"Hold the line!" The captain barked amidst cacophony of gunfire resounded. The red beasties were turned into horrifying Picassos of blood and gore.
The Fuji tank unloaded its ammunition at the endless horde. The captain knew that they should retreat, but retreating was not in their doctrine.
Shells from artillery continued to rock the battlefield as the bombardment continued. Yet the beast only continued to charge. Despite the constant shelling, despite being cooked within their own skin for every second they are on the inferno-engulfed battlefield, they continued to rush.
The firecrackers persevered; their rifles slowly turned to slag as their swords turned to liquid. Their armor melted and started to press against the skin beneath, but the firecrackers payed no mind to it.
Although they had the upper hand at the beginning, they severely underestimated the number of enemies they would have and also underestimated just how tenacious they would be.
TASUKETE!" Yelled a firecracker in a gut-curdling scream as his arm was torn off his body. He did not receive even a moment's respite when he was suddenly swarmed by five more red beasties.
"WATASHI O TASUKETE!" He continued to yell as the red beasties tore through his armor. They teared through his flesh, cracked his bones, and flayed his organs around as he continued to let out heartbreaking screams. "YAMETE! YAMETE!"
"Kuso yarō!" Yelled another firecracker as he jumped head first into the blob of gore. He tore through the carapace of the beast and killed them almost instantly.
"Oi! Watashiwomite!" He yelled in his creator given language as he knelt down beside his comrade, and with his hands, he made his bleeding comrade turn to face him. "Tasuke ga kimasu! Mattekudasai!
His dying comrade grasped his arm as the rest of their comrades fought valiantly around both of them. He pulled him closer and said it in a hushed whisper. "Shinitakunai, tasuketekudasai..."
Slowly, he felt himself lose the strength to hold on any longer; this was more so for his comrade holding him. "Oi! Son'na koto wa shinaide kudasai!" He cried out as he let his friend's life slip by, the sounds of battle still continuing to rage just beyond their small bubble.
"Oi! Okiro! Oi! Okite kudasai!" He yelled out with all his heart as his friend flatlined. His jaw felt as if it were about to fall off as he felt tears roll down his cheek, escape his helmet, and turn to vapor before they could hit the ground.
Returning to the battle around him. Tears continued to roll down his eyes as he grabbed hold of the katana that was close to turning into molten slag. He grasped the flaming hilt as the steel shone just as brightly as the inferiors around them.
"Kuso yarō!" He yelled out with every breath he had within himself as he charged straight into the horde of red beasts.
"OI! YAMERO!" Yelled another firecracker as she watched him bulldoze through the first line of beast and into the heart of the horde. He did not hear her pleas as his rage burned just as hot as the inferno around them.
He screamed in anger as his sword cut through the carapace of his enemies. He took down as many as he could, but for every one he cuts down, five take their place. Even within the raging flames, he refused to yield; he refused to falter. Consumed by blind rage, he fought so ferociously that the red beast faltered for the briefest of moments.
He spat at the ground as he watched how the beast seemed to have formed a circle around him. He yelled something in his creator given tongue before rushing towards them. The beast finally out of their stupor once more fought him in a brutal rumble where flesh and gore rule.
One of the red beasts gets a hit, striking through the joint that connected his arm and forearm together. He yelled in pain as he felt the serrated scythe tear through his mostly melted armor. Despite the creator's several augmentations, it seems he is still flesh and bone, yet he still did not yield as he roared as he ran his katana through the skull of the red beast.
I looked towards his forearm and saw that it was now hanging on a but a thread of flesh. He gritted his teeth in pain as the hilt of his katana was now turning to ash and charcoal. His grip around the hilt steeled as he looked in front of him with hate in his eyes.
The beat roared, and so did he, before he alone engaged them in melee combat. Around him, artillery shells continued to hammer down into the stony earth of the cavern. The flames around them continued to burn as the firecracker decapitated another one of the red beasts.
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From the corner of his vision, he saw one of the bigger ones charging straight for him. His rage continued to burn like the fires around him as he charged toward the approaching beast.
The beast chomped down as its six legs made the ground below shake with every step it took. The firecracker dodged the bite by weaving to the side. With his sword in hand, he ran the blade through the neck of the beast.
The beast roared in agony as the firecracker ran his blazing-hot sword through its head and down to the length of its entire abdomen. The beast hit aside the firecracker with its body, launching said firecracker a few feet away from it before finally succumbing to its wounds with the firecracker's katana still embedded within it.
Panic gripped the firecracker as he realized he had lost his only means of defense. He quickly got up and ran around the red horde that was now chasing him.
He slid, he weaved, he jumped—he did everything he could to escape the sea of claws and jagged teeth, but it was obviously not enough. The firecracker stumbled and fell to the stony floor. With only seconds to spare before the red beast tore him to shreds just as they did his friend, he mustered up as much mana as he could to create an explosion with him as the epicenter.
The sound of the explosion he caused only became background noise as the heavy artillery continued to beat the battlefield into oblivion.
Back with the remaining firecracker, they fought with every last vigor they could muster. The Phoenix class firecrackers continued to fight, cut, and blow the red beast apart as the Napalm class firecrackers burned them all to a crisp.
The captain, now down an arm, barked orders as he stood at the forefront of the onslaught. The only reason they weren't overrun was because of the heavy artillery. The captain saw another one of his remaining soldiers fall prey to the claws of the beast, kicking and screaming as they tore her apart.
He refocused on his own fight as he felt his life slowly but surely whisk away, though he continued to fight, stabbing at anything that got too close. He was bleeding, he was exhausted, and he was dying, yet he continued to fight with the same amount of ferocity he had when the charge began.
Just as he was about to be tackled by a red beast, an eruption-class firecracker was able to gun it down with his heavy weaponry. "Captain! Are you okay?" She said, running to the side of the captain.
The eruption class's helmet had a large piece of her visor missing, with several claw marks on its sides. From the spot where the piece of visor was missing, her maroon-red eyes stared with fear and concern for her captain.
"I am fine. We must reorganize and attempt to congregate into a single unit; they are picking us off one by one if we let them continue to split us up like sheep." the captain said as he aimed his forearm-mounted gun and blew a hole through the cranium of one of the red beasts.
Yes, captain!" The eruption class yelled, raising her heavy machine gun to her hip. Just a few feet away from them, they see another one of their comrades commit Kouen. The explosion their comrade made was a bit larger than the others; it must have been a lieutenant. The captain clicked his tongue as the eruption class looked to the frontlines and saw that the artillery strikes had now all but ceased.
"Why did the artillery stop?!?" Yelled one of the firecrackers as the rest of the firecrackers also expressed their grievances, those that finished up their fights anyway.
"DID THEY RUN OUT OF SHELLS ALREADY?" Yelled an eruption class as he gunned down the now slightly less disoriented beast.
"THAT CAN'T BE, THE AUXILIARIES MADE MORE THAN ENOUGH SHELLS FOR 6 HOURS OF CONSTANT BOMBARDMENT!" Yelled another as he decapitated a beast before engaging with another one right after.
"CAPTAIN, WE NEED TO RETREAT!" One suggested frantically as she noticed a few aculonoid figures retreating from the corner of her eye.
"CAPTAIN, WHAT DO WE DO?" a firecracker yelled, not noticing the tide of red monsters closing behind him.
"CAPTAIN, WE'RE BEING OVERWHELMED; PLEASE TELL US WHAT TO DO!" another firecracker yelled as she diced the red beast with her searing hot katana as the inferno around them slowly died down.
"CAPTAIN, I'M OUT AMMO!" Yelled another as he clicked the trigger of his gun that was now barely recognizable.
"CAPTAIN, THE METHANOL PLATOONS ARE RETREATING BACK TO THE TEMPORARY CAMP. WE'RE ALL ALONE NOW!" Yelled the firecracker from awhile ago as she realized the retreating figures from before were the platoon of methanol firecrackers who were supposed to guard the flanks.
"CAPTAIN, I NEED ASSISTANCE OVER HERE!" a phoenix class shouted as he and a few others slowly backed up from the sheer numbers they were now fighting against.
"CAPTAIN, WE NEED RETREAT." someone said just before they were tackled down by a group of red beasts and had their arm torn off.
Soon everything devolved into a chorus of pleas and cries. "SHIT! CAPTAIN F-289 ARM IS GONE!" "CAPTAIN" "RUN" "CAPTAIN" "HELP US" "CREATOR" "SAVE US" "HELP" "CAPTAIN"
The captain looked all around him as his soldiers cried, wailed, and pleaded for salvation. Their guns are now but unusable slags of liquid metal, as with their swords. There are only a handful of them left, yet the enemy is still just as endless as before.
Has the creator abandoned them? Have they done anything wrong? If so, what did they do?
All of these questions the captain asked himself as he watched everyone put up their hardest fight. Maybe he should have just retreated; maybe he should have just abandoned the combat doctrine the creator gave them....... What is he saying?
There is a reason why their doctrine says they should never surrender. There is a reason why they charged headfirst to death. If they are to die, They will die in glorious battle, like the flickering flame of a candle against the storm.
He was ready to give it his all one more time when suddenly thunderous thuds were heard just behind them. The whole battlefield went quiet as everyone turned to the source, and there, the firecrackers saw their salvation; there, they realized why they were to never surrender and why all of the elements doctrines told them to never ever yield. For 100 meters away, they saw two Gigantic Aculonoid figures making a mad dash for the battlefield.
The cluster knight fired its missiles into the air, leaving trails of smoke as it flew higher and higher in the vast cavern. Soon the missiles stopped climbing and came crashing down upon the stampeding horde of red beasts.
As the missiles detonated, they created explosions that dwarfed the artillery fourfold. The cluster knight's machine gun whirred to life as a voice from within the 10-meter mech exclaimed. "MOVE OUT OF THE WAY."
The firecrackers did just that.
The Fuji tank narrowly got out of the way as the cluster knight opened fire upon the enemy. The red beasts were mowed down by the dozens per second, slowly losing ground.
Even with their overwhelming numbers, they were unable to counterattack. From just the sheer volume of lead being pumped out of the gatling turrets, the beasts were forced to retreat, or send everything they had to rush the cluster knight and hopefully overwhelm it. They, of course, chose the latter. The dumb fucking animals.
The beasts slowly encircled the cluster knight, who made them pay for every inch of land they take with a dozen fresh corpses of their kin. The mech discharged more missiles into the horde of beasts; the missiles pummeled the battlefield, causing Gigantic explosions as they combusted.
Just when the beasts thought they would be able to finally attack the 10-meter mech, another one dashed that belief. The guardian Droid stood towering over everything, even the cluster knight by a whole 5 meters with its retractable wrist blades out.
The guardian Droid stomped and kicked as its shoulder-mounted light machine gun made quick work of those that got behind it, and with the cluster knight still decimating the thinning horde, the battle's Victor was now obvious.
Aculon One, Red Beast Zero