A Hero's War [Web Novel]

[Dart-Sama]

new chapt is up, consist on two side episodes, since like danine's student just discovered body reinforcement =O

[jseah]

Side: Morey continues next week. His part got long enough that what's left is still about a full chapter's worth.

[jseah]

Sneak preview of the bit I couldn't finish last week (it just finishes up Morey's battle, the counterattack will be the rest of the chapter).

Spoiler:

Morey was relieved to find the village empty when they arrived back at the wall, zombies hot on their heels. The villagers had sensibly evacuated once Grand Cross proved to be insufficient, as was clear the moment Ereli summoned it. The last of the villagers were already streaming out the furthest gate from the zombie advance. Etani gathered her magic into her feet and simply bounded to the top of the single storey wall in one leap.

Not for the first time, Morey resolved to try learning Ems again, the last few times he had given up in frustration after the amount of work made itself apparent. But it was sure convenient.

"Now's our chance to go as well!" Etani shouted from the walls, pointed at their Rekis the villagers had left tied in the middle of the village square.

"But then the zombies will overtake the villagers!" Morey shouted up at her as they ran through the small side gate and up the stairs, "we must stall the monsters for them to get away! Nal, fire the wall enchantments!"

Instead of blasting the raw power of the enchanted walls at the zombies, Nal instead began to cast a spellstorm. Ever since Morey had got her to attack the Titan with that unusual spell conversion, Nal had suddenly developed an interest in not doing things the normal way.

"Do you want to die?!" Etani screamed. Still, she slammed the door down beside her and unslung her bow. The compound bow designed by Morey's stories and the best smiths in Inath over the last two months was very close to what a weaponized compound bow might have been. Optimized for Ereli's Em-enhanced strength, the steel limbs could drive the metal arrows clear through four feet of solid stone, with all the speed and accuracy of a normal shortbow, and that was before the acceleration and aiming enchantments they could stack on steel arrows. The downside was that the bow couldn't fire normal wooden arrows, it was so powerful the arrows invariably shattered on firing.

They hadn't managed to optimize the accuracy yet, but judging by the black tide of zombies pounding the crop fields flat, she wouldn't need it.

Morey left her to it and looked at the other two. Ereli was already setting up her Blade Wall summoning stone, surrounding their short length of wall with a ring of sharp flat plates. Locoss was moving up the walls, tweaking the enchantments according to Nal's instructions.

Etani's arrows began to fly right before Nal finished her spell. A swarm of small spells flew across the wall, activating enchantments. Then all the platforms behind the walls, except for the area directly under them, exploded outwards over the walls.

Morey had noted that the black mist of the zombies behaved a lot like a magic disruption effect. And thus physical projectiles were the obvious counter, given their experience with the giant crab-thing.

The logs making up the wall tumbled end over end as they flew outwards towards the zombies, a rain of wood from the sky the size of tree trunks. More zombies were crushed and even more broken and knocked over by the rolling bouncing projectiles.

Zombies normally couldn't shoot back, but this time they answered in the form of two beams of light. Only for the beams to scatter into wide cones. Morey flinched as one of them caught him, it was hot! Even through his armour! But at least it wasn't instant death. He nodded a silent word of thanks towards Locoss, the telltale distortion in the air in front of them as a waterfall of magical Mist blurred all light heading their way.

What protected them from the deadly beams also protected the monsters generating them from Etani. She had fired back almost immediately but her aim was off and the arrow merely plowed into the zombies near the shooter. Her next arrow caught it dead center and the blurry glow from the charging second shot winked out. That was insanely lucky.

The other shooter missed them entirely, even the area of magical Mist hovering in front of them.

As Etani exchanged shots futilely with it, it was up to Morey and Ereli to protect them, the zombies were now at the walls!


He huffed and puffed, the air was getting hot in his armour from all the dancing around. Another wave of zombies came over the tops of the walls only to be bisected by the rotating shields of Ereli's Blade Wall. The edges of the flat shields were as sharp as any Sword summoning.

Three zombies made it through and Morey pounded over to them. His sword smashed into them, wielded more like a club than a cutting device. It bounced off a crystal growing over the zombie's head, ringing in his hand. Shit! These zombies were hard!

Morey sent his magic into his arm, driving it downwards again with more force, the only Em he could use as yet. The sword vibrated like a ringing bell and Morey hung on with a death grip as the crystal shattered and the zombie crumpled. As zombie limbs flew in all directions, he caught a glimpse of more out of the corner of his eye. A mental command sent his Sword summon to the other side of their platform, beheading a zombie that had climbed up from the side.

Behind him, Nal continued to fire her spellstorms downwards into the zombies packed around the base of their platform. All around their little section of defended wall, zombies were clambering over the walls and falling into the village itself. There weren't too many to overwhelm the Rekis yet, but it was clear that it was only a matter of time before they had to retreat.

Etani growled as she fired another arrow and missed again. The first lucky shot that destroyed one shooter hadn't been repeated yet and firing at the blurry white dot was like trying to hit a mirage.

"We can't hold on for much longer!" Nal shouted over the stampeding zombies. The dogpile of zombies outside the wall was turning into something like a ramp.

"One more shot! Just give me one more-" Etani's yell was cut short when the Mist generated from the wall enchantment suddenly collapsed under the onslaught of the dark disruption magic and Ereli's blade shields suddenly wavered. The disruption hit them like a tidal wave, lapping at their magic and lifeforce like the ocean attacking a sandcastle.

Below them, the Reki's howled as they savaged another group of zombies. They felt the dark magic too.

Growling in frustration, Etani slung her bow over her shoulder and readied her shield and warhammer. Right on time. The entire crysteel door suddenly flashed pure white, light pouring from it in all directions as it absorbed and scattered a beam of light. The crystal shooter on the zombie's side was clearly aiming for Etani now.

"Back! We're leaving now!" Morey said, praying that they had done enough to delay the zombies.

If the zombies reached the fleeing villagers... he shook the dark thoughts out of his head. Etani leapt straight off the platform and landed in the dirt pack road, warhammer bowling zombies left and right like so many pins. Ereli recalled her blade shields into a tight circle and they simply ran down the staircase, not caring if the edges bit zombie or wood.

As the platform collapsed below them, Ereli renewed her flickering summoning spell with more magic while they mounted the Rekis and bounded clear out of the ever increasing zombie horde.

Riding through the streets, Morey suddenly slowed to a halt in front of the tavern that had been housing them. A thought came to him.

"Wait! Let me check something!" he said. The four girls looked at him incredulously, eyes darting from him to the zombies running after them. Nal rolled her eyes and fired a spellstorm down the street.

Not wasting any time, Morey looked into the tavern. Yes, the spirits were still here. At least that crazy innkeeper wasn't crazy enough to take the Hero's alcohol with him. Morey ignored the conspicuously missing plates they had been using the past days.

He charged up the maximum five firebolts he could manage and scattered them into the tavern's wine cellar, making sure at least one went into the cask of strong spirits.

The Hero's party rode as fast as they could away from the village, trying to catch up to the column of fleeing refugees. The burning village, including the zombies inside, left a streak of dark smoke in the sky behind them.

[Breimn]

Nth baseless theory about miasm , giant rechargeable battery for nice magical nukes! Zif it is it a certain crimson clan chuuni loli would definitely love to cross over to this series.

[jseah]

A double length special. Next week is just a Cato's Notes. I'll see if I have the time to write a side project (just like last time).

[Breimn]

Ty for new ch. I guess that by killing a good chunk of the zombie army the one controlling them had more mana to spare and so turned more zombies in laser shooters , the crystals are probably born from high concentration of mana?
And since in previous ch even those close to grand cross and not hit fell if they manage to find a way to disrupt the mana control or like Cato is doing studing spells to control other spells you could in theory either decrease number of enemies with a special field(or maybe stop their regenerating ability?) or even turn the midless monsters against each other(though it may not apply to those who already grew up crystals).

[jseah]

There are sufficient clues in the previous chapters to figure out a really important part of the magic system that explains a lot about the zombies. Well, except for one important ability, but hey, I can't give you all the answers right? =P

PS. if you really can't wait, drop me a PM

[Breimn]

It is about the magic the little fuka is using,isnt it . The black mist is using the same system. Furthermore using movement(or whatever it is written in english) magic to control the zombies.
Id say that since it only recently started employing distance attacks it does not have much intelligence yet so is trying to copy humans.As for miasm i would not be surprised if we get some mana stone around there or maybe even a hidden summoning gem that lets you control it.
As for spoils i will refrain myself at the moment.It will make wait more suffering than it already is and spewing bullshits theories is funny ,(though not as much as 4chan threads we have with overlord since there are not anons following it so no one to make funny fan fictions with).

[Dart-Sama]

new chap is up, its social revolution ppl =D

[Breimn]

Wait, what? I tought there would be no more updates this week?

[jseah]

Yeah, as it turns out, I ended up writing a shorter chapter and posting that instead of posting a full chapter later. I'd rather keep releasing chapters on weekends than end up posting in the middle of a week.

[Breimn]

A bit late but here is another guess , black fog and green mist are the spirits of the two brothers that are still continuing their fight.
If you use the right magic colour on your body you can use the power stored up by the miasm getting a bit of power up.

[Dart-Sama]

new chapt is up, story building is over, new arc is begining =)

[Dart-Sama]

new chapt out, those city fukas are so mind broken, its irritating...

[Breimn]

This new ch just made me think of the anti arrow magic item that the MC from the name of the wind created , then massproduced it with the academy s help and started selling it to the merchants since it would lower risk of ambushes(if i remember well it could attract up to 16 arrows before breaking) .If they could manage something similar things would get easier for them.
As for new girl, the apprentice, she is starting to look sospicious.

[Tenzen12]

Still didn't read anything (and didn't getread this thread past OP (I don't wanna get spoiled), but this one definitely caught my interest. Count me in.

[Breimn]

You are in for a nice ride , pal.

[Dart-Sama]

new chap is up...
oh cato, oh cato, u r so evil =D
but... such a good evilness
GO! BREAK THEIR SOCIETY!!!!

[Breimn]

>stealing something he wanted to give for free since the start
Well , nice try.

[Tenzen12]

Ok, at first I thought it's OK, but nothing special... than I found myself binging whole thing while neglecting my job as well as playing FGO in middle of event. It's really great, I love chemistry between Cato and Landar. Morey's "harem" is also hilarious ploy.

Better than most "official" Japanese WN and LN.