Fortuna Verto

37-Dramatic Problems

With a proper amount of sleep behind them once again, the two girls were ready to face the dawn of another day. With as much preparation behind them as possible, Lyun and Axln made their way to Mheridz's outpost to await the coming battle.

Lyun obviously didn't feel at all ready for this. Her stress and worry had actually woken her up repeatedly enough that she had slept in longer than Axln for once. Axln had simply let Lyun get the extra sleep, going over mental exercises in her head about what sort of actions she should be taking in combat. Axln was even so occupied at trying to improve after her considered failures in their last battle that she hadn't even been properly aware of Lyun's concerns. It was in this state that the two of them returned to Mheridz to get an update of the situation. However, as the battle was known to happen that dawn, and dawn was a hundred moments long, there was still an unspecified amount of wait time before anything would actually happen. Mheridz was not spending this time fruitlessly though, it remained an excellent opportunity to plan and prepare her troops. Even if their foe did arrive, they would have some time where the thing would just wander around, waiting for their ambush.

"So, where is your standing tower of death?" "I'm guessing you're comparing your experiences of your last battle to what you're seeing here. Unfortunately, the foundry did not think highly of the idea of unmovable weaponry when trying to defend so much area. My heaviest hitters are all mobile, we have no sentry weapon on site. The variety of siege weapons however are significant, some with some rather impressive firepower, all of them with some substantial range. I made it clear that things needed range at least, we can't afford to let anything get close to our enemy. If you're going to make use of citadel weapons, destroyers might be your best bet for the same reason. The citadel itself might have some kind of suitable long range attack, but not any suitable to people actually working in the area. If you want to have the citadel back us up, please keep that in mind." "Makes sense. Coordinating efforts would be difficult in the middle of battle too." Axln nodded at Mheridz's suggestion, keenly aware of how the citadel's core weapon was not only too prone to wide area damage, it was also generally ineffective against things made from the void. They needed strikes that were as elemental as possible, or such a strike simply wouldn't do anything.

"Don't worry, I'll be coordinating things with Luna from a distance, we'll be fine. Someone is going to have to keep an eye out for when the thing decides to call its friends, too." "Oh, so Vael had to deal with something that could call for backup. Do keep in mind, void spawn, as well as its counterpart, are all generally very distinct. Given time, people are going to start classifying these things by how much intensity of the void it starts bringing with it. As for what each one does, there are no set patterns at all. We can not be certain what our target will be capable of until it is demonstrated. In that consideration, you may want to watch out for any strange behaviours, so that you are not surprised." "I'll do that then too. Don't worry, I'm an elf, we're sort of physically made for this sort of work." "Hmm.. do as you wish." Lyun could tell her optimism felt a little artificial, Mheridz might have even picked up on that too. If Mheridz knew the Lyun from the future, it might be a little rough to cloud such stuff over. Axln however didn't look into it, she instead simply considered what she herself would need to be doing. At the very least, someone had to commit the thing's attention, that might have become her job. She was however eager to make up for her past failures, so that wouldn't be a problem.

Eventually during preparation, word came in about their target being sighted in the ashen dunes. Lyun was the first of the three to get to spot it, her elven vision standing as dependable as she had claimed it would. Axln however was able to see it even clearer once her circlet was calibrated to do so. Mheridz didn't even bother getting a visual impression, turning to her forces to organize them for battle. The outpost was very empty soon after. Luna had arrived at least to their request for support, ensuring that they would have a stock of her destroyers on site in support of Mheridz's forces. In another moment, their foe was surrounded with substantial numbers that still kept their distance. Windcrafts scoured the skies in a flurry that unleashed a barrage of explosions from above in a bombing run. The fiend was enraged, but the windcrafts rapidly flew away in all directions. While the fiend remained confused, all of the ground forces opened fire, the ground shuddering in the high impact onslaught. Axln was on route, but she wasn't even certain what to do given everything going on. It was as if everything was already under control. Lyun meanwhile was all too happy to discover that things were generally going smoothly. She was still diligently keeping to her assigned duty, keeping watch from a distance. Such was why, even obscured by a cloud of explosions, herself doing nothing but watching, she was the first to notice their enemy's change of approach.