( At the dark faction camp )
The orb that was the nearest to the place where the Bloodfall clan was defending was an orb that was being defended by the demon clan of Red-Foot Demons.
Although most at the light faction liked to club all the demons as one single entity, that was simply not true.
There were different clan amongst the demonkind just like there were different clans amongst the dragon kind, and the difference between the different clans spread more than just physical colours and properties.
The distinguishing feature of this branch of demons was their hands and feet were redder than the rest of their body and hence stood out.
They were not massive like some of the other demon clans, their build being about the size of an average human at 5 and a half to 6 and a half feet, they were not the most feared opponents.
Amongst their forces which primarily consisted of only Red-Feet demon's, there could also be seen some high demons and nagas mixed.
The leader of this force seemed to be a high demon with wings who was a tier5 warrior and his immediate underlings seemed to be all from the red feet demon clan.
Sebastian who had found their base of operations after a day's March into enemy lands was currently scouting their defences from a high ground about 7 kilometres away from their base.
Unlike the Bloodfall clan who had made a fort to protect the orbs, this demon clan seemed to have deployed the use of illusion techniques and fakes to keep the real orb safe.
In a field scattered for roughly 1.5-2 kilometres, Sebastian counted roughly 10-15 thousand orbs levitating in the air and emitting the bluish hue just like the real one.
Whatever technique the enemy had used to make the fake appear as the real one was working, because even after trying to figure out which orb might be the real one for about an hour, Sebastian was unable to spot any discrepancies.
As for manpower
The enemy had a legion of 100,000 troops deployed in the forest and had set up various traps.
The enemy had a second legion of 100,000 troops guarding the open plains where the fake orbs were placed and a third legion of roughly 200,000 troops who had set up camp behind the plains where the orbs were located.
The enemy could not have more than 400-450k troops total and they did not have an extremely high number of tier4 warriors either.
The only point worth noting was that while the enemy numbers were low, the Naga regiment amongst them looked terrifying.
The Naga that Sebastian had encountered was small like a common rattlesnake however the Naga which were roaming at the base were easily 12-15 feet long and had scales that looked hard like a dragon's.
There were two tier5 warriors in the Naga regiment, 4 tier5 warriors amongst the Red-Foot commanders and another tier5 high demon as their overall leader.
This brought the total tier 5 opponents to 7, which more than compensated for their lack of numbers on ground.
The path to march the army to the Red-Feet camp had no options but to move through the forest, which meant that casualties through the forest fight could simply not be avoided.
Although Sebastian did feel that the attack on this base was doable, he also understood that without a solid plan it would cost the Bloodfall clan a lot of soldiers to take this base down.
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( Meanwhile the returning scouts )
Max had brainwashed the four scouts into forcing them to speak a report that he had prepared rather than the actual findings that they found.
He had started the story by the scouts reporting that the Bloodfall clan had excellent air defence systems borrowed from the dwarves which caused them the initial heavy casualties and loss of numbers.
The weapons forced their leader to command them all to dip and from there everyone got scattered in the forest.
A few of them died at the hands of the Bloodfall clan soldiers lurking in the forest, as they reported a strength of roughly 20,000 troops and traps being set up in the forest area which was far less than the real number.
What followed was them slowly reaching a vantage point and scouting the enemy defences of the orb to find that the enemy had anchored two large naval ships in the middle of the river around the orb that was floating just above the surface.
Every scout was brainwashed by Max to say that the enemy strength was at roughly 250,000-300,000 troops total and that they only had two tier5 warriors amongst their ranks in the form of one legion commander and their lord.
The other fighters were tier4 at best and the quality composition of the armies was more or less trash.
The way that Max had crafted this report was brilliant as he encoded small variations in the words of each scout to make it seem as if everyone had scouted the area personally and brought back their own conclusions, rather than everyone sharing the same insight.
He had deliberately made the enemy feel like the strength of the Bloodfall clan was on the lower end of the spectrum and that they were easy targets to try and defeat.
The high-demon who was the leader felt sceptical of the report when he heard it once from a single scout, but when over the next few hours different scouts returned one after another with the same report, he couldn't help but dispel his doubts as he thanked his lucky stars to have gotten such an easy first target.
Based on the gathered Intel, he began drawing a strategy of attack, completely unaware that a certain dwarf had already scouted his base and was making his way back to the Bloodfall base, where they would decide his fate.
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/// A/N - Bonus chapter for hitting the GT target, good job everyone ///