Naxi Fortress.
This imposing fortress at the end of Grayrock Pass had been built against the mountains, with the sheer cliffs of the Grayrock Mountains at its back. That natural barrier meant it only had to face threats from the swamp.
Its ten-meter-high walls were massive as mountains, built from hard gray limestone and the blood and sweat of countless craftsmen. Their surfaces were riddled with pits and scorch marks left by wind, rain, and countless battles.
In the ever-present damp, the dark gray stone was covered in a slick, sickly layer of dark green moss, like rotting skin.
Faced with a fortress like this, Little Knife felt he would have few options even if he led the current Holy Crusade Army against it.
He could bombard it for several days with nearly a hundred Field Cannons and more than a dozen Siege Heavy Cannons, concentrating their fire on one section of wall and trying to collapse it into a gentle slope men could climb, then begin a meat-grinder assault.
Or he could strike before the defenders had finished preparing, using cannons and rockets to provide covering fire while the Demolition Squad reached the gates. They would blast open the gates before they could be barricaded, then send in a player assault team unafraid of death to seize the fortress.
Beyond those options, Knife-in-the-Butt could think of little else for the moment.
Yet this formidable stronghold at Grayrock Pass, this Naxi Fortress that should theoretically have exacted a terrible price from any attacker, had recently fallen to the Snake-Men overnight, in an almost disgraceful fashion.
That fact lodged like a thorn deep in Little Knife's understanding. No matter how he turned it over, he could not make sense of it.
Standing on a relatively dry rise several kilometers from the