“Placing too much faith in your war machines is foolish. No weapon survives bad circumstances.”

- General Frank Zurich, Confederate General.

+++

+++ Lieutenant Hans Hoffman +++

Near Rignon

“Captain!” Hans shouted as he pulled his mech into a hard retreat. “What’s your plan?”

“Hold on—” Adelyn replied. Hans neared the position she held. It was a small hill that effectively held fire control on the flat fields, around them, alongside the road that the convoy would be passing through. “Okay….I…well, I’m contacting the suppression force.”

“Do we open fire now?”

“Absolutely not!”

Hans gripped his controls and bit his teeth hard, his main gun aiming straight at the wagon that contained that strange woman. That thing’s going to kill those innocent children. But at the same time, maybe if he pulled the trigger now, they might be able to save the rest of the civilians running.

No, nothing but a pipe dream. She’ll survive it.

And he’d just murder a bunch of innocent civilians prematurely.

His mech stopped its panicked retreat.

Damn it!

“What’s the news now?!”

“They’re sending in the light cavalry and two regiments at us,” Adelyn said. “But the folks talking to me are still about to dispatch the orders on horseback. It’d take too long.”

“Then they have to march here,” Hans said, still keeping his main gun tracked on the target. “I’m gonna switch to Laura’s frequencies.”

Hans fumbled through his mech radio’s controls before he heard the buzzing sounds from it as Laura answered it, her deep breaths almost matching the sound of the gallops of her horse.

“Lieutenant?!”

“We found her,” Hans said. “North of you. On the road running eastward of the town we last visited.”

“I hear you, we’re riding as fast as we can there!”

“Make haste. We need that magical support now.”

Hans closed the radio transmission, before reconnecting to Adelyn.

“Any ideas?”

“I don’t know,” Adelyn said, her voice cracking into a more nervous one. “She’s…she’s using those people as meatshields.”

“This is some insurgency tactics,” Hans said. They continued watching the convoy drive forward. “I’m not letting them get away. We have to shadow them. We don’t know how fast the Calamity of Desire can travel when she reveals herself. The closer she is to Rignon, the more at risk those people are.”

“Okay, move out, now.”

The two immediately drove forward, their mechs hot on the tail of the moving convoy. Hans himself was thinking long and hard about this predicament. First of all, outside of that ability I used, I have no real confirmation that she’s the devil. ‘Eye of Paranoia’ was specifically for spotting demons. It didn’t spot her. ‘Liars Detect Liars’ was more broad. It was for spotting ‘hostile entities’, which could mean anything. She might not even be a demon.

Or perhaps it’s an issue of classification and technicalities? Hans couldn’t figure it out as he pressed harder on the gas. Are Calamities so above that of simple demons that they don’t count as one?

He didn’t know.

Most important, was the decision. Should he open fire at a wagon carrying children to save tens of thousands, even if such a decision probably wouldn’t even work?

He didn’t know either.

“Alright…I think…I think we need to forcefully go on foot and separate her from them.”

“It wouldn’t work,” Hans said. “If we try that, she’ll probably transform or something like that demon in Rousselot, and then we’d be dead!”

“So we’ll just open fire on these people?”

“I didn’t say that.”

“Damn it…”

“Where are we going?”

“This road is headed to Rignon,” Adelyn answered. “We’re going straight there.”

“And the cavalry?”

“They should meet these people head-on soon.”

“Okay…maybe they can separate her from them? Then we keep an overwatch?”

“Sounds like a plan until it’s not,” Adelyn said. “Goddess, these things are city-destroying creatures. How are we even supposed to stop it when it’s hugging innocent people closely?”

Hans didn’t have an answer. They continued shadowing the convoy, their guns turning and tracking them.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

“Let’s try my plan,” Hans said. “If…if she turns hostile, then damn the civilian casualties. We’ll stop her before she gets to Rousselot. We’ll just try avoiding it by getting the Imperials to separate them first on foot.”

“Okay, gotcha.”

+++

The Imperial Cavalry soon arrived dead ahead of the moving convoy. The civilian column immediately stopped when the plumes of the Cuirassiers appeared, their horses running fast through the fields surrounding them. Hans and Adelyn stopped approximately four hundred meters at their rear, their mechs observing the unfolding situation.

Adelyn already informed them through her magical device on who to remove, so it would be up to them to do it now.

Hans watched as some of the cavalrymen dismounted. They drew their pistols or carbines out, while the others continued circling the convoy. Hans felt awful about this entire thing—the two were keeping their distance, understandably so. The bad side was they’d be using the Imperial Cavalry as cannon fodder to do the dangerous job for them.

It didn't sit well with the two.

Soon, the dismounted Cuirassiers began shouting at the civilians, who cowered in fear on the side of their wagons. Hans watched the leader of the unit, who himself rode with his horse, his saber drawn, beside the lines of wagons and carriages. He was shouting with clear hostility at the fearful townsfolk.

The other men on foot on the other hand began violently ransacking the carriages and wagons, tearing them open, and throwing the belongings of the crying civilians as they searched for the “hidden demon” with wild abandon.

“What the hell are they doing?”

“Imperial Cavalry,” Hans said. “I wouldn’t be surprised if these people routinely raze the countryside while searching for Republican insurgents.”

Soon, they reached the wagon that Hans remembered as the one containing the suspected demon. The children from inside were quickly ordered to leave and scatter, running away in tears from the Imperial Soldiers. But not the woman. The woman didn’t come out. The Cuirassiers on foot began shouting violently at the wagon until two of them went inside to violently drag her out.

They immediately threw her into the road, ripping her cloak away a bit to reveal her face, before one of them stepped on her back, gun pointed at her head.

“They got her,” Hans said. “They took her.”

“Why isn’t she resisting?”

“Did you tell them to get the civilians away?”

“I did. I told them to just separate her so we can deal with her.”

“Then what the hell are they doing?”

The two were distracted by a loud bang. White smoke obscured their view temporarily until they saw what had happened. The cavalryman who had stepped on the woman shot her in the head. There was silence from the rest of the onlooking Cuirassiers, many of them stepping back for a brief second as the commotion died.

Then, a bright pink flash blinded them all.

“What—”

Then a slash—and a violent scream. The body of one of the cavalrymen found itself sliced cleanly in half. In front of him, the woman had reawakened, the wound in her head closing as if it were nothing as she smiled sadistically. That, and Hans saw her holding the most ridiculously looking oversized axe he had laid his eyes on.

It glowed for a second, and she aimed the axe at the group of cuirassiers, who began to form up into an ad-hoc firing line, their guns aimed at her. But a red glowing circle appeared in front of her axe, and it fired multiple red, blood-like pulses at the Imperial Soldiers in front of her. All of them immediately dissolved into a puddle of red flesh, their bodies reforming into dozens of sickly, fleshy, doll-like objects that moved and merged with each other.

“It’s really her!”

“Engage! Engage!”

Hans immediately charged forward, as he switched his main gun’s ammunition into that of an MPAT round—set to airburst mode. He then pulled the trigger and rained a hail of machine gun rounds at the woman. Adelyn did the same, as the woman jumped and dodged it, going straight for the wagon line and hopping between their roofs.

The two however didn’t stop firing, their machine gun peppering the wagons and carriages with holes as the civilians dropped in a panic on the road. Meanwhile, the remaining cavalrymen scattered around the fields, their guns drawn as they joined at opening fire on her, their shots staggered, scattered, and inaccurate.

“Is this what you all want?!” She shouted, her sultry and feminine voice echoing across the battlefield. “At last, to challenge me?”

A demon speaking our language? He stopped momentarily as he allowed his guns to cool down, before resuming. This is a new one.

Hans pressed his speakers.

“Stand down now, on the orders of the Imperial Army!” He shouted as he followed her nearly flying form with his machine guns. “You’ve committed grave crimes against humanity!”

She laughed as she jumped down on the panicked cavalrymen. Before they could scatter, her magic struck them all, once again turning them into those same fleshy dolls as they disintegrated, each body forming dozens that moved and reformed into this bigger, biological mass that resembled that of an ugly, giant human body.

The civilians were no different, also being struck by her same magic, and falling into the same fate. Even those that ran had no chance, as her giggles echoed, her voice unnaturally loud.

“Humanity! Humanity! How amusing!” She said as the bodies formed three major fleshy masses, covering her from the gunfire that Hans and Adelyn were unloading at them. She then mocked them from behind their protection. “Why? Does humanity not commit the same with their endless desires?”

“That’s a damned crazy woman,” Adelyn muttered. “Talking to her is pointless.”

“Get an ADI incendiary, MPAT!” Hans shouted as he fired one of his MPAT rounds straight into one of the fleshy creatures. It immediately exploded violently, but it quickly reformed, nullifying his attack. “Hit the one closest to her!”

“On it!”

Adelyn fired her main gun at the creature, the shot burning through the thing violently. The woman was distraught by that development, as she suddenly turned her attention to Adelyn’s mech, her eyes narrowing with a glint of clear hatred.

“...Angels.”

Suddenly, the woman sprinted, almost like a flash on the battlefield, straight to Adelyn’s direction. Naturally, Adelyn pulled into a hard retreat, her machine guns raining hell at the charging woman. Hans immediately jumped into support mode, his mech riding straight into an intercept—then he fired his main gun.

The explosion forced the woman into an ill-timed jump, shrapnel and explosive shockwaves blasting through her body after the proximity fuse detonated the MPAT round. In a split-second, a slash came from above her, as Hans’ mech stepped on her torso using one of his forward leg razors.

Crimson blood seeped on the green grass. The woman stared at the metallic leg and the tons of weight distributed by the razor on her chest. All as the battlefield became still.

“I got her—”

Hans’ nervous celebration was cut short when. A sudden slice removed two of his Wanderfalke’s legs. His mech immediately collapsed on the dirt right in front of the woman, who jumped away. When Hans managed to turn his turret to her, he only saw her standing for a split second—before her oversized axe sliced through his unarmored cockpit.

Blood spurted out of Hans’ sliced torso. He screamed and screamed. The lights inside of his mech died out as blood flew out of his cut abdomen. Then the frontal part of his mech’s hull separated alongside everything below his waist.

“My legs! My legs! My legs!”

“Lieutenant!?”

Gunfire broke the comms from his headset, as Adelyn continued to duel the woman.

Hans watched his blood spurt out everywhere in his sliced-open cockpit. Slowly, his vision turned gray, his breath turning from panicked to shallow as he lost blood.

I stabbed her! I stabbed her! Why? Why?!

Shock soon set in. His eyes were still wide open as they looked at the other half of his body. Then they slowly closed, his head going limp. The only thing holding him to his seat was his bloodied seatbelt, as his closing, angered, defeated, and confused thoughts dissipated.

Why?

His mind shouted one last time to the void in the face of this unfair defeat.