VOL 1-3

[chapter] III The Watch/Guard on the Rhine

THE RHINE FRONT
The sky over the Rhine Front… Among the mages soaring through it is Magic Second Lieutenant Tanya Degurechaff. If anything separates her from the others, it’s that she’s been ordered to fly solo.
Why was I given such orders?
Because the higher-ups are idiots.
And so I’m flying around the front lines alone.
The whole sad story of how I was sent here can be told in three sentences. Perhaps this is unexpected for the Empire. But as someone hastily selected for deployment due to the higher-ups’ lack of foresight, I can’t really let it go as simply “an unanticipated turn of events.”
I’ve learned from my experience against the Entente Alliance on the northern front that there’s no cover in the sky. Clouds are about the closest thing you can get. And as for defense, mages are lucky they’re tough.
But just because I’m resilient doesn’t mean I’m immortal. If someone asks me to stand in front of a high-penetration sniper rifle or a machine gun with a caliber that breaks the scale, my answer will be a flat no. Solo assignments are worse for mages than any other branch of the military. Nevertheless, the brass ordered Tanya to fly alone in hopes of drawing out a strategic delay.
How can a lowly second lieutenant possibly dodge the order? All I can do is adhere to my employer’s regulations like a salaryman. I want to weep for the lack of such a noble concept—a soldier’s right to refuse. As for my aerial combat maneuvers, my diligent training in the academy earned me the ACM Skill Badge. Whining that I can’t fly isn’t a valid tactic at this point.
And so, no matter how loath she was to go, Tanya nevertheless scrambled to fly ahead of the land forces. She would serve as airborne early warning and a scout for the forward warning line. Western Army Group’s Control Center gave her the call sign “Hawkeye.” It was certainly preferable to “Fairy.”
“Hawkeye 03 to Command Post. Please respond.”
Hawkeye 03 is my temporary call sign as a member of the early warning team. With eyes like a hawk, my job is to fly ahead to search for enemies and notify the advancing troops if I find any. Other than that, I’m supposed to maintain a fixed distance from the approaching enemy and continue gathering intelligence. Depending on the situation, my duties might eventually include taking on the role of forward air controller to guide direct support groups.
Unfortunately, though, I have to admit this job is tougher than I thought it would be. I didn’t realize I’d have to work so hard just to contact the controller of the area I’ve been assigned to.
“…Hawkeye 03 to Command Post. Please respond.”
Ever since the surprise attack, radio communications have been growing more and more chaotic. With that in mind, perhaps I’m lucky that ground control eventually connects to one of Tanya’s repeated—and exasperated—calls.
“This is Seventh Provisional Field Command. Call sign Lizard 08. Reception is poor but not a problem. Hawkeye 03, send your traffic.”
Basically every single type of unit targeting land forces wants to take out the enemy’s eyes in the sky—aerial mages—first thing. The situation is essentially the same as the one I experienced on my mission in Norden. If an army fails to secure air and magic supremacy, it’s akin to losing their ability to see. Lone magic officers are preyed upon more than any other unit of the military.
In a military operation, the first course of action is generally to eliminate interference, not that you can afford to neglect anything.
“Roger, Lizard 08. I can hear you on my end as well. Commencing support mission now.”
“Thanks, Hawkeye 03. Glad to have you! We’ve been needing another pair of eyes.”
And that makes what’s coming next even worse. Now I have to kill the excitement of troops who are sincerely thrilled to finally get decent support.
“Hawkeye 03 to Lizard 08. Sorry to say this so soon, but don’t expect much help from me after all. I’ve picked up a large group approaching fast from up ahead.”
As a solo mage under enemy assault, it’s out of my hands. If I get attacked the moment I arrive, then I have to defend myself before I can provide intelligence support.
Personally speaking, Tanya feels no desire to take pointless risks out of some desire to sacrifice herself for the greater good. She focuses as much as she possibly can on ensuring her safety. Anyway, if it’s necessary to fly solo, then the moment enemy detection is confirmed, fleeing becomes the name of the game.
So although I hate to draw attention, I gain altitude using the power of the Type 95 computation orb, which has been issued to me for field tests. As always, I take advantage of my acceleration abilities and ascend to a certain point, where I can quickly dart up and out of range of any hostile enemy aircraft sent after me. At the same time, in anticipation of anti–air fire from the ground, I form the best protective film I can beneath me; a single hit would probably be all I can take.
The altitude I choose for my survival is eight thousand feet. That’s the upper limit for combat operations, which were made possible by the protection of the Lord and Type 95. According to the mad scientist, this is the fruit of a miraculous collaboration between the hands of God and man, but the details of how this technological innovation was accomplished are immensely unpleasant for a certain free-spirited individual. Not only is this device cursed, but the most vexing part of all is that Tanya has no hope of escaping the duty of being its dedicated tester, since she’s the only one who can operate it.
Well, there are other ways to look at the situation; someone might describe it as being “in the care of providence” or “blessed,” but Tanya adamantly refuses to think of it in that light. There are reasons for that I don’t even want to talk about.
In a manga I read a long time ago, a member of a crime syndicate whispered that secrets make a woman beautiful, but that’s an unmitigated lie. The more Tanya uses this orb, the deeper it engraves this “faith” or whatever in her mind. With no choice but to praise the Lord, I’m dying for my inner self to be free again.
Well, before I start to think about this stuff too much, I should at least do the job before me. It’s time to get down to business. This is what it means to be hounded by reality until you lose your inner freedom.
“An approximately company-sized group of mages is rapidly approaching from three o’clock.”
Tanya conveys what she can observe of the enemy to ground control as she gains altitude, all the while grinding her teeth and vehemently cursing the ineptitude of the higher-ups in her head.
Tanya was out here with a target on her back due to their failure to notice the François Republic’s attack coming from the west. Their gravest error was committing forces to trample the Entente Alliance in earnest. They had faithfully followed the theories of force concentration, pursuing battle in their desire for ever greater military achievement. Some even had delusions of annexation, it seemed.
Thanks to that, they left their own country unguarded, stupidly inviting an invasion from the west. I can’t help but laugh.
Normally, according to the Empire’s defense plan, it’s fine for the north to just focus on delaying operations. The Northern Army Group is responsible for the northeastern front; lately, there’s been an argument that they should support the Eastern Army Group against the Empire’s primary potential enemy, the Federation. If each individual army group was prioritizing defense, reinforcements would be only sporadically available, and they would have no hope of achieving total victory.
As such, the General Staff had apparently schemed to take advantage of the unanticipated large-scale invasion and cut down the Entente Alliance with a single stroke by mobilizing reserves on a grand scale.
Mobilizing so many troops, however, rapidly altered the situation. “The art of war is of vital importance to the state,” but the Empire’s foolhardy mobilization showed poor judgment at a time when established national strategy called for caution; whether it liked it or not, its actions had provoked the surrounding countries.
In the same way the Empire hoped to proactively take out the Entente Alliance to gain future national defense advantages, the François Republic decided to take advantage of the opening and launch a preemptive strike of its own. Only an idiot could say they didn’t see it coming.
To the Empire, the mobilization was surely meant to address the problems between it and the Entente Alliance. The neighboring nations are nervous about the Empire’s ever-present interest in increasing its military might, however, and consider the prospect of a break in the encirclement terrifying. Not to mention that François Republic, to the west, is unable to overlook the Empire’s overall goal. The long-smoldering border disputes and territorial issues between the two have erupted into localized wars on multiple occasions in the past.
The chains binding the cornered Empire are beginning to loosen, and what if the master isn’t home because he’s out trying to pry them off? Fully aware of the gap between its own military strength and that of its potential enemy, the François Republic believed that it could not miss this opportunity.
Ironically, it did the exact opposite of the Empire, with its huge debate about whether or not to break from the existing military strategy. In the François Republic, they had no choice but to go on the offensive to ensure the effectiveness of their own strategy.
“I’ve also got a battalion-sized ground unit at one o’clock. Also, multiple unidentified aircraft are approaching fast.”
That’s how Tanya has ended up flying, forced to use this new orb she doesn’t even want, while facing swarms of incoming hostile mages.
“Lizard 08, roger. Take immediate evasive action.”
The relationship between the Empire and the François Republic is such that they both have a fairly good idea of the cards in each other’s hand. Naturally, the François Republic can predict that the Empire will confront the encirclement via interior lines. As a result, its defense strategy focuses tightly on how to defeat the interior lines strategy of its potential enemy.
The solution is quite simple. Before the Empire completes its large-scale mobilization, the Republic’s core standing army would storm and subdue the Empire’s western region, the source of a great deal of its industry and military power. That would drastically cut down the Empire’s war potential. The Republic’s strategy also includes taking action if the Empire invades a third nation.
Strictly speaking, the Republic’s position gives it no choice but to frame all its actions as responses to the Empire. If the leaders let the situation be, they would eventually have to contend with an Empire free of northeastern pressure. As such, they have to act now, while they can still gain the upper hand.
Oh, I get it. From a purely historical perspective, it’s possible to say the northern front will be decided in one blow. It would really only take a second. Anyone with common sense, even an amateur, could clearly see that the war is going to end soon.
The Entente Alliance’s resistance wouldn’t amount to anything, and it would be forced to surrender to the Empire. That snapshot of the future is too realistic for the analysis to be flawed, but a specialist would have told you it wasn’t quite right. A few months is a bit fast for a country to fall into ruin, but strategically, it’s also far too long to have your main forces tied up.
In a few weeks, mobilization would be complete, and the troops would be able to march in great numbers. Under those circumstances, an offensive would become a seductive option for the François Republic. It’s akin to the Empire’s conviction that it could use the Northern theater to break the fetters that had kept it bound to their defensive policy for years. The François Republic is equally confident that, with this one move, it can eliminate a significant threat that has been plaguing its fatherland’s national defense for so long.
The Empire is prioritizing victory in the Northern theater. In other words, the higher-ups are insisting this is a strategic decision… Really, they either foolishly failed to foresee this scenario, or it did occur to them and they underestimated the probability.
The war has been recklessly directed in the first place. The stupid radio stations and newspapers were celebrating the sweeping victory on the Northern theater with dreck like, “This is the Empire’s secret plan to avoid a multifront war, and the roar of artillery heralds the birth of a new order,” and now, thanks to the sudden attack, they’re slinging daily propaganda about the diabolical François Republic. But the people on the front lines don’t care about propaganda; that’s only good for making jokes about the brass to kill time in the trenches. They want to yell, If you can afford to broadcast propaganda all the way to the front, get more men and supplies over here. They’re the ones in trouble if the higher-ups keep arguing about causes and ideals instead of facing reality.
“It looks like the vanguard mages have spotted me. They’re still coming up fast.”
Reality is cruel but also simple. The forces in the Western theater are basically a punching bag until the main forces return. The Empire has reached the limit of its resources. The proof is the special deployment of the instructor squad from the forces at home and the evaluation unit that assesses the practicality of preproduction models.
Really, the instruction and research-oriented units are meant to improve the overall quality of the army from the rear, not to fight on the front. Sending them in is usually a taboo that only a nation nearing its end would violate. Of course, these units are universally skilled, which makes them great problem solvers. And that’s why, with the nation in a panic over the unexpected development, Tanya got thrown from a homefront research lab to the front lines.
“Lizard 08 to Hawkeye 03. We’ll send reinforcements immediately.”
“Hawkeye 03 to Lizard 08. I’d appreciate it, but I won’t hold my breath,” Tanya acknowledges as she promptly begins to withdraw. She’s allowed to run this time. No need to tough it out.
“Leaving this airspace.”
“Hawkeye 03, good luck!”
Out on the battlefield, incoming reinforcements might seem like a ray of hope, but I know all too well from both personal experience and history that more often than not, they don’t make it in time. It’s the epitome of stupidity to count on unreliable backup and risk one’s life with wishful thinking, so I give my undivided attention to retreating.
“Hawkeye 03, roger.”
The hand I’ve been dealt is discouraging, but I know I need to confront reality, even if it makes me reluctant enough to pull a face. The impatience and conflict in Tanya’s blue eyes resemble that of a philosopher yearning to explore the wisdom of mankind; the groan that slips from her adorable mouth in that immature voice, her indignation at the unfairness of the situation, embodies the innocence of a child.
“…Ugh…”
Tanya Degurechaff’s worries are quite simple. She’s angry that the duties dumped on her exceed her pay grade, and she’s distressed by her evil workplace that fails to comply with safety regulations. She would accept the existence of unions, and she wishes with all her heart for the creation of labor laws.
Part of the issue is my personal conflict with the army’s goal-oriented rationale. Armies generally supply aviation personnel with high-calorie diets as a means to relieve fatigue and maintain the concentration necessary for withstanding consecutive days of intense combat, and that’s great. In the Empire, too, mages and pilots have to be provided high-calorie diets.
But I’m not so sure I want them to make me take Pervitin. And “hesitant” doesn’t even begin to describe how I feel about my orb as a trump card. The fruit of the collaboration between Being X and the mad scientist could poison my sharp mind in a manner far more insidious than any drug. Really, I should have gotten rid of it.
That’s how desperately I don’t want to use Type 95. I really hate the idea of relying on that damned computation orb steeped in the grace of God. But what if I need it to survive? Truly the ultimate choice.
This was supposed to be a day like any other for the 228th Reconnaissance Mage Company commanded by First Lieutenant Michel Hosman. The François Republic Army had successfully conducted a surprise attack, and this company was its forward-most advance guard. Even if the “surprise” was beginning to wear off in places and the mission was transitioning to assault, the spearhead’s duties didn’t change.
Crush the Imperial Army’s eyes as it attempts to recover from the chaos, and cut off their communications while you’re at it. Their duty was to isolate the enemy and prevent the formation of an organized line of resistance, which would help later troops widen the breach. It was the same assignment these veterans and First Lieutenant Hosman had received the previous day. Yet on a real battlefield, unlike in war films or novels, there was no foreshadowing what would come next.
“Golf 01 to CP. I’ve encountered an enemy sentinel.”
“CP, roger. We think it’s local direct support. Upon elimination, continue searching for the enemy’s main forces.”
Luck isn’t on this guy’s side. That was First Lieutenant Hosman’s impression. After all, this sentinel was up against a whole company of mages, and it was Hosman’s company, the vanguard for an entire army. It was obviously not a fair fight. That was why the enemy mage had been focused on running ever since detecting the company’s approach.
Seeing that response, Hosman immediately recognized that their opponent was extremely accomplished and excelled at quick decision making; the lone mage had already climbed to the impractical altitude of eight thousand feet. And that was why Hosman couldn’t help but consider the enemy unlucky: Soldiers never lived long without luck, no matter how skilled they were.
“Golf 01, roger. But that mage sure was bold, climbing up to eight thousand…”
Nobody could last long up there, but it was their only avenue of escape in the face of a whole company. Hosman was also perfectly aware of that fact. To shake off pursuit in a confrontation like this, their opponent’s only options were to flee where hunters would be hesitant to follow or to fly erratically low to the ground and trust everything to fate.
Units advancing over long distances were usually loath to expend the energy necessary to climb that high, so the sentinel had assumed they would avoid that option. Not bad.
“Only little kids can get away with crying, ‘It’s too high! I can’t reach!’ Let’s get to work, men!”
They couldn’t very well let an enemy mage escape to fight another day. Considering their mission, there was no way they were backing down.
“Everybody got that? Okay, Platoon Mike will eliminate the sentinel. Everyone else is conducting recon-in-force with me. We’re gonna bust right through.”
With the Empire’s warning line spread so thin, the Republic had a good chance of victory. That was the guiding light for everyone participating in the operation, regardless of rank. They couldn’t waste time on a provisional defensive line when the main enemy forces could return.
That was why the reconnaissance mage units were crucial to disrupt the enemy lines. They would start with the usual recon-in-force, which entailed initiating contact with the enemy to gather intelligence, but they were then expected to also create openings to break through. Knowing that Republic victory rested on their shoulders, they were determined not to get routed.
“Wilco, we’ll catch up with him right quick.”
After the platoon leader’s acknowledgment, Platoon Mike climbed rapidly. Naturally, operating at eight thousand feet would be exhausting even for the Republic’s elites. Standard combat altitude was four thousand, though if they really pushed it, they could tolerate six thousand.
In this sense, their enemy was doubly clever for choosing eight thousand. First, the chase would exhaust Platoon Mike, reducing the overall strength of the recon-in-force mission to two platoons. Also, the sentinel was making significant contributions to the wider battle by distracting the enemy and dragging things out. We’re taking on a respectable opponent.
“Engage. Fox 01, Fox 01!”
The silence of First Lieutenant Hosman’s thoughts was suddenly shattered by radio contact from one of his men. As company commander, he followed the calls for long-range magic formula fire. At the same time, the enemy soldier in front of them performed a new maneuver after realizing that escape was improbable. The bandit abruptly circled around to rush Platoon Mike as if descending upon some prey. Apparently the lone mage was taking the offensive.
“Fox 02, Fox 02! I can’t believe it! He dodged that?!”
The confused voice of his subordinate on the radio contained both surprise at the enemy strike, as well as the shock of his shot missing. As Hosman speculated about their enemy’s intentions, the distance between Platoon Mike and the mage shrank considerably.
Hosman was in a somewhat-removed position, but when he confirmed the platoon had cautiously begun combat maneuvers, he was certain they were on top of it. Was the enemy trying to squeeze more time out of them by engaging at close quarters? As a tactic that could be employed immediately, it wasn’t a bad choice. But unit Mike was a platoon, not a company. The coordination of a platoon was too tight to easily disrupt, and the difference in their combat potential made it hopeless for one mage to take them on alone. Hosman respected the courage and resolve, but it was a reckless maneuver.
“Enemy incoming! Disperse! Disperse!”
That very moment, Platoon Mike spread out to shift to a formation more suitable to close combat. Their objective was eliminating the opposition’s eye in the sky to support follow-up Republican attacks. Their plucky opponent couldn’t have known it, but the reconnaissance mage company’s mission had been all but accomplished the moment they made visual contact. Take out the eyes. If they could do that, even if they were held up for a bit, they would be fine.
“Three rounds of interlocking fire! Get your formulas ready! Nail ’em! Fox 03! Fox 03!”
The coordination and skill of Hosman’s subordinates were textbook ideal as they deliberately kept some distance in order to intercept the charge and maintain cross fire. The enemy mage had entered the line of formula bullet fire. Even if he had superior speed, Hosman’s men were ready and waiting. It wouldn’t be hard to nail him.
But what happened next was something no one could have predicted. It was definitely a direct hit. Regulated fire of military-grade explosive formulas, which could easily strip off a mage’s protective film and even chip their solid defensive shell, had hit the target dead-on.
“Fox 03! Fox 03! Shit! The bastard’s so tough!”
The moment the formulas in the multiple bullets activated, the flames should have swallowed up the enemy mage for sure. But even so…
That thing continued its advance without missing a beat, casually closing the distance as if it were flying through an empty sky. By intuition, not logic, they sensed something bad was happening. However, as civilization had advanced, humans as a species were no longer in touch with their animal instincts.
“Mike 3! Check six! Check six! Ahh, damn it!”
In a blink of an eye, the bandit had rushed Hosman’s subordinate. Absurdly but undeniably, a magic blade sprouted from the man’s chest. Then, in a single, unenthusiastic motion, as civil as someone cutting up their dinner, the blade sliced clean through him.
“Pan-pan, pan-pan, pan-pan!”
“What is that thing?! What?! It’s—! Agh, Fox 04!”
A tangle of radio calls. What was that? What the hell was that? Hosman watched the unfolding scene through his binoculars. He couldn’t believe his eyes. In terms of air combat maneuvers (ACM), Platoon Mike was the best in his company. They were being given the runaround? “It can’t be…,” he muttered in spite of himself. Can a mage really move…that fast?
“Mike 1? Mike 1?”
By the time Hosman realized, Platoon Mike was half-paralyzed. One and three were down, and the engine of four’s computation orb seemed done for. He had stalled and was falling. Two was barely hanging in there covering for four and wouldn’t last long, either.
“Shit, Bravo, Golf, turn back! Turn back! We have to cover Mike!”
There was no way First Lieutenant Hosman could stand idly by while his men were in trouble. He abruptly ordered the platoons in his command to race back at full combat speed to support Platoon Mike.
But inside, he wondered, How? No matter how much individual abilities differed between mages, could there ever be a fight this lopsided? He had heard that some imperial mages were armed with specially tuned computation orbs and had naturally high mana output.
But even then, the most they could take was a two-man team. Supposedly even those Named monsters mostly specialized in hit-and-run tactics. For someone to face a platoon head-on—and capably—instead of picking off the mages one by one was inconceivable.
“Enemy in range!”
As the company commander, though, Hosman didn’t have time to lose himself in those thoughts. The enemy was already within shooting distance. The question on his mind had nothing to do with the fight, so he pushed it aside and called out sharpshooting formulas at long range in flight formations. It was a little far, but with a hail of bullets from two platoons, they couldn’t miss.
Their opponent must have understood that as well and began taking textbook evasive action, which was perfectly fine. There was only one problem. Just how was that mage flitting around as if gravity didn’t exist?
“Fox 01! Fox 01!”
But the most unbelievable thing—no, the utter nightmare—was how resistant the enemy’s protective film was. Although the recon company had prioritized accuracy due to the long-distance nature of their shots, they had combined, albeit imperfectly, explosion formulas with the guidance formulas. Even if their target dodged all the shells, there was no one who could completely avoid the fireball blotting out the sky.
But the enemy didn’t seem to be in any pain and returned fire unfazed. Hosman had to wonder if it was a joke.
“I’m going in! Cover me!”
Golf 02 probably felt like they weren’t getting anywhere, so he charged with magic sword in hand. Certainly no matter how tough someone was, they’d have to take some damage from a close-quarters slash with a magic sword. If the platoons couldn’t finish the enemy off at range, concentrating their fire was also a reasonable strategy.
“We got ’em! Fox 02, Fox 02!”
They agreed and advanced, ready for a midrange brawl where it would be difficult to take evasive action. At the same time, they executed the Named Killer, an internationally famous tradition of the Republic’s and the epitome of fire discipline. The support fire was six sharpshooting formulas with an explosion formula as a smoke screen, and they all made a direct hit—or rather, it should have.
“He’s still fine?! Of all the ridiculous—!”
“Golf 02! Break! Break!”
The enemy mage was still up and running even after the combination of restraining and enveloping midrange fire. Those sharpshooting formulas can pierce subpar defensive shells easily. How can anyone still fly after that? Though he could hardly take it all in at once, he didn’t have time to ponder the question.
As for Golf 02, who had tried to charge in close, he just barely managed to escape the tiger’s jaws thanks to Mike 02’s cover fire. Then the enemy mage shot through two protective films like they were nothing and took the men out of the fight.
“It’s a trap! You piece of shit!”
Hosman had been had. He didn’t like it, but he knew it was the truth.
Evading by climbing to eight thousand feet was a trick to divide our forces. Common sense says combat maneuvers are impossible at eight thousand…but that’s been proven false. We walked right into this. My men are being taken out one after the other, and it’s all my fault. Chewing his lower lip, he was having trouble swallowing his fury at the deaths of his subordinates, but he understood the situation they were in. They had encountered a monster—an unknown Named.
“Mayday! Mayday! Mayday! We’ve encountered a new type of enemy!”
“Shit! And they said this would be easy! Golf 01 to CP, this is an emergency! Tally one unknown Named! Requesting reinforcements and permission to RTB!”

IMPERIAL ARMY TECHNOLOGY RESEARCH LAB BOARD OF REVIEW
When building a new weapon, it wasn’t enough to simply implement the latest technology. Production cost, maintainability, and mission capable rate were all matters of life and death. Even so, many elements were difficult to evaluate without using the weapon in actual combat.
To the General Staff, the fighting with the François Republic that had broken out in the west was a horrible disaster, but to the Type 95 development team, it meant a highly anticipated chance to try the orb out in the field. The engineers awaited the results en masse, and the Type 95 proved itself—it blew past their expectations.
“How did the battle go?”
“Very well. Six downed, three defeated, three missing. According to the observer squad, it’s incredibly doubtful that the three who went missing will make it back to their base.”
They had assumed it would be impossible. After all, the experiment had only succeeded thanks to a miracle. But the test run had yielded surprising results. Type 95’s achievements were worthy of all the praise the elated technology personnel were heaping on it. They could hardly stop grinning.
Of course, the skill of the user made a big difference. Second Lieutenant Degurechaff certainly had the skills of a Silver Wings Assault Badge recipient, but that alone shouldn’t have been enough to overcome such a disadvantage and get such impressive results.
“She basically took out an entire company by herself.”
She didn’t defeat all the mages, but she had still repulsed the whole unit. She was overwhelmingly superior in a fundamental sense, nothing more. The theoretical values had indicated possibilities, but she had made them real.
“Yes, to think it’s come so far…”
From a commonsense perspective, the results could only be described as incredible. The orb was nothing short of revolutionary. This technological innovation opened the door to a whole new universe of combat.
“Right. Judging from its record at Elinium Arms, I was expecting it to have major issues.”
The officers who had questioned continuing development were now commenting in wonder, almost self-deprecating. They had been so worried about this thing, but when they saw what it was really like, the results were so good that all previous failures could be forgiven. If it could perform this well, everything was fine. They could even lower the cost via mass production.
“Oh, it has issues all right.”
The tech department grandly threw a bucket of cold water on them and their admiration. They understood Operations’s feelings all too well. They were excited by the revolutionary technology, so they were hoping for a revolutionary improvement in quality. But unfortunately, it was all a fantasy.
They had to wake everyone up from the dream.
“What do you mean? It achieved far more than we’d expect from a solo flier.”
“Right. This thing could change mage combat as we know it.”
Certainly, Type 95 had achieved stellar results. That was a fact. In terms of performance, it was in such a league of its own that you could call it a next-next generation orb. That was made possible by quad-core synchronization. The quad-core engine’s demonstration of mana fixation in actual combat and the possibilities inherent in that were enough to make Operations drool.
After all, the technology to stabilize mana and store it like bullets was of immense tactical value. The ability to freely use stored mana effectively removed the barrier of mana capacity.
“My understanding is that all the worries and criticism raised in the past have been proven false in combat,” a General Staff officer muttered.
Really, the achievements spoke for themselves. Quad-core synchronization made quadruple output a reality, increasing combat potential to a whole new level. After seeing the technology was usable, Operations had to have it.
“We only have one successful case. The project has been a huge failure, unless we say the goal was simply to verify the technology.”
But engineers didn’t deploy Type 95 in order to convince the army to adopt it. They just wanted to see what kinds of issues would come up in actual field use, so when war broke out in the west, they sent it to the front. They had focused on the tech and never even considered mass-producing it.
“What happened in the other cases?”
The most successful case was also the only successful case. If anyone asked about the prospect of mass production, they would have to raise doubts as to whether they could reproduce their success. Users of mage technology were already a chosen few, but even then, an orb with only one successful operator couldn’t have much chance for mass production as a weapon.
“In one of the worst tests, there was an explosion in the lab, and we lost a whole platoon.”
The things were constantly blowing up—one defective circuit would cause them to self-destruct. If someone could manage to coat the orb with mana, it could take a beating, according to the actual combat trials. However, the success rate of that critical step was hopelessly low.
The worst accident had occurred during a synchronization failure; four times the usual mana had detonated and blown away the platoon doing the testing—a group of elites including instructors from Central and members of the Advanced Technology Inspection Corps.
“…But it can shoot bursts of mana, right? That’s too appealing to give up on.”
“The only one who can use it is Lieutenant Degurechaff. The best anyone else has managed is not getting blown up.”
As developers and engineers, they were ethically bound to push back. Even the engineers who had requested to continue research had only cared about the technological revolution. After their impulsively inquisitive minds had been inspired, Chief Engineer von Schugel and his team had spent their days focused only on testing the limits of what was possible. But when they took a moment to think calmly, they were the ones who best understood the orb’s dangers and difficulties.
Of course they understood—they built the thing.
“But you have one successful case, right? Can’t you just replicate it?”
“…I told you we almost lost Elinium Arms! Even the successful case of Lieutenant Degurechaff was a total fluke—though I shouldn’t be saying that as an engineer. We still don’t even really know what happened.”
Analysis of observed values made it clear that mana fixation via quad-core synchronization was more dangerous than anyone had imagined. The experiment was a miraculous success, but they had measured enough mana to know that if the test had failed, the entire Elinium Arms Factory would have been blown to bits. It was obvious to anyone with a modicum sense that they couldn’t afford to repeatedly fail an experiment that would cause destruction on that scale.
“A fluke?”
“Just when a runaway mana reaction was about to melt the cores, the interference waves harmonized, and moments away from liquefaction, the cores synchronized.”
For the engineers, it was a frustrating result. They didn’t know how, but they had managed to succeed. By some fantastic stroke of luck, the uncontrollable mana had just happened to straighten itself out; that was as far as they could grasp. Even if they wanted to verify the results further, all they could tell was that it was a coincidence.
You could propose that it might be possible to duplicate the results if they lost control of the mana and then adjusted accordingly…but that was a conclusion. It was impossible to make conclusions about these results. They simply couldn’t be duplicated. This was like seeing a lightning strike that just happened to carve a splendid sculpture and then trying to re-create it with human hands.
“So the rampaging mana stabilized itself. Basically, it was a miraculous coincidence.”
The fact that Chief Engineer Schugel noted in the experiment report “We owe our success to the power of God” showed the extent of that miracle. Something that was by all rights impossible had occurred, and it just happened to do so beyond the reach of human understanding.
Even Chief Engineer Schugel, who created Type 95, had given up on continuing development, saying, “Going any further would be blasphemy, an insolent act in defiance of God.” Even the hard-core techies concluded that you probably had to be chosen by God or something to use that computation orb, which goes to show how hard it had to be.
“So what does that mean?”
“We’re currently using something we don’t understand without understanding it, and it hasn’t been easy.”
In other words, that was about all they knew. Whether unraveling the principle behind the orb or reproducing it, a vast amount of time and effort would be required, and on top of that, their probability of success wasn’t worth betting on no matter how they calculated it.
“It might be better to just glorify Lieutenant Degurechaff as a hero.”
“…I agree. That could help us out in a bigger way.”
Fortunately, Second Lieutenant Degurechaff had earned her Silver Wings Assault Badge at quite a young—frankly, tender—age. Praising her abilities for publicity would be much easier than trying to show off the flawed orb.

CADET CORPS DORMITORY
I, Viktoriya Ivanovna Serebryakov, am an early riser.
“Visha! Get up, Visha!”
“Urgh, morning, Elya.”
Technically, that’s because my gorgeous friend always wakes me up. The ever-kind Elya is taller than me, and she has curves in all the right places even though she’s so thin. Not only that, but she also doesn’t get low blood pressure in the morning—she’s always full of pep.
I’m only a centimeter shorter than her and just as slim! God is just so unfair. Elya and I have the same lifestyle, so I really don’t get why certain parts of her body are so much more developed than mine.
Anyone fresh out of the Cadet Corps wants to stay sound asleep in their warm beds as long as they can. That’s because one of the only fun things about cadet school is staying up all night chatting with your dorm buddies. Elya is one of the girls who really loves it. I go to bed before her pretty often.
But then she always gets up earlier. How does that make sense? I guess it’s just one of those differences between people. I can’t do anything about it no matter how hard I try.
I probably sound like I hate my good-natured friend, but really, I don’t.
In general, joining the Cadet Corps is voluntary, but anyone eligible to become a mage is basically forced to enlist and thrown into the fray. So this unlucky cadet was bound by the strictest rules and continually chewed out by demon drill sergeants. Of course I blamed God at the time, but I couldn’t stay mad when I’d met such a great friend.
Sadly, my time with my good buddy is scheduled to end today. It hasn’t sunk in yet, but today, we’ll be assigned to our respective combat units. I hope we end up together, but that’s probably too much to hope for.
It’s less like we’re wearing our uniforms and more like our uniforms are wearing us, but we’re still real soldiers. For whatever reason, fate gave us magical potential.
And so, we’ve become Imperial Army mages, pride of the Reich. Well, technically, we’re newbies. Before I knew it, I was tossed into the dormitory of the Western Army Group as a reinforcement for the Rhine Front.
My duty as a soldier is to serve indefatigably in the west as a shield for the beloved fatherland at this critical juncture…or something. I’m an imperial subject, too, I guess, so I do think maybe I should fight for my great country, but it doesn’t feel quite right. Maybe that’s only natural since I was born in lovely snow-white Moskva. Well, the hazy remnants of my memory are just a torrent of red, which isn’t very fun. My parents turned to relatives for help, we thankfully managed to escape the country, and that’s my story. I was too young to really remember much, but I might be lacking qualifications compared to imperial soldiers actually born here.
That said, I’m so grateful to my aunt and uncle for taking me in. I’m second grateful to God for giving me my daily bread.
“Let’s eat!”
Our diet here is different from the rear, but I already got used to the less-than-fresh veggies and the canned goods you tend to find at the NCO mess halls near the front. On the first day, I cried because the food tasted about as awful as combat rations, but lately I’ve been enjoying it just fine.
“Visha, did you hear that the platoon you’re assigned to is getting a new leader?”
Mealtime is fun since we get to chat. Given the circumstances, it’s no wonder we’re interested in discussing our assignments.
“Really? Isn’t this kind of a weird time to add a new platoon leader?”
“It’s definitely true!”
“Elya, calm down.”
Of course, so much of the chatter is gossip. I heard that once you get to be a vet, you can catch wind of your own assignment and your buddies’, and I bet it’s true. But as you might imagine, mages fresh out of the Cadet Corps, mere NCOs, can’t tell right from left in the army.
Still, I’m interested in my assignment, and my friend has an uncanny ability to overhear things.
“But seriously? We’re supposed to be reinforcements. Would they really make a whole new platoon on the front lines?”
“Logically, no, but this has to be true, Visha. I heard personnel officers talking about it!”
I do wonder where Elya just happened to hear all this news. It isn’t like they’re elementary school teachers chatting about their classes; would officers from Personnel really discuss assignments in front of other people? …I shouldn’t overthink it.
“Elya…sometimes I wonder if you’re a ninja from the Far East.”
“Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha. A woman has her secrets, Miss Serebryakov.”
“Well, whatever. So do you know where this new platoon will be deployed?”
“Oh, so…it’s not a new platoon but a replacement for one that got wiped out. You’ll be okay, though. Supposedly the leader is a veteran with Silver Wings.”
For a second, I don’t understand what she said. I’m normally easygoing, but when I come to my senses, I’m so shocked that I can’t help a knee-jerk reaction.
“Silver Wings…? You mean the Silver Wings Assault Badge?!”
“Wow, your eyes are like saucers.”
“What?!”
“Visha, your faces are always so funny.”
I’ll have to thank her later for keeping her burst of laughter quiet so we don’t draw attention from the other diners. But wow, someone who is still alive got the Silver Wings Assault Badge… An awesome imperial soldier? More like an awesome human being.
“You must know about your own assignment, too, right?”
“Yup. I’ll be supporting the artillery as part of an observation squad. Of course, I’ll be making tea in the back!”
“Hey…you never know what’ll happen if you’re not careful.”
That said, the news that my friend will be somewhere safe makes me envious, but I’m still relieved.
“Uh-oh, if we keep lollygagging like this, our time’ll be up. Chow down, Visha!”
“Yeah, you’re right… Hey, where’d my caramel go?”
“Oh, you hadn’t eaten it yet, so I helped you.”
Yes, this maddening mischief maker is my precious friend.

(A FEW DAYS EARLIER) IMPERIAL CAPITAL
“Reassignment?”
I’m being transferred away from the technology research department and from being treated like a guinea pig as the dedicated tester of the Type 95 computation orb. Magic Second Lieutenant Tanya Degurechaff has longed for this notice—waiting out days that felt like years—and is pleased as punch to accept. Her application must have finally, finally been approved. My mind will be freed. I’ll leave this place and head to the new posting immediately.
“Yes, a reassignment. Guess the brass isn’t about to let an ace just hang around. You’re going to be leader of Third Platoon in the 205th Assault Mage Company.”
Considering resources are so low that even the instructor unit has to join the battle, there’s nothing I can do about ending up on the front lines. Actually, as someone fresh out of the academy, leading a platoon, even in the thick of battle, is much better than getting abused as a guinea pig.
Finally, I’ll apparently have subordinates. Now I can delegate tasks I would have had to handle alone in the past. And in the worst-case scenario, although I’d lose favor with the higher-ups, using them as human shields is a possibility. I mostly hope they aren’t incompetent, but either way, this is cause for celebration.
“And congratulations, Lieutenant. It’s not much compared to the Silver Wings, but in recognition of your recent achievements, we have decided to award you the Aerial Assault Badge.”
“Thank you, sir.” Tanya gives a cheerful salute and a smile that makes her look like the little girl she is.
In high spirits, I return to the dormitory and set about packing luggage. Of course, soldiers don’t have many personal belongings to begin with. Even though she’s biologically female, Tanya feels that clean and neat is good enough for clothes. In fact, her uniforms are the only clothing she has. Since none of the existing sizes fit, she just has to apply for a clothing allowance and get them made to order.
It takes less than an hour to pack my officer travel bag. I briskly tell the manager of the dormitory, where I was staying during my temporary assignment, about the transfer; show him my orders; and thank him for taking care of me while I lived there. With that, my moving preparations are complete.
Then I head straight for my designated unit. These are frontline orders. They require me to forgo annoying social obligations like farewell parties and take up my position as quickly as possible. Hence, after receiving permission to fly from the Air Defense Identification Zone, I immediately take my bag and race across the sky toward the assigned rendezvous point.
Fortunately, though the army is facing a crisis, this is still only moving between bases in the rear. The short flight ends without incident, and less than two hours after my departure, I arrive and present myself to my new company commander.
“Magic Second Lieutenant Tanya Degurechaff, leader of Third Platoon of the 205th Assault Mage Company, reporting for duty.”
“Thanks for coming, Lieutenant. First, allow me to welcome you. I am company commander, First Lieutenant Ihlen Schwarkopf.” He confirms that I’ve arrived as ordered and completes assignment procedures as he welcomes me. While keeping things businesslike in adherence to military regulations, we casually appraise each other. We’re both soldiers, and soldiers don’t get to choose their allies. Thus, it’s logical to assume that they won’t last long on the battlefield if they don’t at least get to know each other.
“Commander Schwarkopf, sir, pleased to be serving under you.”
“Great. Let’s get to it, Lieutenant Degurechaff. Do you have any experience leading a platoon?”
One thing that makes Tanya happy at a glance is that her commanding officer appears to be an extremely orthodox mage. He is a first lieutenant. Judging from his age, he has probably served a decent amount of time. And from the medals he’s wearing, it’s easy to gather that he has a wealth of combat experience.
The decorations commending his participation in several minor conflicts, especially, provide a certain level of assurance. So my first impression is that he isn’t an inept superior, which would be scarier than the enemy. Since I can’t choose my commanding officer, if he ends up being like the legendary soldier who ruined the Burma-Imphal front, I may decide to take action and mourn the ensuing “unfortunate accident.”
“This will be my first time, sir.”
Schwarkopf is also observing Degurechaff. He can’t deny being a bit puzzled to see a little girl appear before his desk in the company command office. All he has heard from above is that they would send him a mage from an instructor unit at Central who has combat experience on the northern front.
Schwarkopf figured they would give him a seasoned veteran. It’s safe to assume that a second lieutenant from an instructor unit would have worked up from noncommissioned officer status, and a veteran should be reliable in any situation. Plus, as a recipient of the Silver Wings Assault Badge, whoever the brass sent would have to be a capable soldier with a wealth of combat experience. That’s why when Schwarkopf laid eyes on this kid younger than his daughter announcing her arrival with a perfect salute, he wonders what he’ll do with the difficult platoon. His original intent to give her the command had relied on his expectation that she would be a veteran…
“…Lieutenant, I’ll be frank.”
If the records don’t lie and there isn’t any mistake, the second lieutenant waiting at attention for him to speak is a significant asset who has splendidly distinguished herself in battle, and she had been dispatched to deal with the worsening situation on the western front. But being a great athlete is different from being a great coach, and Schwarkopf fears this situation is similar.
“The 205th Assault Mage Company is meant to have three platoons, but during the early days of the war, our numbers dropped to less than two, and we’ve been operating undermanned ever since.”
To replace the lost men, a new platoon leader and fresh members have been assigned to the company. Schwarkopf knows he can’t complain, even if every member of the platoon is a raw recruit, but that’s precisely why he hoped the leader would be an experienced veteran.
“…Can you command a platoon of recruits straight out of the Cadet Corps?”
To cast the situation as it currently stands in a pessimistic light, the platoon will consist of a child leading greenhorns. It would be not only ineffective but also deadweight—worse than deadweight. Needless to say, if the Empire’s forces could simultaneously babysit and wage war, they wouldn’t be having such a hard time.
He asks the question partially out of doubt; whether an immediate change in personnel is necessary or not will depend on her answer.
Degurechaff’s response is simple. “Please give me the order.” She keeps her reply short and speaks in an even, matter-of-fact tone. Yet her eyes shine back at Schwarkopf with nearly arrogant pride, rejecting his misgivings about her ability. “I will give you results.”
Her reply also shows her unfaltering self-confidence. It surpasses his expectations. The first step toward trust is believing that if this combat veteran says, “Give me the order,” the order will be carried out.
“Well, you’ve got the Silver Wings Assault Badge. I’m expecting a lot out of you!”
“Yes, sir!”
A living recipient of the Silver Wings Assault Badge from the instructor unit is worthy of that much trust.
Tanya, for her part, surmises that Schwarkopf only accepted her response because of the decoration she’s wearing. In other words, the entire worth of Second Lieutenant Tanya Degurechaff can be summed up by the badge.
In that sense, she’s truly grateful to have received the Silver Wings. Apart from the “White Silver” moniker that comes with it (which I never wanted in the first place and am more than eager to get rid of), and the sanity checks it forces onto me, nothing about my current situation is harmful, and I have a good reputation.
Well, I should probably welcome this. Beneath the face of a soldier, Tanya is calculating. Goodwill and praise are better than hostility and insult, at least.
“All right. I’ll go ahead and explain the situation.”
“Yes, sir.”
Having gotten more or less good impressions, they decide for the present to trust each other enough that they can focus on their respective jobs. Next, it’s time for work.
“As you know, the Great Army’s main forces are urgently being reorganized and assembled.”
The Empire has fallen into disorder in the immediate aftermath of the François Republic’s surprise attack, but overall, it mostly held its own in the early battles. That doesn’t change the fact that the troops are under pressure, but the national defense policy calls for interior lines strategy. In that sense, though it’s true the Western Army Group has received reinforcements from remaining units at Central, they have completely fulfilled their duty of delaying the enemy.
“While that is the case…it will take some time to reach the western front.”
There’s only one problem: The reserves and standing troops, who are supposed to be the counterblow, have all been invested in the north. The top General Staff members wanted to resolve the Norden issue with one push, but the original national defense plan is falling apart.
“All the Western Army Group can do is hope they arrive soon, but we have to assume it will take a while.”
Originally, the plan called for Central to send three divisions within twenty-four hours of mobilization orders, including one Imperial Guard division as vanguard, and within seventy-two hours, seven more divisions to follow. Within a week or so, the Great Army itself would invest an overwhelming force—twenty divisions of their dignified regular troops and enough reserves for sixty divisions.
That’s why the Western Army Group never imagined a need to slow down the enemy on their own for a month. And of course, since they don’t have the reinforcements from the plan, even if they only fight to delay, they’ll have to do it in a way that minimizes their casualties.
The only plan the Western Army Group has prepared is a defensive battle limited to large-scale resistance.
The General Staff forgot that while investing the Great Army in Norden, and the price has been higher than anyone imagined.
The fact that the higher-ups have mobilized the instructor unit in an attempt to establish western defenses shows how panicked they are. They even sent out Type 95, a military secret that wasn’t supposed to leave the lab, under the pretext of continued evaluation with Tanya; really, they just wanted the muscle.
Perhaps the rapidly changing war situation gave them no choice, but if they’re in so much turmoil they can’t prioritize confidentiality, there’s no way they can carry out the defense plan as it was envisioned.
The Great Army, the main imperial attacking force, was deployed to the north in its entirety due to an error in strategic judgment. Even if it only took a short time to reorganize and redeploy the troops, that was far too long from a military perspective.
“How is assembling the Great Army going?”
It’s obvious that their difficulties stem from the lack of a plan for this unforeseen need to deploy troops. Even a minutely calculated operation is difficult to execute without hitches, so handling this situation off the cuff seems nigh impossible.
Inevitably, the current pace of assembly is not ideal. In this situation, the delay of reinforcements and ensuing impact on the front are matters of life and death for the Western Army Group, as well as critical concerns for the imperial soldiers who have to suffer the brunt of the attack before the Great Army arrives.
“Not good. They’re short on vehicles in the north, so they need about two weeks to redeploy the units to the west.”
Schwarkopf seems to doubt they’ll really be only two weeks late. Experience has taught him that HQ always gives optimistic estimates when it comes to the number of reinforcements and their arrival time.
Redeployment sounds simple enough, but it involves more than just reorganizing the units and setting up a new chain of command; the units need to be replenished and resupplied before they can go anywhere. It’s no easy feat. Just transporting an army consumes resources—not only fuel and supplies but also intangibles such as soldiers’ energy.
That’s why Tanya isn’t surprised when her superior matter-of-factly explains, “We’ve given up on delaying along the western line. We’re switching to mobile defense.”
Once you determine that buying time won’t cut it, adopting a mobile defense strategy is a natural step. Normally, you would base the troops in rear locations that are reinforced against long-distance enemy artillery and use the distance you withdrew during the delaying battle for defense in depth.
“Lieutenant, I doubt I need to say this to you…but this is a classic example of something easier said than done.”
“Yes, sir, understood.”
The original interior lines strategy calls for the defensive line to obstruct the enemy’s advance and for the Great Army reinforcements to surround and annihilate the forces that have penetrated too deeply into imperial territory. But that line has already collapsed, and they’re now fighting a defensive battle on thin ice, which is not much fun at all. Probably the only enjoyable defensive battle would have been the one fought behind the famous Maginot Line,12 perfect for shut-ins. You could have just holed up in there and wait for the war to end.
To Tanya, this is a problem that goes deeper than a strategic level failure. If you’re planning on fighting using attritional containment tactics, then it should probably have dawned on you to tighten up your border with forts instead of going for a strategy that will fail before the fighting even starts. If command actually assumed that the François Republic would be content to overlook the threat of their exterior lines strategy collapsing upon the defeat of the Entente Alliance, that naivety would leave Tanya dumbstruck. Lower-ranking soldiers like Tanya and Schwarkopf are stuck paying the price of that miscalculation in blood, which is something they can’t tolerate.
“We are soldiers. If the brass tells us to do something, we do it.”
A patriot might argue that the nation’s leading strategists work against the country by dint of their incompetence. Tanya doesn’t house even the slightest intention of dying for the Empire. I always have to make exemplary remarks that go against what I truly feel, acting out the expected role to help myself succeed. To that end, I would even give a Tsugene-esque13 speech, though I despise his incompetence. If it came down to it, I would even shout, “Patriotism is not a crime!”
I can blather about those things as naturally as breathing, and that plus Tanya’s doll-like appearance is enough to suggest my patriotism to anyone listening.
Most importantly, the majority of soldiers detest the idealists throwing around words like patriotism and brave loyalty in the rear, but to them the sentiment of loving one’s country is sacred. Combat veterans who earned their praise in the field swear to defend their country. In extreme conditions, they treat that vow as a declaration of faith.
“…Quite right, Lieutenant Degurechaff.” Thus, the model imperial soldier is one who indifferently completes their missions in adherence to mission-oriented war doctrine, and those qualities are praised. “Good. Back to the topic at hand, then.”
“Yes, sir!”
He must at least be able to tell that I’m not inept. With a deep sense of satisfaction, Schwarkopf is able to relax a bit. The situation is unpleasant to be sure, but here’s a good asset.
He has to take units that were mobilized at the last minute with no clear strategic direction and fight a defensive battle. He’s lost a great number of his already harried troops, the replacements are deadweight recruits, and their leader is a little girl? For just a moment, he feels like looking to the heavens in despair, but for Schwarkopf, the mere fact that Degurechaff is an officer who can get things done makes her one of his few valuable resources.
“The 205th Assault Mage Company has been selected as a mobile strike force in the mobile defense battle.”
Schwarkopf and his company’s skilled fighting and finesse during the initial battles have landed them on the mobile strike duty; their job is to rush around putting out fires, and it will require playing more roles than ordinary units do.
“We are the linchpin of the counterattack. That’s a big responsibility for us to share. I look forward to seeing what you’re made of out there.”
“Thank you, Lieutenant. I’ll do my best to protect the fatherland.”
Tanya looks at Schwarkopf with her innocent blue eyes and speaks of noble ideals and contributing to the nation with her childlike lips.
Of course, Tanya’s words don’t have an iota of sincerity; I just know it’s a line someone in her position should say.
Tanya knows how awful the trenches are—even if my sources are war films and books from another universe—so she’s happy to be a counterattack reserve instead of stuck in one of them.
Certainly, holing up in some fieldworks fortified with reinforced concrete seems like the safer option at a glance. I can understand why amateurs would think that. The invention of the machine gun gave defense the advantage, and to anyone who knows that, the defensive position is unquestionably strong. No one ordered by General Nogi to capture Port Arthur with swords would hesitate to make an “accident” happen. Humans are much frailer than concrete and iron.
At the same time, it’s important to remember that the base at Port Arthur was destroyed by heavy naval artillery. Fortifications on a battlefield have the fatal structural flaw of being immobile. History teaches us that that no matter how sturdy the fortress, before siege artillery it’s nothing but another target. Given the previous point, Tanya knows that being part of a mobile unit out in the field where they can run anywhere they need to in a pinch is safer.
Even a mage can’t attack a well-defended stronghold at close range and get off easily, but I also know that stronghold will get pummeled by artillery. And I’m also aware that attacking the enemy vanguard is safer, if only in comparison, since they’ll be exhausted from breaking through the defensive line.
Thus, Tanya makes false declarations of loyalty, while the only thing she truly welcomes with joy is her assignment. Raising her chances of survival even just a little is undoubtedly a happy occurrence.
“Great. Any questions?”
“Yes, sir. Will we be sortieing from the defensive line or the rear?”
There’s one point worth bearing in mind. Mobile strike forces come in two types. One is positioned in the rear and responds quickly to seal enemy breaches. The other sets off from a forward position to catch the enemy around their backside. The difference between the two is whether you can kick back and relax as counterattacking personnel in the rear or have to dig trenches and build fortifications while under the constant threat of enemy attack. They are two completely different environments.
Of course, the unit that has to seal the breaches will take some damage since they do have to charge up to the front lines, but generally, the act of launching a counteroffensive in the first place usually means they get to enjoy numerical superiority. In other words, I won’t need to worry about being sent on counterattacks if the situation is overwhelmingly bad.
“Rejoice, Lieutenant. We’ll be on the forward-most line.”
“What an honor.”
This is the worst.
Mobile strike personnel on the front? Meaning they would have to defend the line and double as distraction during the counterattack? No number of lives could be enough. If she were defending from a trench, she could use the nearest people as shields, but she can’t do that if she leaves the line to be a decoy. Pincering the enemy with the guys from the rear might sound great, but we would only be glorified targets.
“I never doubted that would make you happy. We may also need to help defend the strongpoints, depending on what the situation calls for.”
As expected. Should I be happy? I’m not thrilled that my ominous hunch was right on the money. As a way to hone my crisis management skills, this assignment won’t be bad, but I would rather never need to use them.
“So we’ll prioritize mobile strike operations but also support the defensive line?”
“That is correct.”
Am I supposed to just accept my fate? Let myself be exploited as part of the mobile strike force after being stuck on the line? There should be a limit to how much you can overwork someone. I’d like to demand better working conditions or at the very least an increase in base pay.
Of course, I don’t have any problem with performing duties covered by my contract, but this is a bit much. I’d like to be adequately compensated.
“However, our mission isn’t to eliminate the enemy, just repulse them. We don’t need to bend over backward to surround and annihilate them.”
“This is the worst. Assembling the Great Army must be going rough.”
“Oh, you can tell?”
“If we make our only objective to delay enemy forces and don’t adopt a mobile defense aiming to exhaust them, we won’t last long enough. Even the stupidest freshly minted officer could see that.”
They couldn’t possibly conduct a successful delaying defense along the whole huge front. Without using a mobile defense strategy to exhaust the enemy forces, it would be impossible to suppress the enemy; things are so dire that the Empire would have to risk allowing raiders to get through at one location and attack them there. At least they would be organized, so it probably wouldn’t be as much of a disaster as the latter days on the eastern front in World War I, but I still have to brace myself.
“…That’s one way to put it. Well, there’s no cheerful way to fight a war, anyway. Here’s who is in your platoon.”
“Thank you, sir.” Tanya takes a mental deep breath and looks over the list of her first subordinates ever, but it’s so ridiculous, it makes her brain freeze up. It dawns on her that she’s reeling. The only reason she doesn’t instinctively hurl the document away is due to excessive shock, rather than a triumph of reason. In words, her thoughts would be, This is too much! “My understanding was that there was a general lack of key personnel in the Western Army Group and that because of this, the only replacements we could get for the third platoon were rookies with zero experience, but I have to correct myself… Perhaps we should call them untrained recruits?”
“I see no problem with that. This means your platoon will be extremely rough around the edges. I want you to make defending the position your main duty.”
These mages have only completed Cadet Corps basic training, and we’re rushing them into a combat unit? Anyone with half a notion of how mage battles work would laugh it off as an April Fools’ joke. With four to a platoon and twelve in a company, mage teams prioritize skills over numbers more than anyone else. Even someone with innate mage potential would only be in the way as a newbie with nothing more than basic training. This is like taking a guy with only the most basic army rules and regulations beaten into him, putting him in a plane, and telling him to fly. It’ll be worse than a turkey shoot.
I see. By having us on defense, he’s telling me that he doesn’t consider them fit for combat. It’d be irrational to expect anything out of this unit, so it’s a valid conclusion.
“Commander, a humble suggestion, as platoon leader, if I may…”
“Lieutenant Degurechaff, I realize fighting a war while babysitting is a lot to ask, although it’s weird to say that to you…”
“I have to say that, frankly, I would be more useful fighting solo than in that platoon.”
I get that the platoon lacks training, but you’re telling me to make it a stationary force? They can’t handle mobile battles, so you’re telling me to defend the base while reeducating and training them? Isn’t that the same as ordering me to let the incompetent hold me back?! Tanya vehemently protests this crisis with indescribable rage. Unless the regulations that she learned at the academy have been revised, childcare is definitely not in a soldier’s job description.
It would be safer to hurl these novices into no-man’s-land and free myself of the burden. Maybe I should do that if I get the chance. No, I can’t judge them without even meeting them…
“As an officer, I have no plans to abandon my command duties, but I hope you will consider the way to use our forces most effectively.”
“These guys are backup. If the situation calls for it and the timing works out, we’ll send you on guerrilla missions.”
Even though he wants her to whip the platoon into shape, he’s implying from the start that he will send Tanya on her own if necessary.
“Understood. Are we permitted to abandon our position if need be?”
“Regrettably, we can’t pull the lines back any farther.”
“So we have to hold it?”
“Command says we can choose victory or Valhalla.”14
Victory or Valhalla? Is that even a choice? It’s just a roundabout way of ordering us to die on the line. No, it’s not even roundabout—it’s just narcissistic bullshit.
Why should I die for other people? If someone wants to die for me, that’s their prerogative, but forcing me to die completely violates my free will.
Freedom reigns supreme. We can be democratic, nationalist, or even imperialist, so long as I’m free. So please, stop issuing war bonds. Financing the war by printing bonds under the assumption the Empire will win just guarantees hyperinflation no matter how the war ends.
Win or lose, I can only imagine the future will be a barrel of fun. How utterly unpleasant.
“Splendid. Both options sound great.”
“Fantastic. Then I’ll introduce you to your platoon.”
Okay, time to greet my allies in this miserable war. If they happen to be in the right place at the right time, I might even use them as human shields, so I have to expect a lot out of them.
And so, though neither of them wanted to, the young lady and the little girl would slurp the same sludge and nibble biscuits so hard they had to chip them apart with bayonets before they could eat them, fighting side by side on the western front under a shower of shells.
My first impression of my direct superior, Imperial Army officer Second Lieutenant Degurechaff of the western front mobile strike army, Seventh Assault Group, 205th Assault Mage Company, was “vampire.” Her skin was so white she looked sick, and her sharp eyes seemed to loathe the sun. It was quite a shock.
The first time I saw her, First Lieutenant Schwarkopf had ordered us to assemble, and as we were standing by, a little kid who looked bizarrely comfortable in her uniform showed up. She couldn’t have been a student from the Cadet Corps—she wasn’t even old enough to enroll. The cap sitting atop her messily tied hair was too big for her. Any normal soldier who saw her wearing the rank of second lieutenant would have done a double take.
When the company commander introduced her to us, though, I didn’t feel like anything was off about Lieutenant Degurechaff. I couldn’t quite explain it, but it was like she fit right in.
Still, the moment she turned her icy cold eyes on us like we were objects to be appraised, I shrank from her in spite of myself. People might laugh at me for being afraid of such a little kid, but those eyes reminded me of the way a cat looks when it’s playing with a mouse, which creeped me out.
Just like Elya said, Lieutenant Degurechaff was a veteran ace who had earned numerous decorations for her distinguished service, not the least of which was the Silver Wings Assault Badge. She had a thick aura of battle around her, and her face was almost doll-like, it was so pleasant to look at. Vacant blue eyes, blond hair tinged dark gray.
Maybe it was partly because we didn’t get much sun on the Rhine front, but I noted in my head that she looked just like a vampire.
She urged us, in a calm, businesslike tone that left no room for misunderstanding, to state our rank, name, and where we last served, and I felt—just a little bit—like I wanted to get out of there. The Cadet Corps had a simple method of categorizing cadets. The army knew very well that volunteers and conscripts wouldn’t be on the same wavelength, even if they trained together, so they divided the mages into two classes from the start. Battalion C was expected to eventually train as officers at the academy, and Battalion D would just complete their compulsory service.
My two platoon mates were elites from Battalion C.
“Corporal Kurst von Walhorf from Idal-Stein Battalion C, First Company!”
“Corporal Harald von Vist, also from Idal-Stein Battalion C, First Company!”
I gave my rank and name after the two Cadet Corps volunteers. I didn’t wish I had volunteered, exactly, but it was sort of a bummer to say I was drafted right after people who announced they had offered their services to their country. I couldn’t just not care like Elya; I wasn’t thick-skinned enough to just laugh it off. Oh, God, why must you torment me?
“Corporal Viktoriya Ivanovna Serebryakov from Idal-Stein Battalion D, Third Company.”
You could say I felt a bit out of place as the only conscript. I mean, Corporals Kurst and Harald were volunteers from the same company. If we did things the usual way, that meant the two guys with experience working together would be buddies, and I’d get paired with the platoon leader.
That was why I was thinking, as I reported, that it would be great if I didn’t get chewed out for being a slow, lazy draftee. So I was momentarily stunned by what the second lieutenant said next.
“You have my respect for fulfilling your obligations, Corporal Viktoriya Ivanovna Serebryakov. It’ll be tough, but do your best to survive.”
Unexpected words of encouragement—and from an officer I was convinced was so cold, with those eyes more warlike than any I’d ever seen. For a second, I couldn’t understand what had happened and froze.
Meanwhile…
“Then, to the fellows who enlisted of your own free will: Since you volunteered, you better not die after Corporal Serebryakov and me.” Her calm tone hadn’t changed. She didn’t raise her voice. But the words she spoke with that emotionless expression were incredibly heavy. “First, I’ll make one thing clear. The Empire doesn’t have the time or resources to support inept officer candidates. In fact, doing so would be counterproductive.”
She was different from all the drill sergeants. The way she talked, it was almost like she was a different species of imperial soldier. Her values ran counter to the ones that had been pounded into me since I had joined the army.
“It’d be a different story if you were forced to serve against your will because the nation needed you, but you’re the ones who got in line to don the uniform of the fatherland, so contribute accordingly. If you’re too inept to do that, then die.”
She must have said all she wanted to say to us speechless, frozen recruits. After telling the company commander that was all, she immediately kicked us outside because we were still just standing there. Before we knew it, though we’d only just arrived, we’d been hurled into the trenches and were getting showered with periodic “deliveries” from the Republican Army.
What awaited us there was a reevaluation of our basic skills as mages. We learned that not only were we not earning our salaries, we were worse than garbage.
Having been thus “straightened out,” Corporals Kurst and Harald became rebellious, but they weren’t disciplined outright—key word outright. After the company commander and the second lieutenant mentioned that they simply couldn’t take care of them on the front lines, the pair was assigned to the rear.
After that introduction and a bit of action, I became Lieutenant Degurechaff’s buddy as the sole member of her platoon, and we flew together.
Meanwhile, the two other cadets were transferred to a better position. They were double promoted and assigned to defend the company’s base in the rear. They could stay safe inside a pillbox as reserves and prepare for the counteroffensive. One thing I learned while flying, though, was that…for artillery, an immobile pillbox is nothing but a sturdy target.
It was when we received orders to flank the Republican unit trying to breach the line while we were under suppressive fire by their supporting heavy artillery. Half in tears, thinking I would never make it out of there alive, I followed the senior members of the company, who were grinning as they charged. I saw a base get blown to smithereens while we got off without so much as a scratch.
Weirdly, not only did barely any shells come our way, but also we didn’t suffer any real losses at all before we made contact. After experiencing this over and over, I realized that artillery needs to be used systematically.
It made sense when I thought about it. Machine guns had a better chance of hitting aircraft than artillery. As long as you didn’t stumble upon an anti–air cannon position, the only things shooting aircraft were machine guns. Although mages were slower than planes, we were still too fast for the artillery to take their time aiming.
It would probably be a different story if we assaulted a firing position or a pillbox and took heavy zoned fire. But we were taught that when fighting on our own territory, speed is everything. I was lucky enough to learn from Lieutenants Degurechaff and Schwarkopf that the more experienced you get as a mage, the more suspicious you get about defending a fixed position.
In short, artillery is the god we should trust on the battlefield; it’s also the god we should never anger. You can’t survive unless you make this god your ally and learn how to avoid its iron hammer.
Maybe that was why… My leader is a dyed-in-the-wool believer in firepower, the perfect embodiment of nonnegotiable mobile warfare, and then a mage. The only faith she has rests with artillery.
Could soldiers, by nature a group of realists, believe in God? Her answer to the question was pretty interesting. When I wrote to Elya about it, she wrote back, “Then I am the war goddess in charge of divine will.” That answer was so like her, it made me smile. She had a way with words.
We had eyes and ears, so the devout believers crouching on the front line, in the trenches, and in gun nests were promised the divine revelations of the artillery.
With the contribution of the observers, we could call for fire to break up an enemy charge or a bombardment, depending on the crisis. It reminded me of Elya, smiling about her easy job where she could hang out and drink tea. But she was always the nurturing, helpful type, so I was sure her sense of responsibility kicked in and she was hard at work.
Right before we went on an airborne assault, what the company wished for most of all was supporting fire from the artillery. Whenever we received orders to counterattack the Republican Army breaking through our defensive line, we attacked its flank in sync with the artillery’s fire to break up the offensive.
I was used to battle now. My only job as a newbie was to follow Lieutenant Degurechaff as she raced ahead. Ideally, we were supposed to be partners, but our commander laughed and said I still needed more training.
“Ohhhh, praise be to God. His name is Artillery! That’s about right. Isn’t it a wonderful sound?”
First Lieutenant Schwarkopf beamed, praising the artillery as their shells rained down with perfect timing. Our taste in music seems a tad different—I’m only just able to get through these intense bombardments without the sound freaking me out.
“Yes, it is God of the Battlefield! God has answered our radio requests!”
“Artillery, Artillery! Thou art our friend! Thou art our savior!”
The ones carrying on, relaxing their scary frowns, were the intense but dependable old hands from First Platoon. Although their opinion that artillery was our savior was a little dramatic, I was learning that it wasn’t entirely wrong. We may have been a counterattacking unit, but half of our job was to contain the enemy so the artillery could finish them off.
If we just surrounded them—the rabble, an advancing unit, a defensive unit, or even enemy artillery—the artillery would naturally destroy everything. Witnessing it just once was enough to make you want to pray. Dear God, please grant me artillery support.
The artillery prep prior to an assault was always reassuring for inconsolably fearful hearts. One time our support ran late, so our battalion-sized unit, containing various different mage companies, had to go at it with an enemy echelon15…and a bunch of things I don’t really want to remember happened.
On that note, when there was enough support and enough space between the front and the rear, the weight of combat would grow lighter. Yes, looks like I’ll survive again.
As Tanya gazes at the enemy unit through her binoculars, shells plow the earth right where they were meant to, turning people into fertilizer. In other words, this is the correct way of waging war—taking organic life and rendering it past tense through the use of ammunitions.
“The concentrated fire of a 120 mm really is a spectacular sight, sir. Amen.”
“Truly, Lieutenant. Must be the teamwork between a talented observer and the artillery. They wasted no time before firing for effect.”
People in any situation find it easier to remain calm as long as things go smoothly, and apparently those on the battlefield are no exception. The edifying teachings of the Chicago school say that all things can be measured using economics, but it’s tricky to measure and quantify the effects on health when things go according to plan. When everything is on track, with redundancy limited and no additional costs incurred, it’s just wonderful.
The situation unfolding before the 205th Assault Mage Company is a perfect example. Just as First Lieutenant Schwarkopf had said, the artillery is performing admirably. They must be coordinating quite closely—the way they transition from establishing a calibrating shot to firing for effect in only a few shells shows magnificent skill.
Thanks to that, by the time the company arrives at their attack position, the enemy army is collapsing under the artillery’s thorough barrage. Normally there would be a chance of retaliatory fire and an artillery duel, but it seems the enemy guns are busy with the suppressive fire from our forward position.
“Lucky us. Our corps level artillery blew up the enemy troops with 120 mm shells, and we just have to mop up the surviving remnants.”
“Yes, indeed.”
It was just as Schwarkopf said—the company is in luck. For Second Lieutenant Tanya Degurechaff, it’s a great day for a war. All we need to do is take out the decimated enemy infantry on a battlefield they already have the advantage on—a simple, convenient mission.
“It’s almost time. Company, prepare to attack. We’re gonna hunt down the ones the artillery missed.”
And so, following her commander’s orders, Tanya shoulders her rifle loaded with formula-imbued bullets, grabs her computation orb, and prepares for the assault.
The company is on standby and aware they’ll be charging, but right before they leave, even experienced veterans can’t help but get anxious. The nervous swallows are a familiar sound in the trenches, distinctly audible over even the shells exploding nearby.
“Let’s go to work. If only every time could be this much fun!”
For Tanya, being able to fight against the dregs of infantry ravaged by artillery fire under the lead of a competent officer like Schwarkopf is great—well, relatively. People don’t fight wars because they want to.
Ask if she considers herself happy, and you’d learn everything you needed from the string of expletives directed at Being X for hurling such a young, innocent child onto this random battlefield. Still, she has to be objective, so it isn’t a mistake to welcome a less awful situation.
“Lieutenant, don’t be a picky eater, or you’ll never grow any taller.”
“Commander Schwarkopf, I rather like having a smaller surface area, since it makes me less likely to get shot.”
“…You win, Lieutenant. That’s the best excuse for being a picky eater I’ve ever heard.”
For Schwarkopf, who is waiting for the right moment to launch the strike, the banter with Degurechaff is opportune. You don’t have to look back at history to know that commanders at all levels consider managing pre-assault stress part of making the job go smoothly.
Schwarkopf’s 205th Assault Mage Company may have been veterans of the Rhine Front, but even they still tense up the moment before an attack. So when the light joke relaxes everyone to some extent, the lieutenant chooses that moment to move them out. He alerts the artillery units that they’re launching the assault.
Once he gets the go-ahead from Control, the operation is go.
“Okay, everyone. Don’t let picky Lieutenant Degurechaff hog all the good stuff!”
Thanking God that the company is able to remain calm and chuckle in the face of the enemy, First Lieutenant Schwarkopf roars with his well-trained voice, “Charge! On me!”
Everyone soars from their assault positions and rushes the enemy troops at a reckless speed.
To unprotected infantry, rapidly approaching mages are a threat just as serious as artillery. Mages have protective films and defensive shells, so a few shots aren’t enough to take them down. On top of that, they have no trouble unleashing firepower more intense than heavy weaponry. They are truly tough opponents.
There are a limited number of ways to effectively counter those dreadful mages. One is grenades. If you’re lucky, a mage will come into range—and that’s it. The best way is to intercept them with a concentrated barrage of fire. Apart from that, infantry units don’t have many options.
So from the perspective of the enemy army, whose command structure is already in disarray due to the shelling, even an undermanned company of only about ten mages is a terrifying threat. They probably already have direct support mages to fight fire with fire, but even mages have a hard time on the receiving end of artillery shells.
Lucky for the imperial company, unlucky for the Republican Army, the Empire’s 120 mm guns connected with the flying Republican mages, turning them into mincemeat and littering the ground.
“Make sure to target enemy commanders and communications first!”
Isn’t that obvious? Tanya thinks to herself, targeting a group of soldiers who seem to be carrying the distinctive backpack-style radios. Like the other company members, she uses an explosion formula to greet their uninvited Republican guests with the warm, welcoming embrace of fire and steel.
Judging from the sporadic return fire, resistance is weak. At most, there’s only a handful of isolated soldiers shooting at random. The majority have already given up and turned tail, so all we have to do is sweep through.
Normally, potential enemy reinforcements would be a concern, but this time a mixed group containing another artillery unit and mobile strike team have already taken care of them; the current mission is just mopping up the remaining infantry.
That gives Tanya enough leeway to keep a close eye on Corporal Serebryakov’s combat performance, whereas before she was only able to make sure her subordinate was still behind her. Even under rifle fire, she never drops her defensive shell. Her maneuvers are still textbook, but compared to a month ago, she moves like a totally different mage. That amount of progress isn’t half-bad.
I can’t help but recall Lieutenant Schwarkopf’s comment that this is a combat exercise, using the beat-up dregs of their collapsing enemy as targets. Actual combat really is the best training.
“And just think, not so long ago they were turning green and puking everywhere. It’s amazing what you can do with a bit of training.”
Never underestimate human potential. Remembering that lesson once again, Tanya can’t help but ponder the sacredness of human dignity and free will.
For that reason, she pities the Republican soldiers. What an outdated mess their HQ must be to have ordered them to charge into so much iron. It was demonstrated to the whole world ten years ago during a conflict in the Far East between the Federation and the Dominion that iron dominates flesh.
This is the horrifying thing about people who lack initiative. No initiative basically necessitates lost potential, so it’s a sad irony that they took human resources that probably did have initiative—an abundance of human capital—and exported them to the Empire as mincemeat.
It was to the point where I wanted to ask if they maybe shouldn’t rethink a bit and recognize the value of human capital according to the market principle.
Unfortunately, everyone in the world is bound by contracts. As an imperial soldier, the relationship between Tanya and the Republican invaders is kill or be killed. It’s fine and good for every country’s propaganda to praise the noble act of dying for one’s fatherland, but I really wish people would understand the utterly obvious flip side—that they have to kill their fatherland’s enemies, too.
In terms of precious human resources wasted, there’s no greater crime than war, laments Second Lieutenant Tanya Degurechaff, having just robbed several young people of their futures with a magic formula.
Things just never turn out how you’d like, she thinks to herself as her formulas mercilessly turn the fleeing Republican Army soldiers into organic debris. The only word for it is wasteful. Even though it isn’t her own country, Tanya can’t escape the feeling that something is wrong with squandering so many trained youths. Aha, I see why “extravagance is the enemy.” Of course one of the ironies of history, in a sense, is that a certain country adopted that slogan and then wasted their human resources. Perhaps there will always be inept leaders frittering away the lives of their most promising patriots.
“Geez, maybe I should focus a little more on the battlefield.”
“Artillery plows, mages descend, and the infantry advances.” I remembered learning that on a nice afternoon, when I would rather have been sunbathing than struggling to stay awake in a lecture on the history of warfare. But when exactly that was, I didn’t know…
Back in the Cadet Corps, the lessons seemed so ordinary as I sleepily listened, but once they became real life, it was horrible. Lieutenant Degurechaff had this disheartened look on her face, but she still unleashed a swift, merciless storm of destruction. I was half-impressed at her superhuman abilities and half simply stunned; it was all I could do just to fly after her, but she managed to handle even the enemies coming after me without taking a single hit.
I knew it was pointless to think about these things at times like this, but this kind of stuff forced me to realize that if the two of us weren’t basically in different universes, she would never have earned the Silver Wings Assault Badge.
“Company commander to all hands. In three hundred seconds the bombardment will continue. Fall back.”
And then at some point while I was spacing out, the scattered vestiges of the enemy forces had begun to retreat. The battle always ended while I was just flying for dear life. Naturally, then, I had braced myself for the usual orders to pursue, so it was a bit of a relief to answer, “Roger.”
Yes, relief. Relief that I wouldn’t have to guiltily chase down the enemy. I was different from Lieutenant Degurechaff, who could calmly nail fleeing soldiers in the back with optical sniping or explosion formulas. I was relieved because I wouldn’t have to shoot.
When I was doing everything I can just to fly after her, I practically went into a trance, scattering formulas at random with no time to think. But I still hesitated when I had to aim at a fleeing soldier and cast. I mean…I would wonder if killing them was the right thing to do.
Of course, as Corporal Viktoriya Ivanovna Serebryakov, I should shoot, but as Visha, I have no motive.
“We’re all here. No casualties. No losses besides gear.”
When we landed at the rendezvous point, the sudden release from tension left me dazed. The sole thought occupying my mind was a desire to sleep like a log.
I did wonder if that was all right, as a young lady of a delicate age, but on the front, where there was barely any water, you couldn’t hope for something as convenient as a girls’ shower room. Lieutenant Degurechaff brusquely muttered, “Sleeping now. Night,” and went to bed, so I followed her example and decided to just be thankful I had a bed; I was so ready to rest.
But it turned out God wasn’t so kind. We were suddenly called to assemble. Before I knew it, we had all gathered.
“Good. Okay, company, I have some bad news.”
Uh-oh. I couldn’t help but grow tense as Lieutenant Schwarkopf matter-of-factly—unsympathetically so—continued talking. Even with my limited military experience, I had learned that there was no worse sign than a commanding officer going on matter-of-factly.
“We’ve received an urgent message. The 403rd Assault Mage Company has suddenly entered an encounter battle with two penetrating enemy mage companies.”
That meant the company that was tasked with handling the next enemy wave had been attacked. A new enemy had bothered the guys who were supposed to be attacking the reinforcements. My brain was tired, but the sense of crisis got it moving, and soon I was up to speed. There were our troops, the next wave of enemy forces, and the new enemy.
“…And the reinforcements?”
“The artillery is pounding away at them, but the observer is being chased by enemy direct support mages and can’t properly assess the impacts.”
The conversation between superior officers made me predict a horribly bad future. Ah, I have to fight again, I sighed as I comprehended the situation.
“So we have to rendezvous with the 403rd. We’re moving out immediately.”
It was just one thing after another. And plus, it’s not so easy to rebuild the will to fight once you’ve relaxed. The company commander continued, heedless of me and my scattered thoughts.
“At the same time, we have to rescue that observer who’s under attack. He’s requested backup. That reminds me, you experienced something like this up north, didn’t you, Lieutenant Degurechaff?”
“Yes, sir, and I’m not looking to repeat it.”
Observing for the artillery was almost like painting a target on your back for enemy mages. Any veteran would repeatedly tell you how critical it was to take out the artillery’s eyes, because then the guns were nothing to be afraid of. If you were the eyes for the ruler of the battlefield, your fate was being the first to get shot at.
…Elya, you liar. You’re not safe in the rear having tea!
Observers got targeted to a shocking degree. What terrified me more than anything was that even Lieutenant Degurechaff, who could calmly weave through a hail of bullets, had been seriously injured when she was an observer. That was how intensely the enemies came after them.
Another way to think of it was that this observer, in the same position as Elya, was in serious trouble. It wasn’t at all logical, but a voice was telling me I had to save him. I didn’t really understand the feeling, either.
So I had to do my best in this rescue operation. Newly determined, I stretched and took a deep breath to wake up. But I only felt different. On the outside, I still looked like a dead-tired kid.
“I see. Well then…Lieutenant Degurechaff, as a Silver Wings recipient, is the rescue possible?”
“Not even counting any potential delays, it would be difficult.”
“Even if you used Type 95?”
“…I’m fine, but Corporal Serebryakov looks to be at her limits,” Lieutenant Degurechaff responded, a bit resigned sounding, after glancing at me as I stood there dazed and motionless. “I don’t want to be an inept officer who takes her subordinate out on a rescue mission only to lose her in addition to the one we’re supposed to be rescuing.”
“Then break up the pair. No, never mind.”
The emotions contained in her words were hard to pin down. Maybe disappointment, maybe concern, but in the end, what she’d simply stated was that it was impossible. And the way Lieutenant Schwarkopf changed his mind mid-response said it all. A pair was the basic unit.
If Lieutenant Degurechaff flew the rescue mission solo, I would be faced with an aerial battle with at least two mage companies. Assuming that units over the border would have backup was elementary. Without my buddy’s help, my chances of survival as a squirt with no support were slim.
Even if I wanted to go on the mission, I was standing there in front of them all, tired and absentminded after the last attack. That was why they rejected the idea. That was where their hesitation came from.
When I realized that, I shouted. I didn’t understand the urge very well myself. “Commander, if I may!”
“Corporal Serebryakov?”
“I’d like to volunteer! I volunteer for the rescue mission!”
Lieutenant Schwarkopf sounded suspicious. Well, I had interrupted my superior officers, which could get me punished. I never would have dreamed I’d do something so impulsive, that I had that kind of guts.
“Corporal!”
“I’m an imperial soldier, too! While it’s presumptuous of me to say so, I believe I can handle this mission!”
Lieutenant Degurechaff’s short reprimands would usually make me go limp, but even her harsh tone couldn’t stop me this time.
“Commander, please let me go!”
“That’s what she says, Lieutenant.”
“Lieutenant Schwarkopf?!”
Her shocked yelp and her eyes, usually half-closed in disinterest, now popped as wide open as they could go—the way she objected to this unbelievable response made her look somehow closer to the ten-year-old girl she was.
Apparently even someone who seemed so cold on the surface had been worrying about her subordinates.
“I’ll have Schones’s squad escort you. Move out.”
“But…Lieutenant.”
“She’s made up her mind. I understand your concern, Lieutenant, but any more just makes you overprotective.”
Lieutenant Degurechaff looked astonished. Maybe she’s more emotional than she lets on. The thought was impertinent, but her expressions were so funny that I couldn’t help it. Though it wasn’t what I should have been focusing on at the moment, I felt I sort of understood my friend who teased me for my funny faces.
Lieutenant Degurechaff’s vampire-like coldness had faded, and a little bit of distress took its place.
It was weird to realize just then how unexpectedly important I was to her. And it was a bit late in the game, but it also struck me what a young girl it was taking care of me.
“Understood. I’ll do my best.”
“To save the day in a crisis is the dream of every mage. Good luck.”
“And to you, Commander.”
With that, the main body of the company left. Lieutenant Degurechaff saw them off and then turned to me with an admiring smile.
“Well then, Corporal. Are you ready?”
It was a good smile. For some reason, seeing that expression, I couldn’t help but think that she really did have pointy teeth like a vampire’s. But I still smiled back, proud and confident. That’s right, I made up my mind. I won’t abandon anyone.
“Yes, Lieutenant.”
“Good. Then it’s time to go to work. Sergeant Schones, I’ll be making good use of your team as well.”
“Sure thing. We’ve got more experience on the Rhine Front than anyone.”
“Damn Intelligence to hell! How could they tell us this area is under-defended?!”
The combatants were nimble. Graceful from a distance. But in reality, the imperial mages were desperately taking evasive actions as the observer cast his optical formula with a shower of mana glow. This was finally shot number four. They had been picking off enemy observers for a while now, but it hadn’t affected the artillery’s accuracy one bit. From the sound, they were probably firing 120 mms. Worst-case scenario, maybe some 180 mm or 240 mm as well.




The ground forces trying to leave the fighting area were in disarray, and the enemy was having a field day. Their breaching formation may have been ideal for speed, but it made them vulnerable to fire.
Their only advantage was direct mage support that let them focus on breaking the line. Unfortunately, Control couldn’t get around to assisting them, so they were intercepting about as well as if they were shooting at random with their eyes closed.
Though they had taken out the solo enemy observers, a warning must have gone out. There were limits to how well jamming could be maintained. Enough time had elapsed that they had to assume that a decent intercepting force or quick reaction force was on its way. In the worst case, their own retreat would be cut off in addition to the ground troops’. That was how much time had gone by.
“If you got time to flap your lips, cast some formulas! You bastards!”
To support their infantry’s retreat, they had to neutralize the enemy artillery somehow. And that was the problem: How? The simplest way would be to attack them, but from the scale of the bombardment, it seemed like corps level artillery.
If it were artillery attached to a division or a battalion, charging in prepared to die would give them a chance, but corps level artillery would anticipate anti-mage combat. That’s why their only option is to hunt down the weak points, the observers. But not only did that take a lot of time and effort, the effects weren’t immediately obvious.
“Aye, sir. Agh, there’s only so much we can do with opticals. Give us authorization for explosion formulas.”
If they blew up the whole area with explosion formulas, that would catch any observers hiding on the ground, too. They didn’t have time to scan the surface for each optical cast. Not only did they have to drop their altitude to a certain extent, but also they had to do multiple flyovers to ensure they didn’t miss anything. At first they caught them off guard, but their enemies weren’t stupid. The ones who expect their opponents to be fools are the real idiots.
News of their attack must have spread quickly, so the other observers had probably gone into hiding. Finding them would take a terrific amount of effort.
“At this rate, we won’t even be able to get half of them.”
Hence the idea of blowing the entire suspicious zone away. That was one valid method. Actually, in the preliminary stages of artillery battles, both sides would send out scouting parties to search for the enemy position and lay down high-explosive anti-personnel suppressive fire. If they were lucky, they might take out the observer squad. But this method presupposed a certain amount of firepower.
Basically, they would need at least an entire mage company sustaining maximum available firepower. That would certainly give them a boost, but it would be too heavy a burden for the current forward direct support unit. And if they suppressed them with a formula big enough to burn up the whole area, it would seriously hamper them in sustaining combat later.
“Out of the question. In the long term, it will just make finding them harder.”
But in the long term, it was really not their day.
“Detecting high mana! Suspected reinforcements—mages—coming up fast!”
“Ah, damn it! Forget hunting observers! Get ready to intercept!”
They were scattered and exhausted. Military doctrine would emphatically recommend avoiding combat in such a state, but logic was first and foremost idealistic. Things wouldn’t be so tough if it were actually possible to follow doctrine in combat. Since the leading army had yet to finish extricating itself, if the backup were to retreat, literally everyone would get killed.
Of course, the ground units had been retreating since the moment they failed to break through, and an overhead view of the battleground showed the entire army was pulling out, but mages could move far faster than troops on the surface.
They could just see the observers returning to direct the batteries and take out their ground army while they were fighting off the reinforcement mages.
That was why they had to secure this airspace. There were some battles you couldn’t run away from.
“All units, our observer is down. I say again, our observer is down.”
Hearing that, Second Lieutenant Tanya Degurechaff makes an irritated face and mutters, “Just great.”
If only we had sortied slightly earlier or even a bit later is the lament that crosses my mind.
All I can do is curse the terrible timing. They didn’t make it in time to help their ally but have come too close to the enemy to turn back now. This will be all pain and no gain.
“…As you all just heard, unfortunately we didn’t make it in time, but that just means our job is a bit different.”
“Lieutenant Degurechaff, isn’t this too much for one platoon?”
Sergeant Schones, on loan to Tanya from the company commander, gives a warning. According to the latest from the Combat Direction Center, they’ve lost contact with a mage; they’re sure he was shot down. Before his signal went dead, he reported a group of enemy mages that looked like at least two companies. In a sense, retreating is the correct answer despite the danger of being pursued. They were dispatched to perform a rescue. If the object of the mission has been taken out, there’s no need for them to stick around.
“Sergeant Schones, your opinion is correct in most cases, but not in our current situation.”
Common sense would never have them undertaking this fight as a solo platoon. Even Tanya would turn on her heel and return to base if there was enough distance between them. But rather than risk pursuit and be constantly watching their backs, it’s better to take the initiative and strike.
“I can’t deny that we’re outnumbered…but we don’t need to wait around for the enemy to regroup and assemble.”
Taking out enemies one by one is an elementary war strategy.
“From the way they’re moving, the penetrators are probably two companies equipped for long-range movement.”
They’re probably elite forces, but they’ve come a long way on high alert. Surely they’re more than a little tired. They had to break through the Empire’s defensive line and save energy for the equally long trek back to base; that greatly limits the amount of energy they can expend in the fight. Meanwhile, the imperial mages can put up a fierce defense and then just wait for friendly forces to pick them up afterward. If the artillery makes it to their position in time, a cleanup bombardment could be arranged.
Of course, even if the enemy is exhausted, I can’t count on them to be careless. Still, the body often betrays the will. My platoon’s chances of victory are not slim. More than anything, the enemy is scattered due to the sweeping operation. Their units are too spread out and can only coordinate in groups up to platoon size.
Although this battle is following directly on the previous one, the mages from the Imperial Army can go full throttle since they’re on defense. Meanwhile, the Republican side has to operate on enemy territory with limited support and supplies. Assuming even numbers, the scale will still tip heavily toward the Empire.
“In other words, this is a simple task of taking out one exhausted platoon six times.”
Maybe it’s a slapdash strategy, but they have the supplies. They even have support, though not much.
One-on-six sounds hopeless, but one-on-one gives them a chance. If they do some damage despite their numerical inferiority, the army can’t ask for anything more.
“Okay, guys. I’ll take three platoons. The rest are yours. This shouldn’t be too hard.”
I can’t expect to wipe them out completely, but it’s a perfect opportunity to rack up points by taking out one at a time. It’s a good chance to put my capabilities on display.
The rescue was a failure, but thankfully, we’ve got the artillery battery behind us—a little energy to spare. I heard they even saved some shrapnel shells for us. How perfect! I had been upset that I didn’t get away with using my exhausted partner to refuse the mission, but I guess you never know when you’ll get lucky in life.
Still, Tanya thinks, with a glance at the face of the subordinate behind her. Corporal Serebryakov may be nervous, but she’s flying steady. She’s skilled, yet she was drafted. She didn’t join up because she wanted to; she’s a young girl who was pressed into service. I would never have dreamed a corporal with such a background would volunteer for combat. Was it out of a sense of duty? Patriotism? Love for her buddy? Someone willing to do jobs above their pay grade is a promising human resource.
“Are you trying to monopolize the title of ace, Lieutenant?”
“Good question, Sergeant. Nah, just if I take out ten more, I’ll get a bonus and time off. I’m about ready for a vacation.”
If my score breaks fifty, I’ll earn a special break—specifically, two weeks off, plus a bonus and a raise on top of that. I would be given flextime and authorization for limited discretionary action. Five downed makes an ace; fifty downed makes an Ace of Aces.
Unfortunately, testing Type 95 muddied my memory, and I’m also sniping from artillery bombardment range. That meant that inevitably many of my scores have been unconfirmed. Still, at least some had been acknowledged, so I’m currently at forty.
The best thing is that with these clean results, I won’t be put on trial for war crimes. Even after the war, it won’t be a problem—how about that! In other words, killing one person is a crime, but killing a pile of them gets you a medal. Most people would find that inconsistent, but economic theory makes it acceptable.
“Once I get it, I’m going to take it easy and splurge on gourmet food. Sorry, guys. I want to go have a leisurely beer hall lunch.”
“I can’t even tell you how jealous I am,” Sergeant Schones jokes with a nod. Corporal Serebryakov and the other team member smile, somewhat at a loss.
That’s how it’s meant to be, though. After working to accomplish something, she should be allowed to enjoy the fruits of her labor. Winners on vacation even get to eat tasty food in the rear. There are opportunities to dine with corporate managers. In short, she would be in the best environment to build social capital. Just wonderful.
“I feel bad since you’re accompanying us as a favor, Sergeant Schones, but…well…first come, first served.”
Schwarkopf, concerned for their lack of manpower, dug into his hurting personnel pocket and lent them this squad. Maybe it’s only two people, but in mages, that’s more than a little muscle. It also means that the Empire still has the resources to make a considerate gesture.
In other words, I still have time to fall back to the rear. If I don’t take my chance to go back now and get stuck here till I’m worn down, all that would be left of me is happy times in a psychiatric ward. I definitely don’t want that, so I have to make winning the war my objective and be ready for anything.
…Can we win?
True, the Empire is a war machine of unparalleled precision. Just like the Germany I knew, if they fight against a single country they’ll surely win. Fighting on two fronts is not impossible. But though those facts speak to their military strength, they don’t guarantee victory.
After all, this is one nation against the world. It’s less like a world war than me versus the rest of the world. Can such a war be won? Honestly, it’ll be difficult.
“War is only fun when you’re winning,” Tanya says.
“Oh? And here I thought you would enjoy the despair of the defensive line.”
…I could consider it if it would advance my career.
But frankly speaking, I can’t rapid-fire miracles. Type 95 is the crystallization of a curse. Even if I use this thing—and I don’t want to—it doesn’t mean I’ll win for sure.
“I’m a soldier. I go where I’m ordered.” Company staff fulfills directives. Similarly, if military officers don’t swear loyalty to their country, at least as a formality, they’re in violation of their contract. Tanya was forced to fight this war. Who would take such a gamble with their own free will? Her answer is short and to the point—
“Sorry to butt in, Lieutenant, but you don’t like the war, either?”
—but perhaps unexpected, because Corporal Serebryakov takes the rare step of joining their conversation, looking puzzled.
“Of course, Corporal. Even I prefer a quiet life. What about you, Sergeant Schones?”
“I’m with you, Lieutenant!”
Maybe it’s part of his plan, but Schones jokingly gives a smart-looking salute. Mainly he does it to ease the other pair’s bizarrely tense mood. Nicely accomplished. No wonder they say an outstanding NCO is invaluable.
“Well, that goes without saying. All right, time to plan the welcome party.”
After wrapping up their conversation, Tanya rapidly ascends to combat altitude. Her wish for tranquility and her hatred for the ones who disrupted it are making a storm in her heart. Who actually wants to carry a rifle and fight? Her fury is intense.
Let this cursed world go to ruin. Well, let everything except me go to ruin. If that’s not possible, may I at least avoid ruin, she mutters in her head as she races across the sky.
“What’s your plan, Lieutenant?”
“Let’s give them a grand reception. We’ll treat them to lead and mana glow.”
Lead is a government expense, and wasting the budget will lower her evaluation, but investing resources via sales effort is part of business. The costs of entertaining clients can be expensed because they are a necessity. So if something is a necessity, they can use as much as they want as long as they get results. If mages can mass-produce enemy corpses, no one would complain about how many bullets they use.
I do worry about the stomachs of the finance officers. I feel genuinely bad when thinking of their stress. I really do, so I hope the people in charge of mental health will help them out.
My job is to spend money to defeat the enemy; the finance officer’s job is to come up with the money. And our mental care is the task of professional support personnel. In an ideal world, everyone contributes in their own way. We should praise order and applaud economics for foreseeing this evolution of the division of labor.
“Should we check if they have passports and visas?”
“Yes, let’s.”
That’s right, the law of war shouldn’t invalidate border control laws. If someone crosses the line the Empire has determined to be its border, it goes without saying that the newcomer will have to go through immigration. How careless of me, needing a reminder from my subordinate.
“Okay, that’s our signal to begin. How about we make it a contest?”
“Hmm, then let’s say whoever downs the most enemies wins. If you can beat me, I’ll steal the commander’s secret wine stash.”
I remember when I peeked into his tent one time, I saw wine so fine it looked totally out of place. He must have won it in a card game, but it shouldn’t be too hard to convince him to give it to someone for a job well done. If he refuses, I’ll just abandon civil tactics. Sure, I may not be old enough to drink, but I still know a good bottle when I see one.
“Well then… All right, if Lieutenant Degurechaff snags the win on her own, we’ll all give you our allowances for today.”
“Hmm, not bad. Not bad at all. You’re on!”

THE RHINE FRONT
My head felt heavy, and my consciousness was hazy. My unit? My subordinates? I no longer had the wherewithal to worry about them.
It was all I could do to stay conscious through to the next second. Though I’d quickly deployed a refracting optical decoy, I was still performing more evasive maneuvers than was deemed safe.
Though I just barely managed to maintain control, the company, proud to be one of the Republic’s finest, was at the mercy of a single enemy. Everything had happened so fast.
“Mayday! Mayday! Mayday!”
First was the distress call notifying us of enemy contact. I’d never heard the forward controller scream like that.
“Break! Break!”
The commander instructed us to scatter. Nothing would be stupider than all getting shot at once from a distance. Even though we obeyed immediately and had trained to pull it off, it wasn’t enough. I’d cocked my head, unable to spot the enemy, and my buddy got his upper body blown off.
“Sean?!”
“Bandit! Angel 12!”
“Angel 12?!”
I scanned the sky for the source of the attack, and when I found the bastard, I was speechless. Twelve thousand feet, an altitude that made the practical limit of six thousand for mages look like nothing.
Not only was it a harsh environment where oxygen concentration was roughly 60 percent of ground level, but the bigger problem was that you would run out of mana. The aerial mage limit for practical maneuvering was six thousand for good reason.
“Impossible! It’s not a fighter plane?!”
“Fucking hell, it’s definitely a mage.”
We wondered if it was maybe a plane, but no, there was no doubt about it. We detected mana particles and glow. It was definitely an aerial mage.
The air up there was thin. The temperature was low. Running out of mana was fatal. Acclimating to the altitude was also a hurdle. While it was hard to believe, the enemy mage had overcome all those things and was managing to fight a war. I couldn’t stop thinking that the leisurely soaring figure was an incarnation of imperial military might.
“Climb! We’re climbing! We’ll engage at eight thousand feet!”
My unit was completely exhausted. Eliminating an enemy observer squad had worn down their concentration, and they were also worn down from being in the air so long. If two forces of equal numbers and strength fight, the odds are in favor of the side that is better rested—that’s simple logic.
The Empire’s aerial mages were known for being elite, whereas our side had a tendency to make up for inferior quality with quantity. And this enemy was something else. Even if we were to attack at peak performance, we’d probably still be in for a tough fight. For starters, approaching an enemy at twelve thousand feet was impossible.
“Captain, that’s—!”
“There’s no other way!”
In theory, aerial mages had a slight edge over aircraft.
But that was at altitudes below six thousand feet. Aerial mages were able to use magic, but they were still just flesh-and-blood humans. In combat at high altitudes, they were nothing but targets.
“…No wonder the AWACS is going crazy.”
“Right. That guy’s…insane.”
I see. The enemy mage is far from normal. I could understand why the airborne early warning and control system (AWACS) was going nuts. I mean, according to the standard aerial mage rules of engagement, it wasn’t possible to ascend beyond 6,800 feet. No, it actually is impossible. Six thousand feet was the limit for a proper fight to the death with computation orbs and rifles. I’d heard that in the rare cases of aerial mages from highland regiments, fighting above seven thousand was possible, but this was on another level.
This was twelve thousand. At that altitude, even fighter pilots would need oxygen or they’d black out. The air was simply too thin. The only reason you would ever climb that high was an extreme emergency evasive action.
Even if we managed to shoot down the enemy mage, getting back would be hopeless. But this time, we had to go.
“If we can’t suppress that imperial, our ground forces won’t be able to get home.”
“You’re right… We have to do this.”
It was true for more than just aerial mage battles: Letting the enemy get you from above was fatal.
So all we could do was climb. If we couldn’t at least get him in range, we would be stuck as prey. Whether we would eventually run or fight, we first had to climb. But running wasn’t an option. We had to buy enough time for the ground troops to retreat, otherwise it was possible we would all be wiped out. We were left with no choice from the start.
“This is all-out war. Don’t even worry about getting home.”
I would fight until my mana was depleted. Most importantly, I had to avenge Sean. I couldn’t let this enemy get home alive.
“Crush that mage! Don’t stop until that bastard crushes you!”
Was it an order or a scream? Either way, our commander was determined.
We would either take out the enemy or be taken out. Those were the only two choices.
“Bravo, engage!”
The Bravo team joined the fight. We would probably all be destroyed, and I wanted to curse God in spite of myself. I felt like a real sorry wretch thinking this pain in the ass could have backup.
“…Oh my God!”
But my long-distance observation formula showed me something even worse. I searched for our target’s mana signature in the library. The hit I got was far more horrible than reinforcements.
Registered Mages, also known as Named… The aerial mage world was small. A company was only twelve members. Even a battalion was only thirty-six.
That was the kind of world it was. If you shot down five enemy mages, you were called an ace, and when your score hit fifty, you’d be recognized as an Ace of Aces. Units with six or more aces and individuals with over thirty kills crossed a threshold. Crossing that threshold meant being registered by foreign armies and perceived as a formidable adversary.
Named dominated the battlefield. The only viable ways to counter one were to employ overwhelming resources or an equally strong or stronger Named. To the men on the battlefield, nothing was more reassuring than having friendly Named mages in the sky. For those reasons, enemy Named were given individual names and caution was urged.
To the Republic, “Registered Mage: Name—‘Devil of the Rhine’” meant sheer calamity. A registered enemy aerial mage had been recognized as a strategic threat. Among them, the Devil of the Rhine was the one everyone was most eager to avoid. It had been a mere two months since he had been spotted on the front, yet he had already accumulated over sixty points.
Especially horrifying were his skills with heavy mana spatial detonation and precision optical sniping formulas. Units would lose half of their soldiers just from falling for the “fish bait” strategy snipers commonly use. The nastiest thing was that many of the mages had suffered wounds that nearly kept them from returning to base at all.
We didn’t want to lose such precious resources, so aerial mages received intensive care, but almost all of them died. Not only did that consume vast amounts of medicine, but also it tied up the medics, which led to a shortage of care for ground force soldiers.
On top of that, losing so many mages was becoming an issue from a tactical point of view. A single actor was taking on an entire military and their strategy. What could you call him besides a devil? He had to be taken out by any means necessary.
Naturally, it would be reckless to engage at twelve thousand feet, but at eight thousand, we had a shot. We may not have been at 100 percent, but we did have the numerical advantage. Plus, the guy was flying at twelve thousand feet—no matter how extraordinary you were, that was impossible to do without pushing yourself too hard.
Degurechaff definitely didn’t expect the enemy unit to come charging at her.
They had looked so exhausted and scattered. She couldn’t imagine them having any energy left, so she thought she would pop them one by one from a distance, but apparently she counted her chickens before they hatched. Charging under these circumstances was utterly reckless, but it was also terribly effective.
“Devil of the Rhine! Today, today we take you down!”
“…I don’t believe we’ve met.”
Tanya is bewildered, but for some reason, the enemy’s will to fight is centering on her.
Genuinely puzzled, I proceed with my tactical considerations. My opponents’ maneuvers are nimble and unpredictable. Precision sniping will no longer work.
It would be best to switch to either explosion types capable of targeting an entire area or spatially targeted guided formulas. Target locked. Adjusted for relative velocity. She unconsciously chooses the optimal attack using the Elinium Type 95. Rebuild neural linkage network, ion concentrations normal, meta-motor cortex parameters updated. All systems green.
“Nicht!”
Multiple faint early targeting mana signals detected. Formula types include invisible guided shots and spatially casting blasts. The enemy is close enough to engage, but I was distracted by pointless chatter and didn’t realize!
Signal alarms scream in my head. I immediately start up casting processes in parallel using the Elinium Type 95 cores. Even though I know it will cause a system imbalance, I pour energy in as fast as I can. Meanwhile, she begins erratic evasive maneuvers automatically. Just as she gets out of the way, her previous position erupts with mana glow.
Some of the formulas seem to have been explosion type, and the shock waves create wild turbulence.
“Mmkay. What’s all this now?”
I think maybe it’s a highland unit, but can they climb straight to eight thousand feet without acclimating? Despite the vertical distance between them, they have me in range. Worse, I’m outnumbered. If they’re going to charge, then it seems the enemy is tougher than I thought. Convinced of my opponents’ skills to some extent, I immediately create an optical decoy.
While casting that, I initiate evasive maneuvers in order to prevent them from predicting my flight path. But even after a number of illusions, a magic shot comes flying at my actual body. How is their disciplined fire so accurate so fast?!
“That shot missed? What a monster!”
These guys are obnoxious, shouting like that on the open channel. Wait, they must be doing it on purpose. They’re capitalizing on their numerical advantage. They want to distract me with radio chatter, but I won’t fall for that again.
Shooting magic in volleys is a combat style that imperial mages avoid, since they rely more on individual skill.
The Empire boasts superior quality, but the Republic has always made the most of their numerical superiority—for example, the perfectly ordered formation before her eyes. These have to be some of the Named we’re always warned about.
I check the mana signatures against the library. My irritating guess was right on the mark. These guys are such a pain that the combat instructors warned everyone about their fire discipline. I am clearly going above and beyond my pay grade.
“CP, this is urgent. The enemy company is Named. I say again, the enemy company is Named.”
“CP, roger. I’ve got reinforcements heading your way. Don’t work too hard.”
Well, that’s good news.
I should probably be happy they didn’t tell me to go die. In military creature society, courage and a loud voice are the things that get you praised. When you’re in an insane group that respects the foolhardy over the cautious, it’s rough to be the sane one. But this is all for my advancement. I have no choice.
“Reinforcements acknowledged, but this is my battlefield.”
I don’t want to, but I have to at least rush them. Otherwise, it could adversely affect the evaluation of my achievements in this battle. Now that I recall, I wonder how the Kwantung Army was able to puff up their self-image so much. That said, I can definitely get ahead if I act like them. Nobody who calls themselves a patriot is worth a damn.
True patriots demonstrate their love for their country through actions, but the fakes express it in words. To get ahead, you have to do both. Patriotism is a really handy tool, and tools are meant to be used.
“Our mission is to eliminate the rabble violating the Empire’s borders regardless of whether they’re from the Entente Alliance or the Republic—we don’t discriminate.”
Elinium Type 95 comes with a curse that corrodes my mind the more I use it. In exchange for performance, I have to exalt the self-proclaimed god, Being X, with all my might. The only silver lining is that since I’m employing the Kwantung Army promotion doctrine, I can at least make it sound like patriotism.
But there’s really something wrong with the army if the more you copy those big-talking Tsugene guys, the more you advance. That’s gotta be why there are soldiers who actually want to take part in something as stupid as war.
Really, no one should long for peace and an idle life more than soldiers.
“Spatial coordinates acquired, potential evasion paths calculated, expansion chamber magic filling normally.”
They want to leverage their numerical superiority and hunt me down. I doubt taking out one at a time will work against Republican mages. If I try, they’ll probably gang up on me. They take pride in their perfect coordination, after all.
I was unbelievably lucky to have the chance to pick them off and thin the herd at first. I can’t expect an opportunity like that again, so I need to switch up my tactics. In short, I just need to treat this clump of guys as a single target instead. Time for some giant killing.
I don’t need to fiddle around with my aim. I can just target the whole area.
“CP, requesting theater warning for spatial detonation.”
“CP, roger. Will issue a spatial detonation warning.”
Elinium Type 95 is capable of storing mana via its system of four synchronized cores. With an explosion formula cast at full throttle operation with that stock of magic, it’s possible to superpose interference across the entire war zone. Of course, that means full throttle operation of a flawed orb—something stupid is bound to happen.
“Sergeant Schones! Prepare for impact!”
In addition to blowing up friend and foe indiscriminately, it would litter the area with mana noise and reduce visibility with smoke, isolating soldiers. It would throw organized combat into chaos, making all coordination impossible, so I can’t just go using it willy-nilly when fighting on a team.
The tactic is so disruptive, in fact, that the instructor unit was kind enough to comment that apart from self-destruction, there was no use for it. If, however, the fight is one versus a group, it can blow away the group’s organization and turn the fight into one versus multiple individuals. Thus, the verdict is that the formula causes nothing but problems in team battles but it’s not bad to have on hand when low on manpower.
“Be gone, impertinent foes. This is our Empire, our sky, our home.”
I should be able to get positive evaluations for proclaiming my nationalism to the entire area.
Coincidentally, the military also generally approves of religious faith, so I might as well make use of Being X’s curse to get ahead. I’ll just have to accept it this time, even if I scream in agony as my freedom and dignity are trampled.
“If ye come to disrespect the fatherland, we shall pray unto God.”
The enemy mages begin spreading out. They create a zone of interlocking fire from either side; rather than concentrate their shots on Tanya, they plan to torture her to death in midair. On top of that, as a precaution against ordinary explosion formulas, the spread is wider than usual.
“O Lord, save the fatherland. O Lord, grant me the strength to defeat my nation’s enemies.”
They can pin me down even after all those intense maneuvers up this high? These guys are war crazy. Geez, if you like it so much, you should just split into two sides and kill each other.
Why do they have to get other people involved? Did no one teach them not to be a bother? There had to have been some major flaws in their education. Education decides a child’s future; they need to take it seriously.
Or maybe they’re rational, economical people like me, using war to advance their careers and aiming to survive. Wait a minute. If that’s the case, shouldn’t I do my best to negotiate for a profitable outcome…? How could a logical, economically minded person like me nearly forget the pursuit of profit? Is war so harsh that people lose all reason?
Profit is everything; that’s self-evident. In short, negotiation is key. If you blow up the other party before you start the dialogue, there won’t be any of that.
By the time this dawns on Tanya, she’s overwhelmed by how easily her reasoning had been impaired by war and how far she’d gone down the path to losing her humanity. Unless your hobby is fighting to the death, killing someone without getting anything out of it is pointless. Right, this isn’t a zero-sum game, so building cooperative relationships should be theoretically possible.
Then instead of earnestly slaughtering one another, it would be more logical to rig the game. We’ll move from a savage world of killing and being killed into a world of reason. Surely the fabled “win-win” solution is possible.
We can’t go overboard. Just as economists were able to determine through statistics that Japan’s national sport was riddled with fixed matches, our deception will one day be exposed, but by the time a third party sees through our plot, the fighting will be long over. Economists have plenty of other things to be working on during a war, and most of the time those things are extremely important.
“Save us from the heathen invasion. O God, grant me the strength to slay our enemies.”
I have to just keep singing meaningless praise to make it look like I’m using a formula. That way I can conceal my intentions from CP for a while. If this goes well, all I have to do is settle the negotiations while they can’t tell what I’m doing due to the mana noise.
Things are coming together. Noting that, Tanya thinks for a moment and then decides that the proper time for her message might be at hand.
Perhaps they will open the door to negotiation, and things will go well for both sides. No one can call themselves an adult if they are bound by preconceptions. Maybe she’s only been looking at Republican soldiers as stereotypes.
People are more than appearances. Surely we need to gain a thorough understanding of people’s true inner selves to interact with them properly. All individual personalities are one of a kind and thus deserving of respect.
Even in the middle of a war, if it might be possible to negotiate with someone, you should be sincere with them. Of course, negotiating with the enemy will naturally get you court-martialed. Forsaking combat is treated the same as fleeing before the enemy; you have no way to talk yourself out of the death by firing squad that awaits.
However, if I can avoid needless combat as an upright individual, I’ll accept the personal risk. If I can make myself understood, I’m willing to forgo opportunities for promotion and time off. I’ll earn them by defending myself from war-crazed maniacs.
Most importantly, the amount of risk and labor involved here is clearly unfair, given my salary. I have no obligation to do work above my pay grade.
In the unfortunate event that I can’t make myself understood, I’ll have to take them down and have a nice vacation eating tasty food in the rear. It’s a crying shame I can’t drink wine, but the region back there is famous for the way it prepares sautéed fish. I’m sure it’ll be exquisite.
“Attention! You are trespassing on the Empire’s territory.” For now, let’s start with a couple benign remarks. “We will do our utmost to defend our fatherland, because behind us are people we must protect.”
Apparently a soldier’s duty is to protect their country’s people. Though some armies are violence machines and some belong to emperors, soldiers really are usually protectors of their nation. Well, there are also cases like Prussia, where the army possesses the state instead of the state possessing the army, so it’s not a hard rule. But the generalization sure sounds good.
“Answer me this. Why do you wish to invade the Empire, our homeland?”
She says it like a reprimand, but she actually wants an answer. I’ll get the negotiation ball rolling. I may be talking to the enemy, but this is still innocuous enough that I can explain it away.
I wonder what their response will be, but all I get is a barrage of curses and a hail of bullets. Are these guys really just a bunch of dumb, war-crazy animals? I can’t help but doubt their sanity.
So these people aren’t modern entrepreneurs I can calmly pursue a rational outcome with? Or perhaps they, too, have lost their humanity in the war? If that’s the case, how sad. That means I have to play along with these war-loving fools—the worst possible scenario.
She wants to request overtime pay, along with extra compensation for being placed in this hazardous working environment, but she doesn’t know who to invoice… I realize it’s immature to throw a fit, but I want to cry.
“This is CP with a warning for the theater. Watch out for mana noise.”
CP is kind enough to issue the warning Tanya requested. And she has accumulated enough mana. All right, if these guys are logical, economically minded fellows, they’re sure to value one over zero.
Who knows? Maybe they’re the prudent types who won’t take a risk while the radio signal is good. Even if they get bombed first, rational fellows like that will undoubtedly choose a reasonable solution if they survive.
At least, I would choose a reasonable solution. Maybe I should get this over with. Knock it off with the hesitation and delays and get things moving. Focus on controlling all the mana I saved up and accept the noise in my thoughts.
“O saints, believe in the blessings of our Lord. Let us be fearless.”
Tanya feels drained at the sudden release of loaded mana. She wants to scream as all the energy is sucked out of every one of her cells, but Elinium Type 95’s curse prevents it. Still, she can’t get over how weird it is for pain to be forcefully converted into religious ecstasy.
The sensation of joy and agony blending to rattle your mind is a horror beyond description.
“Lament not your fate. Oh, the Lord has not forsaken us!”
The full-body pleasure and the uncomfortable deprivation of my freedom finally reaches an intolerable level. If she could, she would curse him, but her mouth is probably only capable of praise. It annoys me, but the one thing the commies got right was to call religion a drug.
The Chicago school of economics says drugs should be regulated by the economy.
That said, my problem isn’t that I want to stop but can’t, it’s that if I stop, I’m likely to die. It’s the biggest pain in the ass. The Chicago school doesn’t consider the case of a drug where if you quit you instantly die.
“At the distant end of our journey, let us reach the promised land.”
A process similar to a thermobaric explosion starts up instantaneously. The mana has reached its pressurization limit and gushes out at an immeasurable rate. As the boiling magic explodes into freedom, the scattering mana makes contact with the open air and triggers an unconfined magic explosion. The abrupt changes in atmospheric pressure could collapse lungs and cause pulmonary congestion, and the combustion drops the already low oxygen concentration to fatal levels.
Oxygen deprivation and carbon monoxide poisoning at eight thousand feet would cause even the hardiest aerial mages to black out and fall. Anyone who manages to maintain consciousness would experience agonizing pain. Collapsed lungs, carbon monoxide poisoning, and the complications from the steep drop in oxygen hurt like hell.
“Ngh…gaghk…gagh…”
Even Degurechaff, who was out of range, has trouble breathing as the oxygen concentration falls. If the mages in range are still able to fly, that won’t last long. The free-range magic explosion creates mana noise over a wide area.
Not only does it cut off communications, but also it makes sustaining flight formulas difficult, so continuing the battle is impossible. Although smoke limits her visibility, it’s easy to imagine the state of her opponents who have received a direct hit.
“Attention, fighters of the Republican Army: This battle is over.”
So Tanya attempts to suggest they surrender. She has to wonder if after all that there are any survivors, but it doesn’t cost her anything to try.
Well, if there are no survivors, I can take my accomplishment of annihilating an entire company and enjoy a tea break in the rear.
“If you surrender, we’ll guarantee your rights as prisoners according to the Worms Convention.”
The Republican Army, which had a strong tendency to rely on numerical superiority, had extraordinary faith in their Named. They could put up a fight against the imperial elites, after all. Due to their rarity and strategic value, they were deployed in the most critical battles, and their bravery was known far and wide.
The 106th and 107th Reconnaissance Mage Companies of the Forty-Second Magic Brigade belonging to the Fourth Aerial Mage Division were also famous for their skills. Until recently, at least.
“The tactical council regarding the recent annihilation of the 106th and 107th Reconnaissance Mage Companies is now in session.”
Initially, the Republic had assumed that the Imperial Army’s powerful magic units, including the Named, were deployed on the front lines against the Entente Alliance, so it should have been impossible for its Named and equally elite troops to be wiped out.
And yet, that was what happened. It happened despite their overwhelming numerical advantage—and at the hands of a single mage. When the news came in, no one could believe their ears. They thought it had to be some kind of mistake.
“While the 106th and 107th Companies were engaged suppressing enemy observers, an enemy mage unit came to intercept them.”
They had sent Named units out of necessity due to the long-range nature of the invasion. The mission was too difficult and strenuous to give to anyone else. As hard to believe as the news was, if a numerically inferior unit had inflicted massive damage on them, it was possible it would have repercussions for the entire war.
It was no wonder the ranking members of the General Staff, who understood that fact, looked so grim.
“What I’m handing out now is a report combining the logs from recovered computation orbs and survivor accounts.”
The expressions of the magic officers who had done the analysis were even darker. To prepare the data, they had had to review the computation orb logs and recorders.
The debriefing of the survivors was limited since some of them were severely injured, but what they had heard was shocking.
If the information hadn’t come straight from half-dead survivors, it would have been hard to believe. No, they wouldn’t have wanted to believe it.
“…Anyhow, first please take a look at this recording of the battle.”
“Mayday! Mayday! Mayday!”
That was the emergency distress signal used when encountering an unexpected enemy. The frontline combat controller, whose job was to remain calm and clearheaded at all times, was shrieking. It might have been funny if it had been a newbie, but he was a veteran. He had been the first to report 106th’s defeat and the one to request assistance for retreat. Thanks to him, the survivors of the 106th and 107th companies could be recovered.
“Break! Break!”
The screen, though awash in static, showed the unit promptly following their commander’s order. The aerial mage officers who had done the analysis still found it difficult to accept the reality of what followed.
At that moment, according to the log, the user was sniped from a distance far greater than was thought possible. It was hard to believe.
The 106th was performing erratic evasive maneuvers.
“Sean?!”
The screen kept jerking around due to sharp changes in flight path. During that short time, several soldiers were shot out of the sky.
“Bandit! Angels 12!”
“Angels 12?!”
And then, incredibly, an attack from twelve thousand feet. They had already received this information as an emergency report. The issue was that an imperial mage had climbed to double the current standard. If it was true, all of their aerial mages would be rendered virtually powerless.
“Of all the… It can’t be.”
No one was sure who had spoken, but the sentiment was universal. The number twelve thousand momentarily paralyzed their brains. It was too extraordinary.
In fact, the unit had wondered if their opponent was a fighter plane, but it was undoubtedly a mage.
After performing a series of optical-processing techniques on the video, they had managed to make out the standard-issue Imperial Army rifle and signs of an unknown computation orb.
The distance kept them from getting a clear view of the enemy soldier’s features, but they could make out an incredibly small silhouette. Still, the way that mage cruised so calmly, like the ruler of the sky, told them no one could interfere.
Then it was confirmed that the 106th’s opponent was a Registered Mage. Even worse, this was a new Named who had recently appeared in the theater and rapidly racked up achievements. All details were unknown. They didn’t even know what sorts of tactics this unfathomable threat would use, much less how to counter them.
They had kicked Intelligence’s butt to get a reinvestigation under way, and so far they had found several unconfirmed reports that had been previously dismissed as frontline rumors—things like a lone enemy soldier taking down an entire company, a mage flying at an impossible altitude, and so on.
It was a war zone, after all. They understood some of the intelligence coming in was confused, but it was too bad the unusual nature of their opponent was delaying their identification attempts.
“Damned Devil of the Rhine!”
“Cut it out. Captain Cagire, who is the Devil of the Rhine?”
“An unknown enemy Named. We can currently identify them only by their magic signature.”
The intelligence officer had paled at the sudden question. If they were only able to identify this enemy by magic signature alone, that meant they knew nothing. This was as good as admitting to the other high-ranking officers present that everyone in Intelligence was incompetent.
They could get the gist of what had happened by analyzing the logs of the computation orbs used in battle. In other words, either the intelligence officers had neglected their duties or nothing had been recorded.
“Did you analyze the logs?” The chief of staff, who was running the meeting, asked the obvious question. Essentially, Are you bastards so inept that you couldn’t even do that much?!
“We’ve inspected seventeen, mainly from recovered orbs of mages who were shot down, and the survivors have all been debriefed.” The response from Intelligence, however, made it clear that they had done a proper job. They were the ones who sent the notice that an unconfirmed mage had inflicted heavy damage.
They formed a special task force and even launched an operation to retrieve the bodies of fallen mages who hadn’t been recovered. As a result of that effort, they were able to recover a number of computation orbs and investigate the wreckage to see if there was any salvageable data.
…But they didn’t find anything useful.
They had a mountain of evidence indicating the mystery mage’s existence, but they had no idea what he was like.
“…So only a magic signature? What does that mean?”
“Almost no one survived an encounter close enough to see him. The majority of people who lived were shot down while they were still outside of firing range.”
Every mage that approached the Devil was hit with enough force to leave them with full-body burns. When the computation orbs were retrieved afterward, the tough outer shells had melted, and their cores were damaged. To inflict that level of damage with conventional weapons, you’d have to pull out either the big guns or a metric ton of explosives.
There was a mage out there who could both eliminate opponents at close quarters with overwhelming firepower and snipe precisely at great distances. This Named had been classified as a strategic-level threat, and although they didn’t know the mage’s identity, they had registered the Devil of the Rhine in their library by magic signature alone.
The “Devil” alias was given out of the hatred and fear of an opponent they couldn’t see. And it had only been two months since the first sighting in this theater. Yes, if the records were correct, the Devil had been deployed just as the Republican Army had attacked, and had already scored more than sixty.
Troops on the front line had even sent an earnest request for a Named extermination squad composed of their own elites.
“Moving on, this is footage recorded by a computation orb moments before it failed. Miraculously, the member of the 106th it belongs to survived.”
The video showed an enemy figure casually evading the volley fire of an entire company. The shots seemed so unlikely to connect that everyone wondered what the soldiers were aiming at. Incredibly, despite the cross fire, the enemy was flying so calmly it looked almost graceful.
“…Is that…dancing?” The movements were so mesmerizing that someone murmured unknowingly.
A spectacular amount of magic glow filled the air, but the enemy dodged its many sources with elegant ease. Irritatingly, not a single shot seemed to hit.
They didn’t know who had come up with the alias, but Devil of the Rhine was very fitting. No ordinary person could weave through a setup like that and fight back without seeming to be in any danger.
“Is that mage too quick for our disciplined fire to land any shots?”
“Could their mobility really be that much better than ours?”
The Republican Army had developed their fire discipline in response to the known superiority of imperial mages. Working as a team, its troops could shoot down the overconfident enemy mages who tended to stick out.
Although it was a doctrine premised on numerical superiority, the Republican Army considered it a solution. It figured there wasn’t a mage in the world who could stay in the air once the barrage began.
“The Devil evaded spatial detonations, too. Most likely after detecting the attack during early targeting and getting out of there with no time to spare.”
“You mean the enemy performed evasive maneuvers in a few seconds or less? Wouldn’t that mean this mage could dodge all guided magic attacks?”
The basic concept in disciplined fire was to use a large volley of guided missiles to severely limit the enemy’s ability to evade and try to get a direct hit. At the same time, the unit would estimate the velocity of their opponent and use exploding formulas along a wide area in their flight path to catch them.
If they couldn’t lock on to or measure their opponent, however, it would be almost impossible to shoot effectively. They fought like a team—organized and continually coordinated. In other words, against an opponent on whom those tactics didn’t work, there were far fewer benefits to fighting in groups, though not zero.
The officers in the meeting gasped as their chests tightened. Not only had the observed mana value of the enemy computation orb gone way past the limit, but the mana was reducing—concentrating—and amplifying. Collisions of mana triggered by overlapping compound interference were creating…multiple glows?!
A single imperial mage had called on enough mana for several casters.
“The observation apparatus also returned a value that was off the scale.”
“Absurd! If that’s the case—”
His comment cut off abruptly. They were all witnessing data that indicated a mana fixation reaction was occurring. The immeasurable profusion of mana denoted a phenomenon that mages and nations had attempted to achieve but finally given up on.
In theory, it was impossible for a cast mana phenomenon to access spatial coordinates. Attempting fixation was madness. Nobody thought it could be done.
“…It can’t be! Impossible!”
The technology officer, who understood the significance better than anyone else, began denying reality, as if he had come unhinged. This was no longer mage technology but something from the realm of myths.
“If ye come to disrespect the fatherland, we shall pray unto God.”
The zoomed-in figure shocked them all. The picture may have been blurry and full of static, but what it showed was unmistakable.
“…It’s a child!”
The mage could still be described as quite young, yet she proclaimed annihilation and doom. Together with the mana reading, her cry was an omen of destruction.
Supposing this god you pray to exists—is it the devil or the god of destruction? Everyone cradled their heads, inspired to cling to the Lord.
“O Lord, save the fatherland. O Lord, grant me the strength to defeat my nation’s enemies.”
However, the sentiments were pure. Her gaze was utterly innocent. Could she really be an enemy mage? She was only looking to God for help.
“Save us from the heathen invasion. O God, grant me the strength to slay our enemies.”
Should we really not be allowed to exist? they wanted to ask. Her gaze was that pious and judging.
“Attention! You are trespassing on the Empire’s territory.”
She spoke with the solemnity of a shrine maiden delivering a divine message.
“We will do our utmost to defend our fatherland, because behind us are people we must protect.”
What she said was backed by a sense of responsibility. It was as if defense was her only duty. And they could feel her fervid desire to protect the ones behind her.
It was to fulfill that duty that she had stood before them.
“Answer me this. Why do you wish to invade the Empire, our homeland?”
Perhaps the 106th had sensed disaster; they concentrated their firepower to stop her with all their might. They tried to prevent her from casting even a little longer.
“O saints, believe in the blessings of our Lord. Let us be fearless.”
But reality was cruel. Fate was not on their side. Assuming God existed, he was smiling on her.
“Lament not your fate. Oh, the Lord has not forsaken us!”
The converging mana suddenly began to flood the observation apparatus with noise. That meant there was enough mana accumulated to agitate space.
“At the distant end of our journey, let us reach the promised land.”
It was as if her words were both the key and Pandora’s open box. The officers watching stopped thinking entirely as the monitor emitted a dreadful flash. Eventually, the computation orb was damaged, and the video cut off.
“…Dear God, have mercy on our souls.”
O God, is this…what you wanted?