Chapter 753: Break the Formation

Chapter 753: Break the Formation

The army came down off the rise at a walk, and the ground began to press against Leon’s feet.

He shifted sideways. Pressure followed, strong enough to slow the movement. Behind three ranks of locked shields, thirty casters were feeding a single white light between their raised hands.

Leon went at the left edge with fire running along his sword. Three shields buckled. Before he could follow through, the second rank stepped into their places, and the fallen men were dragged behind the third. He sent lightning along the new front. It spread across the neighboring shields and faded, leaving their bearers shaking but upright.

Sharing the impact. That’s useful.

The shields opened around a narrow gap. White light struck through it.

Leon folded away from the blast, emerging beside the ruined keep. Stone burst against his back as the strike tore through the wall behind him. He brushed a fragment from his shoulder and watched the shield ranks close again.

The Marshal hadn’t left the center. He stood beneath his banner, one hand raised, while pale lines ran between the shields and the officers carrying short iron staffs behind them.

Leon could reach the center with space. The problem was arriving there while those lines still joined the Marshal to several hundred soldiers. The last strike had followed his departure quickly enough to catch the wall at his back. An opening would let him spend his strength on the commander instead of taking another concentrated volley on arrival.

He moved along the keep’s broken frontage. The army turned with him, its outer ranks shortening their steps to keep the formation together.

Let’s make you turn a little faster.

An image of Leon ran from the right-hand breach, sword high. Shields braced toward it. The casters’ light swung right, and Leon slipped out on the left under the concealment of his first-rank Illusion Aura.

He drove earth upward beneath the left flank. Two ranks stumbled on the sudden slope. He was already preparing to fold through the gap when the Marshal lowered his hand.

Half the casters kept aiming at the image. The others turned toward the disturbed earth.

Leon changed his landing point at once. He came out above the broken wall instead of inside the formation, and a white lance struck the space he’d intended to occupy. Heat ran across his cheek.

The false Leon had made no mark in the mud.

The Marshal pointed his sword toward the keep.

"Caster reserve. Hold."

The voice carried clearly. Leon wiped his cheek, found no blood, and smiled despite himself.

"You noticed."

The army answered with another volley.

He raised stone, sloped it, and caught the strike across its face. The slab burst apart. He was moving before the pieces fell, but the shield ranks had advanced while he defended, narrowing the clear ground around the keep. Their pressure now reached both breaches.

The commander wasn’t going to chase another image with his whole formation. He also wasn’t giving Leon time to stand around admiring the lesson.

For the next several exchanges, Leon made him work.

He attacked the right, withdrew under wind cover, and struck the left hard enough to kill the first shield bearer. Reinforcement spread the next blow through the adjoining ranks. Behind them, an officer drove his iron staff into the ground, and the pale connections brightened.

Leon remembered the movement. At the next opening he aimed for the officer instead. A dozen shields tilted inward to protect the man, exposing the troops beside them to a sweep of flame. Several fell. Others took their places, and the staff passed to a new bearer.

His breathing deepened. Maintaining the attacks while defending against the caster volleys was eating through mana much faster than taking the forts had. His native qi continued circulating cleanly, but he could feel its reserve diminishing too.

He backed through the keep’s ruined gate and let a blast take the arch above him. Falling stone hid him for a moment.

The staffs aren’t just for orders.

The lines converged on them. When one bearer moved, the neighboring shields adjusted to preserve the connection. They could replace a dead man quickly. Replacing a broken link while under attack would be harder.

Leon planted his sword in the rubble and pressed both hands against the ground.

Water spread beneath the mud along the approaching left flank. He kept it low, inside the soil. Above it, he sent another image running along the wall, this one accompanied by a real burst of wind that threw grit into the shield bearers’ faces.

The Marshal split his casters again. Leon had expected him to.

He froze the soaked ground and heaved the earth underneath it in opposite directions. The left flank slid apart along two sudden ridges. Soldiers crouched to keep their balance, dragging their shields with them. Three staff bearers raised their weapons to maintain contact across the widening gaps.

Leon pulled his sword free and folded to the nearest.

His blade cut through the iron shaft and its bearer. The neighboring links flared as they took the load. Leon was already moving toward the second, a stone ridge rising behind him to obstruct the casters’ aim.

The Marshal ordered the left flank back.

They obeyed well. The second staff reached the shelter of the inner shields before Leon could strike it. A white bolt smashed through his ridge, forcing him to catch the broken stone with earth and throw it into the retreating ranks.

His right arm jarred under the effort. He kept pressing.

He could see the third staff behind a knot of spearmen. Lightning struck it through a gap between two shoulders. Iron split, and the glow joining that section to the center went dark.

This time, when Leon hit the shields, the force stayed where he put it.

He broke through.

The casters abandoned their gathering strike and scattered behind the Marshal. Leon cut down those still holding the charged light, then turned as the inner shield ranks closed around him. Their remaining links still worked. The Marshal was trying to trap him inside a smaller formation.

Leon drove his sword into the ground and sent a ring of jagged stone through their footing. As they stumbled, he swept fire across the exposed connections. Two more staffs broke. The collective pressure faltered, and he finally had room to move freely.

After that, the difference in strength decided it.

He crossed the inner ranks before they could rebuild, striking through isolated guards and cutting down the last officer reaching for a fallen staff. Under the banner, the Marshal drew the survivors close.

The nearest soldiers laid hands against his armor. Those behind braced palms against their comrades’ backs or locked shields together. Their remaining power flowed inward, gathering along the Marshal’s raised sword.

Leon felt the weight of it and settled his grip. He would not give the man time for a second blow.

Their swords met with wind and lightning tearing outward across the rise. Leon’s feet sank into the ground. His right arm shook, and for a moment the gathered strength held him there.

He pushed through it with the Primordial Void Heart feeding the strike.

The Marshal’s blade broke. Leon’s cut continued through his guard and gray helm. The commander fell, and the remaining lines of power snapped out, leaving the soldiers around him collapsing into the churned ground.

Leon stood with his sword lowered until his breathing steadied. His mana reserve had fallen sharply, and his arm ached. He still had his holy energy untouched, but earning this victory without it had cost him real effort.

He looked at one of the broken staffs beside his boot.

Better soldiers, moving with that same discipline, would have been a very different fight.

I’d rather be the one commanding them.

The air shimmered before him.

[Floor Four — Cleared]

[Mandatory objectives: Complete]

[Optional objective: Complete — Marshal of the Valley Host defeated]

[Evaluation: SSS]

[Reward 1: Administrator authority — advanced]

[Reward 2: Legendary Inheritance — Sovereign’s War Mandate]

Leon read the last line again, then laughed, too pleased to care that there was nobody there to hear him.