+++ Lieutenant Hans Hoffman +++

  Nomosian Countryside

  Hans’ mech screamed as he charged into the battlefield, trying his best to intervene quickly.

  Already, Dragoon Squadron had intervened to support Valeria, who was now single-handedly fighting the armored demon. Their swords clashed with each other, each heavy slash clearly placing great strain on the Virtus mage.

  Hans watched as she pressed onwards, defiant in the face of her demonic enemies. Just like Hans, he saw in her that sheer anger, hate, and desire for revenge. This woman wanted to kill the Calamity of Recklessness, with the same drive that Hans had.

  And Hans decided that he couldn’t waste something so useful.

  “Damn it, Valeria!” Emilia’s voice shouted on the battlefield. “Didn’t I tell you not to do something stupid?!”

  “Am I doing something stupid?!” shouted the younger woman, as she blocked another strike from the demon, causing shockwaves to reverberate on the battlefield. The cavalrymen that had supported her downed dozens of wolves, many of which were trying to eat her in support of the armored demon. “I’m just trying to fight!”

  “No you’re not,” Hans shouted using his speakers, as he jumped into the fray. Heavy incendiary rounds peppered the armored demon, its plates chipping through as fires broke out on its skin. The monster turned its attention to Hans, anger flaring from the few slits on its damaged helmet.

  It charged in on him, only to be struck by Emilia’s dark spells, causing it to slow down considerably. Carefully, Hans aimed his main gun as his mech took a hard break, before sending in an APFSDS straight into the demon’s torso.

  It tore through it violently, sending armor and flesh flying through the battlefield, the demon itself thrown back dozens of meters backward. Like a raging maniac, Valeria charged forward, her sword cutting through any wolf that stood in her path.

  “Goddess, that woman’s a battle junkie,” Adelyn commented, as she helped trim down the incoming horde, her main gun keeping the elephant demons off balance. “Lady Viviani needs to rein her in, or she’ll kill herself.”

  “I doubt that,” Hans confidently said. “Just as Lady Viviani is a hard woman to kill, I believe that Ms. Torre is no different. She’s a part of the Imperial Mage Corps, and a Virtus at that—”

  He watched as Valeria rapidly clashed with the armored demon’s sword, forcing it completely on the defensive. Blood flew through the air, painting her face red as each of her successful slices whittled down the creature’s health. If it weren’t for Dragoon Squadron and Emilia’s fire support from the rear, she had already long overextended herself into the jaws of the horde.

  If I can just bait the Calamity of Recklessness here…

  Hans sighed, she was too far away, and she must be nursing her wounds, all while trying to overwhelm them. He watched as another barrage of canister shots flew above them, further trimming down the numbers of the horde. Already, bodies of wolves were stacked high on the battlefield.

  It was a grizzly sight, the blood and guts of monsters and humans alike almost intermixed with each other on the battlefield. It reminded Hans fully of the brutality of warfare in his homeland when thousands of infantrymen would climb from their trenches to face machine gun fire.

  In a way, his suggestions to the IYC would soon create those sights more and more. Behind him, entrenched infantry kept sending bullets downrange while hiding from the attacks coming for them.

  Many of the wolves seemed to have special magic, sending balls of yellow light from their mouths that exploded. But due to the earthworks created, most troopers of the 1st Anti-Demon Unit were protected, safely dispensing their firepower from their trenches.

  Behind them, the artillery acted as the main reservoir for their forces’ firepower, each shot killing what an entire platoon of musketeers and mages would normally kill.

  He laughed.

  I’m slowly bringing modern warfare to this world. His mech continued circling the frontline, responding in every threatened sector to give their retreating forces breathing room and stabilize the frontlines. If we keep this up, we’ll soon overwhelm them.

  For now, it was hundreds of monsters dying from mankind’s firepower in a few dozen minutes, alongside a demon here and there. But Hans envisioned more. There were dozens, nay, perhaps a hundred or more demons active across the continent, their numbers only increasing.

  He wanted them all to end up like these wolves, dead on the ground because of man’s ingenuity.

  And to do that…

  He needed to win this battle.

  Another pack of wolves fell from his guns, and more would fall as each minute ticked.

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  +++

  “Their tempo of attacks is faltering,” Hans said, as he gathered his main assault force right behind one of the positions of the dug-in G Company. “That means that Ms. Recklessness is recalibrating things.”

  The tired members of his mobile force, Adelyn, Emilia, Valeria, and the few members of Dragoon Squadron stood in front of their parked mechs. Emilia and Valeria seemed somewhat covered in blood. Adelyn seemed a bit dizzy, while the cavalrymen, including Captain Weibel and Captain Strobel, seemed roughed, their blades drenched in the blood of the wolves they cut down.

  “I can arrange a few of my mages to come with y’all,” Captain Weibel suggested, his voice a bit hoarse from all the shouting. “But I’m not sure what more I can do. A lot of my boys are assigned to critical defense work.”

  “I’m going to keep order in the unit, and organize the artillery,” Captain Strobel said. “But yeah, Dragoon Squadron should be able to go with you guys. Just not Salient Squadron. I need them as a quick response force. The bastards keep poking holes in us, and that doesn’t give me much confidence.”

  “So what’s our plan then?” Adelyn asked. “Flank them?”

  “Yes, we’ll be going for the western flank once the horde charges back on our lines. We’ll ride out westward, then swing back onto their rear. That’s where we’ll find Ms. Recklessness,” Hans smiled as he crossed his arms. “I’m sure she still has a lot of tricks up her sleeve, but her control over this horde must be slowly draining her.”

  “In that case, if we push her further, she’ll run out of AP and lose the battle of attrition,” Emilia pointed out.

  “Indeed. Now, the plan is simple. Ms. Torre and Lady Viviani, you two will form the main vanguard of this attack, with me close by. Adelyn will be on our rear, and she’ll be the main provider of fire support for us, targeting Ms. Recklessness with her anti-demon munitions whenever she gets the opportunity.”

  “What about us?” asked the leader of Dragoon Squadron. He was a man in his late twenties, a mere Lieutenant in rank. “What’s our job?”

  “You’ll keep the wolves out from our flanks. But you shouldn’t get too close, the Calamity of Recklessness seems to have a very powerful spell that can wipe you all out in one fell swoop, do not even try.”

  “I see, Sir Hoffman.”

  “What about me?!” a childish voice asked. It was Alizée, grinning smugly as she held her pink sword. She seemed to have partially manifested her ideal. “I can fight too!”

  “What even…” Hans’ eyes widened. “No, get down and sit with Adelyn. You’re not risking yourself in battle. It’s better if the two of you are safe inside the Diligence.”

  “What? But Sir Hans—”

  “No buts,” Hans waved her off. “Though…since you must be so worried enough that you partially manifested your powers, should things go too rough, I’ll leave the right to decide to you.”

  “...Really?”

  “But don’t assume that you can go gung-ho, and I am not seeing you swordfighting the Calamity of Recklessness. Leave the adults to that, okay?”

  “Okay!”

  She plopped back inside of Adelyn’s mech, seemingly satisfied. Everyone outside breathed a sigh of relief, clearly not interested in having a child, even if she was an angel, fighting on the frontline herself.

  Their heads all turned back on the battlefield, as the sounds of the 1st Anti-Demon Unit’s artillery began intensifying. Same with the cracks of musketry and spells, it all indicated that the battle had fully returned, and the desperate defensive action of their comrades was ongoing.

  They’re working so hard to drain Recklessness of her AP.

  Such good soldiers they were, they certainly would deserve a lot of medals after this battle.

  “Everyone,” Hans pulled their attention back to him. “It seems that the Calamity of Recklessness has resumed her all-out assault.”

  He took a brief pause, before giving his orders.

  “Let’s ride out at once.”

  +++

  Their mobile force drove rapidly through the thinly defended westernmost areas of the battlefield. Only a few wolves dared to stop them, which were quickly cut down by their advancing force.

  Valeria and Emilia led their assault, both of them running at superhuman speeds on the frontline. It certainly impressed Hans greatly—these mages were no joke, no matter what. It certainly made sense now how Emilia and her friends once fought multiple demons and the Calamity of Recklessness and Injustice at the same time.

  They seemed to be built for these kinds of fights.

  Shame. The rest of the Imperial Mage Corps still decides to be so useless, when they can be so useful.

  He looked ahead of them, as a line of wolves lined up to stop them, their mouths snarling and growling with saliva falling hungrily on the ground. Their eyes turned from yellow to red, and then, like a coordinated response, they opened up their mouths wide.

  “Everyone!” Hans shouted at his speakers. “Dodge at once!”

  A barrage of red balls of light streaked straight at them, forcing their formation to scatter and dodge. When the magic from the wolves fell on the ground, explosions peppered the battlefield, greatly disrupting Dragoon Squadron's formation. The most unfortunate one was Adelyn, who was struck straight to her hull.

  Fortunately, her armor held on, her mech barely untouched outside for a split-second reduction to her breakneck speeds.

  Their guns finally opened fire in response, as the wolves charged in on them. Hans focused his attention on the monsters directly ahead of him, sending an MPAT to kill three of them, before sending in his incendiary bullets. They were tougher now, their bodies seemingly withstanding at least twenty bullets each.

  Valeria and Emilia made the first contact with monsters, with Valeria efficiently cutting through them, while Emilia dished out her shadow magic spells to pierce, slice, and disintegrate the monsters. Her staff worked in overdrive, sending out pulses of purplish light on the horde as if it was some sort of machine gun.

  Their work allowed Hans to finally carve out a path through the horde, charging in ahead without care for his safety. He was focused on one goal, and that was to kill the Calamity of Recklessness.

  So close…he was so close, and he wouldn’t let go. Even if the wolves in front of him were now tougher, he simply started dodging them while he reloaded his coaxials. He was finally preparing for his main objective.

  At last, the first flying rose nearly struck him, slicing the neck of a night wolf instead after he dodged it.

  His eyes locked on a single figure on his displays—Ms. Recklessness was now staring at him, bloodlust also clear in her eyes.

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