章節 74: The push (2)
I look at the breach in the wall some more and decide to enter and cautiously inspect the camp. There are signs of heavy battle everywhere, tents torn down, weapons and corpses scattered all over the place.
I hear sounds of fighting and horns being blown in the distance but before my curiosity can get the better of my a harpy comes diving down from the sky.
"Attention Jade, attention Jade. Legate Argus requires your presence at the command tent. I repeat. Legate Argus requires your presence at the command tent. Please head there post haste."
Then the harpy flies over to the cyclops and repeats a similar message to him before flying off. The cyclops yawns loudly and uses his war hammer to stand up. Once he stands upright he groggily rubs his eye and stomps off towards Argus' tent.
I also shouldn't dawdle to slither along behind the cyclops. Or at least I try to. That guy is so tall that his steps are large and I can't keep up. Despite that, I arrive before the tent where Argus is still writing and see only a few other creatures around.
There's the cyclops from before, a winged lion with a scorpion's tail and another spartan having a muscle-flexing contest with a half-naked woman.
"Ah Jade, you have arrived. Now that all notable units are here we can discuss our part in the assault."
Argus' words don't prompt much of a reaction. The cyclops just stares at the probably fake sky above, evidently bored. The manticore is swaying gently with its eyes fluttering and I think it's close to nodding off. The flexing contest over yonder has the spartan and his wife? too engrossed to listen so I guess I'm the only one paying attention.
"Ignore them, Jade. They are always like this and I have given up trying to force them to pay attention. At least you are here to listen."
"If they don't listen then how do they know what to do?"
"I have a very forceful hypnosis skill so I just imprint the instructions into their brains. One of the perks of having eyes all over my body is that it's very hard not to look into my eyes. Makes hypnosis a lot easier."
Feeling dozens of eyes zoom in on me still makes my scales tingle. Argus seems to notice my discomfort and most of the eyes close or look somewhere else. He must have multiple brains too or the simultaneous input of all those eyes would fry his visual cortex.
"Anyway, what's the plan? You mentioned something about pushing all the way to the 15th colosseum."
Argus looks down at his notes absentmindedly and shifts around some papers.
"Yes, that's exactly the plan. We are currently in the 19th colosseum and we are tasked with taking back the 18th, 17th, and 16th colosseum. Once we reach the 15th colosseum we are to bunker down and hold that floor until further orders arrive."
"By us, you mean the auxiliary unit and the legion, right? With those guys doing most of the heavy lifting there shouldn't be much of a problem for us."
"Normally yes. Normally..."
Argus takes one particular stack of notes and looks at them as if they murdered his family. Then, in a sudden burst of anger, he throws them all to the ground scattering them everywhere.
I catch a glimpse of a map and a whole lot of areas that are marked red. All the pages are marked with XVII at the top of the page.
"Xvii?"
"It's written in roman numerals. Floor seventeen is a swamp forest theme. Whatever possessed Imperator Vespasian to make that theme it must have been evil.
The legion will be basically useless since trees and the muddy ground will ruin their teamwork. Clearing that floor will be the auxiliary unit's responsibility."
"What do you mean by clearing?"
"We will have to vanquish all adventurers on that floor and break down any structures that impede the legion's movements. I'd call the task impossible but Imperator Vespasian has promised lots of reinforcements. If we can overrun the adventurers and stop them from digging themselves in we can do it... I hope."
"So what will my task be?"
"I was considering the possibility of sending you with a unit of kobaloi. Those creatures are weak and die quickly but since they come in great numbers you should have ample blood for your skill."
"I can do that. Anything else?"
"Well, the manticore is going to act as a distraction by just going berserk on anything that isn't a monster. The Cyclops is going to smash a path through the swamp to allow the legion to pass through. The Spartans and Amazons are to defend the cyclops while he works. I just hope that the kobaloi and harpies can act as enough of a distraction to let us proceed."
Spartans and Amazons? Then the flexing woman over there must be an amazon.
"The half-naked woman is an amazon?"
"Yep, Spartans and Amazons are the only human monsters in this dungeon that can be mass spawned. They are both a little too muscle-brained for my taste. However, they do hold their own in combat and that is what matters most to me."
Argus raises his hand into the air and the scattered notes concerning the 17th colosseum magically move back into his hand. He places them next to the other neat stacks of paper and picks up an envelope. With his other hand, he taps the desk and it transforms into a miniature desk but all the notes are gone.
He whistles and hands the letter to a harpy that appears out of nowhere.
"Bring this to Imperator Vespasian and ask him to send the kobaloi to my next location."
The harpy snatches the envelope and flies away. After the harpy has left our sights, Argus looks around as if to check whether the others are still not paying attention.
"Jade, close your eyes until I say otherwise."
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