War Core 4, Chapter 27.

Chapter 27.

“My forces are suffering after that last attack, your troops should lead the assault,” Vilkrex complained.

“I have problems of my own, you need to deal with the Karsham. My troops will assist you with indirect fire support and stay to help defend your base while you finish your attack. The Karsham are worse off than you are, an easy kill,” Hssim said.

Vilkrex had sent long-range scouts, one of whom made it to Hssim’s territory where the two cores joined forces. The alien between them had fallen quickly to their combined force, and to Hssim’s delight, the alien to the other side of him was taken out by the Hydra. The latest attack was difficult, but something his experienced pod operators handled easily enough. His air mechs had been devastated and would take some time to rebuild, which Hssim believed was the likely outcome for most cores with a sizeable air mech force.

Things had been much worse for Vilkrex, much to Hssim’s delight. Vilkrex’s main attack force consisted of a swarm of infantry with short-range flight capability. Normally, they flew toward their foes, gaining height before gliding in for the kill. This time, the mothership dispensing the attacking force had packed substantial air defense. Three-quarters of Vilkrex’s infantry was destroyed in under a minute by the incoming anti-air missiles. By the time he had figured out that their normal flying attacks were suicide, Vilkrex’s surviving forces barely had the numbers to hold off the assault on his command post.

Vilkrex had pleaded with Hssim for help. Five claws of Ssath infantry were here to assist the attack force, along with six light mechs and a quartet of medium mechs configured for indirect fire. They would back up Vilkrex’s attack on the Karsham, but Hssim would make Vilkrex’s forces be the vanguard and take the bulk of the casualties. Hssim had fought the Karsham before and even claimed a world or two of theirs that proved good hunting grounds. They were a deceitful and deadly race, and he had little doubt that Vilkrex would stumble in his assault. Hssim personally hadn’t been able to confirm it as a war core, but his people had reported the serpent-like Karsham were delectable. When this was over, he would feast on them at his leisure, on them and all the other species that he had missed the opportunity to consume.

The Karsham command post had been damaged by the last automated wave, and earlier skirmishes with Vilkrex’s army as well as the human core to the other side of them. Only a fraction of their army had been rebuilt, giving Vilkrex a slight numerical superiority. Vilkrex could overwhelm the foe, but only with Hssim’s help. The fool had neglected most of his other unit types to concentrate on infantry. Sure, his core was already tier eight, but he had poorly upgraded infantry and just a few light mechs in his force.

Hssim had taken time to build up his forces, creating a flexible army and lavishing them with upgrades. He was only tier six, but that had proven more than enough to deal with the threats so far. All that remained were the four allies and two hostile alien races. Hssim’s scouts had found the human core was on the other side of the Karsham, but for now, he didn’t make contact. There were things Hssim needed to accomplish and one of those was thinning the numbers of his rivals. For the same reason, he avoided contact with the Yaelar who were heavily engaged with powerful D’kahn mechs.

“I will attack, but if losses are substantial, I will have to go on defense for a long while,” Vilkrex complained.

“Begin your assault, my guns will silence any opposition,” Hssim ordered. Vilkrex hissed his displeasure but started the attack regardless of her personal feelings. The attack was led by a dozen converted Karsham mechs, Vilkrex using her species’ rather unique method of subjugating a foe. Hssim found it disturbing, their hatchling’s ability to take over another mech, and he wondered what happened to that mech’s operator. When the pod opened after the battle, would they find the operator inside partially consumed, or would it be the clean kill that the GCA normally provided?

The first wave fooled the Karsham for a bit, allowing them to close before the friend or foe recognition system saw through the ruse. AI defenders started firing first, and they were soon joined by the small group of mechs left to defend the command post. Two scores of enemy infantry, a dozen light mechs, and a single medium mech joined the depleted garrison force. Vilkrex’s captured mechs charged into the fire, their troops’ hive-like mentality made them only marginally more effective than the AI-controlled units, but Hssim did give them credit for their bravery.

Her captured mechs were torn to pieces, but right on their heels was Vilkrex’s main force. Over a hundred and twenty infantry drones swarmed out of the jungle, taking wing before swooping on a trajectory that would take them in and among the foes. Hssim ordered his medium mechs forward, the oversized mortars on their backs already coughing out their first rounds even as his light mechs started snapping off shots with their shoulder-mounted light cannons.

Not known for their accuracy in the best of times, the longer ranges made them less than effective. They were targeting the structures, which were large enough targets that accuracy mattered little. The Karsham shifted fire as the last of the imposters fell. Fire shredded the leading edge of Vilkrex’s infantry, but even now, the first mortar rounds were slamming home. Several enemy mechs were damaged or destroyed in the volley. More importantly, the command post ate two of the shots, bringing down its shield and tearing into the roof of the structure.

Already damaged, Hssim knew the command post wouldn’t stand up to punishment for long. Half of Vilkrex’s army was shot down before they finally landed. Once on the ground, they used their scythe-like arms to good effect, cutting down many of their foes. Hssim watched the battle play out, Vilkrex would likely lose, but the Karsham wouldn’t be able to push Hssim out of the forest before their command post fell.

“Second team,” Hssim called out over the Ssath command link.

“What is your command, Great Leader, do we move to support the allied core, or do we destroy it?” The group leader replied.

“Destroy it, claim your prey,” Hssim commanded. He would be done with two foes this day, Vilkrex and the Karsham. It was a pity that he didn’t have time to secure the forward base and other critical areas in each zone, but time was against him. The longer he fought, the more deadly the waves of attack they would face. Eventually, the GCA would overwhelm them. He needed to thin down the number of foes and take the fight to the guardian as the last survivor.

“Mortars, you need not be so discriminating in your fire,” Hssim ordered. The gun crews aboard the medium mechs would be happy to receive that command. They had tried to avoid hitting any area with Vilkrex’s infantry nearby, but now they could just blast the core and the forces around it to dust. The mortars were powerful enough, but it would still take time to reduce the enemy structure.

“Hssim, you betray your ally! Your homeworld will become my nursery, and your people nothing but hosts for my young,” Vilkrex railed as she noticed Hssim’s indiscriminate fire and the invasion force approaching unopposed toward her core.

“I’m afraid you won’t survive to make good on your threats. I would counter your vitriol with the assurance of your homeworld becoming one of our hunting preserves, but your people taste horrible, so I’ll just wipe out all life on it instead,” Hssim replied. He loved goading an enemy, it was a great way to throw them off their game and force them to make mistakes.

You have attacked the previously allied core known as Vilkrex. Do you wish to establish a hostile stance with the other allied cores, y/n?

Hssim responded no, he would keep up the pretense of an alliance for now. The D’kahn would likely finish off the Yaelar soon, his scouts reported they were on the move, and the human would be used to blunt the attack on the guardian before Hssim killed him yet again. When he controlled the GCA, the human homeworld would be the first to face his wrath. While it hadn’t been under his command, the botched invasion was a travesty that could only be righted by spilling the blood of his foe.

A core has been defeated; 5 cores remain in the fight. For dealing the killing blow to this core, you have been awarded 500 resources. Any critical areas or forward bases under the control of the defeated core have been eliminated.

The system prompt jogged Hssim from his thoughts and he watched as the Karsham command post collapsed under the fire of his mortars and light mechs. Vilkrex’s surviving infantry, which was only a handful of mechs, charged Hssim's forces, but they were cut down quickly enough by the superior firepower he had brought to the fight.

“Do a recon of the zone, be cautious, we don’t want to make contact with the human core yet,” Hugh ordered the troops that had supported Vilkrex. There was a chance that the human secured either the unique resource area or the forward base given that the Karsham core would have had little time for expansion as it was pressed aggressively by two foes at once. Hssim’s unique resource area was a huge boon, especially since he fully upgraded it. The place granted him AI-controlled units in the form of a particularly nasty vermin from his homeworld.

Zigblat were an arachnid species that had been mostly eradicated, but their mech versions were alive and well in Hssim’s zone. Already, he had over a hundred of the things. His ability to control them was limited, and he could only order them to defend their hive or attack a specific core. For now, he held them in reserve, ready to unleash them on whichever core was giving him the most trouble. Hssim had fought in battles where structures like the Zigblat hive existed, and he liked to use the forces they produced as fodder to soften up the enemy before his actual troops attacked.

Hssim watched his forces close in on Vilkrex. The core was still producing units, but her garrison had been torn apart by the last attack wave and wasn’t going to be more than halfway replenished before the strike. A couple of dozen infantry mechs were on hand, with more being produced, but they wouldn’t get the critical mass of units that Vilkrex needed to overwhelm Hssim’s forces before his army arrived. Vilkrex was doomed and it was just a matter of time before she was out of the fight.