The first sign of the Dark’s advance was a surging curtain of pure darkness rising from the northern horizon, and as everyone looked up from the small outpost they had been assigned to, another burst of light came from the south. Tri-coloured radiance surged forward at the same time, and like a speeding stormfront, both sides checked each other’s move at the same time.
Dia fiddled with the weapon in her hands, before looking at the small outpost, which had a Moon soldier sitting inside and checking distances. The Seekers of Life had been assigned an emergency mission; starting from the furthest outpost, they were to harry the forces of the great Dark and cause some “light” damage by conducting what seemed like a fighting retreat from one outpost to another.
Except that they had to be stationed at the very front first, but other than that, everything was fine.
They had gotten here two hours ago, right when everyone gathered, and then began to familiarise themselves with these easy-to-use weapons. Dia herself didn’t really think that these weapons would do that much damage against the Shadowed soldiers, but orders were orders. The Moonlit soldiers that were assisting them expressed similar doubts, but there was nothing much they could do other than to assist them in learning the weapons.
As the sky above reflected the opening of this huge battle, Dia spied the first specks of black from the only ingress possible. “They’re here!”
Schwarz nodded. “Alright, everyone to your positions! We’ll waste all the ammunition here and draw their attention!”
Dia glanced at a mounted repeating crossbow that seemed to draw arrows from a huge gun, before checking the angle. At the same time, the others checked the siege weapons that were stationed on this small outpost that was destined for a blazing end, and then began to operate them.
Her right hand operated the small crank on the side of the repeating crossbow, and flurries of brown and silver charged out of her weapon, arching into the sky.
“Raise the angle slightly,” the Moonlit soldier behind her advised.
All around her, their Moonlit supporters offered their own pieces of advice to maximise damage. As for why these people themselves weren’t doing the operating, a good glance at these Moonlit soldiers would make things clear — they were already dead. They could speak, but there was no interacting with them.
Furthermore, bi-folders were generally twice as fast as one-folders, which made the Seekers of Life a more useful guerrilla group than the Moonlit soldiers.
The five other outposts released a similar barrage of attacks as she placed a new drum of arrows into the depleted drum’s position. The Moons had been crippled badly by Absolute Terror; whatever manpower that was stuck doing harassment duties were the best fighting force they could already muster up. These people, like their motley little crew, had been told to man these outposts and use them to thin out the numbers, even if it was to just put a dent or two in.
The outlook wasn’t optimistic, though. While the sheer numbers meant that aiming was pointless, it also meant that whatever they were doing wasn’t probably going to do much either. If it wasn’t for their contract and the fact that a new wave of reinforcements was inbound, Dia and the others would have fled long ago.
Oh, and that the Moons wouldn’t be defeated before the Trial of Aeons concluded, naturally. That said, they had to be alive — that was the most basic prerequisite.
The first volley of arrows, rocks and other assorted items burst in mid-air as they hurtled towards the mass of approaching troops, drowned out by a burst of blue light. The next few volleys, however, started to see some effectiveness here and there, as a few objects landed into the huge mass.
Dia, however, simply focused on turning the crank and adjusting the weapon as ordered by the ghostly spotter behind her. Drum after drum was emptied, and before long, she found herself out of arrows to shoot.
Nero, who was using his incredible strength to toss rocks, glanced at her once. “You’re out too? Do you need those drums?”
“…You’re going to throw them?” Dia asked.
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A wooden contraption hurled a wave of small, burning stones, which knocked down the frontmost line. Farah stepped away from the weapon a moment later, and without skipping a beat, said, “Can you also throw this at them?
“And my catapult too,” Schwarz added.
“…Damn you guys,” Nero muttered. “Whatever.”
Gripping the huge siege weapon Farah had been operating earlier — her spooky spotter had informed her that it was an onager — Nero spun on the spot once and hurled it in the general direction of the enemy. Blue light attempted to intercept the incoming attacks, but the ground still shook from the impact caused by that hurled onager. Nero didn’t slack off either; within moments, he had hurled the other siege weapons with spinning starts, and after emptying the outpost of all its weapons, he turned to the structure itself.
“Right, this thing has explosives, right?” Nero asked.
“No, it’s the ground underneath,” Schwarz replied.
“Okay, good enough. Moon guy at the top. We’re going to throw this thing, so get out of the building.” After three seconds, in which time the Moonlit soldier perched at the top joined them in the small perimeter made of barb wire, Nero pulled out the outpost nonchalantly. Of course, she couldn’t miss the faint blue sheen around the Holy Son of the Black God, but…
With another spinning start, a small building hurled through the air.
“Better than leaving it behind anyway,” Nero replied, as dust clouds rose from the north. “The enemy, once they see this building, would just attack from long-range and try to dismantle it. Might as well make good use of it.”
“And the enemy is unlikely to notice that this place has been rigged with explosives,” Schwarz muttered.
“Exactly.”
Farah nodded. “Come on, let’s beat a retreat. Next outpost, then.”
Halfway to the next outpost, blue light burst out from the north, and one of the frontmost outposts exploded. Like a prearranged signal, the other outposts were battered and torn down by more mana — just as what Nero said, the forces of the great Dark had simply torn down the outpost.
Therefore, using it as a weapon was more prudent, although Nero was probably the only one who could use it that way.
After a few more meetings of mad running, they arrived at the first fallback point. The same weapons had been set up, and everyone took no time at all in peppering the incoming army with more weapons.
“Odd,” Risti muttered. “Their scouts should be here, right? Or are they advancing mindlessly?”
“Absolute Terror isn’t here, and it seems that—”
Five distant explosions interrupted Nero’s words, and an equal number of smoke columns appeared. In that instant, the Moonlit ghosts guiding Dia and the others urged them to capitalise on this moment of weakness, and everyone let out small grunts as they worked the weapons in the outpost’s perimeter to the point of exhaustion.
Before long, the stack of drums containing arrows had been depleted. Nero, however, was the first one to finish exhausting his own rocks — he had even tossed his own catapult for the heck of it — and was already eyeing Dia’s now-useless weapon.
“You didn’t get addicted to throwing these things, did you?” Dia asked, suspicious.
“Uh…wow, such nice weather. I’ll take that, thank you very much…” Nero picked up the complex repeating crossbow. “Incidentally, I didn’t know that throwing these things are half as exhilarating as drinking Schwarz’s strongest brews.”
“That’s your unit of measurement?”
“My highest unit of measurement!” That last word coincided with the man—sized crossbow cutting a beautiful arc into the sky. The approaching army’s cohesion had been disrupted by the explosions and by the random things Nero had hurled, but they had reorganised really rapidly, enough to deal with something like that.
“Tch.” Nero looked at the sight of the flying siege weapon torn down into its constituent parts by blue light. “It’s too small.”
“Sorry, then.” Dia rolled her eyes. “Now go and hurl the rest of the trash. Schwarz’s done with his anyway.”
“Gladly.”
As siege weapons and an outpost flew through the sky, Dia couldn’t help but lament the absurdity of it all. This should have been a serious occasion, but the fact that Nero was just throwing siege weapons and buildings so nonchalantly and cracking jokes had all but dispelled any fear she had. In fact, rather than fear, Dia was now curious about the types of things Nero could hurl, especially since the base camp had lots of buildings and other things.
Dia shook herself once as the outpost building flew through the air, and she joined the others in beating their next retreat. The area between the outpost they had just abandoned and their next point of resistance was fairly hostile. In fact, it was the area that Dia and some Moonlit soldiers had turned into a death trap for Absolute Terror, but at least it wouldn’t activate while she and the others were traversing it.
“Damn.” Schwarz hopped over a gully, only to nearly lose balance on the next point. “This place is dangerous. Can we just fly over it?”
“I think there’s some danger if we fly, so no. Just make your way across slowly,” Dia replied. “We have enough time, and this is the last rally point anyway.”
“They better have more rocks there,” Nero muttered. “It’s a bit unsatisfying.”
“…You can have my rocks,” Risti replied. “I’m not a fan of operating catapults anyway.”
“Really?” Nero’s eyes glittered in a way that reminded Dia of a child. “Wow!”
…It would seem that this desperate defence had turned into a fun pastime for Nero.
Making their way to the final outpost, Dia and the others checked the siege equipment once more. Each of these things were worth a fortune, but Nero had hurled them into enemy ranks happily.
Unbelievable…but again, the outpost would explode, so it didn’t really matter.
Her heart, however, didn’t care about that little fact.