I assigned a man by the name of Tolstoj as my lieutenant and a woman by the name of Rachel as the spotter, a clear-voiced man by the name of Stephan would be the comms officer, due to him having a high quality comms unit in his Walker.

And yes. Explaining their jobs and duties took a moment, and explaining the rest of the “chain of command” what a comms-officer was took even longer.

Eh what? ‘What about the man you removed?’ He was a nuisance so I threw him away. The Arcology security looked past my transgression due to the ‘special wartime circumstances’ in other words, the Arcology can’t afford to imprison higher merit members of the Commission Hub, that would be suicidal. I might have a problem after the battle though.

Nevertheless soon enough, the grand total of our Weapon force was mobilized.

And so, we begin our war.

The location chosen for taking on the horde is an entrance to a valley that works as one of the few rare natural passages through the long and tall local mountain ranges. Located some 26 hours away from the boundary of the Arcology.

One could recommend cutting the enemy supply lines, but that would be impossible. Old Beasts don't use them. If they are hungry they eat what they find, be it a dead carcass or the weakest of the pack.

According to our estimate, Neuro’s horde should reach us in 56 hours. Counting in our travel, that Gives us some 30 hours of much needed time to set up.

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For the sake of not letting the enemy through, defences were set up, portable, light cover bunkers, basically some metal walls to hide behind.

But much more importantly. Trenches. Oldschool. Most of this was done by the Constructions Group.

Aside from this, large radius shrapnel mines were laid out. They wouldn't stop anything larger than a small Medium, but they will definitely help slow the enemy down.

Turrets were Installed at many parts of the defensive lines. Albeit, personally I think those will be killed rather quickly, they are stationary and in the open. Easy pickings.

The artillery units settled at the far edges, well behind the defence line. Snipers were sprinkled both into the defence lines and into specific vantage positions. The Hub supplied them with high end thermic splinter rounds for this job. Great due to their ridiculous penetration and wide AoE.

The ‘Heavy killers’ (those Walkers that are armed with high-end rail actions and similar) would mostly be brought in as needed, with many ground-mounted rail actions included along the defence lines, inside bunkers and in wider “rooms” inside the trenches.

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The repair and medical units have their camps some kilometer behind our defence line. Hopefully ready to keep our Weapons alive and functioning.

Our squad would be mobile. Supplementing for any snipers that would be lost, and creating new vantage positions as the need arises.

Honestly what do I think of our odds?

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Honestly, no one else here seems to realize it. But Aurora is not that highly stocked in war equipment… if I assume correctly. The ammo for the artillery is taken right out of the Arcology defences, the rail actions are not ours either. I heard that companies like the one my friend runs were demanded to hand over any excess heavy weaponry at gunpoint. And half of our combat force does not belong to Walker-types. Making me assume they are volunteers. All in all we number 500 Walkers (100 unit rotation) and 700 foot units.

Heh, look at us. Priding in being able to kill hordes of monster with our metal machines, and we still needed a large armada of young men and women to fill the trenches. Truly war never does change…

Honestly though, the leaders did not make multiple lines of defence that we could slowly retreat backwards along, the supply lines are not defended well enough, an oldschool artillery bombardment could cut us off from all reinforcements if the Lord utilizes his artillery in a manner similar to how “Blitzkrieg” utilizes it.

...In fact, can we even take a full out frontal assault from their whole horde whilst under artillery fire!? I don't think so… T.T

I tried to convince Alicia to not take part in the coming battle since her Walker is too under-equipped and to simply stay in her cockpit within Fea instead. But she wouldn't agree no matter how hard I tried...

Just how goddamn much do you want that squirrel!?

Eh? Apparently she wants to be useful… Darn this cute fella. You win. But you better not get hurt ya hear!? (Finding a new squadmate would be a pain after all)

During the travel I tried to get to know my lieutenant, but he seems to get pale whenever I address him informally… I gave up after the 5th attempt.

The comms officer on the other hand seems like a nice fella, I chatted with him for a while during our transit. He even asked for my number in comms-network at one point.

Eh? ‘Did I give it to him?’ Well of course? After all, if I play my cards right I might get a new squadmate, furthering my income even further. (3 man squad is the minimum for squad-specific skirmishes that pay a squad bonus!)

Some 4 hours before the scheduled arrival of the horde we had first contact with a few scouts. A few fast running Lessers. We killed most but a few got away.

Now they know we are here. We should brace ourselves for what is to come.

The upside is that a full frontal assault is almost certainly not going to happen. The same military knowledge that makes the enemy dangerous, also makes a frontal assault nigh impossible. No leader would charge headfirst into enemy lines without knowing for certain that they would win.

No, no most likely what is something more tactical. More coordinated.

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A few hours later. The enemy armada started to appear on the horizon.

So, it begins. An old school battle with strategies and tactics.

...Or so I thought, until I saw and heard their artillery open fire, and their armada breaking into an open charge.

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….Whut?