+++ Lieutenant Hans Hoffman +++

  Nomosian Countryside

  January 8, 1539 CE

  “We’re still going to head southwards, no?”

  Hans felt a brief shot of pain when he opened his eyes. He seemed to be inspecting the dead avian demon that they liquidated yesterday. Another obstacle appeared in front of him, and as he expected, it would be the Calamity of Recklessness herself. The pain quickly turned numb—and Hans grinned.

  “Of course we are,” Hans replied to Captain Strobel. He stood up and looked back at his colleague. “Why wouldn’t we? We still haven’t killed her.”

  “Yeah, but…we’re already starting to get overextended—”

  “Overextension is a problem. Of course, a strained supply line is going to limit our options at times. And we’ll be forced to take longer breaks to let supply wagons catch up whenever we run out of supplies,” Hans shook his head and smiled. “But I have a very good feeling about this. We won't be stretching ourselves any further.”

  Captain Strobel raised his eyebrows.

  “What do you mean by that?”

  “The frequency of demonic attacks is increasing,” Hans turned back to the remnants of the dead demon. “That means we’re getting close to the brain of their operations. What do all of these demons have in common anyway? They somewhat take orders from their master. That means we’re on the right path.”

  “I see then. I presume we’ll be remaining ready for mobile combat deployments on the march?”

  “Yes. Though, I doubt that’ll be needed. I have a good estimation of where we can dig in. A place that we’ll use to bleed and defeat the bastard. I think we should conduct a forced march to reach that place.”

  “But the supply wagons—”

  “They’ll catch up to us sooner or later. Once we dig in, we can resupply as well. It shouldn’t be a problem. And if it becomes a problem, I have a backup plan anyway.”

  Hans looked at the horizon, confident of his chances.

  No matter what you throw at me, I’ll get you eventually.

  He laughed.

  Reckless, huh? We’ll see who’s going to pay for their recklessness then.

  +++

  “I wonder what your plan here is,” Adelyn asked beside Hans.

  They were silently eating on top of his Wanderfalke’s hull. It was already afternoon, and they had advanced as the scouting party a few dozen kilometers south of the 1st Anti-Demon Unit. Ahead of them was a destroyed town, its walls destroyed and buildings consumed by what he assumed was a large fire.

  Hans forced another spoon of chicken stew into his mouth, courtesy of Adelyn’s cooking.

  “I plan to bait the bastard into our defenses. Naturally, the same as our other plans. Then, once the engagement starts, I plan to slowly whittle her down with our improved defensive capabilities. Once she’s pushed to her limits—” Hans turned to Adelyn and frowned. “I’ll execute her.”

  “You know, I’ve been wondering, how? How do you seem to know all the time where to set things up, and bait them?” Adelyn asked. “It’s just…so hard to imagine how you’ve been consistent all this time. No matter who our opponent is, we’ve never been ambushed on the march. It’s always us who ambushes them.”

  “Advanced planning, I suppose.”

  “I wish I could have some of that brain of yours. So I can peer into the inner workings of your ability to predict when an attack is coming.”

  “Come on, it’s just pre-battle foresight. Even you probably easily know that an attack is imminent. I mean, we’ve been racking up kills of demons. Isn’t it obvious? She’s probably trying to delay us…”

  “Are you assuming she’s weakened?”

  “Well, we roughed her up before she was forced to retreat.”

  “Ugh, now you’re just making stuff up,” Adelyn shook her head. “Alright…what if the guys on foot and horseback are too tired to make battle though? What then?”

  “I suppose that will be a bit of a complication. And it would be a complication if that demon brings in reinforcements on her side.”

  Adelyn stopped eating from her bowl.

  “She probably would,” Adelyn said.

  “Indeed. But regardless, we’ll find a weakness somewhere. Then we’ll kill her. I’m not letting crappy ass setbacks to end this campaign. Only her death is going to end all of this.”

  Adelyn looked at Hans briefly, a hint of concern brimming in her eyes.

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  She sighed.

  “I see then. You’re starting to scare me sometimes though.”

  “Huh?”

  +++

  January 9, 1538 CE

  They charged in quickly through the area that Hans deduced was the best area to dig in. It was early morning, and the work had already begun. Troopers and engineers of the 1st Anti-Demon Unit were all around the wide battle area, digging in hard. They were still waiting for the incoming supply wagons, but there was no time to not work.

  Hans watched it all. They had greatly improved already. They were now digging earthworks fast, the men shoveling so hard and well that it reminded him of the Great War. Mage engineers on the other hand scoured the frontline, using their wands and staff to rapidly excavate the ground.

  Each man served a purpose, and even when tired, they were doing their purpose like a well-oiled machine. On the other hand, every hour, Hans and Adelyn conducted rapid scouting sweeps throughout the frontline. Alongside that, the cavalrymen of the 2nd Fast Recon Battalion participated as well, rotating every thirty minutes between their two component units—Salient Squadron, and Dragoon Squadron.

  Not a single twig in the twenty to thirty-kilometer radius from their dug-in site went unsurveyed. Hans wasn’t just doing the recon sweeps for this battle, no, he was doing it for himself. He needed to memorize every little thing about the battlefield that they had chosen for this fight.

  If he failed in this battle, then he’d make sure that every adjustment necessary for the next one would be prepared.

  He even took the final measures to reach level five, upgrading ‘smooth response’ to tier two by killing a few goblins. That meant that not only had reduced the cooldown time greatly to ten minutes, he increased the blocking chance to two and the activation duration to four minutes. That meant that in the event of an engagement, he could probably withstand two devastating “one-shot” attacks.

  Though, I wouldn’t be able to withstand those spikes. They don’t count. I hope the next upgrade turns the shield into something more useful against weaker but still devastating threats.

  He held his controls tighter as his mech screamed through the verdant forests of the countryside. Behind him, Adelyn followed close by. She appeared to be confused by Hans’ increasing recklessness at scouting, but as usual, she was following him without much question.

  It earned a chuckle from Hans. His excuses worked perfectly well. The entire 1st Anti-Demon Unit was following his directives down to his little specific nitpicks. Even the Viceroy didn’t voice much concern when they had to stop and dig in quickly.

  Soon, they looped back to their base of operations, which was still being rapidly built up.

  Their two mechs screeched and stopped at the entrance set up for them, driving straight into the regimental HQ of the 4th Holy Ygeia Regiment. Hans dismounted his mech, alongside Adelyn, and the two made their way into the tents of their unit’s command post. Inside, the various officers of the 1st Anti-Demon Unit were talking with each other, and Hans made his way past them, going straight to Captain Strobel.

  “We didn’t find her yet,” Hans reported. “How’s the progress on the fortifications?”

  “It’s going well,” Captain Strobel replied with a smile. “Give us two more hours, then another hour to rest and recuperate, and we should be fine if you proceed to the next phase of the plan.”

  “What about the supply wagons?” Adelyn asked.

  “They already arrived,” the Viceroy replied with a smile. “We’re distributing the food and munitions already. Alongside the replacement boots, guns, and what else.”

  “That’s nice,” Adelyn turned to Hans. “Are we going out into another sortie?”

  “Nah. Let’s rest for a few more hours, then we’ll head back out again. We didn't sleep properly last night either.”

  Adelyn only nodded thankfully.

  You should be in your best condition too anyway. Hans thought. Same for me.

  +++

  “So they’re going to be sending in their goons first,” Hans said, watching as two beasts moved through the fields on his thermals. They seemed to be slowly approaching the defense lines that they set up. “Seems like they’re sending in hordes of monsters then. There’s no mistake.”

  “It’s the Calamity of Recklessness?”

  “Indeed,” Hans sighed, watching the hundreds of night wolves and other monsters that were following the two demons ahead of them. Both demons seemed like corrupted war elephants, with massive bodies, and blood-red eyes. They seemed to be locked into the direction of the defenses. “These guys are under the spell of that lunatic.”

  “Yeah…it’s like, they’re robots…”

  “I imagine that’s her special power then. Both monsters and lower demons that look like animals are under her,” Hans said. “Makes sense. She seems to represent corrupted nature itself. Of course…she’ll send corrupted nature at us.”

  “Almost like nature striking back to trim an unruly species.”

  “Well, she did say that we’re ‘reckless saplings’ once,” Hans laughed. “But whatever, we’re not going to roll over because of this. Inform the 1st Anti-Demon Unit. I’m taking holding positions here.”

  “You’re doing what?”

  “We’re nearly twelve kilometers south of our defense lines,” Hans readied his hold on his control sticks. “I think I can reasonably buy time for our forces. So just go. I’ll hold them off, then I’ll flee and bait them to our lines.”

  He heard Adelyn take a deep breath. Then, she turned her mech’s hull northwards. Her turret however remained aimed at the monsters that were moving toward them.

  “What are you doing?”

  “On three,” Adelyn said. “I’m not leaving without participating in the first volley.”

  Hans chuckled a bit.

  “Alright. On three.”

  The two began counting down, as they aimed at the most opportune targets. Hans had already loaded another MPAT round into his main gun, and he was aiming it straight at one of the demonic war elephants.

  A beast like you doesn’t even belong in this place.

  “One…”

  Neither is your master.

  “Two…”

  Neither is your buddy beside you.

  “Three.”

  It’s not us that needs to be trimmed, but you.

  Two MPAT rounds flew through the battlefield, striking deep into the lines of the goons sent by the Calamity of Recklessness.

  The war elephant that Hans targeted roared—its eyes locking straight at his mech after it emerged from the smoke, bloodied and bruised.

  Heh, come at me then.

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