Republic 2nd Corps Headquarters, Soissons City Hall.
“Have we made contact with the Bern River side?”
“Not yet, Your Excellency. The signalmen went out to inspect the lines, but they’re late returning.”
“Lazy bastards.”
Henri clicked his tongue. That was when it happened.
Bang—!
The office door flew open violently. Henri frowned in displeasure and raised his head.
“Who dares come in without permission…!”
But the curse stopped in his throat.
Standing in the doorway was not a man, but a figure like a monster, covered head to toe in mud, soot, and fresh blood. Burn marks stood out clearly through his torn uniform.
“Y-Your Excellency…!”
“You, you’re… what on earth…?!”
As Henri reeled in confusion, he recognized the insignia engraved on the officer’s shoulder.
“You’re from the Bern River garrison? What in God’s name happened to you?”
The officer staggered and collapsed onto the carpet. He barely managed to look up at Henri as he spoke.
“They… they broke through…!”
“What?”
“The river… they broke through the river! It’s the Imperial Army! Their tanks… their tanks crossed the river!”
The wineglass slipped from Henri’s hand and fell to the floor. Clink. Red liquid soaked into the white carpet, but no one paid it any mind.
“Tanks? How did Imperial tanks cross the Bern River? What about the Ashen Forest?!”
“They came… through the forest! They’re… monsters! Their 88mm guns blew the bunkers apart with direct fire, and… aaagh!”
As if his PTSD had flared up, the liaison officer clutched his head and screamed.
The atmosphere in the office began to turn grave. Henri’s mind started working rapidly.
‘A tank unit? Impossible. Unless they knew that forest inside and out, it would take days just to pass through it.’
By his common sense, the numbers simply did not add up. But judging by the state of the officer before him, it was no lie.
“…Their scale? How large are they?”
“I-I don’t know! There was too much smoke… at least battalion strength… no, maybe even more….”
At that moment, the aerial reconnaissance photo he had been briefed on earlier flashed through Henri’s mind. The large-scale armored force that had supposedly been discovered in the Ashen Forest.
But he soon shook his head. The officer’s statement that they were battalion strength or greater was likely wrong.
‘A detached force. A small raiding unit. It must be a commando force that crossed over prepared to die in order to disrupt our rear.’
There was no way a large force had traversed that terrain in such a short time. In that case, there was only one answer: create maximum confusion with a small elite force. The officer before him seemed to have fallen for their deception, but he, the corps commander, must not.
“Calm yourself. It’s only a few rats that slipped through.”
Henri began issuing orders swiftly. He was the commander of the Republic’s main force, the 2nd Corps.
“Call the guard captain. And have the reserve armored company and infantry battalion stationed on the city outskirts sortie at once.”
His baton struck the map on the wall, right at the midpoint of National Route 4 connecting Soissons and the Bern River.
“We’ll use only the minimum necessary force and stop them on National Route 4.”
Henri’s judgment was perfectly rational.
“Y-yes, sir! I’ll have them sortie immediately!”
Of course, his opponent merely existed outside the bounds of common sense.
*
2:15 p.m.
The midpoint of National Route 4, which Henri had mentioned.
“Do not stop.”
I gave the order into the radio from the command armored vehicle.
[Roger. Maintaining full speed.]
The battlegroup’s momentum was truly unstoppable.
We were now deep in the enemy’s rear, stirring up their own backyard. The enemies here were less soldiers with guns than civilians softened by peace.
[Zzt— Two kilometers ahead, the entrance to Loeur Village. Do we pass through the urban area?]
It was Major Frederica on the radio. I brought up the [minimap].
A modest rural village. A main road cutting through its center. And a barricade with a small number of guards blocking that road.
If we pushed through, it would take only five minutes, but if even one tank lost a track during those five minutes, it would be a loss.
“No. We detour. There’s a culvert cover, so take the tractor farm road.”
Rumble!
The lead tank quickly changed direction. Abandoning the well-paved road, the massive lumps of steel plunged into a field where yellow sunflowers were in full bloom.
Crunch, crunch!
Sunflowers as tall as people were mercilessly snapped by the wedge formation of the tanks. An armored unit charged through a scene of fluttering petals.
At the village entrance, the Republican guards who had set up a barricade and were conducting inspections were stunned by the thunderous roar passing straight through the flank of their village.
“Wh-what the hell is that?!”
“Tanks?! Are they ours?”
“Hey! You’re ruining the whole field! You crazy bastards!”
One guard blew his whistle, ran out, and waved his arms.
From atop the armored vehicle, I gave him a salute.
“Keep up the good work.”
“Oh, sure! Good work to— huh?”
The guard reflexively returned the salute, then belatedly realized that the color of my uniform was not khaki, but dark gray.
“Im-Imperial…!”
By the time he tried to lower the rifle from his shoulder, we were already crossing the hill behind the village.
We ran like the wind.
If we encountered a broken bridge along the way, we crossed at a ford I found with the [minimap].
If we spotted a Republican communications relay station, we fired one tank shell, knocked down only the antenna, and moved on.
Boom—!
Leaving the collapsing steel tower behind us, we continued advancing.
Twenty kilometers to Soissons.
*
2:30 p.m.
Soissons City Hall, corps commander’s office.
Ring, ring!
Lieutenant General Henri de Dubois irritably picked up the receiver.
“This is the commander of the 2nd Corps. What is it?”
[Y-Your Excellency! This is the 4th Supply Depot! An enemy armored unit just passed in front of the warehouse!]
“Supply depot? That’s by the national road, isn’t it? Fine, so where are they headed?”
[W-west! They simply passed our main gate and are racing west!]
“West? Wait, west means toward Soissons.”
Henri clicked his tongue and hung up.
“Chief of staff! Has the armored company departed?”
“Yes! They just left the city outskirts and entered the national road. They should encounter the enemy within thirty minutes.”
“Good. They’re nothing more than a small detached force. Once they run into us head-on, they’ll piss themselves.”
Henri lifted his coffee cup again.
But five minutes later.
Ring, ring!
“What is it now?”
[Your Excellency! This is the 12th Communications Company! The temporary communications network along the national road has been cut! The enemy’s last sighted position was…]
“Where is their position?”
[L-Loeur Village!]
“Loeur Village?!”
Henri shot to his feet. Loeur Village was another ten kilometers farther in from the 4th Supply Depot.
“Listen, it hasn’t even been ten minutes since the report came in from the supply depot! Where in the world is there a tank that covers ten kilometers in ten minutes? Are you people insane? Report properly!”
[B-but the messenger saw it with his own eyes and confirmed it! He said black tanks passed straight through the village without turning it into ruins….]
“You fools!”
Henri slammed the receiver down as if throwing it.
“It’s confusion. Now that the line’s been breached, they’re frightened and seeing phantoms.”
He pointed at the map.
By common sense, it was an impossible speed. Considering the top speed of Imperial tanks, road conditions, and the spacing required during unit movement, it was a figure that simply could not be achieved.
“They’ll be stopped here, near the supply depot. What appeared at Loeur Village must have been a few reconnaissance motorcycles.”
Henri forced himself to trust his common sense. War was fought with numbers, and numbers did not lie.
*
2:50 p.m.
Five kilometers outside Soissons.
Lead tank of the Jäger Battlegroup, under the 1st Armored Division.
“Lieutenant Colonel. Enemy armored force ahead.”
Along with Hannah’s calm voice, red dots appeared on the [minimap].
It was the reserve armored company the Republican Army had hastily dispatched. Five René medium tanks. They were blocking the middle of the national road, guns aimed forward.
“Annoying bastards.”
I clicked my tongue.
René-IV. A heavily armored tank those Republicans were so proud of. With the short-barreled guns on our Imperial main tanks, it was difficult to penetrate their thick sloped frontal armor.
“Major Frederica.”
[Yes, Lieutenant Colonel. We estimate the enemy is beyond the corner ahead. Shall I send the scouts first?]
I examined the 3D terrain map on the [minimap]. Inside the corner where they were lying in wait, I saw a gentle hilly area extending beside the national road.
At first glance, it looked overgrown with brush and difficult for tanks to maneuver through, but when I narrowed my eyes, I saw something else. Beneath it was firm, dry ground.
“We’re changing tactics. Prepare smoke rounds.”
[…Smoke, sir?]
Frederica asked back, sounding puzzled. Beyond the corner was a blind spot, after all.
“It’s obvious the enemy is there. We respond preemptively.”
There was no time to explain everything one by one. I gave a rough excuse and issued my orders.
“Lead 1st Platoon, stop right before entering the corner and deploy smoke. Then rev your engines. Make it sound as if we’re there.”
[…U-understood! 1st Platoon, prepare smoke rounds! The rest of the tanks, break off to the right!]
Rumble!
The battlegroup’s movement split. The three lead tanks stopped on the road and set off their smoke launchers.
Bang! Bababang!
Pale smoke filled the bend in the national road. At the same time, the drivers stepped on the accelerators, increasing the roar of their engines.
Meanwhile, I and the main force minimized our noise and slipped into the brush on the right.
But the enemy turrets all remained fixed on the front of the national road where the smoke was rising. They were adjusting the angles of their hull guns, waiting for us to emerge.
My trick had worked perfectly.
‘That’s not where we are, you idiots.’
Crack, snap.
The main force trampled through the brush and climbed up the hill at their two o’clock, a direction the enemy had never anticipated.
[Zzt— Lieutenant Colonel, is there really a path this way? The slope is too steep! We can’t get a firing angle!]
Frederica spoke in an anxious voice. But it took only moments for the lead tank to break through the undergrowth and reach the edge of the hill.
[……!]
Over the radio, Frederica sucked in a sharp breath.
Looking down, we saw five René medium tanks, the pride of the Republican Army, lined up in the middle of the national road. Their barrels were stupidly fixed on the road ahead, where the smoke was billowing.
[Th-this can’t be… they really are there! Five René medium tanks!]
[The position, distance, even the angle… how is this possible?]
[Good God, they haven’t noticed us at all!]
The tank commanders began reporting all at once.
“We got lucky. It matched exactly.”
I answered indifferently.
“Open fire. Aim for their side grilles.”
[All vehicles! Fire on the side weak points!]
Kwaaaang—!
Shellfire poured down from the hill. The distance was only three hundred meters. For the Republican tank commanders, it was nothing short of a thunderbolt from a clear sky.
Clang! Crunch!
“Aaagh! Where is it?!”
“O-on the right! Our flank!”
An armor-piercing shell slammed into the engine compartment of the rearmost René tank. Its thin side armor was pierced clean through, and the fuel tank ignited, sending up a pillar of flame.
“Turn the turret! It’s the right side!”
The Republican tank commanders spun their wheels like mad. But the chronic weakness of the René tank, its painfully slow turret traverse speed, dragged them down.
Creak, creeeak….
While their gun barrels turned like turtles, the loaders in our tanks had already finished loading the next round.
Clack.
“Goodbye.”
Boom! Kaboom!
The second volley.
The sides of the René tanks, whose turrets had not even turned halfway, were mercilessly ravaged. Internal ammunition detonated, turrets were blown off, and tracks snapped and spun uselessly.
[Zzt— Confirmed, all five enemy tanks silenced!]
Over the radio, the tank commanders cheered.
[Good God, those heavily armored René tanks… they were ripped apart like paper!]
[This is insane… if we’d met them head-on, our main guns wouldn’t even have scratched them!]
[Were those really armor-piercing shells we fired? They punched through like we were shooting training targets!]
The heavily armored tanks that would have given us trouble in a frontal battle collapsed like scarecrows before superiority of information and tactical maneuver.
“No need to finish them off. Push the burning wreckage aside and clear the road.”
I checked my watch.
Three minutes from the start of combat to the end. We had been delayed only slightly.
And what I had to say was the same this time as well.
“We’re going to Soissons.”
We shoved the burning René tanks onto the shoulder and picked up speed once more.
Soissons was right before our eyes.