(Third-person perspective)
The defenders realized their first small-scale battle was futile and retreated to Stone Stonehold, the main stronghold on Pebble. Aermir sensed their despair and knew this battle would determine the fate of the island.
As the North army approached Stonehold, Ser Reynard stood defiantly atop the Wall battlements, covered in blood. Since Pryor Player was dead and his son was only six months old, he was appointed leader.
Aermir's voice was like a bolt of lightning.
"Your resistance will only prolong the inevitable end; bow down to your new lord, for rescue will not come, and we should not waste your lives any longer."
Ser Reynard shouted dismissively.
"Come on, let's see how many men you'll lose to get this Citadel; we're all prepared to die under the light of the Seven!"
Aermir decided to make an example of him. He would conquer the Citadel alone, and do so with utmost cruelty. Citadel, they still had four thousand men, but faced with Aermir's magic, they were helpless. During this battle, Aermir realized that one of his greatest weaknesses was his lack of bombardment spells. Almost all of his spells worked within line of sight or were linear.
Since his first battle in Longsister five months ago, he had been studying two new spells in his Training Space: a bombardment spell like a mortar shell. Now, he could fly to the Wall to cast the spell. But he needed to prepare for the future; he didn't believe he was the only spellcaster on the planet, nor did he believe there would be more powerful warriors clad in magical weapons and armor, and he couldn't always fly into enemy Citadel.
Aermir stood at the forefront of the army, his eyes fixed on the Citadel's imposing the Wall. He first ordered Bo to dive-bomb inside the Citadel and launch some Earth Shards at the Citadel towers, so that the citizens would run into the Citadel; he wanted to kill as few civilians as possible. Then, he turned his gaze to the sky directly above the Citadel. He raised his hand to the sky and began to cast Fireball Spell.
" Daomio Perzys(Rain of Fire)"
The Fireball had a radius of half a meter; crimson Fireball began to form, but instead of releasing them, he combined them together. As the Fireball grew larger, his minions, unable to withstand the intense heat, began to retreat. Because it was only made from a level 1 spell, and contained only one spell, Aermir was able to combine ten spells into one. Once ready, he released the Fireball, which had a radius of three meters, into the air.
The Fireball was huge and slow. Slowly, it reached the top of the Citadel. Once it was ready, Aermir reactivated the magic, and the huge Fireball exploded into ten smaller Fireball.
Without exception, they flew to every corner of the Citadel. It was a very energy-consuming combination spell, and Aermir couldn't cast it as frantically as he would with ordinary spells, so he had to wait a few minutes to allow his energy to rest. Every few minutes, he would cast the spell eleven more times, plunging the Citadel into a hellish state.
On previous occasions, they could hear agonizing screams emanating from within the Citadel. In the Citadel's halls, the cries of pain mingled with the crackling of flames outside. Stonehold was now utterly vulnerable; its wooden structure had been consumed by the elemental attacks.
After the sixth spell, the screams stopped; they took refuge in the Citadel and stone buildings. On the bright side for the Vale people, the Stonehold, as its name suggests, was entirely built of stone. On the other hand, apart from the fortress and the Wall, all the other buildings were burned down; the roofs of every building were made of wood, so the continuous Rain of Fire destroyed everything.
Aermir's Fireball weren't as scorching as dragonfire, capable of melting stone, but they were still enough to destroy Citadel at will; it was like subjecting the Citadel to a thousand cuts, each Fireball slowly eroding a small part of Citadel. With rest, he could bombard the Citadel twice a day.
The next day, Aermir ordered a feigned attack on the Wall and pulled all his soldiers out of their hiding places, but as his men approached the Wall, he unleashed another bombardment spell.
" Ice Fog "
The spell was like the core of Winter Spell shrunk into a snowball; it trapped icy Fog inside a snowball the size of a tennis ball, then combined it into a giant snowball that looked so unassuming, like a huge, fluffy snowball. You almost wanted to touch it.
He unleashed the spell like a mortar shell, detonating it as it reached the top of the Wall. Dozens of tennis ball-sized snowballs rained down on the Citadel. These snowballs weren't hard; they burst into Ice Fog the instant they hit someone or something. But as the snowballs fell, the soldiers' agonizing screams echoed throughout the Citadel. The spell drained all the body heat upon contact, causing frostbite within seconds. Five minutes later, many people's hands, ears, and legs began to turn black from the cold. After another eleven Suvion Caligos ( Ice Fog ), a fog colder than the coldest Winter enveloped Stonehold. Because it was a spell, the Fog only lasted ten minutes, but to the soldiers, it felt like an eternity. His target wasn't the Citadel, so the civilians were largely safe, and the Citadel wasn't large enough to hold thousands of soldiers.
Aermir planned to methodically wear down the defenders, weaken their will, and force them to confront the wrath of nature. Inside the Citadel the Wall, the guards' conversation hinted at the losses inflicted by the relentless assault. "We can't endure this forever. Druid are ruthless," said a weary soldier. Hearing this, Ser Reynard rushed to the soldier and struck him with his sword.
"How dare you undermine the unwavering resolve of our followers? We are followers of the Seven. We will not bow to the Dark Magic of those treants."
Another knight, clinging to the last vestige of defiance, joined his ranks. "Yes! We will not bow to this witchcraft. We must find a way to repel their attack!"
For a week straight, he relentlessly bombarded them with two bombardment spells; of the initial 4,000, only 1,500 died, but the constant bombardment left everyone trembling with fear. It was only thanks to the lord and his knights' unwavering resolve that they maintained their fighting strength. At night, the lord bombarded with ice, followed six hours later with fire. The atmosphere in the Citadel began to change; though it was the height of summer, the nights felt like Winter. At least, that's how they perceived it.
Aermir had completed his experiment and realized he needed a bombardment spell more destructive than either of the two spells; Rain of Fire was good for destroying wooden buildings, Ice Fog was good for dealing with soldiers standing on the Wall and was also a good psychological weapon, but neither of them was enough to completely destroy the fortifications.