Chapter 347: Physics

The remaining climbers had followed Kael’s example and used their cannons against the orc formations. None possessed anything comparable to the golem cannon, but several well-placed shots tore through the approaching elites before they reached the fortress. They were doing their own thing and were excelling at it. Yet it was not enough to destroy the entire brigades.

Orcs survived, and they reached the walls.

The goblins had been dangerous because of their numbers, tools, and climbing speed. The orcs added brute force and an unpleasant amount of creativity.

One grabbed a goblin by the waist. The smaller creature shrieked with delight rather than fear as the orc drew its arm back and threw it.

The goblin sailed over the battlements and landed among the fortress soldiers with a dagger imbedded so perfectly in one of the soldier’s necks that made everyone around him panic. If it wasn’t for the shrill and the greedy nature of the goblins, it could have gotten another kill while the soldiers were still shocked by what just happened.

More orcs copied the tactic. Goblins flew through the air in every direction, laughing as they crossed the defenses that had previously forced them to climb. Even though a few had become artistic decorations on the rampart walls due to insufficient strength put in the throw, a good majority of those who were thrown made it over the walls.

One or two landing on a wall could be handled easily.

A hundred orcs throwing a hundred goblins at once was different.

The western battlements disappeared beneath fighting. Soldiers fell as goblins landed behind their shield lines and attacked the ballista crews. Archers were forced to abandon their positions and draw short blades, while several siege weapons stopped firing as their operators defended themselves.

The addition of forces on the walls slowed the ballistae, which also accelerated the advance of the goblins beyond the walls, the opposite of what one would call a vicious cycle.

The spear wielder returned to the fray immediately. She moved through the goblins in a blur, her weapon stabbing forward so quickly that several creatures fell before the first body touched the ground. Whenever another goblin flew over the wall, she changed direction and intercepted it before it could land among the soldiers.

The mage raised a barrier over her section. Thrown goblins struck the magical surface and slid down the outside of the fortress, their delighted screams changing into panic as they fell.

The burly climber simply cut them apart in the air. His enormous sword moved through two or three bodies with every swing, spreading blood across the stones and defenders below. As for those who made it near him, they found the chance of falling next to ten soldiers far better than being near a man who wasn’t afraid to swing his big, fat... sword...around.

The orcs began climbing after them. They moved more slowly than the goblins, but hot sand and boiling water did little to stop them. Their thick hides and heavy armor absorbed the punishment while their hands broke into the seams of the walls. Rocks thrown from above struck their shoulders and heads without loosening their grip.

Several reached the battlements.

The first orc to pull itself onto the western wall charged directly toward a ballista. It swung its axe into the structure and nearly broke one of the firing arms before the spear wielder drove her weapon through its eye.

Another reached the mage’s defenses and struck the base of an upgraded turret hard enough to crack its reinforcement. The climbers killed the intruders and immediately spent currency repairing the damaged weapons.

Kael watched the points beside their names drop. Their defenses were suffering faster than his.

"Oi, dumbass!" Kael shouted.

The Leonard looked up from the battlefield below.

"If you want to fight orcs, they’re on the walls!"

The Leonard followed Kael’s gesture, and his eyes lit up.

He hooked a rope onto the battlement and pulled himself upward. The mechanism attached to his armor reeled in rapidly, carrying him fifty meters into the air while goblin arrows struck around him.

He reached the top, rolled over the edge, and charged toward the nearest orc without offering Kael so much as a glance or thanks. His battle-axe struck the creature’s neck, separating the orc’s head cleanly.

The Leonard reversed the weapon and buried the opposite side in the chest of another. He kicked the corpse away, ducked beneath a cleaver, and drove the blade of his axe through the attacker’s knee.

Kael watched him for a moment. "For all that scummy attitude, the fucker can fight."

He returned to the cannon.

The Leonard’s arrival helped stabilize the northern wall even further. He moved from one orc to the next, gathering the contribution he desperately needed. There were several breaches on the wall, and only Kael’s section was safe for now, so he moved to ’help’ the others.

The second rail was almost complete.

Kael checked the neighboring defenses again. Several ballistae on the other walls were barely functional. Firing arms had cracked, loading mechanisms had jammed beneath arrows and blood, and one cannon remained tilted after an orc struck its wheel assembly.

Kael opened the group interface. He transferred two thousand points to the spear wielder, then two thousand to the mage, and another two thousand to the burly climber.

All three received the notification during combat. None had time to ask why.

They understood.

The mage immediately repaired the damaged base beneath her cannon. Light spread through the metal, sealing the cracks and returning the barrel to its proper alignment. The spear wielder restored two ballista arms while continuing to fight, and the burly man used his points to repair one turret and reinforce the section of wall beneath it before another orc reached the top.

The defensive weapons resumed firing.

Kael’s reserve was gone, but he did not regret it. Saving currency was meant to prepare for emergencies. Watching three walls collapse while hoarding points would have defeated the entire purpose.

Kael delivered the final strike.

The golem cannon had become a railgun in appearance. Its barrel had separated into two long metallic extensions, with a reinforced chamber behind them and a narrow channel holding the projectile between both sides. Additional metal surrounded the base to keep the structure from tearing itself free of the wheels when fired.

It looked convincing.

It was also incomplete.

There were no coils, no electrical storage, and no internal mechanism capable of producing the electromagnetic force used by the Tower weapon. It was a structure and nothing more.

Kael picked up one of the elongated projectiles created for the fortress railgun. He inspected it briefly, then placed it within the channel of his own weapon.

The metal shell rested between the rails.

Kael lowered Brokk’s Hammer. "Alright."

He approached the rear of the weapon. "I hope the Seebeck¹* Effect doesn’t bite me in the ass."

The principle was simple enough. A sufficiently large temperature difference across a conductive material could create an electrical voltage.

Under ordinary circumstances, the effect would never generate enough power to fire a railgun. Kael was not dealing with ordinary temperatures, ordinary metal, or ordinary magnetic force.

He placed his left hand against the left rail and pressed his right hand against the other.

Frost activated through the left gauntlet.

Fire awakened through the right.

Cold spread into one half of the weapon, but it was no ordinary winter cold. The rail flash-froze beneath his palm. Ice formed across the metal and cracked immediately as the temperature continued dropping, while frost spread along the extension in jagged white patterns.

The opposite rail began glowing red.

Heat poured from Kael’s right hand. The Reclaimer metal absorbed the Fire Rune and conducted it through the structure, turning from black to crimson and then toward a near-white glow.

The temperature difference became absurd. One side burned while the other froze.

A tiny spark jumped between the rails.

Kael held both runes active. Another arc appeared, followed by several more.

Electricity snapped from the heated rail toward the frozen one, following the temperature gradient through the conductive metal. The arcs were unstable at first, thin and brief, but every second Kael maintained the opposing runes increased the difference between both sides.

The sparks grew, and blue-white electricity crawled around the projectile.

The goblins below continued screaming while orcs fought across the battlements. The Tower railgun beside Kael was still charging its next shot, unaware that a second weapon had begun imitating it through a combination of engineering, runes, and extremely questionable judgment.

The soldiers nearby noticed. They backed away, and one of them dropped the ammunition he had been carrying.

Kael pushed more internal energy into Fire and Frost.

The weapon began vibrating. The right rail expanded from the heat while the left contracted beneath the cold. Brokk’s reforging held the alignment together, but the cannon groaned as the opposing forces threatened to tear it apart.

Electricity thickened between both sides. The projectile lifted slightly from the channel.

Kael’s eyes widened beneath his helmet. "It’s working."

The arcs converged. Every hair beneath his helmet rose, and the air smelled of scorched metal, ice, and ozone.

Kael maintained both runes.

The world turned white.

[Check author’s note for a physics lesson, it’s kinda cool]