The king’s general turned out to be a haughty elf by the name of Jerill and the man took his job extremely seriously. Their ‘briefing’ which was really just an interrogation lasted for four hours and once it was over the general assigned his party to the gnomish section of the army camp. Placing them with the slaves was no doubt meant to be an insult but Milo wasted no time in exploiting the opportunity for everything it was worth.

  “Hervix, say theoretically somebody had the power to destroy this army and free your people, would you be willing to relocate?”

  Hervix’s eyes narrowed, and he looked around as if fearing they would be overheard but the sound of the marching army and Ivy’s wall of bodyguards made it next to impossible to listen in on their conversation.

  “Not if it meant exchanging one benevolent master for another.”

  Milo waved his hand dismissively.

  “I have no need of slaves, in my experience people work more effectively and with far more enthusiasm without the threat of a sword hanging over their necks. The only thing I would require of your people is that you undergo the ritual of conversion, afterwards you may do as you like on my lands.”

  “Define conversion.”

  Hervix was too intelligent to be easily fooled so Milo told him the whole truth.

  “It is a magical ritual which would change your people, it will add to their lifespans, make them resistant to illness and it will even make them stronger. In exchange you would be bound to my cause, although I don’t expect you to fight in my armies.”

  Hervix looked thoughtful, then he looked over at the fifty or so Hybrids who were ringing them in. He studied their weapons and then shook his head.

  “You don’t have the power to deliver on your side of this deal.”

  Milo just grinned at the gnome.

  “Are you certain of that?”

  Hervix hesitated and Milo could practically see the calculations in his mind being made in real time. When he next spoke, his voice was low.

  “You need to sweeten the deal, it is not enough to destroy this army, you need to take their capital, Oakcrown. My people will never be able to move on with our lives unless we know for certain that the elves will never again plague us.”

  Truth be told, his short interaction with the king and his advisors had already convinced him that the elves would need to be converted at the tip of a sword. He was therefore quick to agree to Hervix’s request.

  “Done.”

  “Just like that?”

  “Just like that.”

  “Fine, I agree.”

  Once the alliance was agreed to Hervix was quick to expose every weakness the elves had.

  “Their magic is powerful but relies on wood as a raw material.”

  This revelation did much to impress Ivy.

  “They have mastered transmutation magic?!”

  Milo was still a complete novice when it came to magic and so Ivy hurried to explain when she saw the blank look on his face.

  “Transmutation magic is the art of manipulating elemental matter into the desired form. You yourself have recently encountered an example of this when you fought the black knight, his sword changed into a scythe, remember?”

  Milo did remember, that huge scythe had been a nightmare to deal with. He quickly filled Hervix in on the encounter and once he was finished the gnome spoke again.

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  “I’ve seen them shape branches into arrows, weapons and huge trees into siege towers, although the siege towers have to be assembled by my people after the elves make the parts.”

  Ivy added to the explanation.

  “That’s because the created object can never exceed the mass of the raw materials.”

  Milo thought he understood the essentials.

  “Meaning they can turn a giant tree into a long spear, but not into a house, which means their mages are useless once they run out of raw materials.”

  Both Hervix and Ivy confirmed this with nods. Then the gnome continued his lecture on elven weaknesses.

  “They are also quite arrogant and see all other races as lesser than their own. Time and again I’ve seen them underestimate my own people and the humans they trade with. They don’t know it, but the human traders have been taking advantage of this to swindle them for years, it has long been a source of amusement for my people. It is also why they will never see the rebellion coming until it’s too late.”

  Milo hoped Hervix was right, his current plan had a lot of moving pieces and points of failure. If even a single gnome in the know screwed up, they would be cut down before the assault on the death faction even began. Which was why Hervix had only shared his new allegiance with a handful of his most trusted people.

  They reached the ocean two days before Rostrian would be resurrected. Had Milo been here with his own army there was no way they would’ve been able to build enough boats in time. Fortunately, the elves were so proficient with their transmutation magic that boats were being produced at a staggering rate. In the end it took them only a single day to build enough boats to transport the entire army. Unfortunately, a spell of bad weather meant they had to postpone the launch by another day.

  When the weather finally cleared only twelve hours remained until Rostrian would be resurrected. The elves wrongly believed they had all the time in the world, but Milo had managed to convince their king to rush the attack before reinforcements could arrive. The king clearly knew he was hiding something, but he’d ordered the attack anyway.

  Milo stepped into the boat and was followed by Hervix and Ivy. They were among the last to board the boats along with the rest of the gnomes and his hybrids. Apparently being in the rear of the army was a peak insult among the elves, yet it suited Milo’s plan perfectly. Milo watched as one of the few elves who had stayed behind to watch the king’s guests attached a rope to the boat, at the end of the rope was a huge wooden log floating in the water. He looked in the distance and saw that each boat was towing a giant wooden log behind it, along with the boats these logs would serve as fuel for the elven mages.

  Their destination was only fifteen minutes away by boat and by the time Milo and his group arrived the king had already launched his attack. Milo watched with fascination as the elven vanguard advanced into the cavern. As soon as they passed beyond the mouth of the cave green spells started raining down on them. Milo recognised the spells from his own battle with the death faction. The elves kept rowing and as soon as they reached land they started dragging the huge logs they had been towing ashore. The logs were then transmuted into a static barrier of wood which did a remarkable job of stopping the death element spells.

  “The elves don’t know it but they are using the life element to power their magic, it is anathema to the death element.”

  Sure, enough the elementalists defending the cavern switched to shadow spells and once again the death toll started rising. Yet the elves just kept coming and once enough boats reached land they started returning fire. Huge lances of wood started flying towards the defenders whom Milo still couldn’t see from his position at the rear.

  Finally enough boats had entered the cavern that it was Milo’s turn. As soon as his boat reached the mouth of the cavern he whistled.

  Not only did the death faction have a fantastic starting position but they also had an amazing fortress. The fortress in question was a combination of white stone and bone. Like Emberstone it was situated with the cavern at its back and both flanks secured by the cavern wall. Yet this fortress was also protected from above by the cavern roof. It looked almost unassailable, and he knew at once that there had been zero chance of his own army taking it without the elves.

  “What a marvellous structure, it must have taken decades to build…”

  Hervix sounded genuinely happy to see such a beautiful piece of architecture.

  Milo led their party ashore just in time for a giant ball of shadow magic to strike him in the face. Luckily everyone around him had thrown themselves to the ground and had thus avoided getting hit. Milo made a brushing motion on his shoulder and winked at a wide eyed Hervix.

  “Let’s go!”

  The elves had already moved their wooden barrier closer to the fortress and most their mages had switched to making siege ladders and components for two siege towers. A red-faced elf came running down to meet Milo’s group and screamed at Hervix.

  “Get moving you lazy bastards you have siege towers to assemble!”

  Milo could see Hervix gripping his crossbow so hard his knuckles turned white. He stepped in front of the gnome and addressed the screaming elf.

  “Don’t worry sir, I’ll get them moving.”

  For a second it looked like the elf would scream at him but then his eyes took in the fifty scowling hybrids standing behind Milo. His hybrid bodyguards had genuinely done their best to get on friendly terms with the elves, unfortunately the elves had treated them with disrespect at every turn. They were now having trouble supressing their obvious hostility towards what he had heard several refer to as a magically stunted upstart race.

  The elf huffed.

  “See that you do, or the king will hear of it.”

  Milo led the gnomes and his people up to the siege camp. He watched as Hervix and his people started assembling siege ladders and siege towers. Watching them made him feel like a kid playing with puzzles, each piece was part of a complex whole.

  It took the gnomes half an hour to produce the first siege ladders. Milo was expecting the king to wait until the towers were ready, but the king launched an attack as soon as the ladders were ready. Milo observed the attack but even he with his limited understanding of siege craft could tell that the attack was doomed from the start.

  The elves streamed up four giant ladders. The leftmost ladder was pushed away from the wall right before the first elf reached the top. The two ladders next to it were bathed in burning oil. As for the final ladder, a pale man in white robes with a bone staff leaned out above the ladder and pointed his staff down. A huge spear of pure shadow magic obliterated ten elves before breaking the bottom half of the ladder exploded into wooden shrapnel.

  “Well that went poorly…”

  Nobody disagreed with him, but Ivy looked worried.

  “This is going too slowly, Rostrian will be resurrected in four hours, at that point this cavern becomes a death trap.”

  Milo walked over to Hervix.

  “How long until the towers are ready?”

  Hervix looked around and then replied in a low voice.

  “I’ve been slow walking it so that more elves will die, I could have them working in three hours if I really wanted to.”

  “Work as fast as you can, in four hours our enemy will receive reinforcements, we need to have won by then.”

  Hervix narrowed his eyes.

  “What are you not telling me?”

  “Trust me, I will deliver you and your people to freedom. All you have to do is get me into that city before its too late and everything will work out.”

  Hervix sighed but he gave the orders, and the gnomes started working faster. A little over two hours later both siege towers were ready. As soon as the elves learned that the towers were ready they arrived, led by the king himself.

  King Valar’s smile was cold as he greeted Milo.

  “Lord Milo, I think it’s past time you and your people join this siege.”