Volume 24 Chapter 2: The Clash With the Hermes Guild
Weed organized the troops of the Undead Legion. The skeletons that were gathered on the ground below have heard about his reputation! With the glorious title of the Warrior Commander of the Undead Legion, gathering soldiers was an easy task. Weed went around the fortress speaking to the undead.
“Come with me.”
“Yes sir.”
+Death Knights have joined.
“Let us go fight.”
“I have heard that Bar Khan has great confidence in you so I would like to play an active part in the fight.”
+Doom Knights have joined.
“Stop playing around and let’s go fight.”
“I have been waiting.”
+The Balkan Undead Knights have joined.
Since he had the status as Bar Khan’s direct subordinate, he could easily recruit the knights. He gathered as many Death Knights and Doom knights that he could. It was a very powerful force.
“I need to gather as much power from this place that I can. That way the chances of success are higher.”
Under his command, Weed expanded the number of undead troops he had available. The Necromancers and Doom Knights regularly summoned more undead. He was thinking of annoying the Hermes Guild with the undead. He was supposed to command the undead to fight against the Elven and Barbarian Alliance. Since he was acting contrary to his orders, his reputation with the Undead Legion would drop and their trust in him would be reduced.
“I need to hunt down Bar Khan anyways…”
He was thinking of betraying them later on. Weed organized a group of over 700 elite undead knights.
Aside from the main force, there were an assortment of low rank spectres and other undeads.
“I don’t think they have an unlimited number of arrows.”
Spectres were best to use once all the the wizards’ mana and the rangers’ arrows were depleted. Aside from magic, in order to deal damage against them they needed to buy a lot of silver, which was a limited resource. Weed had Intermediate Blacksmithing but it was not easy to find enough users in the Continent of Versailles with the skills to work with the material.
“They will never see the real purpose to the Blacksmithing skill.”
For people that had easy access to weapons there was no need to bother raising the Blacksmithing skill!
***
“Come!”
Weed took the undead troops and went to fight against the Knights, Wizards, and Rangers. Marein had expected that Weed would come back for revenge and it was true. Last time it had been a small battle skirmish, but now it was a full fledged war. Since leadership was encouraged in the Hermes Guild to some degree, Palon and his men had readied a defense on a favorable hillside.
“He’s charging this way to us with the undead.”
“There are Death Knights, Doom Knights, and others. There is a formidable amount of power in his forces.”
“There is a significant number of knights than I can count. I have never seen so many knights before in a army.”
The Hermes Guild had a much different outlook on the situation. Weed had come rushing back, impatient and angry, which meant that they could kill him once more…
Looking at it as nothing more than a game, the users of the Hermes Guild thought themselves to be in a fortunate position.
“Even if the undead knights come, then we will just break their forces with arrows and magic.”
“They have come into our attack range!”
The users wet their dry mouths in anticipation of the undead advance. They would show their might by covering the sky in arrows and magic attacks. Magic had a great power and a large enough attack would mean the difference between victory and defeat in combat. Weed knew about how troublesome it was since a lot of the high ranking Doom Knights were nervous.
“Fire!”
Once in range, the rangers drew their bows. The wizards hurled magic accordingly. Silver arrows and fireballs came flying through the sky towards the group of undead. Weed had commanded his minions to charge through the barrage of attacks.
“Fall back.”
Weed then quickly backed out with the undead. Since most of the group was made of knights and spectres, their mobility was strong. The area was blown apart by magic and the ground became littered with silver arrows but most of the undead did not die since they were out of range. Weed stopped the undead outside of the strong attack and waited. Then he spread out his undead troops and began to march on them again.
“Get ready to attack again. Fire!”
The Rangers and Wizards had to distribute their attack over a larger area now.
“Rangers target the center, Mages should focus on attacking the left and right sides.”
The armed troops’ concentrated power was very strong but now the damage had to be spread out evenly.
Their firepower was terrifying so Weed would back out with the undead whenever the time was right. Since the damage had spread out evenly and with the undead regeneration speed, only about 90 undead were injured.
“Uwaaa!”
“Do not let the undead come close!”
The morale of the wizards and the rangers increased. If the enemy came closer then they would cause significantly more damage. Even with the fast mobility of the undead knights, once they entered attack range they were focused upon and struck down with several attacks. This way, a similar situation repeated itself four times. Weed was using the Undead attacks to consume all of the Rangers’ silver. The Undead Legion was not budging even though they were being attacked with a modest amount of silver. Thanks to Bar Khan’s Death Aura skill, the undead had high resistance to magical attacks and faster health regen.
“We got a lot. Be sure to collect all of it.”
Weed had the spectres go around and bring in the silver into a stack so he could sell it. He was going to supplement the loot that he had lost with the silver.
“Lullulu.”
He was humming a happy tune because of the silver.
“If the fight continues in this way, then I think I’ll be able to collect tens of thousands of gold.”
It didn’t matter to him if the undead died.
***
The next day Weed came back after he recruited more undead. There was little difference in the futile battle and the undead lost a lot of their units. Unfortunately the moral of the undead dropped frequently. By luck the enemy would always have slightly greater attack power. Weed found this to be inevitable. The amount of time that was spent looking around the citadel for good knights increased.
“It’s that fledgling Doom Knight. Without us the undead cannot hope to get any great achievements.”
The dragons saw him as ridiculous. They felt their lives were more valuable than the rest. Pollon and the Hermes Guild had been staying on that hill for the last day. It was a very defensive location where they had good mobility. Their objective was to murder Weed. If that was not possible, then their goal was to interfere as much as possible with Weed’s success rate with his quest.
“Today he came back with more undead.”
Since they had spent most of their silver arrows on the first day, the attitude of Pollon and the Hermes Guild users had changed.
“Use arrows. Hit them with magic and wipe out those knights!”
Today they decided to change their tactic to use their mana for magic while using enchanted arrows to stop the charging knights. Divine magic was the natural enemy of the undead knights. Blessings, Protection, Magic, Recovery. The four groups of divine magic began to hunt down the undead knights. They had confidence in their power to kill Weed and win.
“Attack!”
“Trample them all!”
This was the proof of the bravery of the the Kingdom of Haven’s Knights! The Knights refused to stop their advance even after being hit 10 times. The power of the magical groups that backed the knights could not be ignored. They were known as the 10 best knights that they had. Their level exceeded 380 and they were fully equipped with the best items. While mounted, the knights had twice as much power. The Knights were known to have amazing speed and destructive force to destroy their enemy.
“Weed is only one person and compared to the rest of the undead he is slow. Charge and wipe them out!”
“Uwaaa!”
The Knights’ charge was very intimidating for Weed. However, he was not going to let them chase him on horseback
“I have to win this fight.”
Weed ordered the Doom knights to assault the Knight Templars.The power of the undead that he had brought with him from the fortress was significant. The Knights of the Central Continent were known to shrug off magic and arrows to some degree and have won every fight. However, there were over 9800 undead among them were many Death Knights. When a fight broke out, they had more than enough power to inflict damages.
“The Knights are to focus on attacking and killing only one person. The goal is at the far end away from their knights. Do not care about the other foes and only head towards the goal.”
“Yes, as you command.”
Weed fell back. He used his ability to manage the undead as well as he could. Weed did not stay behind to let them rain magic down on him and busied himself with commanding the undead that were rapidly collapsing. There had been 27 Knights that were killed in that battle. This was thanks to Weed who had commanded the knights strictly through the arrows and magic. Due to the characteristics of the Knight class, it was difficult for them to help their allies that have fallen during the charge. During the fight, he had minimized the damage taken and the magical explosions did little to the undead as it fell, since the Death Knights continued to advance.
“The profits are alright.”
He had a lot of weapons and armors that the knights were equipped with. It was like in an elementary school where the teacher scolded the child and not the snitch!
“The human have us at our physical limits. I cannot help but think what the honorable Bar Khan will say when he finds out. Do not let the humans leave this fight. Go to battle.”
At that moment, he used Yell to command all the undead that he had gathered from the fortress.
“This, these humans must be eliminated.”
“I fight for Bar Khan.”
The Death Knights and the Doom Knights continued to rise to fight.
Pollon’s unit wiped them out again. However Weed did suffer some losses. From the consecutive defeats, his reputation with the Undead Legion’s had deteriorated considerably.
“I heard that the undead unit had to return again.”
“I hear that there’s an incompetent Doom Knight. He’s not reliable enough to take care of some humans. He must have no pride.”
Weed was not handling the undead forces delicately. He simply came back and collected more undead. The original task of hunting down the elves and dwarves would have been nice if Bar Khan or the dragons had come along. The excitement of being known as a dragon knight. There never had been such an entity on the Continent of Versailles. Leading the undead army, with a dragon to burn down human villages would have been exciting and aggressive!
“It would have been nice if we weren’t so close to Morata…”
Unfortunately the closest large city was Morata. However, all of it would become useless once he betrayed Bar Khan. He properly utilized the undead for this purpose. Once they had scrambled the Knights, they had no longer bothered to fire silver or magic.
“Thankfully there’s a lot of silver. The skeletons I summoned were beaten! Such a waste of mana. They couldn’t manage to killed one or two knights before they died.”
For trying to fail his quest, Weed was paying back their cowardice back a hundredfold!
One Silver Arrow, two Silver Arrows, he was collecting them to make silver bullions. Weed laughed as the silver continued to pile up.
“Keulkeulkeul. This is the best hunting ground.”
Pollon and the Hermes Guild could not manage to kill Weed.
“We can’t make any mistakes when it comes to catching him…he ran away the very moment I saw him.”
“We need to take advantage of the rangers’ and mages’ attack range. To take him down we need to move into another formation.”
Weed only watched the undead battle from the back and then returned to the Undead Legion camp. Weed’s only goal was to get more knights. Pollon led the vanguard but he could not stop the undead from leaving. Every time they were left with less knights and Weed only came back with more undead. It was having a cheaper lunch than your friends in preschool!
“Keulkeulkeulkeul.”
Weed provoked them by having a wagon filled with the silver dragged along by skeletons. They deliberately slowed the pace of the undead to gather silver. Sometimes they would be dancing or walking backwards. Compared to a villain that showed up on TV and movies, Weed was the worst. Still they continued to watch Weed on the TV and supported him.
“This is a bad situation.”
As the battle continued, Pollon’s forces began to accumulate damages. The knights were all high level and very experienced players but there were still damages. Since there were more NPCs than user, their size had reduced considerably. Even a lot of Pollon’s valued knights were gone.
“Our job is to hunt him so a surprise attack would be better.”
Pollon: It does not make sense to stay here. Weed will not allow us to kill him in this situation and will retreat if we try.
Pollon opened the communication channel with the Hermes Guild leaders. He was calling for immediate aid from the magical division. Without commands they were not allowed to make a move.
Rafael: Controlling your area is important. They had already recruited the necromancers and there are many people watching the battle on TV. How are you incapable of killing Weed? Do not move your unit until you succeed.
Pollon: We are in plain sight. Even with magic and arrows we only have so much range. There is no benefit to this order. We do not have a large enough force for that.
Rafael: I command you to stay. Continue to interfere with Weed’s quest.
The Hermes Guild no longer cared about stopping with Weed’s quest. It was enough for the guild leaders to hold Weed in place.
***
“It’s strange that they’re not avoiding battles.”
Weed continued to attack Pollon’s Hermes Guild unit with the undead relentlessly. Meanwhile Pale’s party and the Geomchis had arrived from Morata to hunt Bar Khan. When they heard news of the endless battle they came riding their bulls.
“Keoheom, so we’re here now.”
Geomchi3 descended from his bull and looked at Pollon’s unit of archers.
“It’s still not over yet?”
“Sahyung, that must be our share that’s left behind.”
Pollon had suffered a lot of damage since he was only focusing on defense. They had used magic and arrows to attack the undead as they came closer but they suffered a lot of damage from the undead as the fight went on. Their total of 200 knights had now decreased to 127.
Out of the one thousand mage and archers, they only and 130 left intact. Comparably, Weed’s Undead Legion was not badly injured while 73 of Pallon’s units were in bad condition. The very same Knight units from the Kingdom of Haven that could occupy a castle were now in such a state. Geomchi got off of his bull and took out the food ingredients.
“Weed, I’m starving. I want to eat some grilled meat.”
Delicious, quick to eat grilled meat. The Geomchis had brought food over from Morata in order to eat. It did not matter if they wanted to eat rice in the middle of the fight with the Hermes Guild! Weed made some marinade for the meat as the Geomchis handed over their weapons and armor.
“It’s a bit worn out.”
“I just came back from the ocean. Can you fix it?”
The Geomchis took off their black armor that had less than 20 durability points left.
“It will not be that difficult since its not completely broken.”
Weed repaired the equipment to maximum durability and set a whetstone on the floor.
“Hello. You look good as a Doom Knight.”
“Long time no see, I’m Belotte.”
Pale cautiously made his way around Pollon’s camp to scout and returned.
“Euheum, the rangers of the Hermes Guild…they’re not going to be that challenging. By the way, Maylon is on today.”
“At such a time?”
“Let me see if its time yet”
Maylon was busy everyday so she decided to take a vacation for this major battle to go hunt Bar Khan. The priest and paladins from Morata watched as Weed, that they looked up to and admired, carried on in ordinary conversation with his friends.
“At such a time…! In front of such a large battle, how can they be so relaxed.’
‘Are they not scared of the Hermes Guild?’
Weed worked the whetstone as the paladins and priests came by to say their hellos.
“Hello.”
“Nice to meet you Weed.”
High level priests and paladins! They could not read the expression on Doom Knight’s Weed’s face. Weed began to contemplate his possibilities with the priests and paladins.
“Do you have everything you need?”
“Yes?”
“Would you like to have a bargain?”
Inside his backpack were all sorts of japtem and rusty weapons such as maces for priests to use. For priests, it had many divine stats that would help them in the fight against the undead. Weed had used the undead to keep fighting against Pollon’s Hermes Guild unit regularly.
“Who are they?”
“Weed’s colleagues?”
“I don’t know why they came here. Surely they’re not here to help Weed attack us?”
From the report that they had on Weed, he mostly moved alone and only had a few friends. However there were more than 1000 priests and paladins with the Geomchis that have arrived. Weed was not the type to ask for help in a personal fight. There was no way that Pollon had thought that he had called them from Morata to hunt down Bar Khan.
“I’m in trouble.”
Pollon and the users of the Hermes Guild could not believe it.
***
Every board associated with Royal Road had topics about Weed and the Hermes Guild Battle.
-The shining star known as Weed has descended.
-Isn’t the Hermes Guild the strongest guild on the Continent of Versailles?”
Time after time, Weed appeared before Pollon’s unit. Public opinion began to change.
-Weed’s true ability.
-Hermes Guild finally meets their match.
-Pollon’s prided magic, ranged, and knights group are going to fall to the undead.
-Is there really a limit to Weed’s leadership skills?
In more ways than one it was an urgent concern. The number of users that cheered for Weed was overwhelming. Broadcasters were forced to side with Weed in every battle. Just by doing that their ratings would increase 2-3 times more than usual! The broadcasters had smiles hanging from their faces.
“They just keep fighting all day.”
“Quickly finish the advertising…people want to get back to the broadcast.”
More people began to hope that the undead defeat Pollon’s unit. Every time a Hermes Guild unit died, then the audience had a heated reaction.
Weed’s reinforcements had arrived. They had a large amount of priests and paladins for healing combined with blessing and other abilities that were crucial to a prolonged war. The hosts of the stations covered this pivotal point live.
“Even if the Hermes Guild is high level, we can not ignore the fact that the priest and paladins are wearing the professional equipment.”
“Their equipment looks a bit worn out. Will this make a difference to the battle?”
“Undead and divine power will conflict with each other so it will be difficult for Weed. Could it be that the Hermes Guild holds the advantage?”
“The result will be seen from the fighting. Out of the two sides, the Hermes Guild is expected to win.”
“The undead are comprised of non user units so Weed will not retreat anymore.”
Each station had a different perspective. Most of them thought that Pollon’s unit was higher level and thus had the advantage.
***
The priests and paladins from Morata had a meeting.
“Are we going to fight?”
“I thought we were only going to hunt Bar Khan…”
The prestige of the Hermes Guild was more horrible than a legendary monster. It would result in immediate retaliation and then they would get in trouble with the Hermes Guild. It would be difficult for them to fight a guild of a large kingdom.
“But I like Weed’s adventures. We came here to hunt Bar Khan anyways.”
“Yea, we should fight anyways. I never like them anyways.”
Most paladins started out in the central continent so they knew better than anyone about the power of the Hermes Guild. Of course when they decided to follow Weed they never thought they would fight the Hermes Guild. The Hermes Guild was known for its cruelty.
“We’re already here so the Hermes Guild won’t leave us alone.”
“It would be better for us to participate in battle than for us to be alone. We should fight together.”
The priests and paladins made their decision to Weed.
“We will fight here.”
The users had made their resolution to Weed. In the inspiring atmosphere like that of a movie, Weed shook his head.
“It will be difficult.”
“It’s fine. We understand what it is like to be the ones at a disadvantage, especially if its from the Hermes Guild…”
“They’re mine.”
“What?”
“I will not concede their executions. You came late so you are not eligible.”
Weed left the priests and paladins and headed back. He shamelessly was not going to share with them. It was the same as not sending a wedding invitation to a friend that you have lost contact with for over 5 years. The Geomchis were blessed by Irene and headed over from the priests and paladins. The volunteers that came to help Weed went to an emergency meeting.
Taleukin: The armor that they’re wearing is quite expensive. It’s at least level 200.
They were analyzing the Hermes Guild as they were watching the video. KMC Media as well as other broadcasting station began live coverage the instant they found the out the information from the weapon merchants and blacksmiths of the Hermes Guild.
Pollon: Ignore it then. Their level is around 200 so their magic resistance is weak and we can just sweep them with magic.
Taleukin: That’s not what I mean. You need to understand…they are definitely wearing lower level gear. However it is significantly worn out.
Compared to the nice armor of the knights, the Geomchis looked incomparable to it. Several parts were considerably worn down or broken. It went to question how long they had been using that armor.
Pollon: Level 320 then?
Taleukin: It looks like it has high strength and agility restrictions for level 320 but their sword looks even more. At least level 350.
Weed had raised his stats through sculpting while the Geomchis had raised their through intrepid hunting and physical training. Except for special cases, that stats of most of the Geomchis were comparable to at least level 350.
Pollon: Level 350, to think they could get this kind of force.
They were only judging the Geomchis by their looks. They could easily been seen as high levels. It looked as if Weed would get more reinforcements. Even going against the ranger and mage unit had not been easy but now the power balance was tipped.
Pollon: It will be very difficult to continue to be stationed here. Please give new command from the guild.
Pollon’s orders had been to interfere with Weed’s quest by attacking him. However they had not known that their safety would be jeopardized.
Rafael: Okay. Are you thinking of moving?
Pollon: That’s what I’m thinking. Since they have poor mobility I was thinking of using magic to defeat them.
Rafael: Do you think you can win? We can not send more troops since that would mean that the Hermes Guild was having a difficult battle.
Pollon: That’s what the fight seems like. But that will be to our advantage…
Pollon believed that the priests and paladins would not help Weed so it would be an easy battle.
Pollon: Attempt to get the Necromancers’ cooperation with the Hermes Guild. If they help then we will have a significant power. They can help without having priests to waste mana on them.
Rafael:Magic and Ranged Unit with Undead…Not bad. It is allowed.
Pollon thought that if he beat Weed then the Necromancers would join the Hermes Guild to avoid hostilities. Since that was Pollon’s intention, Rafael accepted. The fight was going live on every station! They hurriedly contacted the Necromancers to come. The battle had slowed down quite a bit but that was because the Geomchis were grilling ribs to eat. Many viewers and users waited for the battle to start.
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