War Core, Chapter 30.

I've got another chapter ready today, but this will be a busy weekend so I won't get anything else posted until Monday.

Chapter 30.

This battle will be a checkpoint assault. As the instigator of this conflict, the Krixnas core will be allowed to choose whether they wish to be the attacker or the defender for this battle.

The Krixnas core has chosen to defend.

New battle format detected for the human war core. As your core has not experienced this type of battle format before, a short overview will be provided before the battle starts. Given the nature of the battle type, no negotiations are required.

With that, Hugh found himself hurtling toward another conflict world. This time, while he was traveling, the GCA played a quick tutorial on whatever this checkpoint assault battle type was. He found himself looking at a replay of a fight between two alien races, one of which he was interested to see was the Ssath. The battle began with the Ssath as the aggressor; a pair of large airships dropped down toward a small valley. The Ssath airship looked like the spitting image of a flying saucer and once landed, troops began to pour out as the system began to explain what was happening.

In a checkpoint assault, the attacker is given a preselected force to fight with. At each stage of the battle, you will face not only defenders placed there by your opponent, but also randomly generated forces that are hostile to both factions. Each stage of the battle will have an objective. Meet the requirements of that objective to proceed to the next stage.

Hugh watched as the Ssath infantry emerged, they looked like he expected, mech versions of a velociraptor. The head of each infantry mech had a mouth full of jagged teeth and their arms had been replaced with plasma weapons. These looked like higher tier units, given the extra armor plating bolted on and the grenade launchers mounted on their shoulders, the weapons already coughing out rounds toward the distant defenders.

The opponents were hovering infantry mechs that looked like someone had taken a chunk of steel and melted it. In the real world these things must have been some blob-like creature, he had seen similar aliens while on leave. The entire surface of the blob mechs glowed, charging up before unleashing a beam of destruction at their foes. Despite the extra armor, the Ssath moved quick, and closed in on their outnumbered foe. The last few opponents were taken down in melee range and the tooth filled Ssarn mouths had proven more effective than Hugh would have thought. When the dino’s bit down, the teeth began to whirr like a chainsaw blade, easily cutting through the armored shell of the blob aliens.

The battle fast forwarded at that point, Hugh barely catching that the Ssarn were able to occupy an abandoned command post where they pumped out some replacements. The Ssarn were victorious, blowing through the blob people with ease at each stage of the battle. Hugh looked closely at the fast-moving video, trying to figure out how the Ssarn and their opponents fought. One thing was clear, the dino’s knew what they were doing. The last stage found the defenders hunkered down near their command post. Hugh watched as the Ssarn overran the position, destroying the command post and winning the match. The system gave a quick recap, not bothering to give much in the way of details.

In this example, the final challenge was to destroy the defender’s command post, but that may not always be the case. As the attacker, you will need to manage your resources and fight smart if you want to preserve enough of your forces to face whatever the final challenge may be. The defender will also be faced with limited resources and must decide how much to commit to each stage of the battle.

There were a lot of unknown questions, and the only way he was going to find out was by fighting. When the replay ended, Hugh could see that he was hovering over a dark world, the surface apparently devoid of any life. Furthest from the sun, and way outside the goldilocks zone, this planet likely never supported life. Just like in previous battles, as he zoomed in, there was small patch on the surface what was bright and heavy with vegetation. If the GCA could do this on a lifeless world just to have an interesting setting for a battle, why didn’t they help the various races to create their own safe worlds and eliminate the need for conflict? He didn’t think he would get an answer anytime soon.

Initial force calculations are being made. Your first challenge will be to land the assault force and restore the damaged command post to a functional state. When you are ready, move your forces to the designated extraction point to complete this stage. There is no time limit but understand that you opponent has a command post up and running which is slowly feeding them resources. As the attacker, the normal resource flow for a command post has been cancelled. You will only have what you find inside the battlefield. Your initial attacking force will consist of the following.

Infantry Mechs, 40. Your infantry mechs will start at level three.

Machinegun Team, 1.

Construction Drones, 2.

War Core, prepare for battle.

Hugh found himself inside a large transport aircraft, his point of view able to shift at will. Not being bound to a command post felt a bit strange, and he lacked the ability to monitor the entire battlefield at once. Focusing inside the craft, he could see the rows of his infantry lined up and standing on glowing blue pads. His two construction drones also stood on glowing pads near the front of the aircraft. Hugh zoomed his view outside the aircraft to get a look.

The oversized air mech he rode in was making good speed, flying over a dark ocean as they approached the bright mainland in the distance. If he had to guess, Hugh would estimate they were relatively low, only a couple of thousand feet over the calm sea below. He tried to see if there was some device or visible means that the GCA used to generate bright sunlight over the battlefield, but the secret of their technology eluded him. When he tried to focus on barrier between the light and dark sections, Hugh’s vision blurred. Whatever made the phenomenon happen, the GCA wasn’t going to show him. He was also received warning prompts when he tried to move his view past a certain distance from his forces. Hugh would be tied to his troops until they took the command post.

“Major Logan, can you read me?” Captain Tran asked over comms.

“I’ve got you, captain. We’re in something called a checkpoint assault and we’ve got to take an abandoned command post to pass the first stage of the battle,” Hugh replied.

“Roger that, it looks like we’re on a tier ten transport craft, so when we’re over the drop point, our forces should be automatically teleported to the surface. No chutes to worry about on this jump. We’re getting close, I’m going to make sure the men are ready,” Tran said, Hugh listening in as he confirmed the combat pods had connected to all the infantry mechs aboard.

“Sir, we’ve got a new unit driving the combat pods for the infantry. The men would like to advise you of something, if you don’t mind,” Captain Tran told him. Hugh was a little concerned, not sure what was wrong, they were nearly to the jump point and he didn’t need any trouble before the fight even started.

“Go ahead,” Hugh responded.

“Sir, this is Sergeant Landry,” A new voice said as Hugh linked into the unit wide channel. “We would like to inform you that today’s jump and all of your infantry support for this battle will be provided by the 325thRegiment of the 82nd Airborne Division. We would like to ask you to pass on our apologies in advance to the armor and air mech guys for the lack of targets, we’re going to hog them all for ourselves, sir,” the sergeant said. Hugh could do nothing but laugh as the men whooped it up.

“Sergeant Landry, I’ll pass on your regrets to the other forces. Go get some Airborne!” Hugh bellowed. The light indicating that they were over the drop point blinked and the glowing circles under each soldier brightened. One by one, the circles flashed and the infantry mechs were teleported to the surface. As the men dropped, Hugh remained tuned into their channel, listening as Sergeant Landry led them in singing a song that Airborne units have sung since World War 2. Blood on the Risers seemed oddly appropriate given the mech’s resemblance to vehicles of that era, these men braving the same risk of death that their forefathers did.

Gory, gory, what a hell of a way to die.

Gory, gory, what a hell of a way to die.

Gory, gory, what a hell of a way to die.

He ain’t gonna jump no more!

Hugh felt a burst of pride, it was an honor to lead men such as these. He could think about that later, for now, he had a battle to win. Shifting his view from the aircraft, Hugh watched as the last of the troops teleported down. They were on a grassy field just off the beach. The sea and the darkness were behind him, a direction he designated as south in his units’ interface so they would all be on the same page during the fight. To the east and west, the ground rose into rolling hills that gave way to impassable mountains. The terrain features that limited movement were now a familiar feature of a GCA battlefield.

The crack of plasma rifle fire was heard as Hugh’s forces engaged some Krixnas infantry that were charging down the slopes from both the east and the west. His level three mechs were up to the task, accurate fire burrowing into the opposing infantry, taking them down before the inaccurate fire from their face tentacles were able to do much damage. His machinegun team had finally been set up and got into the fight, coughing out rounds at a pace that seemed way too slow, but was still much faster than his rifle armed troops. When the firing stopped, three of his infantry had been destroyed, but they had shot to pieces nearly a score of Krixnas. This was an exchange rate Hugh was more than happy with.

While there were few visual cues for the Krixnas infantry, Hugh began to suspect these were merely level one units. He had jumped in with level three infantry, but how long would it take the Krixnas core to match or surpass his unit levels? His opponent had a command post to work with and upgrade, he only had what he could scrape together from each stage of the battle. Of course, that might be part of the GCA’s balancing efforts, giving him an early advantage in unit quality to get things rolling, but allowing the defender to slowly improve until they had a chance to become the superior force.

Hugh didn’t want to rush things, but every minute he delayed would equate to another point of resources for his opponent. He held the troops in place while he took some necessary time to survey the battlefield. The beach area led into a small valley. Up on the hills in the northeast, Hugh could make out some partially demolished buildings, these were likely the ruined command post he was tasked with reclaiming. It was too far to see the extent of the damages, but it didn’t look too good from here. To the west, the hills gave way to a small plateau before the mountains blocked them off. On the plateau, Hugh could detect some movement, there were mechs up there walking around in the random pattern that usually indicated AI controlled forces.

First things first, Hugh ordered his forces forward, his unit was essentially a platoon in strength, so he designated all his forces as the first platoon. When he did so a new prompt appeared, allowing him the option of assigning any new units that were acquired to be added to this formation until it was brought up to strength. He approved the task, leaving the priority level highest for drone replacement, then infantry, then other unit types equally. He didn’t think the command post he now ordered his force toward was functional, but there had to be some way in this crazy battle to replenish his losses.

Setting the ruins as his objective, Hugh watched as Captain Tran moved his troopers into formation and began the long advance up the hill. Three squads led the way with the final squad and the machinegun team placed slightly behind and formed up to protect the valuable construction drones. Tran pushed a few infantry ahead of the main body as an advance guard to spot any trouble.

Hugh couldn’t open his normal interface since he wasn’t connected to a command post, which left him unable to access any resources he might have started with. It as one more reason to take the objective quickly. His troops had only lost three infantry mechs, but a few others were functional, but had some level of battle damage that hampered their efficiency. Once he had access to his resources, he could patch them up and make sure they were operating at one hundred percent.

“Contact, enemy hiding under the dirt!” One of the soldiers controlling an advance guard unit shouted as his mech was drug down to the ground. Glowing Krixnas tentacles were already burrowing into the mech destroying it as the soldier tried to bring his rifle arm to bear on the ambusher.

The soldiers were well trained and lost no time in reacting the to threat. Another advance guard unit was pulled down, but the others had already sighted the suspicious bulges in the earth that held the Krixnas ambushers. The enemy attacking his two infantry were torn apart by accurate fire, but not before they destroyed their victims. Three other Krixnas were uncovered when the rest of the platoon blasted their hiding places. The enemy tried to return fire, but there were only a half dozen ambushers in total and nearly forty human mechs blazing away at them.

When the shooting stopped, Hugh was down another three mechs. Captain Tran wasted no time in carrying out Hugh’s orders, quickly reshuffling squads to balance out the losses and pushing forward toward the command post. With the battle just under way and this being the first checkpoint, Hugh doubted the Krixnas would have risked much more here than he had already faced. That theory proved false as fire met their final advance toward the ruined command post.

Heavy beams shot forth from a pair of Krixnas light mechs, that were scuttling their way from behind the damaged structures where they had been hiding. Another handful of infantry supported the light mechs, all of which were moving to close into melee range. Hugh was having none of it, ordering his forces to fall back while staying at the far end of their weapon’s range. The Krixnas light mechs were faster, but with this troopers walking backwards while firing, the closure rate was slowed. His machinegun team wasn’t very effective here, they had no time to deploy their weapon and if they tried to stop and do so, they would be overrun.

Rifle fire peppered the hulls of the enemy light mechs, burning their way into the armor, weakening it with each strike. Captain Tran had three squads targeting the light mechs while the fourth squad took the enemy infantry under fire. Hugh ordered the pair of construction drones further back from the fight, not willing to risk them to a stray shot when they might be the key to victory or defeat.

One of the light mechs crashed to the ground as the armor was finally burned through and something critical inside was destroyed. Four of Hugh’s infantry were down, destroyed in one hit by the powerful weapons on the light mechs. As they closed into melee range where the Krixnas had the advantage, his troops spread out. While he couldn’t prevent them from overtaking his forces, he could make it hard for them to take down more than one or two before he stopped them.

The second Krixnas light mech went down as it paused to lash one of Hugh’s infantry with its plasma charged face tentacles. With the larger threats down, his infantry had little trouble finishing off the last of their Krixnas counterparts, the lower-level enemy infantry falling easily to his superior firepower. With the immediate threat eliminated his forces pressed on toward the ruins of the command post. No further attackers showed themselves, but Hugh’s infantry had been taken from forty soldiers, down to twenty-eight and a machinegun team. When the first infantry mech stepped next to the command post, Hugh received a prompt.

Take control of command post, Y/N?