War Core, Chapter 34.

Chapter 34.

“It looks like the Krixnas have stopped feeding their units in piecemeal, sir” Captain Tran observed. Hugh continued to push his troops north through the Makonar tunnels. At first, the Krixnas had continued to send pairs of infantry into the tunnels every few minutes, but that stopped after his troops easily wiped out more than a few of the groups.

“I think our opponent is running out of resources, the Krixnas must have spent a lot of what they had to build the force trying to take the Makonar supply depot. I suspect whatever they have remaining is being gathered together for a last stand,” Hugh said. The moved another mile or so in the winding tunnel when daylight could be seen ahead.

“Send a team of scouts up to see what we’re up against,” Hugh ordered, watching as two of his infantry rushed ahead of the main body, approaching the exit to the tunnel complex.

“Enemy command post in the distance, it looks like their digging in, sir,” one of the scouts reported a short time later. The tunnel they were in exited out at the end of the canyon. Just beyond the narrow canyon, a small grassy plain sat, its gentle slope eventually reaching the mountains bordering the north of this zone. At the foot of the mountains, Hugh could see a Krixnas command post and a couple of other buildings standing. A series of two trenches were being dug in front of the command post, the ends of which were anchored to the impassable mountains.

“It’s hard for me to get a good count on them. Some of the Krixnas are probably inside the trench line below our line of sight,” Hugh said, ordering his forces out of the tunnel.

As bad a walking through the tunnels had been, the journey was far better than it would have been if he tried to keep to the canyon. Rock giant mechs could have ambushed him at will, and when he finally made it through that gauntlet, he would have to fight off the Krixnas who would likely be reinforced by units taken from the Makonar supply point. Because he took a risk, Hugh had been the one to add the rock giants to his forces, rock giants he would now turn against the Krixnas fortifications.

“It looks like their fortifications aren’t complete yet. We need to hit them before they finish,” Captain Cartwright added. As they watched, a Krixnas infantry unit marched its way from the command post and began to assist in the construction of the trench line. The command post must be down to only the trickle of resources that normally flowed in, otherwise, it would be pumping out units a lot faster than it was. Still, every minute he delayed now meant the Krixnas would amass more resources they could use to produce more defenders. He had to strike, now.

“Move out, we’re going to destroy the enemy command post. When we do that, I believe we’ll have finished this stage of the battle. Fall into formation while we’re moving, give me a three-squad frontage with a fourth in reserve,” Hugh ordered. His forces moved forward, the professional soldiers expertly maneuvering their mechs into the desired formation.

Hugh slowed the troops down just a tad, giving the slower rock giant mechs time to take the lead. He set the command post as the giants’ objective and used something that Maddison had called attack move to direct them to the target. The giants would head toward their objective, fighting anything in their way. While a good way to make sure they didn’t ignore things attacking them while heading toward their objective, the maneuver would be one that could easily be exploited by a sharp enemy, using a worthless unit to draw his giants away from the fight. Hugh wanted to set a secondary pursuit limit to the giants, but the interface didn’t allow for that.

The distance to the Krixnas command post lessened as Hugh relentlessly moved his troops forward. Responding to the approaching threat, any Krixnas still working on digging the trench line gave up their efforts and joined the other defenders. Hugh still couldn’t get a good count, but he figured the enemy forces limited, having likely been seriously depleted from the earlier fights. When they were still outside of heavy machinegun range, a pair of bright flashes were seen in the second trench line.

“Incoming, it looks like these Krixnas have mortars,” Captain Tran said. Hugh watched the balls of plasma drift down toward his advancing troops. Hugh instinctively ordered his lines to spread out a bit, it would dilute their firepower once they were in range, but it would lessen the chance each mortar round would take out multiple soldiers with each hit.

The first rounds exploded well in front of his advance. From the size of the explosion, Hugh figured the Krixnas mortars were about twice as powerful as a plasma grenade. He really wanted to unlock something similar, but it would likely require a level four barracks to do so. The mortars’ slow rate of fire told Hugh they were probably low-level weapons. It was a good thirty seconds before the next pair of shots landed; this time behind them. They were just about to enter heavy machinegun range when the third mortar rounds fired.

“They’ve got us bracketed now,” Captain Tran said as the mortar rounds arced toward his main line. The pair of explosions took out three of his infantry, the splash damage was much worse than he had expected. The T-7’s now began to fire, their rounds unlikely to hit at this range, but it made everyone feel better to be hitting back at the foe. Walking toward a prepared enemy while under artillery fire was about one of the worst things a soldier could be ordered to do.

As they closed to rifle range, the Krixnas began to raise up from the trench to fire their tentacle lasers before ducking back down. A quick estimate showed they had only between fifteen and twenty defenders. The lead rock giants began to take hits, they presented the largest and closest target for the infantry mechs.

“What is that?” Sergeant Landry said as one of the rock giants stumbled. A glowing tentacle had emerged from the ground, burning deep into the giant leg it was wrapped around. A second, then a third emerged as they advanced, two of the new ones grabbing the same rock giant, taking the mech down and rendering it a mobility kill. The third one snagged and killed one of his infantry mechs.

“I think it’s the Krixnas version of a minefield, kind of creepy but since they only affect a single target, I’d say they’re not as good as ours,” Captain Tran replied.

“It’s probably a low-level weapons, I’m sure the higher-level versions are more trouble than these. Mines or not, we’re almost there, keep pushing,” Hugh replied.

Another two rock giants were taken down by infantry fire. A T-7 and an infantry mech fell victim to continuing mortar fire. The rock giant mechs now were near the first trench line, the Krixnas occupying the trench rose up to engage the rock giants in melee. Stone fists met glowing face tentacles as they fought. His other troops continued to close the gap, gunning down the now exposed Krixnas. Without the ability to take them to the next zone, Hugh told his troops not to worry about friendly fire if the rock giants were in the way. A pair of grenades went off, clearing the Krixnas that hadn’t moved into melee range.

More mortar rounds landed as Hugh ordered everyone to press the attack. The second trench line wasn’t complete, and the Krixnas there had less cover. His light mechs moved at top speed, outpacing the rest of the advance as they homed in on the section of trench where the mortars were firing from. Heavy fifty caliber rounds punched holes in any Krixnas that tried to poke their heads up for a shot.

When they reached the second trench line, his T-7’s looked down at the strange mortar weapons the Krixnas used. The weapon was bolted onto the back of a slightly larger infantry mech. With the added bulk, the mech housing the mortar couldn’t move very fast, allowing his light mechs to blast them down before they could defend themselves. More plasma blasts announced Hugh’s infantry arriving at the last trench line. The smattering of defenders fell quickly to his forces, and now the destruction of the command post could begin.

Fire from his mechs slammed into the building, blasting out chunks with each shot. A final Krixnas infantry walked out of the barracks, but it didn’t stand a chance on its. Hugh had now observed the Krixnas building infantry at both the building he assumed was their barracks, and at the command post. The ability to produce combat units at the command post seemed very powerful and should have meant they could outproduce him in terms of infantry, but there didn’t seem to be that much disparity between their forces. It was another question for the intel team to investigate. If they could find out something helpful like that, they might be of some use after all.

The Krixnas command post has been eradicated, you have completed the second stage of the battle for es1423. Proceed to the designated extraction zone with all your forces to progress to stage three of the battle.

The rest of the Krixnas structures went dark with the destruction of the command post, at least he didn’t have to waste time knocking down each of the buildings. Their assault on the command post had been the costliest so far. His troops had performed well, but the enemy had been dug in with mortar support, not to mention the bizarre mine field. A few of his mechs were mobility kills, and since he had zero resources remaining, he couldn’t repair them. The final count showed Hugh with 23 infantry, seven of which had some level of damage, his machinegun team, and two light mechs. A light mech and four infantry were down with damage, but not destroyed. When they moved to the next stage of the battle, and forces left behind would be removed from the battlefield. There was no way for Hugh to know if the removal from the battlefield would result in them being considered a casualty, forcing the troops piloting those mechs to risk a chance of death.

Just past the ruins of the command post, Hugh could see a patch of the ground glowing faintly blue, just like the jump pads inside the aircraft they had arrived in. It looked like they were going to jump to their next battlefield. The platoon was reorganized, there were too few units to support four squads, so he cut it back to three. Two squads had eight infantry and a light mech, and the third squad had seven infantry and the machinegun team. His construction drones grabbed some of the damaged infantry and the light mech. It required two drones to haul the light mech and the others grabbed three of the damaged infantry mechs.

“Anybody have any ideas how to haul the last damaged mech out of the zone?” Hugh asked. He could order his drones to pick up something, but there was nothing in the interface that would allow his infantry or other mechs to haul a wounded comrade.

“Let me try something, I don’t want to leave anyone behind,” Captain Tran said. The final damaged infantry mech had lost one of its legs to a mortar hit. There was other damage, but the leg was keeping him from moving. Captain Tran had one of the light mechs walk over to the wounded infantry unit, the man piloting the damaged mech wedged the barrel of his rifle arm under the leg of the T-7 mech and pulled, bending the barrel into a hook. With a little trial and error, the infantry mech was able to sling the hook over the barrel of the T-7’s fifty cal, and with his other hand holding on for dear life, was able to stay aboard as the pair headed carefully toward the extraction zone.

With everyone accounted for, Hugh ordered his forces forward. The extraction zone was a flat area the size of a basketball court at the edge of the mountains. As the first units walked onto the extraction point, the glow began to intensify under their feet, flashing rapidly as some power built up inside it. With a flash, units began to teleport away, but the pace was slow, only a single mech every ten seconds or so. Hugh shifted his view to the first mech that had been teleported, taking in the scene as several prompts flashed into view.

You have entered the third and final stage of the battle. Destroy the enemy command post to claim victory. This is the first time you have fought a battle of this type, please observe the following familiarization guide. Once the guide has been completed, your forces will begin to arrive, and the battle will commence.

Hugh’s view zoomed out from his command post, a highlight was placed over the area, showing where his forces would randomly arrive once the guide was complete. Like previous command post destruction battles, the battlefield itself was symmetrical. The two command posts were placed at the top of a slight incline and the ground between consisted of scrub brush and a rocky soil. There weren’t a ton of terrain featured, but the vegetation and rocks would provide some cover.

The enemy command post was in the north and Hugh’s was placed here in the southernmost portion of the battlefield. Overall, the shape of the zone was rectangular, and the borders of the battlefield were the familiar range of mountains that had been used in the previous stages. Hugh tried to take in everything, but his view was taken over by the GCA who wanted to highlight certain features of the battle for him.

While you have been completing the previous stages, your opponent had been slowly building up their command post and related structures. Much of the battlefield has been restricted for them, limiting access to resources and special locations. Now that the final stage has commenced, all access restrictions will be lifted. Please observe.

Hugh watched a time lapse feed of the zone, noting that initially the Krixnas had nothing to work with save for a pair of infantry which immediately began construction of a command post. Their starting resources must have been just enough to get the building completed, as their mechs went idle as soon as construction was complete. Around the area of the command post, it was a normal sunny day, but most of the zone was still dark. As time fast forwarded, Hugh could see the Krixnas start to build other structures and gather nearby supply crates. The darkness receded over time, gradually revealing more of the zone and unveiling hidden resources for the Krixnas to exploit.

His opponent built up a force of infantry and marched them over another of the blue teleportation platforms, like the ones his troops were currently using. The units that were being teleported out must have been the ones he had fought in the other zones. If that was the case, the Krixnas must have started the battle before his own troops had jumped into the fight. Things continued along the same pattern, more of the battlefield becoming accessible and forces being created and shipped out to engage his own. The light stopped halfway across the battlefield, blocking the Krixnas from approaching his side of the zone.

At the base of the mountain deep into Krixnas territory, a small passageway opened in the mountainside, allowing a small force of infantry through to investigate. The troops didn’t return and a bit later the Krixnas sent a larger force, including several of their light mechs. This did the trick and as the battered remains of the attack force left the canyon, they were followed by a flight of five air mechs. The Krixnas air mechs weren’t that different from ones that Hugh might field. The air mechs moved on a pair of engines mounted to the sides of the fuselage. Unlike his air units, these didn’t have wings, but did sport a fuselage with some type of weapon bristling from it. These mechs were medium sized and looked slow, reminding Hugh of a ground attack helicopter more than a fighter plane.

If the two sides of the battlefield were a mirror of each other, Hugh should have a similar objective near his command post. The aircraft would be tough to beat with his current forces, so gathering whatever bonus units awaited him would be a priority. He also knew that when he made his move to grab the bonus units, he better do so with overwhelming force, given the losses that the Krixnas appeared to have taken in their initial efforts. The video ended with the ground near his command post glowing as the first unit was about to be teleported in. In the middle of the battlefield, Hugh saw the Krixnas forces massing. They intended to assault him before he could get his production up to speed. With limited forces, and many of them damaged, his foe had a good chance of succeeding.

This familiarization guide is now complete, the battle commences.