Chapter 152: The Second Battle with the Tribes (Part 2)

(Reiteration: This is the old version of the chronicles.)

Patrick and Lothar joined forces, deploying the coalition's formation along the Thalassian Avenue. The human army, consisting mostly of warriors and knights, naturally shouldered the responsibility of the front lines, while Patrick's troops primarily formed the rear.

Seeing this troop arrangement, the human knights and warriors rolled up their sleeves, eager to meet the enemy head-on. Patrick thought to himself, "This is the best thing about human knights—they aren't afraid of throwing their lives away."

Now that the coalition was united, he finally had a group of strong cannon fodder—ah, no, I mean front-line units—capable of absorbing the orcish charge for him while also protecting his own troops.

In the distance, the orc army could already be faintly seen. With red dragons circling in the sky, they had naturally spotted the battle-ready human-elven coalition long ago, and a major battle was on the verge of breaking out.

Lothar drew his broadsword, preparing to command the knights to charge, but Patrick grabbed his arm before the word "charge" could even leave his lips. "Lord Lothar, let our elven forces launch the first wave of strikes before you charge."

Lothar asked with a puzzled expression, "The distance between the two sides is still quite far, and a knight's charge carries much more momentum and lethality. If we wait until the orc forces close in, we will be at a disadvantage."

"I will properly entertain those otherworldly guests with some magic." Patrick raised his voice slightly, amplifying it with magic so that the surrounding humans could hear him clearly. "Before we begin, I will unleash a long-range, large-scale magical strike against the orcs, and the rangers will follow with a volley of arrow rain to disrupt the momentum of their charge. At the same time, to avoid friendly fire and ensure the survival rate of your soldiers as much as possible, attacking only after our first wave is the best approach."

"Thank you for your generosity, High Lord of the Elves." Lothar expressed his gratitude. Long-range units and mages were rare in Stormwind; when humans first encountered orcs, they had to rely entirely on head-on clashes with warriors and knights. Facing orcs whose stature and strength far exceeded their own, the Kingdom of Stormwind had suffered terribly. In the early stages of the frontal battlefield, Stormwind had achieved almost no victories, relying entirely on the heroic sacrifices of knights and warriors to buy time for Lothar's grand retreat.

Patrick was merely doing a favor while cleverly masking the weakness of having an overly singular troop composition. In truth, it was Patrick who wanted to use the human coalition to withstand the frontal pressure of the orcs, yet it was made to look as though the elves were generously shielding them.

The orcs began their assault on the coalition camp. The red dragons in the sky circled continuously, and one smaller red dragon, losing its patience, spearheaded an attack by releasing a breath of dragonfire toward Lothar and the others. Some of the humans, facing a dragon for the very first time, frantically swung their weapons in the air, vainly attempting to sever the surging torrent of dragonfire.

Just as the dragon breath drew closer, it was suddenly blocked by a layer of blue-white barrier, keeping all the flames completely at bay. Seeing this, the morale of the human forces soared even higher.

When Khadgar witnessed the deployment of such large-scale magic, the very first person that came to mind was his master, Medivh. Even Medivh had never wielded magic in quite this manner. For a split second, Khadgar drifted into a daze, his thoughts drifting back to the days of living in Karazhan.

Although Khadgar understood well enough that he was a spy for the Tirisgarde, Medivh had never made things difficult for him in Karazhan. Otherwise, given the nature of Sargeras, the moment Khadgar stepped foot into Karazhan, he would have met an untimely and sudden death. After all, ending someone's life was far too easy for an Astral Mage, especially within Medivh's domain of Karazhan—doing so was no different from walking the path to the netherworld.

No one noticed Khadgar's momentary distraction. Meanwhile, Patrick had already begun to unfold his spiritual sight, with arcane energy fields overflowing from his body. His red, gold-trimmed silk robes billowed in the wind as arcane power began to seep into the surroundings. Higgens-El-Carobon and Loran-Ryuuka flanked him on either side, uniting with the surrounding elves to safeguard their lord's physical body.

Free from enemy interference and heavily protected, Patrick could unleash the full power of the arcane, letting the enemy experience the true might of a super-magus, much like that Blackrock council member he had once encountered.

Mental energy began to replace matter within the energy field, and his perception reached saturation. Patrick's proud super-magics—Arcane Rose and Blazing Aura—began to spin into motion. Simultaneously, he used his mental power to notify the ranger troops to prepare the first wave of arcane shots, ordering them to rain free-fire arrows directly into the front ranks of the orc army in hopes of immediately breaking their charge.

The humans on the outer perimeter wore tense expressions. This was their first time fighting in alliance with elves, and they had placed all their hopes on the High Elves. Seeing the orcs charging head-on, anxiety was only natural.

The rangers had been holding their breath in concentration. At the command, they drew their bows and loosed their arrows. The arcane-infused projectiles streaked toward the orcs like a cloud of locusts. Many orcs were wounded by the enchanted arrows, but given their formidable constitutions, minor flesh wounds meant little unless they hit vital organs. However, as the enchantments on the arcane arrows detonated, the stricken orcs were instantly consumed by flames and collapsed lifelessly to the ground, their eyes wide with unfulfilled resentment.

Though a few lucky ones managed to avoid the arrows, the moment these stragglers charged into the blue-white barrier, one layer after another of blue rosevines sprouted around them. These vines rapidly bound the orcs' hands, feet, and bodies until they could no longer move, causing them to tumble face-first onto the ground, where they could only slowly writhe.

Regrettably, before they could struggle much longer, death arrived silently. The rosevines turned incandescent red in an instant, and a pungent odor of burnt flesh swept across the battlefield as those orcs were consumed by the flames.

A mocking smile played at the corners of Patrick's lips. Wisps of arcane energy still flowed through his hands, and the arcane power within his mental realm was fully deployed, keeping everything around him under his spiritual surveillance.

Witnessing the scene before him, Orgrim flew into a rage. When had the Horde ever fought such a frustrating battle? The Warchief roared angrily, "Gul'dan! Zuluhed! Kill those fragile creatures at once!"

Prompted by Orgrim, Zuluhed immediately channeled the power of the Demon Soul, driving all the red dragons into the fray. The circling red dragons in the sky launched their assault, and more than a dozen of them unleashed their breath weapons toward Patrick's position. The raging flames from the jaws of the giant beasts came rushing forward, crashing squarely into the arcane barrier Patrick had erected.

The smooth, blue-white shimmering arcane barrier developed fine cracks. Sustaining the simultaneous dragon breath of more than a dozen colossal dragons required an immense expenditure of energy, pushing Patrick to the brink of exhaustion. If not for the fact that he was backed by a floating city—granting him home-field advantage—and that the Ghostlands naturally harbored a residual radiation from the Sunwell that partially replenished his mana, maintaining the arcane barrier for the entire legion alone would have been straining enough, let alone preparing a legion-wide super-magus spell. Such a technique, fusing multiple meta-magic skills, possessed devastating power and clear lethality against the orcs, but it would drastically accelerate mana consumption. Ordinary ninth-tier mages would never dare to casually squander arcane power the way Patrick did; should their mana be entirely depleted before the battle ended, the consequences needed no elaboration.