This was the bit that made a wyvern rider’s life worthwhile. The screaming dive on an enemy below, watching them disperse and run to escape the deluge that was to come. Faranigranthis saw the humans below, their fortresses built around their iron chariots besieged by harpies and with the ground forces and beasts closing in. Off to one side, he saw a strange rippling blue flash tearing at the human positions and realized that had to be the naga at work, pouring their lightning bolts into the enemy ranks. As his wyvern dropped, Faranigranthis could see them more clearly, could see the great coiled forms strapped to the back of the Great Beasts that carried them. He touched his wyvern with his mind and the creature changed the angle of its dive so he could dump its load on the humans engaged by the naga.
It was time, nearly time. Faranigranthis calculated angle and speed, He had selected a line of three fortresses for his attack, a group that was already under heavy fire from the naga, the blue lightning bolts rippling off their armor. He touched the igniter that set the left hand set of brimstone bags on fire, then hesitated slightly and pulled the drop bar. To his delight he saw his aim was true and the deluge of burning yellow stones swept across the human iron chariots. Beneath him, the harpies swarmed over the stricken vehicles and the infantry floundering across the open space between the Phlegethon and the human defenses gained fresh heart. They swarmed up the banks and over the iron chariots that lay within them
Then, Faranigranthis saw how the human defenses worked. As soon as the three fortresses he had hot were in danger, those on either side opened fire on them, the little red flashes that streamed from them raking the position held by their fellows. From beneath the seething mass of harpies and infantry, he saw the iron chariots moving backwards, out of the overrun fortress, back towards the safety of the line behind. Still they were being raked by their fellows, but Faranigranthis saw the red fireflies bouncing off the iron chariots and he realized what was happening. The human fireflies couldn’t penetrate iron so they bounced off and just killed those outside its protection. None of whom were human of course.
Well, Faranigranthis knew what to do about that. He still had his right side pouches of brimstone and his flechettes. He dragged his wyvern’s nose around, touched its mind and gave it the instructions necessary. His next run would be on the second line of fortresses, the ones that were covering the escape of his first target. Once more his aim was true and the yellow cloud of flaming sulfur engulfed the iron chariots in their fortress. Their fireflies faded away and stopped as the chariots tried to back out from the cloud. Above them, Faranigranthis turned his wyvern again and headed for the chariots that had been the victim of his first pass. They were still there, fighting the infantry and Beasts that surrounded them and the harpies that flew over them. He aimed carefully and saw his flechettes hail down upon them. As he turned away, his load gone, he could see a rolling cloud of black smoke, laced with orange. An iron chariot was burning and he, Faranigranthis, had killed it.
It was time to go home. The Wyverns were assembling back at their original height above the battlefield and Faranigranthis could sense the exultation of the riders. They’d got in and they had struck a savage blow at the humans. Then, he did a count, there were fifty three Wyverns flying in the formation of the eighty that had dived on the humans just a few minutes before.
Naga Group, the Southern Front, Phlegethon River Bulge
Baroness Yuku fought the exhaustion that was growing throughout her body. The naga were built for maintaining a constant series of discharges but the rate at which she and her fellow naga had been firing them at the humans was greater than they had ever attempted before. Yet it had to be done, the humans had to be kept under fire if the assault was to stand a chance. Yuku mentally thanked her Lord that he had had the wisdom to ‘modify’ the instructions to send his best naga to aid Belial in his mad schemes. He’d interpreted ‘best’ to mean his youngest and least experienced coven, keeping his two most experienced groups with him for this battle. By the look of it, several other lords had done the same and that was a good thing, otherwise the assembled covens would be collapsed into semi-consciousness by now.
Those that still lived that was. There had been 54 covens assembled for this assault, just over 700 naga, and Chiknathragothem had grouped them in the center of his formation top punch a hole for the rest of his army to follow. That had seemed like a good idea until the holocaust of human mage-fire had descended upon them. The casualties had been dreadful but the soft, unarmored nagas had been hard hit. Less than 300 had survived the mage bolts and the churning ground. They’d forded the river and kept the human chariots under a constant series of bolts but nobody could do much more until the wyverns had doused their positions with burning brimstone. That had forced the humans back and out of their defensive positions.
The combination of bolts and brimstone from above, the relentless fire of the nagas and the advancing infantry and fliers had done it, they’d started to destroy the human defense. From her position on the river bank, Yuku could see the black, rolling smoke rising from more than a dozen iron chariots that had been overwhelmed and destroyed. Around them lay the bodies of their crews, many half eaten as they had been cut down. That might once have been a satisfying sight but Yuku could see more. The ground was black with the bodies of Chiknathragothem’s army where human magery had caused its terrible toll.
One of the infantry cohort commanders waved her forward, the foot-soldiers and cavalry were trying to clear the evil metal snakes and exploding mage-bars that covered the ground. The mage bars could be cleared by the simple expedient of picking them up and throwing them away, if they exploded, the mage-bar was gone, if it did not, it was gone. Slowly, a way was being cleared through the defenses, even though the human mage-fire never ceased and the casualties of those doing the clearing were high beyond counting. Yuku started to lead the seven surviving members of her coven forward along the cleared path, summoning up enough energy to unleash another series of bolts against the defenders. That was when the foot soldier leading her raised his trident.
“No further Highness. This is as far as we can go, the next line of human defenses is ahead of us.
And on either side of us and behind us thought Yuku. Nowhere is protected on this battlefield where the humans can see all and their mages can strike where they will.
Then, she heard a strange whistling sound and more mage-bolt explosions. Only these were soft in comparison with those she had experienced on the banks of the Phlegethon and they looked different. Instead of rolling clouds of black and red smoke, surrounded by thrown earth, they were gentle and white, almost angelic in the purity of their whiteness. Yuku watched confused as the white feather-like tendrils spread into a cloud that was utterly opaque yet still had the blinding white purity of the initial bursts. The clouds started to rise and that was when Yuku felt the intense heat as more of the mage bolts spread the white cloud still further.
Yuku was suddenly aware that the white cloud was irritating her eyes and her nose was running. A stray cloud of the white smoke swept over her and she coughed, an explosive cough that shook her whole body. She looked around, she and her nagas were surrounded by white fragments that were falling over the whole area. One of the fragments landed on her skin and she looked at it, curiously at first but then in horror as her scales started to bubble and smolder. The lump was eating its way into her body, she could feel it searing into her flesh as it bit deeper and deeper. The agonizing pain started to spread as more and more of the lumps touched her and started the process of her destruction. All around her figures were on the ground, rolling and screaming, trying to brush away the fragments that brought this unbelievable horror to them. Even as they did so, more of the rounds thumped down, adding yet more smoke and fragments to the cloud that was enveloping them.