The "Elites" Who Shattered at First Contact

Kapil was a member of the Wolf Clan. From his earliest memories, his parents had constantly recited the teachings of the Wolf God to him, telling him how wolves were united, ferocious, brave, tireless, and invincible. There had been a time when the wolf packs roaming the wastelands were the greatest threat faced by the survivors of Polo Province... In the end, the survivors triumphed, though not easily. To commemorate that respectable adversary and inherit their martial prowess, they erected a totem to the wolves' deity in the City of a Thousand Pillars, hoping to receive its grace and blessings. From that moment on, the Wolf God gained its first flock of worshippers. Those blessed by the Wolf God were not merely born warriors; they were the pride of the Empire, born to fight, kill, and plunder. Because of this, Kapil took endless pride in his identity as a Wolf Clan tribesman and labored incessantly to become an imperial soldier. Hard work paid off. Blessed with ample nutrition and steeped in warrior culture from childhood, he stood out from tens of thousands of peers who enlisted alongside him. First, he was selected for recruit training, and then, thanks to his outstanding performance in boot camp, he was assigned directly to the Gray Wolf Army under His Majesty's personal command, groomed as a reserve officer. Not every member of the Wolf Clan had the opportunity to join the Gray Wolf Army, and even fewer could become officers in this ace formation. He was the pride of his parents and of his clan. And the one who had bestowed this honor upon him was none other than the great Wutuo Xilan—the supreme Emperor himself. Kapil swore to bring glory to His Majesty in gratitude for such boundless imperial grace, to earn military merits, and to eventually rise to become a general commanding tens of thousands. Now, he had finally received that chance—to prove his loyalty to His Majesty with the fighting spirit of a vicious wolf! Yet at this very moment— The sight unfolding before his eyes stamped sheer despair into his gaze. "Charge—!" The ringing in his ears, deafened by artillery shells, gradually receded, replaced by the hoarse roars of his officers, chaotic footsteps, and a rising tide of war cries and blood-curdling screams. The scene before him had caught more than just him off guard. It had defied everyone's expectations. The cramped, narrow slums marked on their maps seemed to have vanished into thin air. The mud-brick huts and ramshackle shanties had been utterly dismantled, leaving behind nothing but an endless wasteland of crushed bricks and rubble. He had no idea what kind of sorcery those iron men had employed; all he knew was that in barely over a week, they had cleared away more than a thousand buildings that should have been standing here. From the nearest cover to the Governor's Mansion perched atop the high ground lay nearly six hundred meters of open ground. This clearing was an insurmountable chasm, strewn with crushed bricks, shattered tiles, and construction debris—and absolutely nothing else. Circumventing this chasm from the flanks meant either facing a pincer attack from the direction of Rowell Camp or swimming in from the distant coastline. That was even more suicidal than charging across six hundred meters of open dirt. And they were already standing here. They had no choice but to advance. Urgent shouts driving them forward rang out once more. Clutching their rifles, soldiers launched rush after rush toward the distant, unattainable Governor's Mansion, only to be mowed down like wheat beneath a rolling harvester without the slightest suspense. The converging torrents of bullets swept past like the churning blades of a chainsaw. Watching flesh and bone shred across the battlefield, Kapil felt as though his heart were about to leap out of his throat. For the first time in his life, he realized how utterly insignificant human existence was, and for the first time, he saw a terror he had never witnessed before plastered across his comrades' faces. This was not combat— This was outright slaughter! In the blink of an eye, an entire century had been wiped out. The friendly troops pinned to the broken brick rubble were suppressed into absolute immobility by the machine guns mounted atop the roof of the Governor's Mansion. They either howled in agony or wriggled forward in agonizing desperation. There was no cover anywhere in sight to mask their advance. There were only the corpses of their fallen comrades... Rifles from within the city fired toward the Governor's Mansion, but they failed to exert even the slightest suppression against those well-prepared firing points. The Alliance soldiers had welded steel gun shields onto their machine guns, to say nothing of the thick, heavy armor plating adorning their bodies. Seeing the century ahead almost completely wiped out, the officer turned his gaze toward Kapil's unit and roared at the top of his lungs. "Move! Charge, damn you!!" Staring at that impenetrable position and his battered comrades crawling through the dirt, Kapil's eyes flickered with raw terror. Yet the order to attack had already been given. If he dared hesitate for a single second, a fate far worse than death awaited him. This was, after all, the path he had chosen for himself. Gritting his teeth, Kapil fought down the rising dread in his chest and forced a roar through clenched jaws. "For the Empire—!" Amid the sparse, ragged shouts that answered him, he emptied his mind of thought and bolted howling from the shelter, leading the ten comrades behind him into the open. Yet the courage he had so painstakingly mustered shattered on his very first stride. A mortar shell detonated nearby, hurling him into the air to crash back down like a discarded rag. The comrades following behind met the exact same fate. Over two decades of sweat, toil, and pride were reduced to a thick puddle of gore, crudely smeared across a bed of broken brick... ... Kapil and his men were neither the first Wolf Clan warriors to shed their blood for the Empire in this battle, nor would they be the last. A fresh salvo of artillery crashed into the demolished slums six hundred meters in front of the Governor's Mansion, engulfing both the Gray Wolf Army soldiers crouching near remaining mud huts to return fire and those who had just cleared cover to launch another assault. There were still about a hundred shacks that hadn't been demolished in time. However, the residents living there had already taken their demolition compensation and evacuated. All that remained were men carrying guns, allowing the Alliance to open fire with absolute abandon. At the same time, the machine gun nests perched on the roof and perimeter walls of the Governor's Mansion unleashed a ferocious hail of fire. The chatter of automatic fire was relentless, as though their ammunition would never run dry. The pride of the Wolf Clan fell in swathes. In another breath, yet another century was snuffed out on that field of shattered brick and crimson gore. Converging streams of tracer fire plummeted like a torrential downpour. Here, a soldier's life could be measured in mere seconds. That young Rat Clan lad who had sworn an oath to the "iron men" had indeed made good on his word—he had forced the Empire's soldiers to fight prone on piles of broken rubble. The 1st Regiment, tasked with storming the Governor's Mansion, was suffering the humiliating fate of being treated as target practice. They had already abandoned over five hundred corpses, yet apart from burning through some Alliance ammunition, they had achieved absolutely nothing. "Damn it! I remember this place being a slum!" Gazing at the relentless machine guns, the chiliarch sheltering behind a mud-brick wall cursed bitterly. A thick band of gauze was wrapped around his forehead, beneath a steel helmet he had just scavenged off the ground. A piece of shrapnel had scraped his brow earlier, nearly sending him straight to the grave. According to the original plan, they only needed to sprint across a single street. At the cost of two or three hundred casualties at most, they should have engaged the Alliance soldiers in close-quarters melee. Instead, a street barely a few paces wide had been stretched into a six-hundred-meter corridor of death. Not only did they lack armored support, but they also possessed virtually none of the artillery fire crucial for an assault. Instead, Alliance artillery and machine guns had battered them into complete disorientation. "We've taken over fifty percent casualties! Continuing like this is pure suicide! We need artillery cover! I repeat! We need fire support!" Grabbing the radio from the radioman crouching beside him, the chiliarch barked into the handset once more. He had been requesting artillery strikes for over ten minutes. Prince Dilip had personally promised him that the rear artillery was preparing its barrage and would soon pound the enemy positions, urging him to press the offensive without delay. Yet seeing his unit virtually decimated while not a single shell arrived, he felt as furious as if he had been made a complete fool of. Static hissed across the line for a few moments before an awkward voice answered through the earpiece. "I'm coordinating it... Damn it, what is that idiot Alaiyang doing?! I've been demanding artillery support for ages, so why haven't I seen the shadow of a single shell..." Listening to the useless excuses filtering through the comm line, the chiliarch felt his scalp tingle with rage, yet he dared not openly rebuke the royal. Swallowing hard, he asked in a trembling voice, "My Lord... what about your direct artillery battery?" The Alliance's firepower was too overwhelming and precise. If an imperial gun fired even a few rounds, it would have to scurry back into hiding, making prolonged support difficult. If all else failed, hitching the guns to trucks to charge into the urban sector and leveling them for direct fire toward the Governor's Mansion would be far better than waiting here in helpless agony. Just as he was about to make the suggestion, silence lingered over the radio before a mumbled reply came through. "...There was an issue while conducting counter-battery fire against the Alliance. We've temporarily lost contact with them, so that idiot Alaiyang will have to figure something out." Hearing that, the chiliarch nearly spat a mouthful of blood. So while they were still crouching in their trenches, the six artillery pieces General Alaiyang had assigned to this pompous fool had already been wiped out by the other side! Attempting counter-battery fire without frontline spotters to correct the aim... The man had to be completely out of his mind. Even if he had somehow guessed where the Alliance's artillery positions were, did this pig have any idea where his own shells were landing?! "Lord Dilip, if this continues, no amount of men will be enough..." The chiliarch ground his teeth. "Please permit us to withdraw and regroup—" Before he could finish, the figure on the other end of the line shrieked like a rat whose tail had been stepped on. "No retreat! You are imperial soldiers! Now is the time to dedicate your lives to His Majesty! Are your oaths nothing more than toilet paper?!" "It's only six hundred meters! Charge! Before sunset, I want to see the Twin Sabers banner fluttering atop the Governor's Mansion!" Confronted with such an absurd order, the chiliarch could no longer contain the fury blazing in his chest and roared into the radio. "Lord Dilip! This isn't your private backyard! This is the frontline! The frontline! The Alliance's machine guns are right in our faces! Never mind six hundred meters, we can't even push across sixty! Why don't you come to the front yourself and see what kind of hell this really is!" "I say again: no retreat!" Prince Dilip shrieked hysterically across the channel. He utterly refused to believe that a mere six hundred meters could halt an entire regiment. It was only six hundred meters. Even if one man fell dead for every meter crossed, over four hundred men would still reach the other side. As long as they took down the Alliance's machine gun nests, the remaining four regiments under his command could sweep over the defenders in the Governor's Mansion like a tidal wave. Giving the chiliarch no room to argue, he snarled on. "And are you all pigs?! Who told you to run headfirst into their gun barrels? Can't you use your brains for once and flank through the alleys—" "There aren't any buildings left here! The Alliance leveled the whole area! How many times do I have to tell you, not a single house remains! They even cleared away most of the rubble!" the chiliarch bellowed, casting all deference to rank aside. Morale had plummeted to rock bottom. The soldiers huddled behind cover didn't even possess the courage to poke their heads out to trade shots with the Alliance. Ordering them forward to die under these conditions would only result in him, the chiliarch, being lynched by mutinying troops long before the rest of his command was wiped out. Clutching the handset, Prince Dilip stared wide-eyed, unable to believe either the insolent tone coming through the line or the news he had just received. He wasn't deaf. Though he hadn't visited the front lines personally, ever since the engagement began, reports had filtered in claiming that the Alliance had evacuated the locals near the Governor's Mansion and torn down their homes. Yet in his original assumption, even if no intact buildings remained, there would surely be vast mounds of debris and rolling earthworks left behind. While inferior to trenches, they should have been more than enough to screen an infantry advance. That was how it was supposed to be... "How is that possible..." Prince Dilip's voice trembled, a touch of helpless panic creeping into his haughty cadence. The chiliarch roared in sheer fury, "What's impossible about it?! They pounded them with artillery, blew them apart with explosives, smashed them with sledgehammers, and even dragged the beams down with ropes! Don't you have any idea what kind of miserable shacks those paupers lived in?! Did you think their rat holes were made of reinforced concrete like the Governor's Mansion?! Leave them alone long enough and they'd collapse on their own!" "Those maggots, those treacherous rats... How dare they side with the Alliance! I'll slaughter every last one of them!" A pained groan escaped Prince Dilip's lips. Even though this was his first time stepping away from the sand table and onto a real battlefield, he knew full well that defeatist panic spread among troops like a plague. Though his brain was utterly barren of counter-strategies, he recognized that he could no longer afford to hesitate. He had to do something before the front collapsed entirely! Once the line broke— The consequences would be unthinkable! "Pull back for now... We'll rotate the 2nd Regiment in. Wait, hold on a little longer until the 2nd Regiment moves up! You must hold the line!" Hearing that concession, the chiliarch finally breathed a sigh of relief, the heart caught in his throat settling back down. Though the prince's orders were a muddled mess—changing twice in a single sentence—he understood the gist of it. As long as they could withdraw to rest and refit, everything was manageable. Offering a silent prayer for the comrades rotating in to take their place, he hung up, shoved the radioman aside, and roared toward the frontline positions. "Hold the line! Friendly forces will relieve us sho—" The rest of his sentence froze in his throat. The moment the chiliarch turned his gaze toward the flank of the position, sheer horror consumed his features. A massive mechanical crab, four to five meters tall, was scuttling forward on metallic legs, rounding a row of collapsed ruins and tearing directly into their flank. *What in the world is that?!* Blank bewilderment was written across the chiliarch's face. Two thick, elongated gun barrels—or rather, autocannons—extended forward from above a pair of massive, sturdy pincer limbs, aiming straight at the Wolf Clan warriors pinned helplessly behind broken walls and dilapidated shanties just ahead. The spectacle was so utterly overwhelming that the Y-2 drones, "Hellhound" UGVs, and dozen or so soldiers armed to the teeth in powered exoskeletons flanking the mechanical monstrosity seemed entirely negligible by comparison. Before he could react, twin tongues of flame erupted from the barrels, pouring a savage storm of fire into his troops! *Thump! Thump! Thump! Thump!—* There wasn't even time for screams to ring out. Scores of soldiers sheltering behind cover were pulverized into red paste and shredded debris alongside the very walls protecting them. Spent casings cascaded from the breeches in a ceaseless clatter, clinking onto the ground alongside shattered remnants of human flesh. Blank shock gave way to unadulterated terror—not merely for the chiliarch commanding the line, but for every soldier crouching behind cover. They had never faced something so ferocious! The rounds fired from their Ripper rifles bounced off it like harmless tickles, while their own cover crumbled like wet paper before the relentless hammering of its cannons. Troops armed with Panzerfaust rocket launchers were pinned so flat by the concentrated barrage that they couldn't even raise their heads; those who tried were promptly acquired by overhead drones and had their skulls blown apart. The Alliance had deployed far more than a single "King Crab," even if that colossal machine drew nearly all the attention. Six "King Crab" amphibious all-terrain infantry armors spearheaded six mechanized infantry teams, launching simultaneous assaults along six different axes. In a matter of mere breaths, the flank of Prince Dilip's 1st Regiment was torn wide open, collapsing like an avalanche. No longer able to contain their terror, the soldiers crouching behind cover ignored the shouts and threats of their officers, casting aside their rifles and fleeing in the opposite direction. They scattered in wretched disarray, scurrying like terrified rats. "Aaaah!" "Monsters!!" "Demons! The Alliance summoned demons!" What shattered was not merely the defensive line beneath their feet, but the deepest defense within their souls—their baseless confidence and haughty arrogance. At this moment, they cursed the Wolf God for not giving them four legs so they could flee this cursed place a little faster. Bearing despair and terror, the fleeing routed troops collided head-on with the 2nd Regiment, which had been marching forward with puffed chests and high chins. None of the newcomers could believe the sight before them—until the monstrous "King Crabs" closed in, snapping at the heels of their fleeing comrades and bearing down on their own lines... ... While the crack troops of the Xilan Empire were being routed and running for their lives, Prop Master, who had led the 3rd Century to strike the enemy's flank, discovered that his six mechanized squads had somehow transitioned from a flanking detachment into the vanguard. The imperial troops whose flank they had bitten into didn't even put up a semblance of resistance; they dropped their weapons and ran for their lives. As a result, their plan to encircle and annihilate the regiment from the rear turned into an empty swing—only for them to run smack into another imperial regiment marching up as reinforcements. These arriving Wolf Clan soldiers were a stubborn bunch, offering a textbook demonstration of smashing one's own forehead against a steel plate. Caught completely off balance, they engaged the Alliance players in a fierce alleyway firefight. Initially, Prop Master intended to pull his squads back, drawing these stubborn fanatics toward the 2nd Century's heavily fortified positions at the Governor's Mansion before mowing them down. Yet the enemy proved far too inept; they dared to charge forward without a single armored vehicle capable of posing a threat, only to scatter in panic the moment they realized they couldn't bite through the hard bone in front of them. The enemy had practically served their heads on a silver platter. If he didn't take a bite now, his teammates would mock him for a week. Seeing the Xilan Empire's frontline reinforcements crumble as well, Prop Master pressed a hand against his helmet and bellowed into the company channel. "All units, listen up—!" "Using the boundary line marked on the tactical map as our limit, all units push forward! Weapons free! Don't hold back on ammo, hit them with everything you've got! Don't think about heading home until every last magazine is empty!" Enthusiastic cheers answered him through the comms. "Copy that!" "Boys, let's roll!" "For the Alliance!!!" "Awoo!" With the order given, the "King Crab" all-terrain infantry armor suits kicked their mechanical legs into gear. Screened by advancing infantry, they surged past low-roofed shanties, rampaging forward in an aggressive push. Everyone had worked themselves into a frenzy. Especially the Intelligence-type players piloting the bellies of the mechanical crabs—nearly every one of them had racked up triple-digit body counts. Quadcopters buzzing overhead provided a top-down view, meaning all the pilots had to do was squeeze the triggers wherever clusters of targets appeared. With 20mm armor-piercing incendiary shells mixed with high-explosive rounds, they barely even needed to aim; brute-forcing their way straight ahead did the trick. The imperial soldiers trapped in the narrow alleys were battered into complete disarray. At first, they could still spot where the tracer fire was coming from. Later on, they were pinned and shredded before they could even catch a glimpse of the enemy. "Hahahaha! My Urgot is going on an absolute rampage!" Listening to the manic cackling over the squad channel, several players advancing alongside the vehicle cast envious glances at the pilot tucked inside. "Damn it, get down and let me take a spin!" The Intelligence-type player rolled his eyes inside the cockpit. "Piss off! You think you can just press F to hop in? I had to train in Dawn City for several days just to qualify for this beast!" As they bantered, a Panzerfaust rocket suddenly hissed out from an adjacent alleyway, striking one of the mechanical legs dead on. Perhaps divine retribution had arrived for boasting too much. The molten jet pierced clean through the drive assembly of that leg, causing the crab to buckle and crash sideways, flattening the mud-brick shack beside it. The imperial soldier wielding the launcher was promptly perforated into a sieve, but the fallen mechanical crab lay amidst the rubble like a drunken brute, struggling in vain to right itself. It was, after all, an experimental prototype fresh from the laboratory. Its cutting-edge design came with too many unresolved variables. Even if testing showed it could limp along with three severed legs, it couldn't always handle the chaotic conditions of a live battlefield. Seeing imperial soldiers surging back toward the immobilized wreck, the Intelligence-type player who had been swaggering just seconds earlier shrieked in panic over the comms. "Holy shit! Sons, come protect your daddy!" The players already laying down suppressive fire around him twitched their mouths in exasperation. Son of a bitch! For a split second, they genuinely felt an urge to test just how thick the machine's armor really was... ... Meanwhile, along the northern wall of the Governor's Mansion. Watching the Gray Wolf Army soldiers recede like an ebbing tide, the player manning the machine gun post flipped on the safety and muttered in deep disgust. "Good grief, these guys fold faster than a cheap tent." When they first heard the enemy numbered over five thousand, nearly everyone had braced for a brutal slog. Who would have thought these so-called "elites" would turn out to be so utterly pathetic? Still, one could tell they had tried their best. Ranging shells had consistently landed near the Governor's Mansion, only to be promptly silenced by Alliance counter-battery fire. They had attempted human-wave tactics to overwhelm the mansion's machine gun nests, only to be pinned down tight by a handful of 10mm guns. Under normal circumstances, as casualties mounted with zero tactical progress, any frontline commander with an ounce of sense should have realized their approach was fundamentally flawed. If indirect fire support wasn't available, they should have rolled their artillery to the front line for direct fire, or dug more entrenchments and built fortified machine gun emplacements. Turning a swift assault into a grinding war of attrition would still have been far better than forcing infantry to charge naked across open ground without artillery cover. Yet they stubbornly refused to do that, acting as though they were in a rush to be reincarnated, desperate to force an immediate outcome to the battle. It wasn't just the player leaning against the machine gun who couldn't figure it out; Bai Gei Dai Ju, stationed inside the Governor's Mansion, was equally baffled. Were these guys here to fight a war, or were they just here to fertilize the soil...? ... Meanwhile, inside the makeshift command post at Golden Gallon Port, chaos reigned. Battle reports flooded in like falling snowflakes, and the command frequency buzzed with ceaseless chatter. "...Governor's Mansion here. Enemy frontline forces have collapsed! Do we hold our positions, or pursue?" "This is the 3rd Century! We've engaged arriving enemy reinforcements! No enemy armor spotted, only sparse anti-tank weapons... Looks like a regiment, maybe two. We plan to empty our magazines before heading back." "...Damn it, we've got an idiot over here whose 'Urgot' got crippled! Coordinates updated on the map, requesting immediate support!" "How many times do I have to tell you—stop giving equipment stupid nicknames! Use the official designation!" "4th Century here. We've dispatched a squad to reinforce you. Hang tight!" "I'm starving. When's chow time?" "Who's back at the port? Go ask the logistics NPC if we can get an extra dish." "...Enemy reinforcements broken! Crap, these animals run faster than my six legs can chase them! 4th Century boys, don't bother coming! We'll just grab a few locals to help tow this broken bucket of bolts—" "%¥#@!" "Holy crap, what are the Strength-type brutes in your squad doing? You need to hire locals for this little bit of heavy lifting?!" "Governor's Mansion reporting. Our scout team spotted the Gray Wolf Army massing toward 'Kraba Bazaar'! The target is five kilometers north of the Governor's Mansion. They appear to be reorganizing their forces there! Estimated two to three regiments remaining." Despite the chaotic chatter over the comms, reports from the front remained relatively clear, giving Fang Chang a solid grasp of the overall picture. After all, if the tactical situation were even slightly critical or complex, these knuckleheads wouldn't be shooting the breeze over the command frequency. Lao Bai looked at Fang Chang and said casually, "What's the call? Do we wipe out these two or three thousand men directly? Or hand them over to the rookies at Rowell Camp to deal with?" Close to twenty thousand slaves had undergone rudimentary training by now. They at least knew how to shoot, when to shoot, and how to advance and secure an objective. Expecting them to break a disciplined regular army on an open battlefield was pure fantasy, but using them as auxiliary meat shields under Alliance artillery support to mop up a routed force was entirely feasible. At the very least, they could be given a trial run. Unlike Lao Bai, however, Fang Chang's attention wasn't fixed on the two or three thousand men retreating toward Kraba Bazaar. Instead, his gaze rested upon the network of trenches carved outside the settlement. "...Do you think there might be an imperial bigwig among those two or three thousand troops?" Surprised by the sudden question, Lao Bai paused and frowned. "What makes you say that?" "A hunch." Staring intently at the strategic map displayed on the holographic screen, Fang Chang rested his chin between his thumb and forefinger, deep in thought. According to intelligence gathered by scout teams under Brother Killing Dagger, the Gray Wolf Army encamped outside the settlement was already making fresh maneuvers. Though he had no idea why that General Alaiyang had blundered into such a string of terrible moves, the man had clearly noticed his allies' predicament and was attempting damage control. A ten-thousand-man division was gathering in waves toward the perimeter positions outside the settlement, evidently aiming to extract their routed comrades from the front. At that moment, a bold idea crossed Fang Chang's mind. "An identity that even the supreme commander of the Gray Wolf Army treats with caution... what do you suppose that could be?" Lao Bai pondered for a moment before offering an uncertain guess. "Imperial royalty?" He didn't know much about the Xilan Empire's administrative hierarchy, as this peculiar survivor faction was entirely unlike any they had encountered before. Still, since this elite force belonged directly to the Emperor of the Xilan Empire, someone capable of making the commander of the 'Imperial Guard' so nervous was unlikely to be a minor figure like a palace eunuch. Even if only for appearances, the general had to make a show of mounting a rescue—at least enough to ensure that person, or the faction backing them, couldn't find fault. Perhaps Alaiyang didn't truly care whether this 'VIP' lived or died, but the Alliance could exploit that exact dynamic... Realizing what Fang Chang had in mind, Lao Bai looked at him in surprise. "You want to besiege the point to ambush their relief force?" "That's precisely what I'm thinking, but it depends on whether they give us the opening. After all, these guys have constantly defied our expectations—I strongly suspect this time won't be any different..." Pausing there, Fang Chang tapped his earpiece and issued an order to Killing Dagger, who was stationed at Rowell Camp. "Notify Laxi." "Tell him it's time to get to work."