The trench seemed rather cramped being next to a 7 and a half foot muscle monster, the squad seemed to accept Tarsus after a week or so, he helped in some of the short pushes they did to move down the line. they had advanced nearly 90 meters in a single week but were finally

stopped, a mix of high magic and friendly fire stopped their last attempts to advance.

The room was well lit and warm there were hardly any chairs which left most of the people standing, in the middle of the room was a table with a map on it, on the map were lines drawn in black, red, and green.

"Our advances have been halted so far by the enemy mages, they have setup walls between our trenches, we cant get any planes close enough to check their movements." -Unknown 1

"I propose we use some of those new tanks we're expecting, the crews should be here in a matter of days so if we prepare ourselves for the charge it may work" -Unknown 2

"That sounds good but how many will we have, I heard they only made 20 to be divided across the regiments?" -Unknown 3

"We have been given 3 tanks each with a crew of 8 and a replacement crew for each." -Unknown 2

Its been 3 days since the wall had come up and both sides traded mortar fire over it, Parker's squad had been set in the trenches 1 row behind the front and were given orders to prepare for an assault after a light shelling.

They heard the distinct noise of artillery batteries and mortars going off in unison, it wasnt just a regular push, command wanted to go as far as possible. The shells hit and tore down the walls as a thunder was heard from the allied lines, a tank rolled right over the trenches moving at a slow pace and nearly getting stuck several times.

Looking forward the wall had been torn down and Parker saw an open field, or a killing floor, he didnt know what to call the 100 meter flat land just behind the wall. They would be dead before they got all the way over was command insane? Suddenly he had an idea, they had a wall coming their direction.

"Once this thing clears over us we are going to hop right behind it and use it for cover" -Parker

They looked him in the eyes, they thought he was crazy but they had to follow orders. Seconds after the mass of metal chugged overhead they jumped out of their trench and ran behind it, Parker and Tarsus keeping up while the rest of the squad struggled. Parker heard fire and water spells splash and flutter off the tank, and rocks the size of baseballs slam into it, it seemed to take hours of machine gun fire going both ways, but halfway through he heard an unusual noise. A plunk then a fizz and then screaming from the tank, it heated up rapidly then fire shot out the top, and then it cooled. 'Magic' he thought, the tank stopped and he wasnt going to make his men run down a field of death, they sat behind the relative safety of the tank waiting for troops to catch up then pass.

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Magics still slammed into the tank as if to fire through it when Tarsus braced himself against it and started to push.

"I will NOT be left behind on this charge, i WILL have my glory!" -Tarsus

Parker almost couldnt belive he was even moving that thing but he decided to help.

"Push this thing, if you cant find a spot to push then shoot at the enemy line!" -Parker

The tank felt almost like ice, magic was an annoying thing. The allied charge caught up fairly quick as the tank had only moved a few feet at most, Parker gave the order to fall into the fray of the charge and move forward. Being behind at least 4 people made the squad feel safer, though not as safe as when they were just sitting in their holes. By the time they closed in on the enemy line the number of allied troops had thinned rather drastically.

What had started out as nearly tens of thousands of soldiers was now maybe 2 thousand, the cost of claiming land in hell. The battle in the first trench wasnt long, having a minotaur to soak up the damage and deal it out seemed to work fairly well. Parker had wondered why he never even saw one of the battlefield so far, he would have to ask his squadmate later. It took almost a day of fighting to push the enemies into a retreat,

of the initial chage only 500 men made it out alive, Parker had survived a full battle but couldnt believe how many had died 'the enemies had to have lost at least that much....right?' He thought to himself as he watched the mass of routed soldiers running for a town in the distance, the men who had won the day cheered, and congratulated eachother. There would be time to mourn the dead later. The men in the room shook hands and congratulated each other on a battle won.

"Enough of the hugging, we may have won this but we've only pushed them back to Thionville. We will need to take that as well" -Unknown 1/Colonel Dobson

"Yes, right.....so do we have any plans for the assault? Its not exactly a fortress." -Unknown 2/Colonel Wilcox

"We may need some better weapons, what are the losses on the tanks?" -Unkown 3/Colonel Briggs

They looked to a junior officer who had a clipboard.

"Ah..We lost 2 of our tanks sirs." -J/O

"Lets talk to the french, I heard they recently deployed 10 of their new tanks we can ask for a one of those, and a few of their Renaults as well" -Colonel Briggs