The crystal of the dungeon shone like the sun rising in the morning, but it was faster than yesterday. The soldiers were already awake, waiting for the creatures to attack their position like the day before, but they didn’t come. Instead, like a synchronized show of lights, white beams pierced through buildings on all the frontlines, ‌cutting buildings in half or causing massive holes in others.

It took some by surprise, ‌killing others. Others ran from the fallen buildings and with the chaos installed, explosions came from the buildings up front and creatures came out of them and shot at the soldiers on the streets.

Inside the buildings, some walls exploded and more monsters came in from the openings. Communications were chaotic, an ambush, but the movements of the creatures didn’t change, more like the orders received an update, a complete change in strategy.

‘Die!!!’ A soldier plunged a knife into the throat of a creature.

It was a melee of mayhem inside the buildings, with explosions from grenades, knives, and rifles. In the chaos, everything was being used against the creatures. The streets were a different beast ‌as the white beams continued to cause destruction all around, piercing big piles of rubble like nothing.

Ethan was pushing forward with his team, trying to find the “catapults” through smaller alleys where the streets were diverging following the path of destruction the beams were causing. The monsters were attacking from inside the buildings now; outside gave soldiers more room for maneuver and they could advance‌, but now some magic projectiles were coming from all sides, complete chaos.

In the back, inside the command room, Alon was looking at the map with information flying through the room, operators passing requests and relaying updates on the positions of the platoons.

‘Sir, 4-6 wants mortar strikes at position G7/F6.’ One operator shouted.

Alon looked at the map and saw that it was ahead of their current position and made the instant link. Those monsters were using the buildings as cover; they didn’t care for the destruction they were causing.

‘Permission granted, the platoon leaders now can request ‌from the platoon squad.’ Alon nodded at the radio operator.

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‘Yes, sir.’ The radio operator turned around. ‘5-6, this is a command. You are clear; I repeat, you are clear.’ His voice was now calmer.

Nortis, the leader of the mortar platoon, was checking his map; it was the same one Alon was using, but he was seeing it on a tablet. He was checking the numbers of strikes in different places on the map for practice; the map was divided into squares and after that into smaller squares with numbers and lanes on the sides to help with location, a good idea that Edmund came up with when he taught them how to use the mortars back at the mansion.

The explosions at the distance made him uneasy because of how powerless he felt, but that wouldn’t last long as the radio operator by his side gave him a tap, a thought up, and started to write numbers on his tablet.

‘Alright everyone, is our time to shine.’ He shouted.

All soldiers started to get in position, some transporting the rounds closer to the mortar, others just getting into position. The idea was that the number of coordinates was passed by radio, and Nortis was assigned to each squad so they could complete their orders. If every squad already had their orders and more came in, he would do the calculations himself and pass along the positions, and the squad leaders would just check before launching the rounds.

The first one was 4-6 requests for 3 rounds on G7/F6; that was the general direction, but calculating the distance using the map their hands made easier. It was still a developing system, so they couldn’t say it was perfect, but as the rounds flew toward the sky and impacted the location behind the creature lines, a radio transmission confirming the hits or asking for adjustments was all they could wait for.

‘Hit confirm, target destroyed.’ The radio operator spoke to Nortis.

‘Alright!’ He clenched his fist.

On the frontline, the battle was starting to stabilize as the initial confusion settled but now there were more advanced squads doing recon and hunting catapults, as now the enemy strategy was to use the buildings as cover and fire aimed trying to cause as much damage as possible, Ethan was upfront with his team and right between buildings to their right as they though an alley, it was two catapults preparing to fire another volley in the general direction of the defensive position his platoon was in.

‘Caleb hit those things; the rest draw fire from the ones guarding spread out.’ Ethan spoke to his team before running to another position.

Caleb started to prepare his cannon and the other members of the team got into position and started to fire against the soldiers of the demon lord protecting the Catapults, drawing their attention. This allowed Caleb to fire against one of the gigantic monsters before moving to another position, followed by Oran.

His shot passed right through his neck, making it crumble to the ground, but the projectile didn’t stop there; it changed direction and hit the left arm of the other by its side, making the huge creature lose balance and fall toward the one lying dead on the ground but the energy was already stored on the weapon on the back of the creature so it suddenly fired. The white beam pierced the building right above where Caleb was making pieces of it fall and block the alley where Ethan’s team came from.

‘Into the building behind us, go!’ Ethan pointed at a wooden door.

Samal shot the handle of the door just in case and pushed using his shoulder, forcing his way into the building, followed by Arsher, who started to scan for enemies and advance toward a hallway. One by one, they entered and started to shoot against the creatures from the open door, leaving Ethan the last one to enter. Before trying to run toward the door, he threw a grenade at the advancing creatures. As soon as the explosion kicked in, some of them were launched to the sides and Ethan ran to the door with his team members, giving him cover.