Javelin. After a fierce explosion, the minotaur was pushed a few steps back and even the formation on the Catapult was activated. There is a defensive formation, that could take some Pre-transcendent level hits.
Sam coldly looked at Minotaur and started circulating energy. The energy waves passed through his body and entered the spear. He slammed his foot into the wall surface and a small crack appeared as he threw the Javelin at full force.
The Javelin disappeared into a golden flash and the Minotaur panicked. He didn't hold back at all and used all his energy to strike the Javelin as if his life depended on it.
But this time, the situation is different. The javelin passed through the hammer and sent the Minotaur flying towards the Catapult at the same time it pierced through the formation and exploded. When the dust settled, half of the catapult was destroyed and it is clearly not suitable for shooting anymore.
But Sam is not at all happy, because he is panting on the wall. The energy it took destroy the catapult is colossal.