Warbreaker's Rage: A LitRPG Apocalypse Adventure (The Connected System Book 3), page 41
Loch agreed. In every fight he’d been in, the people had been different. There were reasons for it, but he hadn’t had the same exact group yet. That made the first few fights more difficult as they all got used to working together, figuring out which Abilities paired best and which couldn’t interact. There was something to be said for coordinated teamwork, the kind that only came about after a group had been working together for a long time.
In his Army days, they’d had it drilled into them. Where to go, what to do, how to do it, when to do it. There had been no question and no concern for people changing out because they all knew what to do and when it had to be done.
“We start running drills,” Loch said, turning to face Darren, his fellow former-Army. “It won’t be perfect and it’ll be chaotic, but at least people will have an idea of what to do.”
Darren shrugged, not looking thrilled with the idea. Not the thought of running drills. Darren would understand and agree with the idea. He looked less certain that it would help.
Loch stood at the edge of the roof, looking down. On this side, the school was almost three stories tall. For once, he was glad that the separate white building to the west, where he faced, was gone. It left a wide-open area that would be difficult for gaunts to pass. The road was torn up and cracked, with sections pushed up. The area where the building had been was the same, along with the parking lot that had surrounded it.
The gaunts would have a hard time getting through it, with the Clanhold’s defenders attacking them the whole way.
He liked that view. The one to the left and right, not so much. He could see open land from the corner of the school all the way down to the shore of the lake. To his right, aside from the section of wall they’d already built, there was nothing but open space for a very long way, past the farm fields and up to the treeline. A lot of space to defend.
From up here, the wall was pitifully small.
He tried not to let his worry leak out. He had to appear confident and in charge when he really wasn’t.
“We can place the Elementalist up here. She’ll have a clear view of everything. Put a couple of archers as well,” Loch said, pointing to the corners of the attached white building and the edges of the currently being built platforms that ran along its roof. “And one up in the bell tower.”
The brick portion of the school had a flat roof with parapets extending past the wooden portion in front. The bell tower was mounted on top of a slightly sloping gambrel-style roof. A team were scrambling along the roof, installing plywood platforms to form catwalks for the archers to get out onto the roof.
He looked up at the white bell tower, seeing an archer already there. The man was looking to the west, then would move to the front and then complete his revolution around the tower.
“They can act like snipers,” Darren said. “With overwatch. I don’t want to put all our ranged fighters up here, though.”
“Agreed. We’ll space the others out along the walls. Can we get some more platforms built quickly or use something already existing? See if we can get them some height?”
“There’s some scaffolding in the school’s storage. That will work.”
There were desks stacked up along the wall. They didn’t look sturdy.
Loch and Darren walked along the edge. Kristin walked a couple of steps back, jotting notes down. Ed stayed by the hatch leading back down, feeling useless.
“We don’t want everyone on the walls at once,” Loch said.
“Right. We can have two groups on the north wall as backups to replace three or four spaced out along the length. I think one backup group in the south, between here and the lake. There’s not as much land to cover. Two or three groups on the wall. We just don’t have the people for more. I would like to hold one group in reserve, position them behind the school so they can reinforce whatever side is needed.”
“That’s a lot of distance to cover,” Loch said, pointing to the north. “If there’s a breach, it will take a long time to get there.”
“I know,” Darren cursed. “Don’t have a choice.”
“If we can get the wall and barriers set up to funnel the attackers, that will make it easier.”
“I don’t have much faith, so I think I’ll plan on it not happening.”
“That sounds good,” Loch said. “Do we have any communication devices?”
“No,” Darren muttered. “We’ll need runners up here to relay your orders.”
“I’m not going to be up here,” Loch said, smiling as he looked at Darren.
The younger man looked confused.
“But you’ll need to be here to give orders. It’s got the best view.”
“I need to be down there,” Loch said. “Where my strength can be put to use.”
“Then who’ll be in command?” Darren asked, his eyes going wide as he saw Loch’s smile, realizing who Loch had in mind.
Chapter Forty-Five
Aweek passed in a blur. Seven days of intense work from sun up to sun down. Everyone put in effort, there was no one allowed to slack. If the Clanmembers, and by that time, everyone in the Community had joined the Clan, were not going to be fighters, they were put to work on building up the barriers or working in the fields.
Hunters brought back as much food as they could find. The scavengers were sent further out with instructions to bring back anything that could be used as weapons or armor. Food, clothing, and camping supplies were to be left behind. All that would wait.
More people got harvester Classes. Some didn’t want the particular Classes they received. They would have to learn to live with them.
Even the few children in the Clan were put to work.
The fighters worked harder. If they weren’t on guard duty or in the Spawn Field, they were drilling. Darren walked back and forth through the groups, providing instruction and discipline. He assigned squads, most having someone with military experience in charge. He’d hoped to be able to make six-man squads but had to settle for a couple of four-man and two six-man. It didn’t change his basic plan.
Those squads, mostly made up of people with Common or Uncommon Classes, even a few without Classes yet, were rough. They barely had any experience, and working in a group, the way Darren wanted them to, was proving to be hard.
They were learning and getting better, but it wasn’t great.
The adventurer teams, there were four now, but only two had a dedicated healer as part of the team, managed to get two more runs into the dungeon. The others spent their time in the woods, fighting what they could find. Their instructions were simple. Level and get stronger.
Because of the varied nature of those teams, with different mixes of Classes, Darren was planning on making them rovers. His squads would be the front line while the adventurers moved where needed. They were the strongest in terms of personal power. Darren started thinking of them as his Special Ops forces.
Loch and his girls were included in the Clan’s Special Ops units, but not together. Piper would be up on the roof, where she could use her inksummons to their most efficient. Harper, along with Davis, Brian, and Jenny, were one team. They were joined by Randy Sager. As a healer, Julia wasn’t going to be on the frontlines but instead back in the school in the triage unit that would be formed in the cafeteria. Loch hadn’t been a fan of this plan, wanting to stay with Piper. He knew that Harper needed to be out fighting, as much as he hated it. But he could still stay with Piper.
Not the best use of his strength.
It did take some convincing, not much as Loch understood the reasoning even if he didn’t like it, but he finally agreed to be Darren’s bludgeon. Loch was going to be the disruptor, breaking the gaunts’ lines.
All the plans sounded good, but everyone needed to practice them.
Drills were run. In the day and in the night.
Attacks were simulated, the squads rushing to where they were needed. The runners, non-combat Clanmembers, worked out the best routes. Command codes were created and taught to the runners and squad leaders. Since most had been former-Army, or other branches, those codes were decided on. When around, the adventurer teams were included in the drills, working on how to get from their staging area to the frontlines.
Aggravation ran high. It was boring and tedious work. Tiring with no real noticeable impact. But Darren kept it up, even when fights broke out between tired Clanmembers. Tension was thick, Loch could feel it in the air. Everyone’s nerves were frayed. The non-stop work, coupled with not knowing when or if the gaunts were going to attack, had everyone on edge.
People were snappy. They were angry.
He understood.
But they didn’t stop.
Improvements were being made. Even just running the drills, people were gaining in their Abilities. They were getting stronger. Time in the Spawn Field earned them experience, which increased Levels. Repeated drills increased their muscle memory. Their lines were no longer as ragged and formed quicker. Loch and Darren felt proud.
They stood on the roof, looking down into the field, watching a runner burst out of the school. The teen, one of Harper’s classmates, ran to one of the four-man rover squads. Loch couldn’t see the squad; the staging area was behind the school on the west side, and many different levels’ roofs blocked Loch’s view. It was a central point between the north and south sides, giving the teams the best positioning to reinforce almost anywhere.
The squad reacted quickly. Their weapons had already been in hand, makeshift armor on. Loch heard them running across the broken pavement, appearing around the corner on the north. The runner was with them, breaking off to enter the school again. In a couple of minutes, he’d be back on the roof, taking a break as another runner got ready. The four men raced down the length of the wall, reaching the gap where one of the guard squads was pretending to be gaunts swarming through an opening in the barriers. The four men spread out, working together to surround the attacking squad.
No weapons or attacks were exchanged, the two groups coming together. They stepped back at Darren’s shouted command.
“Again!” he yelled, both teams going back to their original position.
“That was quicker,” Loch said, watching the tired teams.
Their shoulders sagged, weapons hanging heavy.
“Not quick enough,” Darren muttered. “They aren’t getting to the breaks quick enough. Too many gaunts would get through. Once they’re on this side of the wall…” He threw his hands up in the air, walking back toward the center of the roof where a table had been set up.
Across it were all his notes on the various fighters and adventurers in the Clan. He was still playing with the lineups, trying to find the best combinations.
Loch knew it was useless. Without actual combat, there was no way to tell.
But he didn’t tell the man to stop. It was a way to work out his own frustrations.
The wind blew across the open roof, stronger than it was down at the ground. Rocks and bricks held the papers down.
Loch looked up at the sky, seeing gray clouds starting to gather out over the lake.
“Going to storm again,” he said.
Darren looked up, seeing the same dark clouds.
“Good. We haven’t drilled much in the rain.”
Loch sighed. It was true, but it wasn’t what he’d been thinking.
“They need a break,” he said.
“I know,” Darren sighed. “They’re close to the snapping point. This isn’t the Army and they aren’t soldiers.” He turned away from the edge, looking at Loch. “Yet.” He looked up at the sky. “Another hour.”
Loch nodded.
Darren leaned back over the edge, watching the two groups separate and walk back to their original positions. A couple of archers were there, watching as well. There wasn’t much for them to do except be on the roof, which is where they would be for the fight. Their days were long but boring.
The first day had been an interesting one. They’d shot out into the open ground to the west of the school, someone down there laying out markers. Loch hadn’t wanted to waste the arrows, but it was important to determine their ranges.
Kim Hudson and Piper sat against the wall, going through Piper’s sketchbooks. Kim had been an art student before the Connection hit. She was fascinated with Piper’s Class, offering tips and tricks to get more detail into the work. Loch, Piper, and Cerie weren’t sure if it would make the inksummons stronger, but Piper was enjoying the lessons.
That made it worthwhile as far as Loch was concerned.
Mid-twenties, Kim was energetic and full of life even after everything that had happened. Loch felt they needed more people like her. With all the death, destruction, and horror the Connection had brought, most people were sinking into depression. Loch wasn’t sure if Kim’s energy was an act to hide extreme depression or the truth. He hoped the latter.
It was infectious.
A cute, petite blonde, Kim was always smiling. Others around her couldn’t help but smile too.
Loch hadn’t gotten a chance to see her use her Abilities. She wasn’t part of any team yet either. Kim wanted to be. Like most, she didn’t want to risk her life constantly but understood that if she got stronger, it meant the Clan got stronger, and she could better protect people. The problem was their current mix of Classes.
There just weren’t the right ones to pair with her Elementalist Class.
Roger Lewis’ group came the closest but they had a caster in Theodore’s Mentalist Class.
And Loch would not subject Kim to Roger. Or Mike Turner. Or Theodore.
He didn’t know anything about the other two members but had a feeling they weren’t thrilled to be in that group.
Loch wasn’t a fan of forcing people to group up. It should come naturally; people wanting to work together or circumstances force them into a team. Like in all the games and books. In a perfect world, it would be that way. But they weren’t in anything close to resembling a perfect world.
They had an imperfect mix of Classes and a lot of people who needed to get stronger. And get stronger fast. Kristin had her list and had started matching people up. A lack of healers didn’t help. Too many groups had no means of healing at all.
They were still losing too many people in the woods. So far, no one had died in the dungeon, but only two groups had gone through, and both of those were the strongest in the Clan besides the people Loch normally had with him. The luck wouldn’t hold out forever.
It was mostly the low Level people. None that had reached Level Five and gotten a Class. That would change sooner rather than later. The woods immediately around the school, where most of the Clan spent their Leveling time, weren’t that dangerous to someone like Loch or his group. It was plenty dangerous to the lower Levels. The deeper they went into the woods, the more dangerous it would get with higher Level monsters.
They would start losing those with Classes.
Not something they could afford.
“Pipes,” he called out. “You okay up here?”
She waved, dismissing him. Loch chuckled. It was such a normal teenager action. It almost felt out of place in their new world. Loch wished he saw more of those. The fleeting moments of normalcy helped ground him.
Those moments were why he was pushing so hard to get stronger. Piper might not have a normal life; he wasn’t naïve enough to think he’d change things so quickly that she could return to relative normal, but her children? They might have a normal life.
Normal for this new world.
Loch would settle for normal, meaning they didn’t have to fight constantly.
He exited the roof through the hatch, climbing down the ladder to the janitor’s closet. The room had been cleared out of everything from the school. Shelves had been moved to larger storage areas, and the remaining cleaning supplies were stacked up or disposed of. Mops, brooms, all that were relocated. In their place were stacks of arrows, a couple of extra bows, and some first aid kits.
The bows were a mix of compound and recurve. Most were modern and fairly new, and a few were older ones. Ancient from the townsfolk’s grandfathers’ days. They were still in good shape and, in Loch’s opinion, were probably better than the compounds. Cases lined the walls, holding the bows, just waiting to be used.
There were a lot of bows in the Clan. A lot of the town had bowhunted or shot recreationally. Sadly, there weren’t as many arrows, as each bow owner only had a dozen or so. Those were going fast. The hunters, along with the adventurers, were retrieving their arrows, but some got lost, and some were damaged beyond use or repair.
For every five arrows shot, three were recovered.
It was a battle of attrition that they had been losing.
But no longer.
Terry Weiss had gotten the Fletcher Class two days ago. He’d started making arrows and had been going almost non-stop. As long as he had Stamina, he could craft. The trick was in adapting the patterns he’d read in the books and what the Connection had downloaded into his mind to fit the modern compound bows.
It proved that using Abilities in new and interesting ways increased the Spirit experience gained. Terry had already gotten to Level Six in his Crafting Class.
Each archer only had about two dozen arrows, and the extras were stored in the janitor’s closet for the rooftop archers. Terry was working as fast as he could to make more.
That had been a huge weight off Loch’s shoulders.
Having the high ground to shoot arrows down at the attackers was great, but it only lasted until they ran out of arrows. Before Terry had gotten the Class, that would have only been a couple of volleys, not enough to amount to much of anything.
Loch wished for more casters. Their ranged attacks were lacking. Even with the hunters bolstering the archers, that was only about a dozen. The archers had Skills that granted them quicker release, but there were a lot of gaunts and a lot of gaps in the barriers.
