Chapter 137 - New Front (Patreon)

<---Chapter 136 - Swarm| Table of Contents | Chapter 138 - Pincer--->

The dying bellow of a mammoth hog dominated the soundscape, the leaves and twigs trembling lightly with each step it took as it staggered beneath the towering trees, trying to get away from an unseen enemy. As time passed, it began to lose energy, its humongous body collapsing from sheer exhaustion, resting against a nearby tree trunk and causing it to creak slightly from the weight. Its thick, oily hide was pockmarked with multiple arrow shafts sticking out of it, numbering more than a dozen, with copious amounts of blood trickling out from each hole.

It heaved and panted, trying to recover its strength when its ears perked up once more, picking up the sound of something approaching once again. Trying to stand up once more, its legs were far too wobbly to support its towering weight, instead using two of its three trunks to attempt to clasp onto the tree for support. The nearby rustling and swaying of trees spurred it on to move faster, though it was already near its limit.

Despite its best effort, the mammoth hog suddenly felt a sharp jabbing pain at its hindlegs, accurately aiming right at the joint. It tripped on itself, tumbling onto the ground as it thrashed about, attempting to snap off the new arrow shaft that had lodged itself in its skin. It tossed around in the ground, snapping off the shafts with brute force as it began to channel arcia energy into its bony horn on its forehead, the natural engravings attempting to seal the gaping wounds off by growing over the bone.

However, it was far too late, the hog now suddenly pelted with a storm of arrows that seemed to be shot from all directions above it in one single burst. Two dozen sharp arrow tips found their mark, killing the hog instantly as one of them drove into the cranium past its horn with precision. As soon as the hog's body stopped writhing, six soldiers dropped to the ground with a soft landing, their curved rugged bows and leather armor a dark shade of brown and dark green, melding into the background perfectly as if they were born of the Keru Forest.

The leader of the soldiers slung his bow behind, using the bow's string as a sling while he drew out a short serrated bone saw from a pocket along his thigh, twirling it in his hand. "Secure the area." He ordered while moving up towards the horn of the mammoth hog and beginning to pry it open. The soldiers complied, two of them still wielding their bows with an arrow expertly gripped between their coarse fingers, ready to pull at a moment's notice. The other two instead swapped to their hunting rifles, enhanced single-shot guns that packed enough power to stop a hulias fox dead in one hit. Anyone who inspected it closely would notice that they were modified remnants of the Yual Dominion's previous generation of weaponry, their obsoleteness only kept it check by the resourcefulness of the armory maintaining them.

However, one of the five soldiers did not take his position at the perimeter, instead kneeling down right next to the head of the mammoth hog's head, his gloved hands riddled with wood chips and decaying plant matter as he laid them on the trunk. He traced out a single sign on the side of the trunk, the emblem of the Sanctum of Yual while speaking out loud. "The memory of your last day shall forever be with Yual and us, and may your actions be remembered as serving your purpose, fulfilling your destiny ordained by Yual himself. We give thanks to Yual for granting us this pursuit, and keeping us humble in the hunt. Let us remember the events of the hunt, so that each time we recall, you are honored in all ways under Yual."

"By the forest we live and die." The other soldiers muttered back in unison, though they did not perform any actions, merely continuing to keep watch around the area. Surprisingly, the leader did not reply to the prayer, simply ignoring the kneeling soldier and continuing to carve out the horn.

The kneeling soldier stood back up to his full height, watching with frustration as the leader blatantly ignored his presence. "Sir, have you no respect for the hunt at all? Are you even a soldier of Yual?"

The leader scoffed as he began to grind hard at the horn with the bloodied bone saw, attempting to snap it off from the hog's skull. "Funny talk for a fresh recruit who barely even knows about the spirits of old."

"The spirits of old are no more. The glory that is Yual has inherited their role and divinity in all ways. Only Yual presides over the world now eternal."

"Eternal? Then pray do tell how the man on the throne is still mortal."

"His authority lives on through his descendants - Emperor Yual is mandated by the spirits themselves!"

The leader grunted as he forcibly grated the serrated teeth of the metal bone saw against the base of the horn, finally disconnecting it in its entirety. Before doing anything else, the leader suddenly gashed the tip of his own finger against the bone saw, before letting blood trickle with three drops onto the dead mammoth hog. "You may have forgotten the grace of Slova, but I haven't. A real man born of Perlis would not." He muttered to the soldier while tucking the large horn under his arm. "Leave the hog here, return to camp."

The soldiers moved in unison, even the fresh recruit complying with the order. They moved with alarming familiarity as if they had lived in the Keru Forest their entire lives, each step barely even a whisper in the wind as they kept light on their foot, approaching a rapidly expanding clearing filled with other soldiers that were being built up. The flag and standards of Perlis and its ruling house fluttered over the ever-growing structure, fashioned from the nearby trees that were being felled one after the other by dozens of worker crews.

Two divisions, totaling two thousand men and accompanying baggage convoy, focused on establishing a foothold in the Keru Forest, far beyond the borders of the county of Perlis. Countless tents and wooden palisades were erected by the minute, the entire force moving like a well-oiled machine. Unlike the forces of both Raktor and Kregol, the men of Perlis were all professional soldiers, with not a single conscript among their ranks. None of them complained about the hardships in the construction of the camp, their veterans toiling hard while employed recruits learned the ropes from them, ensuring a steady supply of highly trained soldiers.

Approaching the gate of the camp, the leader of the returning hunting squad suddenly spotted a man decked in light arctech armor that was walking forward to greet them, accompanied by what looked like a high-ranking general. The leader hurriedly swapped the horn of the mammoth hog over to his other side as he performed a military salute, the rest of his squad following along.

"At ease, men. Good to see you again, Sergeant Timor." The man spoke with a friendly tone to the leader, though his gaze was intense as he examined the state of the squad with fierce green pupils. "How goes the hunt?"

Sergeant Timor stiffened up despite the familiarity. "Sir! The herds will soon learn to keep away from this zone. We have left behind four corpses to send the message across."

"Good. We don't want to damage the forest. The further they stay away, the better. Once you've cleaned up, report to the center." The man relaxed a little, his engraved brown camouflaged pauldrons dropping slightly over his lean shoulders.

"Yes, sir!" Sergeant Timor nodded, the man leaving with the high-ranking general in tow.

As soon as the pair was out of earshot, the fresh recruit confusedly stared at their disappearing visage, noticing that the other veteran soldiers were all saluting them with immense respect. "Who was that man following General Kalka? Why are people saluting him?"

The other soldiers stared at him with incredulous looks. "Are you fucking crazy? That's Count Perlis himself!" One of them exclaimed.

"Count Perlis?! No way, in my mind, he should be a lot bigger... he doesn't look like all that now that I've seen him in person."

"You idiot, look at his ears!" One of the other soldiers grabbed the fresh recruit's head and spun him towards Count Perlis. "Count the marks!"

"One, two... By Yual... how can a man have killed that many?"

"Alone at that, without his arctech armor. He might look weak, but he's the best hunter we have in generations. Now stop staring, move!" Sergeant Timor urged the squad to follow him. They made a stop first at the logistics center, dropping off the harvested horn and collecting their rations for the next day from workers.

Before returning to their tents, Sergeant Timor made one more stop at the armory, where there was a long queue by other squads to get their arms and armor looked at. As soon as he got to the front of the queue, he began to pester the armorer. "Hey, when is that Aspis MK1 repeater coming in?" The leader leaned over the counter, where the armorer and his apprentices were working tirelessly to repair broken hunting rifles and fix bows as well.

"Fuck if I know. We got none left, stop asking." The grizzly old armorer shrugged, glistening sweat trickling down his clean-shaven, tanned face as he barely looked up, still hunched over a workbench nested behind the counter, fixing the engraving on sabatons clamped to the table.

"Old man, listen here, my squad here is the only one here without an Aspis gun! Isn't it your job to make sure we get what we need to fight?" Timor accused.

"Don't try to frame me - you know more than me that your squad isn't the only one. No matter how much you try to push, the fact is that there is none to give. Now stop disturbing me and my workers!"

"Come on, you're registered under the Society of Friendly Weaponsmiths, aren't you? Don't you dare backtrack on that, you were raving about it just the other day."

"Except the Aspis Weapons Factory isn't a part of the Society! You're going to have to make do with your current hunting rifles. After all, that's all you really need." The armorer snapped back and shooed them off.

"We need more than-"

"HEY!" Another squad's leader hollered from behind, clearly agitated by the waiting. "What the fuck is the holdup?"

Timor cursed under his breath, forced to leave the armory empty-handed. He fumed internally but could realistically not do anything. Other soldiers, too, were suffering from the lack of resources. Maybe I should bring it up to Count Perlis. "Alright, break time. We'll continue the hunt after midnight." As the squad nodded and broke up for their rest break, the leader washed his blood stains off his hands before heading to the center of the camp.

A sturdy medium-sized wooden fort had been constructed in the center over the last three days, the green and brown colors of Count Perlis' house draped over the surface while wrapped in plant matter and vines, making it seem like a camouflaged arrow tower. Countless arrow ports allowed perfect firing angles over the entire camp, its three-story tall structure serving as something akin to a panopticon.

Within it, the expansive central hall was noticeably bare, the interior only furnished with the necessary essentials and none of the luxuries that one would expect from a noble's residence. Only the bare necessities required for war planning were added in, and maps of the Keru Forest were laid out with extreme detail, born from decades of hunting and gathering along the terrain.

Already before Sergeant Timor entered the hall proper, Count Perlis and General Kalka were discussing the progress of the war. "Count Leon must have an ulterior motive for this order." General Kalka laid bare his distrust, using a sharpened stick to tap along the battle lines on the map that had been meticulously drawn out. "He could have easily diverted one division to secure the Forest, but instead he chose us. He may be the overall commander-in-charge, but this may be all a ploy to weaken us."

"He is pinned down by the threat of the Versian field army remobilizing from Tenar." Count Perlis motioned at a wooden block indicating the Versian field army's current position, far behind defensive lines that were skirmishing along the length between Ocra and Tenar. "He is suffering the brunt of the war now."

"Isn't that what we want? If Count Leon acquires all of Ocra and Tenar, our power and strength would be greatly diminished as well." General Kalka countered. "We should not act just yet, but instead hold out and let the war take its natural course."

"Even if that is favorable to us, we still must uphold our promise of alliance. Any accusations of not pulling our weight would damage our reputation more than any dip in Count Leon's military power. Though I won't say no to taking it more... cautiously." Count Perlis smiled.

While all three Counts had agreed to fight against Versia, there was nothing to be said about how far they should push themselves. Count Perlis' forces were well-trained but merely a fraction of Count Leon's army size, and as such was assigned the role of securing the flanks to ensure Versian sabotage was unable to strike the rear supply lines. He too did not want to push ahead too aggressively, unwilling to draw the full ire of the Versians onto his front. The nail that sticks out gets hammered in. As he leaned over the map, he finally noticed Sergeant Timor saluting him. "Ah, Sergeant Timor. Perhaps you can provide insight into how our troops are doing."

"Sir! If I'm being honest, the troops are not equipped enough for a head-on battle, not with just bows." Timor explained his viewpoint.

"If they really wished for our success, then they should have afforded us more Aspis MK1 rifles and armor. Having a pair of artillery cannons would be a great boon." General Kalka lamented. Despite their battle-hardened grit and experience, the conditions of the weapons were abysmal. Only half of the troops here had access to a hunting rifle, with only one in every ten having an Aspis MK1 repeater, some of whom might not even have enough pellets to sustain the prolonged conflict. The ammunition store was conspicuously more packed with arrowheads than explosives or arcite fuel. Target practice ranges were designed for archery rather than rifles.

"Artillery fire would be near impossible to utilize here. Training our soldiers in a new form of warfare this close would be counterproductive. They know the forest and their weapons well enough to counter any Versian forces. Besides, the older ones would complain about it." Count Perlis prided himself on the excellence of his troops rather than the quantity. He shifted a few triangular wooden markers to form an expanding ring that cut through the forest, its curvature bending around Desham as the center. "We will not attack Desham head-on but rather have our hunting squads slowly encircle and harass any movements within or between Ocra and Desham. This way we can reduce our casualties and also satisfy Count Leon's orders."

Before either of them could continue, a clamoring of voices could be heard outside the central fort, prompting Count Perlis to see what was happening. A crowd of soldiers was gathered about the bodies of two dead Versian scouts, shot dead by hunting rifles. The Count and General pushed their way through the crowd, approaching the squad who had killed the scouts.

"Found them just wandering about the forest. None of them were even using the branches." The leader of the squad remarked as another soldiers removed the helmets of the scouts. "City folks, it seems like. They didn't even see us coming."

"So it seems that we have an advantage..." Count Perlis knelt down next to the body, inspecting the dead scout's equipment from head to toe. They wore light armor plates on their chest and back that were held together by the uniform they wore themselves, masked by strung leaves and other bark that formed a ghillie net for camouflage. Strange, I don't see any sign of a Versian emblem or insignia. He picked up one of the shoulder pauldrons, examining it closely.

"Looks like Aspis MK1 armor sir, probably pilfered off Count Leon's forces if the information is accurate." General Kalka scoffed. "This man doesn't even look like he has been trained for barely a month, you can see from his clear lack of muscles. Most likely conscripted."

"I doubt this is a conscript, perhaps a new recruit. No one in their right mind would give a conscript arctech knight armor, stolen or not." Count Perlis shook his head, but a strange feature on the pauldron caught his eye for a brief moment. "This pauldron... it has been modified slightly. Whoever is engraving this knew how to tailor the armor."

The more interesting aspect was the gun itself that the scouts wielded, looking like an Aspis MK1 gun but with a strange crystal affixed to its holster. An improved version of the gun, it looks like the rumors of Harrison's genius are not without merit. Count Perlis stood back up, patting off the dust from his knees. "General, we may have to deal with soldiers equipped with far more advanced arctech weaponry than we would have liked. Now that we have killed one of their scouts, it will only be a matter of time before they start to press us."

"Understood, sir. I'll have the hunting squads deployed according to the plan devised by nightfall-" General Kalka was about to continue when a loud explosion suddenly erupted from beyond the camp, more than a few kilometers away. The drifting plumes of smoke spiraled out of the forest, visible from the camp itself.

"What the hell was that?" A soldier exclaimed in horror. The explosion send a wave of shock through the soldiers, many of them not experienced with the brutality of artillery barrages just yet due to the nature of forest combat. Frightened whispers and rumors began to spread through the soldiers. "Are we in artillery range?!"

"General, get the men out now; there is no time to waste. Fan out and find out the source of that explosion immediately!" Count Perlis urged, himself retreating to the fort to calculate the distance on the map to the source of the explosion. The smoke seems to be more than fifty kilometers away from Desham; there is no known artillery that can achieve such a range...

The camp kicked into action, and the well-trained hunter squads responded immediately and spread out through the forest, working in groups of six. Handlers spoke rapidly in tents filled with arctech radios, continuously coordinating movements and relaying information between squads to form a seamless, interconnected web of communication. Count Perlis himself listened into the flurry of commands and chatter, the general updating the battle map with each passing minute.

Sergeant Timor himself also went out with his squad, having no time to rest. They headed straight for the site of the explosion with two other squads, carefully scaling the trees and prowling the area bit by bit to ensure they were not being lured into an ambush. Despite their dismissal of the enemy as mere city folks, they still did not let down their guard, instead sticking to their doctrine and covering every possible angle. They moved with caution, approaching the smoking debris of trees and smoldering bushes from the south.

"HELP!" A cry for help drifted in through the wind from the explosion. Timor perched on the top of a tree branch, squinting his eyes to see a crawling Perlis scout, desperately trying to claw his way forward in the soggy forest floor. One of his legs had been reduced to a mere stump as he struggled forward, continuously calling out for help. The fresh recruit in Timor's squad next to Timor instinctively lurched forward, but Timor stretched out his hand, holding the recruit back.

"Why aren't we going to help him?!" The fresh recruit bristled back.

"It could very well be a trap. This is a common ploy among hunters, a bait. The enemy might be laying in wait right this very instant to pounce the moment we make a move." Timor warned, years of experience in the forest guiding him as he scanned the area, picking up irregularities. As he surveyed the forest floor, a glint of metal flashed at him. He hurriedly swiveled his head about and spotted another squad moving opposite of him, trying to circle the Perlis scout. Timor quickly let out a bird whistle, attracting the attention of the squad leader and motioning to him with a rapid series of hand signs.

The squad leader nodded in understanding, motioning for his own men to ready their hunting rifles, aiming at what seemed like an inconspicuous bush on the ground that was strangely larger than its counterparts, sticking out like a sore thumb. Timor also motioned for his men to prepare to fire at the bush, his left hand raised. The very moment he chopped down, the squads all launched a withering barrage of arrows and powerful pellets that tore the bush apart to shreds.

Instead of the hailstorm eliciting cries of pain, a shoddy mannequin with a single piece of unsharpened armor fell forward, dented and shredded apart by the incoming fire. Timor looked on confusedly, his brain trying to process what just happened when suddenly the forest around physically erupted into a fearsome firefight, enemies popping out from beneath the trunks of trees and other bushes, firing indiscriminately at the Perlis hunters.

[The enemy is here, shooting at us! At the explosion site!] Timor roared into his arctech radio strapped to his chest, and scrambled for cover, hugging the tree trunk as tightly as his body could allow. Whizzing pellets from the enemies' Aspis MK2 repeaters suppressed him with a continuous stream of fire that ripped and tore through leaves and tiny branches alike. He had seen the performance of the Aspis MK1 rifles during his time in the joint military exercise, but for some reason the enemies' rifles were far better than anything he had prepared himself for.

[Understood, diverting other squads to your current location.]

"Get them to flank the site from the north!" He could only watch on as a Perlis hunter from another squad attempted to draw a bow on the enemy soldiers, only for his body to be rag-dolled by what seemed like a thousand pellets, his corpse tilting off the branch and collapsing onto the forest floor. The Perlis hunters cowered from the overwhelming firepower, Timor waving his hands frantically at his soldiers and the other squads. "Circle them! Circle them!"

The hunters were no slouches, able to rapidly adapt to the new conditions. The enemy soldiers have no experience climbing the trees, and they must have a limit to how many pellets they can fire! Timor hatched a plan, quickly leaping over to a nearby branch to group up with two other hunters. "They are standing right in the open like idiots! I'll draw their fire, you two aim for its head! We'll take them down one at a time!"

He kicked into action, brandishing his bow outwardly beyond his current cover and prompting a single enemy Versian soldier to focus on him. The moment the Versian soldier raised his rifle to bear however, two loud cracks resounded through the impromptu battlefield, the two other hunters using their hunting rifles in a attempt to kill the Versian.

Instead of seeing the Versian's brains blown out in a spectacular fashion, the empowered pellets merely cracked the composite armor of the helmet, the dispersal of force preventing the pellets from making it through. The Versian soldier immediately dropped and rolled on the ground, Timor losing his chance to kill the soldier.

The other soldiers were also beginning to realize that their weapons were ineffective against the armor the Versian soldiers wore. Some found success with their arrows by aiming in the seams between the armor plates, yet with the harrowing battle and threat of countless returning pellets, most of the hunters were unable to hold their ground, forced to slowly retreat with each passing minute.

"Not here, not here, not here!" The fresh recruit mumbled to himself as he clutched the branch he was on tightly, keeping his figure as small as possible. The fear had overwhelmed him entirely, and he was unable to even fight back. Even Timor's other soldier found it difficult to return fire when faced with a wall of pellets where a single one could take off their heads.

Just as Timor was about to order a general retreat, a sudden rush of loud cracks erupted from the north of the site, flanking the attacking Versian soldiers. They are here! "Attack! Attack!" Timor roared a battle cry, using his own bow to fire a sharp arrow at the enemy.

Instead of the enemy fighting back, however, they immediately turned and fled, two of them keeping a rearguard and laying a stream of suppressive fire that prevented the flanking squads from collapsing onto them. Faced with the insurmountable firepower, the attempted pincer maneuver by the Perlis hunters failed spectacularly, though their casualties were near minimal.

As the adrenaline of the soldiers began to die down, a chilling realization that they were severely outgunned dominated all of their thoughts. Timor could see the creeping doubt enter his men, realizing he needed to attempt to keep the morale up. "They might be strong initially, but all of that armor and firepower requires arcite energy. Our endurance will eventually win out!" Timor tried to reason with the nearby soldiers.

"Sir, with all due respect, there were only five of them, and we outnumbered them three to one!" A soldier shot back, unwilling to be appeased so easily.

"We still have the upper hand, we know the forest better than them! We'll attack where they are weak, and move away when they are strong-"

[We've lost contact with Squad 12 and Squad 34. Requesting reinforcements from the camp. All other squads to reform the lines.] The arctech radio strapped to Timor's chest blurted out the report by a handler through the communication network.

Those squads, they were right next to us? Timor's heart sank a little. The conflict had only barely begun just an hour ago, and they were already losing entire squads. The other soldiers heard the news as well, their general spirit plummeting as they followed the orders of the handlers.

Small skirmishes and pitched battles broke out along the entire length of the net that General Perlis had devised, the casualties mounting steadily with each passing hour. Even when night fell, Timor was still out there with his squad, attempting to respond to calls for help from other squads. Yet every time they were about to collapse on the enemy, the enemy mysteriously disappeared and retreated from the battlefield as if they were merely ghosts.

Instead, Timor was left to ferry the surviving wounded of the defeated squads back to camp. Each time he returned to the camp, the number of the wounded began to build up dramatically. At first, when he found survivors of any squad, he would be elated and attempt to rescue them. Yet as the night wore on with consistent loud cracks piercing the stillness of the night, he began to notice a worrying trend with every engagement and skirmish he responded to.

"They are leaving more wounded than dead with each attack." Timor saluted Count Perlis on his fifth trip back, in the central fort.

"More wounded than dead...? I was under the impression that they had overwhelming firepower, though with a fraction of our numbers."

"Yes sir. We've never encountered more than five Versians together at any given time, and the survivors all claim they were attacked by only a few of them at best. By all accounts and my own experience, the entire squad should have been killed by them. They certainly have the capability too."

"So you're saying they are doing this on purpose..." Count Perlis scratched his chin, trying to figure out what was happening. Still, it had only been less than a day since they had joined battle with the enemy. "Sergeant Timor, prepare a messenger to Count Leon to request for more weaponry and supplies."

"Yes, sir!"

Over the next three days, the situation facing Count Perlis' two divisions was not improving in the slightest. While they had scored some minor victories, any gains they had accomplished were wiped out by staggering defeats in other parts of the Forest. The battle line was in a constant state of flux, with both sides struggling for supremacy. Each skirmish was seemingly random at first glance, the enemy almost everywhere and nowhere at once.

The soldiers' morale stabilized when they soon found out their death rate was surprisingly low, many of them returning to combat after a day's rest and some health potions. Still, pellets, arrowheads, and medical supplies were dwindling with each day, the number of wounded soldiers now almost a fifth of the two thousand-strong force. Count Perlis did not panic just yet, having supplies brought into the camp from his rear logistics centers to replenish the losses.

Count Leon soon sent over ten artillery cannons and wagons filled with Aspis MK1 repeaters, providing the necessary firepower for the Perlis hunters to start fighting back properly. While this reduced the rate of casualties, they were still unable to make any meaningful progress towards Desham. As the constant battle wore on, Count Perlis was filled with doubt over a single burning question, his mood deteriorating as the days wore on.

"With the new artillery cannons, we can blow the enemy out of the water, no matter what hiding hole they use." General Kalka clenched his fist with vigor. However, Count Perlis did not share the same sentiment, still holding the belief that the artillery cannons would be of no use until they got close to Desham itself.

Sure enough, the limited line of sight and canopy cover that stretched out over the Keru Forest made it hard for both spotter and gunner crews to accurately target enemy positions. By the time they had zeroed in on reported locations, the enemy would have long moved away, another battle breaking out in a different part. This issue was only compounded by the lack of training by the Perlis hunters themselves, who only had a few weeks of practice with them during the joint military exercise.

Still, the presence of the artillery support gave the soldiers some much needed morale, the battle turning into a strange stalemate. Count Perlis continuously examined the state of the battle marked on a map, trying to work out a pattern behind the erratic behaviour of the enemy. Soon enough, a week after the battle had begun, he finally could place his finger on the strange feeling.

"The enemy isn't attacking past this line." Count Perlis explained to the General. "Every time our squad retreats past her, they always give up the chase immediately, even if they have the numbers advantage."

General Kalka widened his eyes in realization. "You're saying that they always had the capability to crush us, but they are not. But why?"

"That is the true question..." Count Perlis muttered under his breath, his mind racing on all the possible motives. The only one he could conceive of was that the order by Count Leon to attack was a trap meant to whittle down both his forces and supplies rapidly. I wouldn't put it past him to weaken me. But if I retreat, my name will be dragged through the mud no matter how good of a hunter I am. Damned if I fight, damned if I don't.

The dilemma wreaked havoc on his mind, and he was unable to sleep through the night peacefully as he tried to figure out his next steps. At first, he attempted to consolidate the hunter squads, pushing harder in one specific sector in an attempt to force the battle line closer to Desham. This worked only for a brief period before the concentrated force was suddenly flanked from the rear, and the weakened battle lines behind them were targeted by skirmishers, forcing them to retreat again. Every effort the Perlis hunters made to try to break through the defense was met with resistance or a counterpunch on the other side of the forest.

The strain and continuous harassment by the enemy began to take its toll on the soldiers once more, the fresh supplies no longer enough to keep their mental health intact. "I've been shot more than five times over the last ten days, and now you're sending me back out to get shot again?! Our front line has barely even budged an inch!" A soldier complained to General Kalka, who found it increasingly hard to get the soldiers to follow the order. Distrust and loss of faith in the leadership were running rampant in the camp, especially with no victory to show off.

Count Perlis too began to buckle under the strain. If only I can find out the weakness of the enemy... I need time. "Call for a messenger. Have them deliver a request for a ceasefire to the enemy immediately." He ordered a nearby soldier, but before the soldier could carry out his orders, an alarm bell rang through the entire camp, the reserve soldiers scrambling to prepare for battle.

He rushed out of the fort once again, grabbing a nearby sergeant who was rushing back to his tent. "Who's attacking us? What's going on!"

"The guards have spotted enemy soldiers approaching the camp!" The sergeant exclaimed, prompting Count Perlis to rush out to the front of the camp, where already two dozen Perlis hunters were aiming their hunting rifles beyond the walls. Explosions sent tremors shuddering through the wooden palisade, the dust shimmering off as soldiers ducked and cowered from the shockwave that washed over the walls.

"How many are attacking?!" Count Perlis shouted as he saw General Kalka barking orders at the nearby soldiers at the camp's gate, "A division?! Get all of our hunting squads back now!"

"No, sir, there... there's only two of them!"

<---Chapter 136 - Swarm| Table of Contents | Chapter 138 - Pincer--->