Siege!
You decide that the obstinate church officials cannot comprehend the enemy you face. You need new superior weapons to crush them. The visions this alchemist has must have been provided to him by God. It is a revolutionary concept, but sometimes radical change is necessary, it is, after all, how the church united the land in the first place. You will need manpower to achieve this project, so you go to the people directly. You make speeches in several large cities explaining your plight: How the evil forest people are using demonic magic making it impossible to fight them with conventional methods and how God has given this man a vision of how to crush them. Church members are infuriated by your actions and some demand your immediate execution for facilitating the will of devils and demons. They have a secret meeting to determine your fate. Fortunately, their fear of the Forest People exceeds their fear of this new technology. They allow the unlimited use of Church resources to construct these weapons. The condition is, if you fail even with these new weapons, you and the alchemist shall be executed and every single evil device eradicated.
Once again, a massive taskforce, this time of smiths and engineers in assembled. Metal ore is fashioned into these large and small tubes with wooden bases and handles. You end up needing to open new mines to provide enough metal for the project, and it takes several more months, during which time the Forest People show little to no activity. It is strange, it is almost as if they are simply waiting for their inevitable doom. Finally, you have prepared thirty of these new superior catapults you name "cannons." You are also able to arm your thousand best archers with these smaller powder weapons you name "rifles." Well armed, your army is eager to obliterate the Forest People in the name of God. You know that if this doesn't work, you are dead so you take extra precautions. The bombardment will be apocalyptic before you send in any ground troops.
You line up all your cannons just out of range of their archers. You decide the best method will be to knock out the towers and top of the walls so they are unusable by the archers, then to destroy the gate. Once all the cannons are deployed and aimed, you order the simultaneous fire of each one. There is a series of terrific blasting sounds and you watch the tops of the walls shatter like glass. After only three more volleys you have taken out the prime archers nests and towers. The cannons are then reaimed towards the gate and you begin to fire. The gate is immensely strong being constructed of the metal from the heavens and after seven volleys you realize it is not going down. The alchemist then comes forth and suggests you shoot around the gate, and you do just that. After several more launches you are able to decimate the walls around the gate and the gate simply falls over from its own weight with nothing left to support it. With it the entire front of the fortress collapses down. The fort now lays open, exposed and bare.
The professional crusaders are ready on their horses, having dispensed with their swords after seeing the cannons in action and taking rifles. Once cries out, "Please, for the love of God, order us to attack! Let us send these wretched fiends to Hell!" You give the order, knowing that the forest people no longer have any tactical advantage. Like a swarm, your cavalry moves in. You hear the whiz of arrows but it is quickly covered up by the sound of black powder exploding. You then order in your ground troops, who charge in a battle frenzy starved for blood.
The battle lasts all of fifteen minutes until the last forest person is destroyed. While your weapons were lethal and able to penetrate armor and shields, they were not incredibly accurate. As a result, heavy losses were taken but every last Forest Person, woman and children included had been slaughtered. The arrow ridden corpses of crusaders lay next to barely recognizable Forest Warrior corpses. The bullets of the rifles left them missing limbs and ridden with massive holes. Some had no faces, others where missing their heads entirely. The alchemist was right, these weapons were a gift from God. With ingenuity and the might of the elements you wrought legendary suffering upon the enemy.
The Church lords you and the alchemist around like heroes to every city. They proclaim that the fight between good and evil is over and good has prevailed. They described an age of eternal peace and paradise in the future. The Forest People are now gone and no enemy remains. This delusion actually consoles the thousands of family's who sustained losses in this conflict.
The fortress is rebuilt and armed with cannons. Before long, these "guns" are mass produced and spread across the empire. Kind of ironic considering an "age of eternal peace" was upon the land. Eventually, factions of the church with differing views on management of the empire arise and civil war breaks out. Now, with these new weapons, the death and carnage that result is almost inconceivable. The unity is shattered and a seemingly endless cloud of darkness lay ahead. Even though they are gone, the Forest People have won. They were successful in destroying the Church's Empire by forcing them to use technology. Perhaps this had been their plan all along, to coerce the Church into creating implements of destruction so great that they would eventually destroy themselves. Ducount would not be pleased with what has become of the land, the fog of war that has set in and it intends to stay.
Once again, a massive taskforce, this time of smiths and engineers in assembled. Metal ore is fashioned into these large and small tubes with wooden bases and handles. You end up needing to open new mines to provide enough metal for the project, and it takes several more months, during which time the Forest People show little to no activity. It is strange, it is almost as if they are simply waiting for their inevitable doom. Finally, you have prepared thirty of these new superior catapults you name "cannons." You are also able to arm your thousand best archers with these smaller powder weapons you name "rifles." Well armed, your army is eager to obliterate the Forest People in the name of God. You know that if this doesn't work, you are dead so you take extra precautions. The bombardment will be apocalyptic before you send in any ground troops.
You line up all your cannons just out of range of their archers. You decide the best method will be to knock out the towers and top of the walls so they are unusable by the archers, then to destroy the gate. Once all the cannons are deployed and aimed, you order the simultaneous fire of each one. There is a series of terrific blasting sounds and you watch the tops of the walls shatter like glass. After only three more volleys you have taken out the prime archers nests and towers. The cannons are then reaimed towards the gate and you begin to fire. The gate is immensely strong being constructed of the metal from the heavens and after seven volleys you realize it is not going down. The alchemist then comes forth and suggests you shoot around the gate, and you do just that. After several more launches you are able to decimate the walls around the gate and the gate simply falls over from its own weight with nothing left to support it. With it the entire front of the fortress collapses down. The fort now lays open, exposed and bare.
The professional crusaders are ready on their horses, having dispensed with their swords after seeing the cannons in action and taking rifles. Once cries out, "Please, for the love of God, order us to attack! Let us send these wretched fiends to Hell!" You give the order, knowing that the forest people no longer have any tactical advantage. Like a swarm, your cavalry moves in. You hear the whiz of arrows but it is quickly covered up by the sound of black powder exploding. You then order in your ground troops, who charge in a battle frenzy starved for blood.
The battle lasts all of fifteen minutes until the last forest person is destroyed. While your weapons were lethal and able to penetrate armor and shields, they were not incredibly accurate. As a result, heavy losses were taken but every last Forest Person, woman and children included had been slaughtered. The arrow ridden corpses of crusaders lay next to barely recognizable Forest Warrior corpses. The bullets of the rifles left them missing limbs and ridden with massive holes. Some had no faces, others where missing their heads entirely. The alchemist was right, these weapons were a gift from God. With ingenuity and the might of the elements you wrought legendary suffering upon the enemy.
The Church lords you and the alchemist around like heroes to every city. They proclaim that the fight between good and evil is over and good has prevailed. They described an age of eternal peace and paradise in the future. The Forest People are now gone and no enemy remains. This delusion actually consoles the thousands of family's who sustained losses in this conflict.
The fortress is rebuilt and armed with cannons. Before long, these "guns" are mass produced and spread across the empire. Kind of ironic considering an "age of eternal peace" was upon the land. Eventually, factions of the church with differing views on management of the empire arise and civil war breaks out. Now, with these new weapons, the death and carnage that result is almost inconceivable. The unity is shattered and a seemingly endless cloud of darkness lay ahead. Even though they are gone, the Forest People have won. They were successful in destroying the Church's Empire by forcing them to use technology. Perhaps this had been their plan all along, to coerce the Church into creating implements of destruction so great that they would eventually destroy themselves. Ducount would not be pleased with what has become of the land, the fog of war that has set in and it intends to stay.
