Von Stropfe would return to that point. It was not something to be taken so lightly, but the Archduke would be more amenable, he thought, after dealing with an obligation that was absolutely his to mind. “The Silver Lances have begun fighting the Netillian army proper, as predicted, and have sustained heavy casualties. My lord must make the decision to deploy reinforcements to them, and perhaps, some have said, perhaps it would be in our interests to deploy further forces…though I have counseled against that. To divide our attention between Almize and Netilland is sure to strain our ability to watch and be able to respond to other concerns and dangers.”

“Then do not. As I said, make your arrangements.”

The Minister grit his teeth and straightened his back. “My lord,” he said after clearing his throat, “I understand that the times are difficult, but you cannot blur your vision with pleasures whilst letting your duties aside for others. Your recent dalliances comforting yourself with young noblewomen is of particular concern, especially those daughters of territorial lords. The rumors speak of associating well beyond even what-”

“Are you my mother, Minister?” the Archduke demanded accusatorily, “To chide me upon how I tend to my wounds? If I were to do naught I would be incapable of even this. Mind your place.”

“You are the Archduke, my lord. An example to your people. This recent recklessness…think of your reputation, at the least, if not the ambitions of those who plot against you. The succession as it is, too.”

“You are dismissed from my presence, Keidel,” the Archduke said tiredly, “Fare thee well.”

“My lord.”

“You are my Minister of War, Keidel, not my counsel upon choice of mistress. If you have naught more to say upon the subject of your appointment, then do not bother me with aught else. You are dismissed.”

Keidel Von Stropfe pursed his lips, bent curtly but politely, and turned to walk out without another word.

-----

The new free state of Ellowie was in a wary state. Once it had forced out the invaders from its (admittedly small) borders, it was only growing in strength, but not enough to meet the demands of what would be ideal to fight with. The ranks of the Army of Liberation swelled with volunteers and deserting conscripts of the Netillian Army alike, but the lack of equipment and supplies shackled the means to exploit this rising strength.

These were reasons to be wary, but the denizens of the free state were optimistic. To be else was to admit a war of potential annihilation. The pilots of the Ellowian Air Force had captured the skies again, however, and the Netillians had been oddly paralyzed upon fronts where they might have had an advantage. Any dread was in the potential, not the present, and so the people toasted the revolt. Despite its lack of resources, the cause was universally supported, and the revolt’s own administration was single minded, under the tight control of King Wladysaw XI.

Yet the personal affairs within the palace were not similarly joyous, the King could not help but observe even as his advisors fed him hopeful morsels of news amongst the less pleasant facts that the populace could safely ignore, or be convinced to forget.

Kamilia’s behavior had become stranger still, and…erratic. She was on edge constantly, speaking to herself. Yes, Wladysaw knew that the present times were stressful, but something was wrong. Something that puzzled the doctor that checked on her. Kamilia was not very old, yet she seemed to be having grey hairs growing in quite recently- that presumption turned out false. They were not grey, but blonde. Utterly inexplicable. The physician had confessed that he hadn’t a clue what the exact cause for all this could be, but did say that she was exhibiting symptoms of Opium withdrawals.

Well, Wladysaw knew about his cousin’s habits. Yet for Kamilia to make a cold stop on her drug habits was another puzzling development. Kamilia was a hedonist through and through- transforming into a recluse and spurning all her usual comforts, it was as if a completely different person had replaced her mind and kept her body. This person being insane, though, as Kamilia was frantic in disposition these days but also curiously unaware of the most basic things, such as who she was, what her history was, or where she even was.

That sudden onset of madness was no pleasant thing to have occupying Wladysaw’s mind. It shared space with the present war and all its niggling little crises. The need to draw up more troops, the stalemates, the places where territory was being chewed away for lack of necessary resources to engage with, and the dire tidings of the Eastern Resistance Army- the Twaryians were smoking out the last of their harassments as they lost their energy and supplies, and what manpower they had. Soon enough, the Twaryians would be in a position where they might try and grab more land, and if they did that, his revolt would be in no place to oppose them. As it stood, the initial burst of energy and initiative had gained most of what the so-called King’s Rebellion now possessed. UGZs had risen up hopefully and were still fighting, but it was not so practical, Wladysaw’s generals apologized, to actually get to them and relieve them as quickly as he’d liked.

Even the murmurings of spies told unsettling rumors- that the Twaryians were not interested in gaining more unstable, difficult to control Ellowian territory. That their movers and shakers in the military were instead eyeing Vynmark, which was presently isolated, whilst the Ellowian situation was garnering the attention of both Netilland’s neighbors and further off powers. The Caelussians were wary of drawing attention too far west, most certainly, but there was plenty of popular opining in Twaryi that the flux caused by both the attack on two fronts and the abduction of key figures of Netilland’s administration ought to be exploited- time to take more of Ellowie whilst Netilland could not object to them merely walking in and laying a claim, not even having to fire a shot, the more ambitious folk stated as though it were guaranteed.

So many sources of stress, but there was a suitable salve for it all. Once but his head maidservant (and partner in many, many years of mutually felt sexual tension), Mabel was still struggling to define her new level of close and personal relationship. She had told Wladysaw that perhaps he “should be more careful” that he not “tempt a scandal with a mistress.”

He had replied to her that his intent was to make his queen with child.

This had sent Mabel into flustered consternation, and she struggled to reason out a compromise. A difficulty, as her sense of reasoning was compromised at the time- her sharp thinking was muddled because of the present activity being of a nature that spoiled the focus rather easily. Afterwards (where her warning against being more “careful” was entirely disregarded) she agreed to a status of “concubine.” Inaccurate, but it would have to do.

Mabel protested that the demand to keep her within arm’s reach was impeding with her work. Always a dutiful one. Such was why she was perfect, why Wladysaw simply couldn’t let her go, even if he knew that there was plenty for her to do. Yet he couldn’t let her go, not now. He didn’t need another worry to ponder in nights that would suddenly be lonesome.

She was happy. Yet Wladysaw still saw sadness in her eyes. A terrible guilt.

-----

You are Lieutenant Richter Von Tracht, officer in the Archduchy’s Silver Lances Armored Division Reserve Battalion, fourth company, second platoon. It was only recently you could properly claim such again after being estranged from your unit, but after a special assignment given to you by your company commander Lieutenant Colonel Georgen Von Silbertau, you had finally been able to return to your unit proper.

Though, you had had to bid farewell to what was left of the Mittelsosalian Republic troops that had accompanied you, fought alongside you from the defense of the town of Ganzenacht (a name you only recently found out, what an odd and appropriate name for your experience), escorted you, and aided you on your mission to destroy an enigmatic device behind enemy lines.

The Revolutionary’s men held a small ceremony for their fallen, including the Revolutionary himself. Yet, the surviving second in command had approached you afterwards and claimed that he was now The Revolutionary- the cause would continue, he claimed, as it would in the hearts of all of humanity. Grand and bold, you had nodded and thanked the men for their aid. They as well as the others would be noted to the Minister of the People, when you were able to send for her. When you had returned to your unit, she had still been missing.

Narr was also missing in action, his tank knocked out and the status of him and his crew unknown. He had seemed a harsh and self-interested sort, but he had trusted your command. You had been hoping to facilitate the reward he had been hopeful for, but Wolfgang had said to not be too optimistic. People in Sosaldt, he had said, tended to not have long lives.

The auxiliary scout leader hadn’t lingered long either. Von Silbertau had had commands for them, and you relinquished the Republic troops to him upon request, after hearing what his intentions were. Backline security- a respite.

A rest well needed for the surviving tanker and crew. Framboise’s eyes were dry, but hollow, as you returned her books to her. She didn’t summon up the energy for more than a small farewell, as she stared blankly into the horizon both before and after you left her.

Upon returning to your platoon, there wasn’t much fanfare. A remark from Captain Vehrlors saying that he appreciated you not making him lose money- the response to being asked if there had actually been a bet being ”kind of.” None of the platoon seemed upset about Van Halm’s absence, and you wondered to yourself if your absence had the same sort of quiet about it. Enough to ask about it when you reported to the Captain about what you’d been doing these past days.

“You can smell when somebody’s got a deathwish, lieutenant,” Vehrlors had said, “That scent’s pretty common around the unit. They can’t be talked out of it, you just have to accept when the inevitable happens.”

“Do I…smell that way?” you asked.

“I don’t need to tell you that, do I? Congratulations on getting in Von Silbertau’s good books. Have a thought for the rest of us when the commendation comes around, will you?” A sarcastic quip followed by a slap to the arm.

That had been a few nights past or so. It was now the afternoon of February 10th, 1933- a reminder given to you when you had asked Captain Vehrlors what day it was, realizing you weren’t actually sure. It was later in the month than you thought it was, but the days had blurred enough that you didn’t doubt the answer. All you had in response was a solemn nod, before going back to the dugout where your tank was waiting in reserve. Only half the platoon was up front- the Netillians hadn’t been coming in the force they used to, before you arrived here, but you weren’t sitting back to rest. As soon as the enemy made an attack, the reserve was to rush up and help, but that hadn’t happened these past few days. Harassment artillery was common, and stole away moments of sleep when you thought you could get them, but damage from it was minimal. Netillian guns and vehicles test you only a little, before going back. The elder Von Rotehof thought they were trying to lull you into a false sense of security, to wear you down. After all, the enemy had reserves of men and materiel, they’d wear you down eventually. Hurling themselves against the Silver Lances was arrogance often displayed, that actually benefited your side. Refusing to commit to a fight was in their favor. The younger Von Rotehof thought the enemy was fearful, but he was alone in such an opinion.

The platoon had been lucky. Casualties were common throughout the company, the battalion, but all that had happened to your platoon had been that elder Von Rotehof’s tank had had its main gun vertical traverse damaged by an enemy shot, rendering it incapable of elevation and thus nearly unable to aim properly. The shot that caused the damage had wounded the gunner, as well, and a replacement hadn’t arrived yet. It rendered elder Van Rotehof’s tank useless in the offense, but the situation on the line demanded his tank nevertheless. It was an imposing enough presence, in your opinion.

The days had been all the same since you returned to your unit, but something…was changing. Your platoon had told you that Netillian air raids had been common and to watch out for them, but since you got back, there had only been one attempt at a strafing run by fighters- one noticed early and warned against, though that did not make it less frightening. After that, the Ellowian planes had returned…and stayed. No more aerial attacks came during the day, though bold night bombings continued.

You could have been fooled on that point. The bombs didn’t drop as close as the artillery did, but when the ground shook they may as well have gone off right next to you. The panzergrenadier squad assigned to your section of the line laughed when you had hid, claiming that “anybody” could have been able to tell that the attacks would go off the mark.

However, today had been different. No artillery or air attacks had come your way at all- no fighters or bombers had passed overhead last night. The usual suspects hadn’t come by to pay your line a visit, sending their jeers in the form of rifle pot shots or mortar rounds or rushed shots of cannon before disappearing. The air…was eerily still.

The expectation was an assault, finally. Yet it did not come. No preparatory bombardment, no scouts. Nothing.

All of a sudden, one day, contact was reported from behind, but it was a swell of Republic troops, looking tired, but eager. They brought news that the pocket to the south of the Northern Lords’ troops had been broken up, and collapsed. A windfall, finally. Did that mean Signy wasn’t missing anymore? You hadn’t actually stolen a moment with one of the chocolate-uniformed troopers, but had gotten the information from Vehrlors in a briefing after he had met with their local commander.

They were still around- waiting. Their arrival had caused a flurry of planning, and you had the feeling you and yours wouldn’t be idle for long…
>Go and ask about anything? (Of who?)
>Ask the Captain if you can scout ahead- you didn’t want to be sitting on your hands around here.
>Other?

Pastebin for past threads- https://pastebin.com/UagT0hnh
Twitter for announcements and shitposts is @scheissfunker
Rest assured anything that I will not solely post trashy softcore smut on it.

>>4748959
>>Other?
Remain as we were. Going out to scout in a tank isnt really covert. If the lines have stabilized like this the republicans or the panzergrenadiers can start patrols.

>>4748992
Supporting

>>4748959
>>Go and ask about anything? (Of who?)
Talk a bit with the brothers Von Rotehof. I assume they stick together so we can talk to them both, but if not, talking with either one will do.
Ask how they both got assigned to the same unit in the Silver Lances, it isn't exactly a proper military unit so maybe they got to pick? Has there been any use of the Bertholite shells, we have been holding off on using those but it would be good to know if the cat is already out of the bag. Does this facial scar/burn look cool or scary or ugly. Masks may be taboo here but it still might be better to cover up in a more civilian setting, avoid having women faint at the sight of us and all that.

>>4748965
Was the tasteful depiction of Anya a reference to the bygone fad of drawing tomboys shirtless in swimming trunks, or was that purely coincidence?

>>4748959
This >>4749002, otherwise just chill. Seems like we'll be going on the offensive again anyway.

>>4748965
You won't fool us. Everyone knows that you wanted a smut quest from the very beginning, but decided to add a non-porn-tier plot to it first and went a bit overboard.

>>4748959
>Ask around about Signy's status.

>>4748992
>>4749002
Im fine with talking to the brothers as well.

>>4748992
>>4749000
>>4749114
Sit in place. Wait right there.

>>4749002
>>4749075
>>4749114
Talk with Von Rotehof and Von Rotehof. Ask about your ugly face.

>>4749106
Where is eyebrows?

Writing.

>>4749002
>Was the tasteless depiction of Anya a reference to the bygone fad of drawing tomboys shirtless in swimming trunks, or was that purely coincidence?
That was the idea, yes. A creature that lives deep in the heart of Quebec whispered the suggestion in my ear and I acquiesced.

>>4749106
>You won't fool us.
I am being bullied.

The rowdy Republican soldiers seemed plenty interested in small talk, but there was only one thing you were interested in at that moment concerning them- that they’d know the status of their highest commander. Or at least, that was how you presumed the Republic’s military was arranged. Otherwise would have been strange coming out of what much of Mittelsosalia had been.

Yet you were disappointed.

“Huh?” A chubby faced fellow with badly shaved fuzz all around his cheeks and chin blinked at your query, and his comrades also stared, “Where’s the Minister of the People? Hell if I know, somewhere, right?” He turned his head to one with a tattoo of tally marks on his cheek, “You hear anything about that?”

“Nah.” Tally man pointed off south, “Anybody know, it’d be the captain or somebody like him, ‘guess. I just know that the Northerners fell t’ pieces over the last few days and each time we hit ‘em, they got a little weaker, until they folded up like paper into a ball. Those green jackets would’ve been bad news, but they’ve been pulling back too. Good for us, but we’ve had it easy. Who’s up north, half-face?”

“Green jackets, as you called them,” you said, and the lot of them frowned. They weren’t very keen on going up against the Netillians obviously. “They haven’t been active, however. Your captain, though, where can I see him?”

“He’ll be comin’ up. You in charge around here?” You replied in the negative. “Well, then he’ll probably talk with your boss.”

“I see. Thank you.” You weren’t any closer to finding out what happened to Signy, if she was still missing, or if this victory would also reveal that she was safe and sound, but it was a start towards somebody who might be able to say one way or the other. Far be it from you to start rumors in the ranks of the Republic- from the tone of the common soldiery they didn’t think their leader was missing, after all.

A quick stop back with Captain Vehrlors, and a request to send for you when he was spoken with- if the troops were coming up here, they’d talk to Vehrlors, since apparently their captain hadn’t deigned to talk with Silbertau on the way up for whatever reason. Despite the difference in the size of command Vehrlors was still rank equivalent to the officer coming up, after all. In the meantime, you thought to acquaint yourself with the other two officers in the platoon…since the day had been so calm thus far, and more and more you were looking like you might even be relieved, if not preparing to sally forth with the enemy’s inaction.

The brothers Von Rotehof were both presently at the front line, for what it was. You ambled up a communication trench, towards where their tanks were positioned on a shallow reverse slope, ready to roll forward to engage the enemy should they appear. Elder Von Rotehof, as he was called, was outside of his tank and cleaning his sidearm; an ambitious task in this dusty environment. A brass gorget with an emblem of crashing waves and a mermaid with a sword adorned his throat, the primary way you could tell him and his sibling apart. Stevan Von Rotehof, otherwise known as Little Von Rotehof, preferred to wear a set of chains from various parts of his uniform that rattled and clinked when he walked. Hausen had taken to called Stevan “Jingles.” Jorgen called him, you had learned eventually through cutting out his northern accent, “Faggot.” Neither of those names would be something you’d want to call the man when he appeared.

“Von Tracht,” Elder Von Rotehof said without looking up from his work, “What’s going on back there? A lot of noise all of a sudden.”

“The pocket to the south has been destroyed. Republic troops have moved up behind us, and a contingent just moved up here.”

“They bring any hot food with them?”

“Unfortunately no.”

“Damn.” Elder Von Rotehof spoke without any interruption for his cleaning as he put gun’s insides back into its casing, “Thought I could be hopeful there.”

It was a joke, of course. The first people to come up to the lines wouldn’t be the kitchen trains unless something had gone seriously wrong, but you sympathized with the sentiment, as petty as it was compared to falling artillery shells and sharpshooters. The coffee lately had been cold, which was somehow even worse than hot coffee, with the only accompaniment to bread being cold chunks of salted lard packed into identical cans to the bread. Rumor held that the Panzergrenadier squad had a can of pickled fruits but they’d denied such. A candy piece that had been knocked to the bottom of the tank days past had turned out to be a blessing, if a dirty one.

“I actually came out to talk with you,” you said to the Elder Von Rotehof. He raised an eyebrow at you as he paused for a moment, then clicked his pistol back together with a firm movement.

“Alright.”

“Well, first of all,” you sidled up next to him against his m/32, “I haven’t heard your first name. I can’t just keep calling you Elder or Big Von Rotehof, after all.”

“Don’t see why not.”

“Is your name a secret?” You asked, puzzled.

“Nah. It’s Lucian. Nothing wrong with it, but I like the other ones better.”

So be it. “And what about Stevan? I thought to talk to him too. To both of you.”

“He’s on the job,” Elder Von Rotehof pointed to the other tank with a casual glance upwards. “Won’t be caught slacking, as usual.” That was something you’d become faintly aware of. Stevan Von Rotehof was very much a stickler in the field when it came to when it was and wasn’t time for him to be doing something, and was as stubborn in keeping his place on the line as he was as staying off it if it wasn’t specifically his time. “Go ahead.”

“Mmhm. I wanted to ask, it’s rather unusual for siblings to be in the same platoon, isn’t it?”

“Yeah. He didn’t start out in this platoon. He transferred over after the scuffle with Valsten. I requested it. Had to keep an eye on him. He was doing his best to get into trouble last year,” Elder Von Rotehof snorted, “Not that he’d put it that way. You got into trouble last year yourself, didn’t you?”

“I did, but, I’m not sure if I see him “getting into trouble,” with how he acts…”

“You can overdo doing what you’re told,” Von Rotehof offered as explanation, “Should count himself lucky that even though he tried his best to get into a mess he never actually got into one. He never liked there being a gap between us.”

“How much of a gap is there?” You asked, “You don’t seem too much older than him.”

“Three years. I’m also married, and he’s not. Wife’s expecting our first in a few months. I think it’d be easier for him to catch up there, but I won’t fault him for getting as far as he has.”

“Oh. Congratulations.” You felt it necessary to say that, if he was going to bring that up. He had rattled it off as though it was just news…was it just his cool disposition or had he spent too long away from home?

“Thank you. I hear that you’re engaged? To what family, again?”

“Von Blum. Maddalyn Von Blum. Van Halm was familiar with them.” Perhaps more than you had expected, you recalled with a frown.

“Ah, highest of highborn,” Von Rotehof shook his head slowly, “Don’t envy you. Those families always get up into nonsense way over the heads of you or me.” You couldn’t disagree, but… “Good luck with that. What does she think of the face you have now, is that why you had a mask or whatever?”

“She,” you hesitated- Maddalyn was blind, mostly, and she couldn’t tell what your face looked like before anyways without touching it. “She’s understanding. I don’t much like showing it though. What do you think? I’d rather cover it up, if it’s all the same. I’ve had enough of women shrieking at my face.” That hadn’t happened much at all, but you’d had enough of it all the same.

“You want it the nice way or the honest way?”

“The latter.”

“It looks awful," Von Rotehof said plainly, firmly. "I’d say cover it up, but maybe other people don’t think so. I’ve seen worse, though. Saw a guy once who got most of his jaw blown off. No mask is making that look good. I’d sure as hell rather be hit with gas than get my jaw show off.”

The thought made you shiver. You’d rather not have either happen, but the Netillians had at least not bothered trying to gas you yet. Neither had your own forces against theirs- betholite shells had gone unused. The assumption by both sides, you’d heard speculated, was that both sides were equipped with gas countermeasures anyways and knew it well by this point, so it was a waste when the same munitions could be employed against, say, Republic troops, who lacked for gas countermeasures.

“It’s your thing too, isn’t it?” Von Rotehof suggested, fingering his gorget, “A lot of people’ve got their thing. You have a mask with a story?”

“Something like that. King Wladysaw XI had it made for me.”

“King who?”

“Of Ellowie,” you said, “The Netillians brought the Ellowian royal family back, but now, they’ve revolted, I believe.”

“You’re more mixed up than I thought, aren’t you?” Elder Von Rotehof said with more disinterested pity than curiosity.

“I suppose,” you admitted, “What’s the story behind that piece, then?” You asked, looking towards the gorget.

“It’s got plenty of story,” Elder Von Rotehof said, loosening it from a clasp behind his neck and holding it out for you, “I don’t know much of it, but I like to pretend a few different things. Maybe one of them’s even true.”

You took the brass piece in your wounded hand and looked closely. It was intricately detailed- with writing embossed at the top and bottom in a language you couldn’t read but might have been Vitelian. The design was quite a work of art, and flecks of paint indicated where it had been further embellished upon. “So what is it?”

“I found it while we were fighting Revolutionaries with Paelli. It’s an award from the Princes- “Valor against Dire Threats to Order.” The Princedoms have all sorts of awards like that. It’s not mine, though. I picked it off a Revolutionary Vitelian’s body.”

“Seems like something he picked off somebody himself, then,” you handed the gorget back.

“That’s what I thought too. Who knows what clown he stripped it from, going around doing how they did thinking they were old style knights when there’s machine guns all over all covered with sparkling jewelry. Maybe it’s bad luck,” he laughed softly as he put the item back around his throat, “But I like the idea of telling fate to come and get me. We’ll see if somebody strong enough to take this from me keeps it going. I like to think about how far it might go.”

Intriguing. Admittedly, the mystery of the thing was more appealing than what it was materially. “So what is one of the stories you have about it?”

“…Usually nobody asks. I’ve an idea. We’ll make one together. You tell me who the guy who was awarded this was like, what he did, how he bit it. I’ll complete the story telling you about the guy I took this off of. Sound interesting?”

It seemed the decision was already made for you. Even though you knew next to nothing about Paelli, besides what your crew said of serving with them, indicating that they were a far-west influenced people rooted in tradition, aristocracy, and flamboyance- a wealthy, cultural sort, even if the Iceforth Gale blocked off the routes that enriched them in the past. Maybe that was interesting to Von Rotehof, though?

>Who was the mysterious person who this gorget was originally rewarded to? What was their story?

>>4749417
>>Who was the mysterious person who this gorget was originally rewarded to? What was their story?
Some old noble who got that from putting down a rebellion;maybe the last time the Utopianists got uppity before this? Died defending his estate during the opening parts of the war and the Revs probably looted it along with whatever else he had.

>>4749417
Beloved by his fellows and eager to please his commanders, the man was always the sort to step up for the dangerous missions and opt to be the last one out during a retreat. When asked why he was so ready to fight and potentially die, however, he never gave the same answer twice.
"I fight for the glory of my motherland."
"I fight for the beauty and tragedy of combat."
"I fight for the ghost of my father and the health of my mother."
"I fight for my wonderful wife and daughter waiting for me at home."
Instead of giving a straight answer, he would spin strange and elaborate tales. Stories to boost the morale of those who listened, and perhaps to even fool himself for a time.
One night, however, after a particularly grand showing of bravery and skill, the young warrior was enjoying perhaps one too many drinks with his fellows. They laughed and drank and made merry as if they were at a festival instead of a warzone. A great time was had by all.
Eventually, one of the younger soldiers asked the man why he was so brave, why he fought, and expecting another fictitious story the whole company gathered around.
But when he spoke, what came out wasn't another story, boast, or long-winded diatribe.
What came out, after 10 years of noble service, was the truth.
"I fight to live, and live to die."
There was an awful silence, and then a few scoffs from those still eager to continue the party despite the thoroughly ruined mood. But despite the almost desperate revelry of that night, the words of the noble warrior echoed in the heads of all who heard what would be his final explanation.
For it was the very next outing, that the noble warrior died, never again to tell another lie or spin another tale.

>>4749417
It wast the righ-hand man and clsoest confidant of one of the Princes, a man famed for his combat prowess. But despite being normally quite boastful, he never once said what he was awarded this thing for, and even punched a few people who were too persistent with their questions.
One day, a letter with a duel challenge was found stuck to his door with a dagger. That evening, he left his home, and the following morning his body was found, sans the gorget.

>>4749417
>>4749458
A man who lives to fight, maybe the last battle he fought in turned out to be the last one of the conflict?

>>4749449
The old noble

>>4749458
>>4749819
The big talker.

>>4749593
A champ.

Writing.

It took some thought. You didn’t know much about Paelli besides where it was, but with a name like the Confederation of Princedoms you could guess what it was like, mostly. One person was built- then another, and…should you combine them? Maybe a couple?

“Really putting thought into this, aren’t you.” Von Rotehof said to your brow-buckling.

“Shouldn’t I?” You retorted, “Give me another minute.” You hoped that the Netillians wouldn’t pick now to resume their activities from before. “…Alright. I have it. Here’s how it started.”

Once, in the Confederate Princedoms of Paelli, there was a noble landowner, a confidant of one of the mighty Princes, famed for his skill in martial matters and battle. He had no small amount of pride for his position and his skill, but the one thing he had that marked him the most as a man of respect was an award he wore around his neck- one he refused to say how he had received. Some speculated that he had put down a local rebellion in his state, of the peasantry, and that he found it distasteful. None ever found out. Any who asked too persistently were met with violent dissuasion. Eventually, one of the curious folk grew frustrated, and decided to see if this noble, having grown older, was the real thing. A dagger in his door, a challenge to duel.

Of course, the proud noble could not turn down even an anonymous request. So he left that evening with an odd spring to his step he hadn’t had in a long time. The next he was seen, he was dead- and the recognition of his deeds was gone from his body.

The inheritor, the usurper, whatever one might wish to call him, had that recognition he thirsted for, that he felt another held undeserved, yet he suffered the curse of the forbearer- he could tell nobody how he had earned his decoration.

Then the war began.

Lusting to justify his theft of glory, the man volunteered for the most dangerous missions, held out in the most desperate of struggles, refused to retreat until he was the last away. Whenever he was asked about the gorget that designated glory, he had a different story each time. Some true perhaps, others false. He changed it every time, as did he change his motivation, depending upon whom he spoke to.

Some liked a nationalist bent, others the familial obligation. Sometimes for bloodlust itself, as the war drew all sorts. Those who lived in the present, for good or evil. In the mud and blood, after all, one could never quite tell if the man next to them was a philanthropist or a rapist the last day.

Ten years after he had claimed his glory, however, the man was asked by a young soldier why he fought, and he had gone deeper in his cups than usual that night.
His answer, that he had finally found after so much time, was thus.

“I fight to live, and live to die.”

He left as the voices of all about were stolen save for skeptical muttering. The next battle he fought was his final one, and the last of the war, where the legacy passed to another man.

“Hah. If only that was the last battle. That’s a pretty poem,” Von Rotehof the Elder said, though not mockingly. “Want me to correct some things or do you like your story the way it is?”

“I don’t mind,” you said, hopeful for the chance to learn new things. Your ignorance of parts of the world was ever painful even if not many noticed. Each piece of information was like a coin found again.

“Alright. For one thing, Paellans don’t duel, they’re too dandy for that. They’re not the same stock as Strossvalders. There’s no rules against it because they just don’t do it. They just like to show off more than each other.”

“Maybe the man wasn’t a native then?”

“Maybe so.” Von Rotehof allowed, “The other thing, you might have guessed. Paelli didn’t back out of the Vitelian War because they won. That war’s still going on. They turned tail and went back because Kallec came down and started kicking their home armies to pieces. This thing wasn’t on a Kallean, it was on a Vitelian. In fact, the last big set of messes the Paellans fought against the Revolutionaries, the Battles of Lapizlazulli- we weren’t there, of course- they got their asses handed to them by the Utopianists three times in a row. Not a good note to go out on. The Revolutionaries were down then, too. Kalleans ripped them apart like they were a bunch of naked virgin girls.”

“I…see.” Von Rotehof seemed to scoff the most at the idea that anybody from Paelli could be what was called a respected warrior, but he didn’t say so directly. “What about your part, then?”

“I’m not going to say it as wordy as yours. Thought you’d only say a few sentences at most. I appreciate it, but I’m not going to change my story now.” He had finished reassembling his pistol, unrecognizable to you but some sort of foreign automatic. “The Revolutionary who picked this up was a worm. He saw pretty things and took them, whether they were things or people. Couldn’t help himself, couldn’t say why he did it besides that he could and he thought he deserved something for being on the right side. One time, he followed his greedy snout into a house that hadn’t been pillaged, and while he was sifting around in the dark, the moonlight glinted off his pretty necklace. Somebody staying in the house saw. And…” He stretched the pistol out towards the distance as though aiming at an invisible man, and dry fired the pistol. “Got a gift for his trouble.”

“…That was how you got it?” You asked.

“Maybe.” Von Rotehof winked. “Who knows what they did. You have to accept that at some point, I think. When it comes to fighting battles, there’s a good chance the world won’t know or care what you did, even in your own time, but some people don’t like hearing that. Like Little Von Rotehof.”

“That sounds pessimistic.”

“Maybe. But I don’t have much to deal with, and I like it like that.” Elder Von Rotehof slipped a magazine into his pistol, chambered a round, then holstered it. Safety off? “You though. You’ve got some fame, getting married to a high house noblewoman. You like your grandiose stories?”

>Yeah. So? You were from a family of grandiose stories. Why cross what you were at this point?
>The ambition you had wasn’t as reckless as Von Rotehof was implying. Everything out of the ordinary that had happened to you wasn’t even your fault for falling into, your betrothal included. Fate just had funny plans for you.
>You wouldn’t mind settling down some, to be honest. You didn’t need more fame than you had now and you didn’t care what your fiancée’s title was.
>Other?

>>4750723
>The ambition you had wasn’t as reckless as Von Rotehof was implying. Everything out of the ordinary that had happened to you wasn’t even your fault for falling into, your betrothal included. Fate just had funny plans for you.

Why does Richter not simply put foundation over the scar? You know back at home not on the battlefield where they'll laugh at him.

>>4750723
>You wouldn’t mind settling down some, to be honest. You didn’t need more fame than you had now and you didn’t care what your fiancée’s title was.
Richter's already gone way beyond what his parents wanted or planned for him.

>>4750723
>The ambition you had wasn’t as reckless as Von Rotehof was implying. Everything out of the ordinary that had happened to you wasn’t even your fault for falling into, your betrothal included. Fate just had funny plans for you.

>>4750723
>The ambition you had wasn’t as reckless as Von Rotehof was implying. Everything out of the ordinary that had happened to you wasn’t even your fault for falling into, your betrothal included. Fate just had funny plans for you
Judge's Plan, Judge's Plan.
He hold back, sometimes he won't, yuh.
He feel good, sometimes he don't, ayy, don't.

But also
>You wouldn’t mind settling down some, to be honest. You didn’t need more fame than you had now and you didn’t care what your fiancée’s title was.
Richter's done it.
He's fought the good fight, he's put his mark on history, and history's put its mark on him. All the ancestors are proud. Hell is smiling down on him. Richter's even a sorta folk hero in some places.
That's the checklist done.
No need to stick around longer than he needed, especially without an heir to leave behind to carry on the self-destructive flame of Von Tract ambition.

>>4750723
>>The ambition you had wasn’t as reckless as Von Rotehof was implying. Everything out of the ordinary that had happened to you wasn’t even your fault for falling into, your betrothal included. Fate just had funny plans for you.

>>4750723
>>You wouldn’t mind settling down some, to be honest. You didn’t need more fame than you had now and you didn’t care what your fiancée’s title was.
Looking forward to that peaceful home life that is totally going to happen when this is all over.

>>4750723
>The ambition you had wasn’t as reckless as Von Rotehof was implying. Everything out of the ordinary that had happened to you wasn’t even your fault for falling into, your betrothal included. Fate just had funny plans for you.

>>4750723
>>The ambition you had wasn’t as reckless as Von Rotehof was implying. Everything out of the ordinary that had happened to you wasn’t even your fault for falling into, your betrothal included. Fate just had funny plans for you.

>>4750723
>Yeah. So? You were from a family of grandiose stories. Why cross what you were at this point?

>>4750723
>You wouldn’t mind settling down some, to be honest. You didn’t need more fame than you had now and you didn’t care what your fiancée’s title was.

>>4750723
>The ambition you had wasn’t as reckless as Von Rotehof was implying. Everything out of the ordinary that had happened to you wasn’t even your fault for falling into, your betrothal included. Fate just had funny plans for you.
But
>Other?
The Silver Lances, while a high point, won't be the end of it. Maybe not a Sosaldt Warlord or Champion of Chivalry but fate has it's hands on Richter and it ain't lettin' go.

>>4750728
>>4750736
>>4750754
>>4750789
>>4750849
>>4751102
>>4751338
Ambition? You're not trying to find dangerous holes to fall into, you've just managed to survive them. Well enough.

>>4750733
>>4750754
>>4750815
>>4751303
But I've certainly done plenty as things stand, haven't I?

>>4751171
I'm me, so what?

Writing.

>>4750733
>Why does Richter not simply put foundation over the scar? You know back at home not on the battlefield where they'll laugh at him.
Of course at the present moment makeup is in rather shot supply, but the other thing would be...well, one has to assume somebody like Richter doesn't have much knowledge of cosmetics at all. To him makeup is just something women put on just because they do. His own fiancee does refer to him as acting like a rube, after all.

“Grandiose?” You repeated with a curve of your eyebrow, “I’m not that reckless. Everything out of the ordinary that’s happened to me hasn’t been something I sought out, not even my betrothal. The whims of fate just have odd ideas for me.”

“Not even your betrothal?” Elder Von Rotehof picked up on, “You ever been with a girl before your fiancée?”

“…No.”

“As long as you’re both happy, then,” Von Rotehof shrugged. “But if fate’s got odd ideas for you then I think you’re heading for a real mess if you don’t try and act against it. Unless that’s something you don’t mind?”

Well. No. You’d rather things calm down for a bit, but you couldn’t quite put it that way after what you said, could you? A frown crossed your face before you answered. “I’m not at my limit, I don’t see this as the end, mind you, but…I wouldn’t mind if this was the highest I’ve come, as long as I still get to settle down at the end of it.”

“Fine with fate, but you’d prefer the calmer side?” Von Rotehof stretched his arms over his head, “I feel that, Lieutenant. I truly do. Leaf on the water. Floating down the cool river with the sun on your chest.”

A look around. “This is a funny idea of a cool river, isn’t it?”

Von Rotehof smiled. “Don’t think about it too hard. It’s not worth it if you overthink things, might end up like the Captain where you get funny ideas about what’s at the end of the water, and how you can change it.” He looked past you, “Somebody’s coming for you, looks like. Either Vehrlors wants you, or somebody wants to find out if your masked man has any ripe sisters.”

It was indeed one of Vehrlors’s crewmen- and you went to him after a short thanks to Von Rotehof for talking, but the news you expected wasn’t something you could put off finding out about.

“So uh,” the driver whispered to you as he led you along, “You’ve got a mosshead driver, yeah?”

…

-----

Captain Vehrlors was in an animated discussion with a Republic infantry officer when you arrived. The Republic Officer was grizzled enough, but he must have taken his new allegiance seriously with the lack of pre-Republic nostalgia on his person. The only divergence from the brown and black Republic uniform was that he had captured a steel helmet from some place at some time and protected his head with it, casting a dark shadow over his face that itself was shadowed by scruff that needed a razor taken to it, unless it was actually iron filings all over his jaw and not beard.

“I don’t care what your orders are,” Vehrlors said to the other officer, “I don’t do what you say. Lieutenant Colonel Von Silbertau will pass it down when it’s time to go.”
“The time is now, damn it,” the Republic officer snapped, “We just sliced through the south like a hot knife through butter. The momentum’s on our side. Our orders are to hit as hard and fast as we can while they’re off balance. If we just sit here and wait for your own commander to send his own orders to do the same thing, they’ll regain their balance!”

“You just got here, and we’ve been on this line for days. Don’t try and tell me what the situation is.” Vehrlors said in a warning tone.

“Excuse me,” you interrupted, “Your orders?” You asked the Mittelsosalian captain, “From who, the Minister of the People? Cyclops?”

“Huh? Sure, at some level.” The officer was caught off guard before he found defiance again, “Who the hell are you?”

“Lieutenant Richter Von Tracht, once known as the Kommandant,” you retorted, having no patience for establishing who the big dog was more subtly, “Where is Cyclops? Does anybody know?”

This person must not have been part of the original army of the Republic since they didn’t immediately submit, but he’d clearly heard of your reputation still. “Don’t know. The orders were given before the pocket fell through.”

“Damn you,” you snapped at the officer, “Can anybody give me an actual answer? Don’t you care if your leader is missing in action?”

“Lieutenant!” Vehrlors barked at you, “Control yourself.”

You bristled only slightly less. Shortage of sleep didn’t improve one’s temper, and you wanted to get mad at something for this.

“Yeah, we haven’t heard anything,” the Republic officer said defensively, “But nobody’s heard shit for a while. You know how the long range radios have been. What’s wrong with you, though? What, you don’t have any faith in her?”

“Mmrgh.” You growled at that implication, but…

“Enough,” Vehrlors cut both of you off, “Captain Waeden, I won’t stop you if you want to take your men forward, but the enemy in this area has mechanized and armored assets even though their artillery has been quiet. I’d advise you wait for my commander to pass down orders unless you want to take your chances with tanks. Otherwise, you can sit here, dig in, and wait. We’ve been told to expect to hold position for some time longer. The main effort’s on the highway, and that’s not here.”

“Hrmph.” The Republic Officer crossed his arms and glowered, but had no response. “I’ll wait an hour at most, your boss better get back to mine by then at least.”

“You won’t do it in my face. Get out of here.” Vehrlors dismissed the officer with a wave of his hand, and to your surprise, the Republic captain actually left, scowling. Vehrlors set his gaze upon you, no more friendly. “You alright there, Lieutenant?”

“What do you mean?” you asked, with an itch in the back of your throat.

“You’re rather badly wounded. I won’t keep you on the line if you don’t think you’re up for it. We’ve held out fine. Maybe you’ll find out something on the way back?”

“Sir,” you slackened at the shoulders, “I don’t know what you mean.” You did, though. He implied that he’d be letting you go on your way, to eventually get back to the rear lines, but…

“Either you’ve got your head together or I’m sending you back myself,” Vehrlors said, “I don’t need somebody who’s got their mistress on the mind, no matter how good a tanker they are otherwise. Got it?”

>You got it. The Republic Officer was right, you just had to have faith in Signy. And you had to stay here with your platoon either way.
>Weren’t you right to be concerned? This was a terrible circumstance for all involved! If the leader of the Republic had been killed, it was possible all the things you’d fought for thus far would fall apart!
>Maybe you ought to go back and heal some, yes- but you didn’t want to leave your platoon lacking. You’d leave your crew and the m/32B here, and head back. Maybe you did need it.
>Other?

>>4751795
>You got it. The Republic Officer was right, you just had to have faith in Signy. And you had to stay here with your platoon either way.

>>4751795
>You got it. The Republic Officer was right, you just had to have faith in Signy. And you had to stay here with your platoon either way.
Finding out her fate won't change anything. If we can't take our tank and go save her from whatever, may as well stay put.

>>4751795
>You got it. The Republic Officer was right, you just had to have faith in Signy. And you had to stay here with your platoon either way.
Obligatory 'she's not my mistress'

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>>4751795
>You got it. The Republic Officer was right, you just had to have faith in Signy. And you had to stay here with your platoon either way.
I see elsewhere that artistic tanq has made a come back. If you're up for taking requests I'd personally like to see a quick doodle of the moment in thread #68 when the artillery struck as Richter was passing around the tube of chocolate buttons, a la pic related.

>>4751795
>>Other?
The last time we fought with the republicans someone made a sacrifice so we could win the larger battle. That time though we were in a position to bail them out of it and we did. It's different now, we can't just go out alone, looking for a Signy that might be dead, fine, or encircled by enemies. It isn't our place now to make the plan, just follow it, but what if the plan was for this republican force to be the rescue that we were back then?

>>4751795
>Maybe you ought to go back and heal some, yes- but you didn’t want to leave your platoon lacking. You’d leave your crew and the m/32B here, and head back. Maybe you did need it.

>>4751800
>>4751806
>>4751807
>>4751977
One way or another, you're here.

>>4751990
This may as well be the plan for all we know.

>>4752303
Head back by yourself.
This would have been a time skip of course but one could assume that.

Writing.

>>4751977
>If you're up for taking requests
I'll see what I can do but I'll warn that my rate of drawing is extremely variable for both time taken and actual quality of result.

He was right, you admitted to yourself with a grit of your teeth, you had other things to focus on- and there wasn’t anything you could do about this anyways. As was the Republic Officer- at this point, the best thing you could do was believe in Signy, at least a little, if only to keep the matter from distracting you. Besides, what if this was part of a plan that you simply weren’t privy to? What if you were just hurrying into worries right as the problem would be resolved? You’d seen this sort of thing play out before in the past, to a degree. Perhaps the infantry that had just swept up and crushed the enemy to the south had been the relief for the risk taken that had resulted in the Minister of the People’s disappearance? They had said the enemy had folded in on themselves and weakened. Perhaps something more was at play here.

“I got it,” you said, shaking your head, “I’m fine, I’ll stay here.” A pause. “She’s not my mistress, either.”

“Good to keep you here,” Vehrlors said, ignoring your retort about his implication, “Go ahead and get back in reserve. The Lieutenant Colonel will be making a decision soon, same with Battalion, the whole Division. Just do what you were doing before, but we shouldn’t be going on the attack any time soon. Not in this situation.”

“Yes, sir,” you saluted lazily, coughed, then tried again for a much better salute.

“Don’t break your arm there, Lieutenant,” the Captain said with a returned salute, “Van Halm doesn’t need your company, I’ll bet.”

-----

The commanders of the military forces of the Allied Republics had reason to be pleased, as they met in the captured fortress that had once overlooked the Northway Road, one of a string that had had to be overcome before pressing further north along the ideal route of offense. There was the notable lack of a particular head of state, but there was reason to believe she would come back up again- and frankly, most there were relieved to not have the upstart young woman around for a little bit, out of place as she was in general, not just at a command table.

If recent rumor were true, though, she had an important part in causing the collapse of the pocket that had created this opportunity, though.

Ever since the positive identification and destruction of the first radio-nullification device, targeted air raids had whittled down their numbers, gradually, to the point that the Netillians had grown more cautious in their deployment. One had yet to be captured, so their exact functions and capabilities were impossible to determine, but the Ellowian Air Force commanders had reported that their “capabilities” were not being interfered with to the degree they formerly were, after a series of strike missions against scouted instances of the RN-Devices. The long and short of it was that the thread had, while not eliminated, been reduced. The Netillian interference in the skies had been all too brief, and in the time they had blocked the most potent support available to the alliance of Republics, they had failed to capitalize on the advantage they had had.

That wasn’t to say the battle was won, far from it. The lines had almost shattered, and it was a wonder that the pocket created of Northern Lords’ forces had remained at all- it had been completely breached, yet the enemy had failed to move out of it before counterattacks against the extended Netillians had forced them back. Even so, scout flights had indicated that the Netillians were bringing up more troops and withdrawing their spent ones, and were readying for another offensive. The lines were in a much more durable state, but all the signs indicated that this next offensive would be much fiercer, and lack the stumbling the first attempt had had, and even that had broken open the lines through superiority of materiel and organization in places, particularly against the Republic troops, though less so against the Ellowian ground forces.

Thus, it was decided that the Netillians couldn’t be allowed to organize this next offensive- a decisive battle had to be won against them, not their Sosaldtian thralls. So the next battles were planned in haste- ones both on the home front, and on new fronts alike, to place pressure upon the Netillians from weaker points not anticipated even by the commanders of the allied forces.

This was a subject of debate, however. The commanders of the Mittelsosalia forces argued that to take forces off the line here was to threaten the integrity of the operations in Sosaldt, and the ones most crucial to forcing a quick end to the war by directly invading Netilland and following the Northway Road all the way to the enemy capital city of Berkesseburg. The representative from the King’s Revolt, of course, advocated reinforcements being transferred through the Spout into Ellowie to help the war there, but he received little support, especially from the expatriate Ellowian commanders who smelled a conspiracy to usurp their Republic.

Yet also, a “prisoner” had been flown down that day, a Netillian “captured” in the territory of occupied Ellowie. He spoke furtively with unusual guests that had come from the Archduchy- and those guests spoke furtively with the commanders of the Silver Lances. Some agreements made- other things being refused, as an impossibility. Ultimately, the suspect figures could not get what they wanted- and so arranged their plans on their own.

The next few days were set to be quite interesting indeed, no matter how the plans were finalized.

-----

The word had come back from Von Silbertau, and all in your platoon were made aware- you were to hold the lines as they were, as Vehrlors had expected would be the decision.
This was not a popular decision with the Republic troops, however, and you saw them moving all around instead of digging in further.

“Let them,” Captain Vehrlors had said over the platoon net when both you and the younger Von Rotehof observed this, “We can’t tell them what to do. They can’t push us around and we can’t either. They’ll have to learn the hard way if they don’t feel like taking my good advice.”

Scout parties attempted to go out, before being set upon by the sharpshooters that had been harassing you these past few days. Not that you saw this directly, but you could tell what was happening just by the sounds, and by the stretcher bearers solemnly walking back soon after. Yet, younger Von Rotehof was reporting, an advancement in the lines was in progress. It appeared the Republic infantry commander was set on leaving you behind, no matter what might be ahead. No matter if he’d been warned of potential enemy strength- of being lured into a fight he couldn’t win. You’d seen the breadth of the Republic infantry’s equipment now- they lacked for many things that would have been standard for your own people. Gas masks, anti-tank guns, they even lacked for anti-tank rifles, and even the squad of Panzergrenadier assigned to your platoon had a beaten, well used one in their trenches. They used it to return fire to the skirmishers sometimes- it scared them away, if nothing else.

The fighting about a kilometer ahead escalated, and the Republic infantry company had left your position entirely to fight up ahead in their brewing battle…much to the younger Von Rotehof’s chagrin.

“Captain!” He protested over the radio, “We can’t sit here any longer, can we? I request permission to go up and help those Republic troops in whatever they’re fighting, I feel useless back here!”

“…You won’t go up alone,” Vehrlors replied, “If you can get somebody else to go with you, then I’ll allow it.”

“Nope.” Elder Von Rotehof said right after, “If they get themselves into trouble that’s their own foolishness. We go up there, we suffer for their mistakes. Keep it together, brother.”
Vehrlors’s vote had been implicitly cast- you were the last one who might say anything, and the moment of silence was full of the younger Von Rotehof’s anticipation of your response- you were his last hope to charge forward.

>Hell, why not? You could handle whatever trouble there might be. It’d be no problem at all. Volunteer to go with the younger Von Rotehof.
>If nobody else was volunteering, there was good reason for you to not do so. Bad luck, little Von Rotehof, but this was how it was.
>Other?

>>4752865
>If nobody else was volunteering, there was good reason for you to not do so. Bad luck, little Von Rotehof, but this was how it was.

Take it from personal experience, you'll get plenty of action without needing to actively seek it.

>>4752865
>>Hell, why not? You could handle whatever trouble there might be. It’d be no problem at all. Volunteer to go with the younger Von Rotehof.
Just, don't go over any hills where there are big booms coming from behind them.

>>4752865
>If nobody else was volunteering, there was good reason for you to not do so. Bad luck, little Von Rotehof, but this was how it was.

>>4752865
>>If nobody else was volunteering, there was good reason for you to not do so. Bad luck, little Von Rotehof, but this was how it was.
Theres glory to be won yet. Conserve our strength for the breakthrough instead of wasting it in the grinder.

>>4752865
>>Hell, why not? You could handle whatever trouble there might be. It’d be no problem at all. Volunteer to go with the younger Von Rotehof.
Just simple infantry support, we'll pull out if things get hairy.

>>4752865
>why not? You could handle whatever trouble there might be. It’d be no problem at all. Volunteer to go with the younger Von Rotehof.

>>4752865
>If nobody else was volunteering, there was good reason for you to not do so. Bad luck, little Von Rotehof, but this was how it was.
So we'll get no support, no reinforcements and be overextended even if we win. I think we've danced to this tune before.

>>4752865
>Hell, why not? You could handle whatever trouble there might be. It’d be no problem at all. Volunteer to go with the younger Von Rotehof.
If the infantry just dies, we\ll lose them for nothing.

Rolled 2 (1d2)

Alright then.

>>4752878
>>4753235
>>4753241
>>4753599
Bad luck for you, bad luck for them. They were told not to and did it anyways, and you've better to spend yourself on.

>>4753056
>>4753347
>>4753581
>>4753700
Why not? Are you incapable? You've sat on your ass long enough, you're a doer.

Time to flip that coin. 1 for the first, 2 for the latter.

It was a harder decision than you thought it’d be. Logically, you had your orders, the Republic troops had known the consequences, and you were under no obligation to go out when your superiors had other plans in mind. Von Rotehof the Younger wanted the action- his brother had told you repeatedly how he sought glory. There’d be plenty of action to come, plenty of fighting to do. There wasn’t any need to seek it out in a war, you knew- even if one tried to avoid it, it just had a tendency to come for you anyways.

Yet. It was something so small, wasn’t it? Infantry support. Simple and easy. If something bad did happen, all this backup that had come up would be wasted. You were the Kommandant, weren’t you? Was this famous semi-legendary being you’d inspired somebody who’d sit on their hands even when prompted by another?

Some fire in your belly again? No, Little Von Rotehof was the one with the fire. You had the sense- and he might need that sense, too, even if he wouldn’t have struck off by himself if told not to. There simply was no reasonable answer against the basic question of why not? So long as you didn’t go about this without any head whatsoever, this would just be an errand.

As much as an errand in an active war zone could be. It wasn’t something small to most, you thought suddenly- that sense of arrogance had been crafted by just how much more you’d found yourself in. Such as the events only a few days past.

“Four One,” you spoke up, “This is Four Five. I’ll volunteer to go with Four Three.”

An exasperated sigh from Vehrlors that he made sure to transmit. He’d extended the offer as a possibility to placate Stevan, but he hadn’t expected you to actually take it. It was a complicated sigh, like he didn’t like the result but knew it might have come, considering your history. “Affirmative. Four Five, accompany Four Three to the operations ahead. The very moment I command you to return to our lines, I expect you to do it. Understood?”

“Understood, Four One!” Little Von Rotehof was excited- he was jumping for a chance, much like you remember doing often not so long ago. Repeatedly. Mistakes? “Hurry up, Four Five, there’s no time to lose!”

The sound of an engine stirring up into gear. He’d already had the tank’s engine started. “Yes, yes.” You took the headset off from your ears and stood up out of the cupola. “Hausen! Jorgen! Mal!” You shouted out of the tank to the three crew outside the tank (Schafer was snoozing in his seat), “Mount up and start the engine! We’re moving!”

“Moving?” Hausen repeated as he stood up, a flurry of custom playing cards scattering with him, and he snatched his hands about to try and catch them before they fluttered every which way.

“Thaell for?” Jorgen demanded, not happy to have whatever card game they were playing be interrupted. You didn’t know the game, but the cards were Hausen’s- custom pieces each with a different tinted photo of a comely western-looking woman upon it (in varying dress or undress). “An attahk?”

“No, we’re moving up to support the infantry that went forward with another of our tanks,” you hurriedly explained, “Come on, he’s already on his way.”

The cards were packed up before you were done talking, and your crew piled into the tank despite their grumblings at surprise assignments. Jorgen shoved Schafer roughly and the gunner, swearing with being awoken so, demanded to know what happened. Jorgen told him grumpily while you set yourself back on the radio.

“Don’t go too far, Four Three,” you said warily as the engine cranked and sputtered to be put to life again. “My tank’s engine’s still cold.”

“Then catch up when you can. What’s there to fear? I’m a Silver Lance, as are you.”

Even though his time in the recent war with Valsten had apparently seen no battles from what you’d been told, you had to assume he had some veterancy in some conflict. You’d have to question which later- else this confidence would be foolhardy even for yourself.

“Hurry up, Mal,” you said over the intercom, “Little Von Rotehof’s off like he’s chasing a skirt.”

“Arrededd skaert?” Jorgen asked with some humor dissolving his grouchiness from having his game interrupted.

“As long as that doesn’t happen to be in a surprise we can’t handle,” you grumbled.

After a minute, the engine finally sputtered to life, unhappy as everybody else seemed to be at being summoned to action again with no notice, but the machine that you rode in at least couldn’t express itself in foul language or jokes at your expense. As far as you knew. “Catch up to Four Three, driver!” You said over the intercom as you settled against the edge of the commander’s cupola, head and shoulders turned out. Just a moment to let them rest against it, you’d be in your familiar hunched over position soon enough, with your arms and legs aching right down to fingers that weren’t even on your hands anymore.

Von Rotehof’s tank hadn’t taken off at full sprint, but he was still a good hundred meters ahead. The area ahead was rather open for a ways, so he would have been easy to spot even if you had waited two more minutes. The intermittent grass, depressions and rises, the scraggly bushes that called themselves trees, were all there, and would matter more once you were off the elevation of the hill, but for the most part the terrain in front was quite even, which had been part of why enemy attacks on your position had encountered frustration.

While you could still look from above, you surveyed the skirmish- not seeing much of the enemy, but plenty of concentrations of Republic troops. There was plenty of shooting, but from the slow forward progress the Republic soldiers made, the Netillians were giving up ground rather than committing to a pitched fight.

In the distance, though, a pair of familiar armored hulks. Beasts that looked as though trucks had bred bastards with bunkers. The armored personnel carriers the Netillians favored for their most modern Mechanized units- but they were idle. Such vehicles had learned to keep from exposing themselves near the Silver Lances, you’d heard, but these weren’t even making an attempt to support from afar. Did they see no need to, or were they waiting for a fight to come to them? Whilst their armament was ineffective against tanks, the small turret with a machine gun and a thing that looked like a mortar tube stuck where a gun would be was certainly of use against infantry. You’d have to keep an eye on them if they moved up, but right now, they were in cover, passive, and far away.

No, now that you looked at them, they had begun moving away. Meanwhile, the sounds of gunfire had thinned, moving on- the Republic troops you passed were in the process of moving forward, changing their positions, lugging forth heavy machine guns that looked as old as you were.

“They’re running like rats, Four Five,” Von Rotehof declared to you. “There’s no stiffness”

“Running away rather too easily,” you replied, “Don’t you think?”

“Oh, of course it’s a trap,” Von Rotehof said haughtily, “But we can spring it before they’re ready. They can’t keep being flaccid like this if we spear them in twain. Come on now, to the very front with both of us!”

You looked around a moment. The ground was open- far from ideal to defend on. Ideal tank country, truly. There was cover, but not many blind spots at all. The further you went forward, though, the smaller your allies behind were getting. There wasn’t even a fight had by you yet- your vehicle hadn’t fired its weapons once since arriving on the scene.

>Somehow you didn’t think purposely springing a trap was something you were interested in doing. Firmly declare you would be supporting the infantry, from well within their lines.
>He was right, after a fashion, was he not? After days of you remaining dug in the last thing the Netillians might expect was for you to just barrel forward into them.
>If Von Rotehof wanted to play the champion, let him. Say you’ll cover him from the rear if he wants to be at the tip of the spear.
>Other?

>>4754198
>>He was right, after a fashion, was he not? After days of you remaining dug in the last thing the Netillians might expect was for you to just barrel forward into them.

At least we know we should be able to survive most hits, to a degree thanks to our special armor; so we should be able to get him out since he is determined to get in over his head.

>>4754198
>Somehow you didn’t think purposely springing a trap was something you were interested in doing. Firmly declare you would be supporting the infantry, from well within their lines.
Who wants to bet there'll be mines and camoed AT guns?

>>4754198
>Somehow you didn’t think purposely springing a trap was something you were interested in doing. Firmly declare you would be supporting the infantry, from well within their lines.
It's times like this where I wish I remembered the details of those tank theory books Richter had.

>>4754198
>Somehow you didn’t think purposely springing a trap was something you were interested in doing. Firmly declare you would be supporting the infantry, from well within their lines.
Remind him they've had *days* to be ready for an attack.
Also the Nets would much rather draw us away and fight than anywhere near where the rest of our tanks are.

>>4754198
>>Somehow you didn’t think purposely springing a trap was something you were interested in doing. Firmly declare you would be supporting the infantry, from well within their lines.
He's probably right but if there's a trap it's the Republic infantry's job to spring it. This is their attack after all.

>>4754198
>Somehow you didn’t think purposely springing a trap was something you were interested in doing. Firmly declare you would be supporting the infantry, from well within their lines.

>>4754198
>>Somehow you didn’t think purposely springing a trap was something you were interested in doing. Firmly declare you would be supporting the infantry, from well within their lines.

>>4754237
Yeah let's get up there, though I'm far more survivable than you.

>>4754275
>>4754322
>>4754366
>>4754384
>>4754477
>>4754595
You know, just because you don't have fingers doesn't mean you're all for poking mousetraps.

Writing.

“I don’t think I’ll be doing that, Four Three,” you replied, “I don’t need to remind that the Netillians have had days to prepare for an attack. I will remain with the infantry, supporting them from well within their lines. We are the support, not the tip of the spear. Even if you’re right, it is the infantry’s work to disarm any traps, not ours.”

Little Von Rotehof’s resolve faltered when you didn’t back him up on his initiative. “Ah, um. Yes. Four Five. I suppose you have a point. We cannot steal all the prizes, can we?”

Especially not the much desired prizes of anti-tank guns lying in ambush and anti-tank mines. “Right. This is their offensive, after all.” You ducked back into the cupola instead of waiting for somebody to fire a round over your head, and looked for conflict. “…Gunner, look to the ten degrees, one of the friendly machine gunners is suppressing that position. Load high explosive and put a round in there.”

“Aye Lieutenant.”

So the fighting proceeded, with the Netillian refusal to give battle making you and Von Rotehof’s work quite simple. Not easy, however- the Netillians refused to make good targets of themselves, and more often than not your attacks did no harm to the enemy as they took notice of your arrival quickly and took care to avoid the fields of fire you dominated. They couldn’t do such completely with the terrain as open as it was, but even an experienced gunner like Schafer had to continually reacquire targets elsewhere as the enemy refused to be pinned for more than moments.

“They picked the good guys for this,” Schafer observed aloud as another enemy slipped away, “These guys are different. Look different too.”

“How so?” You asked, “Driver, forward, take us up next to that friendly machine gun position. We’ll steal their vantage point.”

“The helmets are different shape, and the uniforms. They’ve got camouflage,” Schafer listed off, “They’re tough too. Bet they have armor.”

“That doesn’t help much against rifle fire, does it?” You faintly recalled.

“No, but it keeps the fragmentation from our explosive shots from doing the damage they could over a distance.”

“The bow gun can’t depress at this angle,” Hausen said as the tank stopped, “Can you take us forward?”

You acquiesced to that, and thought about taking a look at the enemy yourself with your binoculars, before thinking better of it. If these men were indeed cut from better stock, exposing yourself to tempt their marksmanship seemed a bad idea. There was no Maddalyn here to reverse the effects of a rifle shot to the chest. There would surely be casualties or prisoners that were safer to look at, after all.

Rolled 58 (1d100)

Except, you noticed through the slow progression northwards, there…wasn’t. Not in frequency for you to notice well at least. The Mittelsosalians meanwhile were getting well bled for their progress.

“We aren’t harming the enemy much for this open ground,” you said to your crew. No good defensive position was being taken with this- it was merely northward progress, and not even on the great highway to the east.

“They don’t have much use for it either,” Hausen said, “Northman, you wouldn’t want to fight on this if you were them, would you?”

“Nah. I’daeve laeft, naet faetet laek thaere.”

So from Jorgen’s point of view, the Netillians should have just left this ground as quickly as they could instead of fighting this delaying action? It was true that they had to occupy this ground to launch their harassing attacks upon you, and that some of the guns they’d been shelling you with would have needed to have come up somewhat further to get in range of your position, but by now they had been fighting for too long to not have a firm idea of what they were up against- and to decide to just flee, perhaps under cover of artillery. It’d be a decent reason to use it if they had reservations against using it for harassment, after all.

That the enemy was letting you think about this was making you uneasy. Uneasiness soon turning to alarm...

>Enemy Roll Under 50, degrees of success apply.

A horrific shrieking noise screamed past your tank’s turret and smashed apart an unfortunate brush tree behind you, followed by the boom of a large sounding gun indeed.

“Four Five!” Von Rotehof’s voice crackled, “Are you alright?”

“Yes,” you said, “Where did that come from? Did you see?” You popped out and scanned the horizon against your better judgment- and nothing sprang out. Was it one of those heavy anti-aircraft guns? You thought you would have picked one of those out rather easily.

“I saw the dust cloud from the shot,” Von Rotehof said, “From bearing three five five, between those two wrecks, there.”

You looked over in that direction, to where a pair of rusted hulks of tanks older than this war seemed to slope down into an unseen hole, and saw…nothing. If there was a heavy anti-aircraft gun, it couldn’t have moved away that quickly. Also- that position was over a kilometer away. A far shot indeed, yet it came so close…

Moreover, Von Rotehof was ahead of you, in a more exposed position. Yet you had been the target?

>An opponent that wanted to take you on? Let them come. You’ll take it as a challenge. Go forward to engage them from your effective range- the infantry will be able to screen you well enough.
>Sit in place and try to spot them when the unknown assailant comes up to shoot next. Despite the range, maybe they were thin skinned enough for a long shot to still neutralize them?
>Advise a retreat and get out of there. This was not an enemy you had come to fight against.
>Other?

>>4754992
>Advise a retreat and get out of there. This was not an enemy you had come to fight against.

>>4754992
>>Advise a retreat and get out of there. This was not an enemy you had come to fight against.

>>4754992
>Advise a retreat and get out of there. This was not an enemy you had come to fight against.
No matter what, MOVE. And tell him to evade as well, there's got to be better cover.

>>4754992
>Advise a retreat and get out of there. This was not an enemy you had come to fight against.

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>>4754992
>Advise a retreat and get out of there. This was not an enemy you had come to fight against.

>>4754992
>>Advise a retreat and get out of there. This was not an enemy you had come to fight against.
Yeah this might be slight meta knowledge but I'm not fucking with something that had a 50% chance to hit from a kilometer away.

>>4754992
>An opponent that wanted to take you on? Let them come. You’ll take it as a challenge. Go forward to engage them from your effective range- the infantry will be able to screen you well enough.

>>4755258
Come at me, unknown brethren.

>>4755020
>>4755053
>>4755066
>>4755076
>>4755111
>>4755242
It's time to leave.

Writing.

“Driver, reverse!” You said sharply, making an immediate decision, “Take us back ten meters, there’s a depression there.” As the tank moved, you switched to the platoon net. “Four Three,” you said steadily over the radio, “We should retreat. If there’s something bold enough to attack us, and powerful enough to be confident in doing so from this far off, we’re in trouble.”

“What of the infantry?”

“I have a feeling they’ll be coerced soon enough,” you said, “But I’ll try to do something about it. We need to evade it in the meantime.” You pushed yourself upwards out of the cupola to see if there was further ground you could withdraw into, terrain to put between yourself and this unknown menace.

“Four Five, Four Three, this is Four One Actual,” Vehrlors suddenly spoke, “Give me a status report, I don’t like what I’m hearing. In fact, I’m ordering a retreat right now. Do it, Four Three.”

“Why am I being singled out?” Von Rotehof complained, but he didn’t refuse.

“The Netillians aren’t giving much resistance but they’re refusing to hold fast and fight. Just now, we’ve come under attack by…something with a very big gun, that’s either hiding itself very well or moves quickly.”

“Don’t bother reversing, throw your tanks around now and get out at full speed. First platoon reported that same sort of contact the other day, and that thing’s been up and down the front. Get back here now.”

“Affirmative, but, what about-“ Von Rotehof tried to cling to the field, but Vehrlors cut him off.

“I’ll make some calls. That infantry company isn’t your responsibility. Get back now.”

“Yes sir,” you said.

“Yes, Four One,” Von Rotehof said too, deflating.

“Driver, turn us one hundred eighty degrees and take us out of here as quickly as you can,” you ordered over the intercom next, trusting Vehrlors’s judgment. If this foe was recognizable enough for him to specifically say not to bother reversing, that must have meant somebody tried it, and didn’t do well for it. After the tank heaved about and began to go southwards again, you watched some of the Republic infantrymen, confused at your departure. If you could linger you would, but, that would help nobody right now.

…Though, you thought as you looked northwards again, this enemy would be back again, wouldn’t they? You hadn’t even seen them. It was wise to send your tank back, but was the same true for yourself?

>Were you going to be the one defying orders now? This wasn’t some dragon for you to slay. Return to the platoon.
>Send your tank back with your crew and dismount here, and watch. You had to at least get a glimpse of what you might be up again, even if it could be dangerous to be stuck out here in the infantry fighting.
>Ask Vehrlors if you can send the tanks to the rear, but if you and Von Rotehof can continue to observe the fighting. You’d need to fight whatever that thing was at some point.
>Other?

>>4755808
>Were you going to be the one defying orders now? This wasn’t some dragon for you to slay. Return to the platoon.

Tempting as it is to discover what exactly the Nets havw, post-maiming Richter is screwed in an infantry fight even with the Fear gone.

>>4755808
>Ask Vehrlors if you can send the tanks to the rear, but if you and Von Rotehof can continue to observe the fighting. You’d need to fight whatever that thing was at some point.
I'm really interested in what it was. I thought it might be a not!Panzerfaust, but from a kilometer away...

>>4755808
>>Were you going to be the one defying orders now? This wasn’t some dragon for you to slay. Return to the platoon.

>>4755808
>Ask Vehrlors if you can send the tanks to the rear, but if you and Von Rotehof can continue to observe the fighting. You’d need to fight whatever that thing was at some point.
From a 'safe' vantage point of course, knowing what it was might even save some tanks down the road when we have to deal with whatever it is. Time displaced and ritually summoned Panzerkampfwagen VIII Maus. Fucking wizards, man.

>>4755808
>Ask Vehrlors if you can send the tanks to the rear, but if you and Von Rotehof can continue to observe the fighting. You’d need to fight whatever that thing was at some point.

>>4755808
>>Were you going to be the one defying orders now? This wasn’t some dragon for you to slay. Return to the platoon.

>>4755808
>Were you going to be the one defying orders now? This wasn’t some dragon for you to slay. Return to the platoon.

>>4755808
>Ask Vehrlors if you can send the tanks to the rear, but if you and Von Rotehof can continue to observe the fighting. You’d need to fight whatever that thing was at some point.
Someone finally figured out that you can gut a tank to stick a longer gun in instead of just a wider gun. You've met sturmgeschutze before, now say hello to jagdpanzers.

>>4756273
A jagdpanzer shouldn't be able to hide this quickly.

>>4756343
Must be a low profile wheeled tank destroyer.

>>4756343
>>4756347

NKE-2(36 RP): Extremely rare and prized capture. An open topped, turreted tank destroyer with frontal armor thick enough to resist most guns of 4cm and below, though extremely light on all other angles to keep it fast, its most significant trait is its long barreled, extremely powerful 7.5cm gun designed to skewer both the T-15 and potentially better protected tanks than even that. Crew of 5.

My bet is on one of these guys.

>>4755808
>>Were you going to be the one defying orders now? This wasn’t some dragon for you to slay. Return to the platoon.

>>4755808
>Were you going to be the one defying orders now? This wasn’t some dragon for you to slay. Return to the platoon.
Don't tell me the Netillians got one of their siege-breaking 1923 pattern landships out of mothballs or judge forbid the Northern Lords cashed out and hired the real Red Tide.

>>4755816
>>4755853
>>4756201
>>4756243
>>4756416
>>4756463
Stop finding excuses to try and get yourself killed, you haven't even been at war for a week yet. Almost.

>>4755830
>>4755889
>>4756014
>>4756273
After so long in the desolate wasteland of no tanks, can you be blamed for wanting to see one?

Writing.

Much as curiosity tempted you to remain behind on foot just to see if you could spot this new enemy, Vehrlors’s orders were clear, and you weren’t going to start defying him now. You couldn’t go chasing after every metaphorical dragon you heard of, and neither could Little Von Rotehof. Back to the platoon with the both of you.

“Let’s go, Four Three,” you urged your partner for this brief outing, for your own sake too, “I have a few ideas about what it might be and none of them are good.”

Was it, perhaps, one of the old landships? A new anti-tank vehicle not known? One built with the other, with a gun with longer range than seen? Or, possibly, was it something you had seen before? That one Ellowian vehicle, made to counter newer Twaryian armor. You’d never been shot at by any of them all the same, so any were valid guesses…

As you moved away, none of the Republic infantry followed, though quizzical glances continued. From there on, their operational integrity was their responsibility. You’d done more than ordered anyways, though when you thought about it, you had done surprisingly little. Would that have changed if the Netillians bothered to put up a solid defense instead of giving way in response to force? You’d find out at some point. They couldn’t put up that act for long, especially when you got close to Netilland’s borders.

If, a voice of doubt reminded, ”If” you get close to their borders.

There was a point there, you had to admit to yourself.

When you returned to your lines, the battle in front still going on with the sounds of machine gun fire and munitions caster explosions blending with rifle fire, Little Von Rotehof promptly got out of his tank and started pacing, mumbling and cursing, kicking dust and pebbles as his crew maneuvered the tank into the fighting hole it came out of. What a curious cause of frustration, you thought as you stared at the man from atop your tank. As you’d said to his elder brother, you hadn’t particularly sought out all that had happened to you, but even when Stevan Von Rotehof sought out danger, he was being yanked back to safety. A funny irony. Even being around you hadn’t been enough.

Yet you weren’t sure whether that was a mercy or not still.

The Mittelsosalian attack stubbornly continued for another couple of hours- from back on the hill, you could see that the infantry company that had come up behind you hadn’t been the only one to come forward. To the west and east you could spy the uniforms of the Republic here and there through binoculars, but it was impossible to tell how they were doing.

Only that, in the span of mere hours, you had gone from quite outnumbered, to having the numerical odds very strongly on your side. Locally, at least.

“Look at them all over,” Little Von Rotehof had decided to look around too near you, and called over to you. “Yet we’re stuck back here. What’s with command?”

The Battalion, the Company, or Vehrlors?” “Maybe they can see something we can’t from here.”

“Whatever’s keeping them must be something big enough we can see from here…” Younger Von Rotehof grumbled.

A crackling from around your neck, and you shifted your headset up.

“Four-Five,” Vehrlors’s voice came up, “Do you copy?”

“I copy.”

“Come and see me. I have news I think you want to hear.”

-----

A goodly way south of the front lines, a meeting had been arranged for this seemingly unimportant group of visitors to the Republic- this band of vagabonds who, while curious (and some, quite intimidating) looking, had no apparent importance save for their leader, who was not the tallest nor strongest, but possessed of a remarkable attractiveness that made the Republic Soldiers securing the meeting second guess their own appearance. His cherubic visage would have been completed by a soft smile, but the way he trudged forward towards the command convoy with another of his own, whom had arrived with the supreme commander of the forces of the Republic of Mittelsosalia, he looked more a devil than anything.

“Where is she!?” the mysterious, beautiful man bellowed like a beast that he did not look like in any way but in the ugly mood on his face. A man that came forward, one of his own confidants, he grabbed by his collar and punched so hard in the face that the man was knocked into the dust. “Isek! What manner of pit did you crawl out of, to face me now?”

“My…Sir, Loch,” the man sputtered and wiped the blood from his cut lip from his mouth, “Calm yourself. Lady Vang is plenty alive-“

The beautiful man’s hand snatched out and dragged his man back up to his feet by his jacket- Isek gave no resistance with his body, and any objection he began was silenced by a second punch.

“I want no excuses!” Loch shouted in his face, “Do you know what you allowed to happen!?”

“Loch!” Another of the statuesque man’s escorts held back his arm before it could strike again, “Calm yourself!”

“This wretched fool-“

“Loch!” a female, commanding voice called, and the named man slackened his rage, let Isek pull away gently and brush himself off. As Loch snapped his head to look to the voice, he saw a pair of Republic officers side by side a young woman, a head shorter than her guards, wearing a white great coat and eyepatch, her hand clutched to her side inside the coat, the sleeve it abandoned flapping in the wind. She was rummaging in a pocket, and pulled out a cigarette that was promptly set in her lip.

“Miss Vang!” Loch’s voice carried relief as he walked up, trying to affect a gentle smile and not doing very well at recovering it, “I was afraid that you were in great danger. It is good to see you…I had heard of some-”

“Of course I was in danger,” Signy interrupted as she motioned to one of her men, who produced a lighter. She tilted her head down and allowed the officer to light her cigarette, “This wouldn’t have worked if I wasn’t. It’d be disrespectful to my troops and to fate itself to not put myself at risk. Though…” She took a deep breath from the cigarette and held it in, before blowing it softly out again. “Phoo…though, I’m not that reckless. Not anymore. This white coat is showy. Nobody would be caught in this battle wearing it but me. If anybody knew where I was, they’d see it, and know I was there."

She continued"So, when I went missing, who could say which was me? No, there could only be one Cyclops. One Minister of the People…” She bit down on the cigarette, held it between her teeth as she stretched out her free hand and shook out her fingers, “They made themselves weaker chasing a half dozen opportunities. That made them weak enough to crush. They were greedy, and hasty. I guess I’m thankful they consider me so valuable. If they didn’t think catching me was worth it, they wouldn’t have thought it’d be the easiest, best way out of where they found themselves. They thought they were going down the quickest and easiest way, while still getting to win big…like I wanted them to think. Instead of just running, or at least staying in place, they did the worst thing, just fort the chance to get me. At some point they must have known it was a trick, but they were too far in. They had to keep going…and they did get close.”

She took her hand away from her side, where a bloody bandage remained stuck just a few finger widths from the edge of her torso. The path of the rifle bullet must have shattered a rib, and from the sweat on the Minister’s brow and the shortness of her breath, she was in no small amount of pain because of it.

“It’s not much,” she said slowly to Loch, “One of my impersonators was captured…and taken away. Another was shot through the eye.” A nod to her flanking officers. “Let us alone for a moment.” They respectfully stepped away, as did Loch’s entourage.

Loch knelt down and set his hand against the Minister’s side, breathless. Even the gentle brush of his fingers caused Signy to recoil.

“Your man that you just beat up,” she pointed to Isek, “He treated me well after I was hit. I thought you’d commend him, not…whatever that was.”

“Your life is too important to throw away on a gamble such as that, you fool of a woman,” Loch said quietly as he put his fingers under Signy’s shirt, where it had been split by a blade to access the wound and tried to lift it up to see better, but her hand fell on his wrist and pushed it slowly away. “Your father would not approve,” he continued.

The Minister of the People slouched over, took her cigarette out of her mouth, and blew a long breath of smoke into the man’s face. “How dare you,” she murmured, “I thought you a better man than to say something like that.”

“How dare I?” Loch demanded with a sharp breath, and he stood up- the Minister of the People now had to look up rather than down at him. “You demand that my men and I save for the most minimal escort stay away from you, and you do something such as this? You’ve nerve uncommon even for your blood.”

The young woman said nothing, and the wind whistled between the two figures as they regarded one another in silence.

“Is this the respect I’ve earned, Loch?” Signy demanded, “When am I going to stop being some toy that you cannot let go? I’ve grown used to men wounding my body by now, but I’m still not used to men wounding my heart.”

Loch had nothing to say to that, but he clenched his fists tightly.

“That movement of the Griffon company,” Signy breathed in smoke again, “Them throwing themselves off the line of battle and back towards the pocket. Was that your intervention? Tell me the truth.”

“It was.” The beautiful man’s frown looked wrong on his face- the perfection of his curls was frayed by loose hairs, and dust in his shining golden locks. Still, the Minister of the People, even now, had to look away from him every so often to avoid being enchanted.

“You had no faith in me.”

“Do you have any idea how much you are worth to the world?” Loch challenged back.

“I’ve heard this before, and I don’t want to see you if all you want to do is be frustrating,” Signy said with exhaustion weighing down her voice and her eyelids like so many stones atop them, “You’ve had your chance. I’ve told you what I wanted. Yet you’re the only one who gets to demand, are you?” She set her gaze back upon Loch’s eyes, “You don’t deserve it, but I’ll give you one last chance. Do something outrageous. Right here and now.”

Loch merely stared sadly at her in that way Signy couldn’t stand.

“Your men can stay,” the Minister of the People breathed, “They’re good people, well meaning and considerate. You, though? Next time I see you, I’ll have you locked up until I find out who comes to beg for you back. Go home, Loch.”

The beautiful man turned on his heel and made a click of his tongue, and a sigh. “If only you could understand…”

Signy only watched him and glowered at his back held straight as he stepped resolutely away and back to his collection of people.

-----

“…So the Minister of the People has been found again…” You breathed with a sigh of relief as Vehrlors told you the news.

“She a friend of yours?”

You shifted from a foot to the other, wary of the comment made earlier about her being a mistress.

Vehrlors noticed a certain guarded posture, and spoke before you could. “I made friends with a Paellan officer, back when we were as far west as you can go before you hit the storms, the Destruction Manifest, all that. He was a funny sort, the kind of person you get when you live too close to the Maelstroms for too long, maybe your whole life. Their heads are different, the way they see, hear, feel things. Some people around there call them cursed, and enough believe it that they’re segregated into their own units. I liked his sense of humor. His view of the world.”

“What sort of view was that?”

“The way he put it…well, his New Nauk was awful, but, their way of saying it,” Vehrlors reminisced while mimicking being edged up against a cliff and leaning over, “We’re people who never bother looking down the cliffs. I figure it meant that he thought everybody in the world was on the edge of…something. We didn’t understand each other so well in some ways, but in others, I felt exactly what he felt, if you know what I’m talking about.” Vehrlors ceased his miming and he hooked his thumbs in his belt. “Then, the Kalleans came around hard as hell. His unit was wiped out, like a wave washed over it. And I couldn’t do a damn thing about it.”

“…”

“So, she a friend of yours?”

“Yes.”

“She got a name?”

You raised an eyebrow at Vehrlors. “I would think you’d know..?”

“Humor me.”

“Signy. Signy Vang.”

“Signy, huh,” Vehrlors tried the name on his tongue, “I knew the Vang part, but that’s a bit cutesy a name for a dictator, isn’t it? She doesn’t have the face for it either. So what sort of friends are you? If you feel I’m making an even trade.”

>She kidnapped you, multiple times, and tried to solicit you for an affair. Trouble. You’ve forgiven her, mostly.
>Cyclops, the Minister of the People, Signy Vang, all part of your history, your legacy. Your stories were part of one another. You wouldn’t be where you are now without her.
>It’s not who she is to you that matters so much. It’s who she is to others. You see somebody who’s a beacon of inspiration to this place of rejected life and broken dreams, and you want her to succeed. To make the world better.
>Other?

>>4757444
>It’s not who she is to you that matters so much. It’s who she is to others. You see somebody who’s a beacon of inspiration to this place of rejected life and broken dreams, and you want her to succeed. To make the world better.
Nice digits and the last one actually made my smile a little so I'll vote for it.

>>4757444
>It’s not who she is to you that matters so much. It’s who she is to others. You see somebody who’s a beacon of inspiration to this place of rejected life and broken dreams, and you want her to succeed. To make the world better.

>>4757444
>It’s not who she is to you that matters so much. It’s who she is to others. You see somebody who’s a beacon of inspiration to this place of rejected life and broken dreams, and you want her to succeed. To make the world better.

>>4757444
>>It’s not who she is to you that matters so much. It’s who she is to others. You see somebody who’s a beacon of inspiration to this place of rejected life and broken dreams, and you want her to succeed. To make the world better.

>>4757444
>>Cyclops, the Minister of the People, Signy Vang, all part of your history, your legacy. Your stories were part of one another. You wouldn’t be where you are now without her.
She got to be leader of a new nation and we got to be in the Silver Lances, everybody wins here in Sosaldt.

>>4757444
>Cyclops, the Minister of the People, Signy Vang, all part of your history, your legacy. Your stories were part of one another. You wouldn’t be where you are now without her.

>>4757444
>It’s not who she is to you that matters so much. It’s who she is to others. You see somebody who’s a beacon of inspiration to this place of rejected life and broken dreams, and you want her to succeed. To make the world better.
I don't agree with any part of the first option and she's grown into a much stronger, different person from the second option. What she's striving for in the third is something to praise and that's the way it should be.

>>4757444
>It’s not who she is to you that matters so much. It’s who she is to others. You see somebody who’s a beacon of inspiration to this place of rejected life and broken dreams, and you want her to succeed. To make the world better.

>>4757467
>>4757483
>>4757491
>>4757502
>>4757789
>>4757848
They grow so fast don't they.

>>4757525
>>4757623
Who are you without each other?

Writing.

“The sort of friends isn’t what matters,” you told Vehrlors, “Not that much, at least. It’s not what’s between us, it’s also what Signy Vang is to other people, to the world. This place was a wasteland of lives rejected, broken dreams, and it’s going to become so much more now. I want her to succeed at that, at making the world better.”

Vehrlors gave you a funny look as he took in what you said. “Talking like that,” he said with a stifled laugh in his tone, “You really are fucking her, aren’t you?”

“I’m not-“ you said in a hot reflex, but you let it go. “You understand what I’m talking about though, don’t you?” Not just yanking on my chain?

“Big talk like that’s easy to make fun of, I’m just giving my share of what I’ve taken, because I do understand. Even if you’re really laying it on thick buttering this woman up. Plenty of warlords have nice speeches that don’t turn into reality, though. You been around many of the sort?”

“No,” you admitted, “But I do think that she truly believes it.”

“Not enough to sway you from your convictions to the noblesse oblige, though?”

“It is better for this place,” you said, “It isn’t as though it’s a coup over the Archduke and his lords. Here, it’s only a gift to the lost people of these lands. A Republican shepherd is better than having wolves in every shadow.”

“Would it still be that way if the shepherd was a despot?”

“I don’t believe she’ll become an upstart despot,” you said. A non-answer, but for authority to be gained from naked power with not a whit of regard towards tradition and precedent of ancestral and societal duty…that would fly in the face of Republicanism and Aristocracy both, would it not?

“If that’s what you think,” Vehrlors said with a little skeptical tilt of his lip, “Not as though there have been many despots who are young women barely out of the gymnasium. Do you know how old she is?” A pause. “How old are you?”

“She is twenty.” You said, and thought about the latter question. Vehrlors liked to play around, so why be direct? “How old do I look?”

“Too young and too old.”

…You didn’t even know how to take that, and you screwed up your face trying to wonder in a moment what that was supposed to mean. “I’m sorry?” You finally gave up.

“Like somebody jammed five years into you in a few months,” Vehrlors tried to be gentler with that tone, “Be thankful you don’t have any grey hairs yet, that’s all. This shit ages you no matter how good you are. I’m thirty years old and I swear when my beard grows in it’s like salt and pepper.”

A sound from the west, followed by sounds from the east. The sharp booms of heavy guns- if the wind told you right, from the south. You looked around, forgetting the subject, though Vehrlors didn’t seem surprised. “Are we supposed to be doing something soon? Those are our guns, aren’t they?”

“Yeah. They’re not for us, though. We’re sitting right here for now.”

You tried to look upwards and place yourself where, even now, a pair of fighter planes were sweeping over, to look down at what was happening now. On either side of you, offensives, yet here, you stayed. What would the theorist Debon say about this? That you ought to shift deployment to put every bit of your strength against where the enemy was weak, you recalled- armor was of no use idle according to him. Yet you’d long reached the parts of his writing where his suggestion against an equally mobile opponent was to limit their mobility whilst not allowing them to impede one’s own- was that your role here?

“Do you know what we’re doing here, or what we will be doing?” You asked as your imagined view settled to the ground again.

Vehrlors cast an amused look north. “Is Little Von Rotehof wanting to go adventuring again? I haven’t been told yet, but,” He pointed to the northwest, looked at his compass, and adjusted his finger slightly to a pair of hills in the distance. “Over in that direction, there’s an old fort that I’m sure we’ll want to take. Even if we’re holding back, this position is lacking for good strong points in case the Netillians’ second go is harder than the last. Nothing the pioneers can make with the time we’ve got will do. We need a fortress either the earth or the man made in no hurry. There’s no shortage of old Imperial forts and things built over top of them, and recon says the one over that way is old but solid. Not good enough for anything made to break concrete, but good enough to sit in and feel safe.”

“So that’s what’s next…” you took your binoculars from around your neck and tried your best to look closer.

“It’ll be a little bit before.”

“What makes you say that?” you asked, looking out of your lens at Vehrlors. Command hadn’t said anything for certain yet, according to him.

“We’ll know,” Vehrlors said, “Because we’ll have to break out the candy box.”

-----

Another hour passed- it was now well into the afternoon, and the Republic Infantry had been pushed back once again, to your positions. A counterattack from mechanized infantry had hit them hard, and they now licked their wounds behind the safety of your forward positions, the enemy keeping well away from you as an Ellowian air strike from a few ground-attack planes prevented the Netillians from hounding your allies all the way back. Captain Vehrlors and the Republic Infantry captain were having an absolute row concerning that failed push, but you kept well away, thankful that your position as subordinate, for once, kept you away from that sort of inter-unit politic.

If nothing else, the Mittelsosalians had gained a respect for the enemy up here that they lacked before, with a lesson that could have been much bloodier. They were now apprised and wary of both the Netillian special weapons and their mechanical assets. Though your own tank was superior to much of the Netillian armored armory (with notable exceptions), the other tanks in your unit besides Vehrlors’s tank were armed with 3.7 centimeter cannons, and they all were less armored than your own tank even without considering the mystical addition to your m/32B. They respected the plainer tanks of the northern forces far more than you did, the materiel if not their enemies themselves.

You and Little Von Rotehof lingered behind the lines, idle, and with the Netillians failing to hurl artillery at you, oddly bored after a short time.

“How did you get that piece of equipment anyways?” Younger Von Rotehof asked you as he played a card game with Malachi, Jorgen, and a crewman. For some reason, the masked man fascinated him- he’d asked to play “Cercle Vingt-Un” with you, but you didn’t know the rules, so he played with your crew and one of his own instead. It was a four player game using a normal deck of cards- Von Rotehof used his own. Jorgen’s preference of Hausen’s cards was “too vulgar.” “I heard some of your report to the Captain of what you’ve been through. Seems like the Netillians would really hate you.”

“I appreciate it much,” you said, remembering your time without the m/32- the X series tanks had little appreciable armor. “It belongs to the Von Blum family. Or Maddalyn Von Blum, my fiancée. So I suppose it’s somewhat of…a dowry?”

“Marrying into a special Territory-developed tank, huh,” Von Rotehof said with the musing of a man calculating, “I ought to try that.”

Well, Mathilda Von Blum was unmarried, but you couldn’t inflict that on a man. Even if you’d only ever seen her but once. At least, you thought with a dark cloud suddenly descending upon your idle thoughts, you hoped you’d only seen her once…

“It’d be the first time something good’s come out of a marriage, Chains,” Von Rotehof’s ally in the game, his radio operator, said as though he dispensed advice from a mountaintop. “I say though, drop the marriage idea, get a lot of ladies sweet on you. Then you can have all the tanks you want, yeah?”

“That sounds like more trouble than marriage, Warn,” Von Rotehof said with a cadence that sounded well practiced, repeated frequently.

“Think of the results, though.” The crewman named Warn was the dealer, and after he dealt out a pair of cards to everybody, one of his own pair turned down, he waited.
Malachi’s speech was no obstacle here. He made a motion like scratching his index and middle finger on the crate being used as a table with a vague grunt, and a card was sent his way.

“Hit-Steal,” Von Rotehof declared as soon as the card went face up, prodding the crate with an up and down motion with the same two fingers used to scratch, and reaching to take the card.

“Haeldahp,” Jorgen coughed, “Snaetch.”

“What?” Von Rotehof snapped his head over and saw Jorgen’s two cards, “Ah, damn it.”

The aim of the game was to reach the number twenty one with the value of one’s cards- or, if this couldn’t be done, to have as high a number as possible without going over twenty one.
“Twaenty-one, thraene baenes,” Jorgen listed off with a satisfied growl, “Faertaeme payoot.”

Von Rotehof sighed and pushed a small pile of notched bullet casings forward. These games in the Silver Lances were apparently high-stakes; the pot, it was agreed upon by organizers going all the way up into the battalion staff, was required to be one’s monthly pay, divided into twenty for each token. It was easy to lose one’s entire pay in such a game, but anything less was looked down upon when it came to gambling for money in the unit.

The terms Jorgen had listed off were multipliers. The payout for victory was the equal to one’s bet, naturally, but one got an equal portion more for each additional victory mark, which included winning with twenty one, winning with the “Throne” card’s adjacent superior value, the Throne being a special bonus card placed before dealing (For example, if the Throne card was a Nine, the cards that qualified for bonuses were Tens). There was also winning with cards in the Royal Theme suit, which occurred when a Jack, King, or Queen was the Throne card. Whatever suit the card was, received bonus points if they were won with.

Such bonuses were added up upon a win, for example, a win with twenty-one with a Throne bonus card and also a Royal Theme Suit bonus for two cards would result in a payout of four time’s ones bet. Such escalation was exciting- and why very often tank commanders especially of noble means were expected to guarantee their crews’ bets.

That was not something you had done, because Jorgen and Malachi hadn’t asked, and not said anything when you were educated on that practice by the Younger Von Rotehof.

The next round was less exciting- the position of Dealer moved on to Von Rotehof, and there were no “hit-steals” or “snatches” this time. Good for him, as that pit the table against him and potentially resulted in more gains from victory, rather than the hit-steals that merely pitted one player against the other and iced the dealer out of playing against the table. Respectively, such was when a player hit instead of staying with their initial dealing (getting another card from the deck by the dealer), and if the card they received did not make their hand twenty one, but it did make another player’s hand twenty one, that other player could “hit-steal” and win directly against that player. Meanwhile, if the same applied to yet another player, they could “snatch” and steal the victory from under the nose of the initial thief.

Important to note, however, was that the dealer could not hit-steal, but they could snatch. This being because the dealer had to reveal their hidden card upon declaration of hit-steal. The dealer could start the game Dealer Open, winning with which gave the dealer an extra point in victory, but you hadn’t seen any Dealer declare Dealer Open yet.

“Your crew is going to steal my inheritance at this rate, Von Tracht,” Von Rotehof grumbled, even though he had done well last round. As the cards were collected and the deck shuffled by Jorgen, he continued the subject before. “I heard from my crew talking to yours that you used to be part of a training mission over with the people we’re fighting now. Is that so?”

“It is,” you said, “I’d imagine the mission’s well over now. Even though the Silver Lances aren’t officially military action on the part of the Archduchy, I doubt the Netillians appreciate it, even if there’s no war between them and the Archduchy…”

“I don’t think I’ve ever met a Netillian, or known much about them,” Von Rotehof said as he stayed on a solid hand- a nineteen. “What’s your measure of them?”

“I remember you thinking they were yellow. Did something change?”

“I say a lot of things,” Von Rotehof muttered. “You can play, if you want. Your northman’s up more than I’d like.”

>What is your measure of the Netillians and Netilland?
Also-
>Play a round of Cercle Vingt-Un?

>>4759287
>Netillians
Are a people like any other from what we've known.
Many of them would probably rather not be here at all, but they're in too deep thanks to their leadership accumulating generations of cyclical violence, and the propaganda they're fed on a regular basis driving them to believe a continued escalation of this violence is the only way to go at this point.
They will fight and fight hard because that's all they've ever known and because they believe they're in the right to do so, so they aren't an enemy to take lightly under any circumstances even if they are one to be pitied as we put them down.
It's hard not to get a little hot under the collar when thinking about the UGZs and the mistreatment of the Ellioians, but at the end of the day, the best thing to do is to beat the mad dogs down until they lose the strength to keep fighting everyone around them.

>Play a round of Cercle Vingt-Un?
We need to save our wages for the wedding!
...
Yes, I know the Von Blums will probably pay for everything! It's the principle of the thing damn it!

>>4759287
>>What is your measure of the Netillians and Netilland?
Netilland itself has transformed into something awful. It has allowed some truly detestable creatures to grow in its shadow. We have met many Netillians of good character however, and its likely even more good people are trapped under Netillands boot. Hopefully this conflict can weaken the current Netilland enough that the more moderate Netillians can wrestle back power and stop the conflict before it reaches a point of no return.
>Play a round of Cercle Vingt-Un?
No, we need to save up our luck for the coming fights. No point in winning the rest of Von Rotehof's paycheck if we don't get to spend it.

>>4759287
Seconding >>4759363

>>4759287
>What is your measure of the Netillians and Netilland?

In terms of quality, decent to pretty damn good depending on the unit (like Zohl's Guards or Magnus's boys). Good enough to hold their own against the Twaryians (which are definitely not slouches) though that's with them tied down with the ERA.

As for people? Well we've met people who are only there because their parents are in a labour camp. We've met a monster of a commissar, a camp commandant trying to dissent in his own way, and people who joined just because up to now it seemed like the Military Council was achieving things the Old Republic never did. So really just like any other society.

The Military Council must die though, and those who'd give people like Zohl the keys to power.

>>4759454
Also
>Play a round of Cercle Vingt-Un?
Supporting >>4759363 's answer

>>4759363
+1

>>4759338
>>4759363
>>4759414
>>4759651
>>4759454
Worthy of respect. Deserving of condemnation.
Also you're not taking my money.

Writing.

“No thank you,” you declined the offer for a game, “I’d like to save my luck for the fighting.”

“You don’t spend your luck gambling, Half Face,” Warn said up to you, “It’s how you read it. It’s like licking your finger and holdin’ it to the wind. It’s not stuff you’ve got saved up in a bag, it’s a force of nature.”

Interesting a theory as that was, you still weren’t going to bet entire monthly paychecks on this particular table, no matter how rich your spouse was.

“When it comes to the Netillians and Netilland, though,” you thought back to when those men in forest green were your comrades and not your enemies, “The people are like any other ones I’ve known, of all stripes. I’ve met a monstrous creature of a Kommissar who used his power to fuel his sick fascinations. There was an administrator of a UGZ who all but dissented against his superiors to try and make the lives of his charges better,”

“A UGZ?” Von Rotehof asked, “What’s that?”

“An Ubergangszentrum,” you recited easily, “Transition centers. They’re places where sections of the native Ellowian population are kept and contained until they’re ready to be put somewhere else. There was a program ongoing where they would settle Ellowian lands with Netillian colonists while sending the conquered population back to Netilland. It was presented as a sort of cultural fusion, they called it, but the UGZs are usually very poor, and don’t have enough resources to care for the people housed in them.”

“This was only for Ellowians?” You saw a look in Von Rotehof’s face- he was building an image of oppressors.

“No, actually,” you said, “There’s UGZs back in Netilland, but they’re different. For political dissidents and that sort of people. There were plenty of people in the Netillian Army solely because their families were in work camps. Penal troops apparently had their family and friends under suspicion or imprisonment too. I can’t imagine most of them want to be here at all, but they have no choice.”

“Hmm…” Von Rotehof settled back into the ground, thinking. “Oh, uh, hit me.” He got a big card and busted. “Damn.” Losing on a bust was far from the most money one could lose, though. The only money lost was the bet.

“There’s truly detestable people,” you said coldly, “Doing awful things with the power they have now, but so many more are just trapped under their government. Plenty of them think that the best choice was to join the Military Council…their ruling government, because they’ve done things their old Republic never was able to do, like finally defeat their longtime enemy. Because of that mindset of winning, though…they’re a nation of fighters, of belligerency, and they’ve been that way for generations. Maybe the Military Council, for all its evils, was something inevitable with them, and now that it’s in place, there’s Netillians who think that it’s the only way to go for them. They’ll fight hard and they won’t doubt their ability or reasons for doing so. The only way to help the moral and moderate ones is to defeat them all, to weaken the structure until the good ones can take back the reigns.”

“They don’t sound like people to take lightly,” Von Rotehof said, “Like mad dogs.”

“I’m not sure if I’d describe them like that,” you frowned and cocked your head, “But they are skilled and well equipped. They’re at minimum decent fighters, good enough to hold their own against the Twaryians.”

“I’ve never heard anything about the Twaryians besides their kooky beliefs and that they’re Caelussians,” Von Rotehof said.

“They’re not to be taken lightly either,” talking about Twaryians would have to come another time. “Either way, they’re hard fighters, but they have to be beaten. The Military Council must die, before they cast their people down a road there’s no returning from.”

“Now that’s more like it!” Von Rotehof’s shoulders straightened and he stood to his feet, the little chains on his jacket jingling. “The Military Council must fall!” He paused, muttered the same thing under his breath a few times, and frowned deeply. “That doesn’t sound very good though, does it. It doesn’t have poetry.”

“You’re in the wrong place for poetry, Little Rotehof,” Vehrlors came tromping down from the skirmish line, and looked over the table. “Ah, I see. You’re trying to wax poetic to try and sway lady Fortune.”

“Lady Fortune’s a skank, Cap,” Warn said, “Nobody wants attention from a lady like that.”

“Aye,” Jorgen agreed, “Flaertyhaarlaet.”

“Nobody wants to marry Fortune,” Vehrlors shook his head, “…Except me, but you ought not to.”

“Is the front so quiet you can come back here to play cards, Captain?” Little Von Rotehof looked north again, as though hearing a call.

“Hell no. There’s something happening soon that we’re going to need to get ready for.”

“Oh?” He had the attention of everybody- the game had been temporarily forgotten.

File: fortattack_out.jpg (292 KB, 1500x999)

292 KB JPG

“Big Von Rotehof’s coming around in a minute,” Vehrlors said, “Finish up your game, boys. I need to brief the officers on what’s happening tonight and tomorrow.”

Jorgen came out of the game a fair bit richer and smug for it, but everybody else had come out for the lesser, if your count of the marked casings was correct. Nobody had hit their limit, so the games would resume, but for now, the business of war took precedence. The line would be heating up again in no time, after a brief respite had occurred.

“Right now,” Vehrlors pointed to the map he laid out on the crate while all the platoon officers crouched around it, “To the west and east the first and second battalions of the Lancers Regiment are advancing north, along with support, and all the Panzergrenadier they can get. The ones that’ve stuck with us are set to pack up and leave tonight to join up with their units again. We’re holding back, for the most part. Command wants us to move up and secure a more solid line of defense, where we can sit still and occupy the enemy to the front while the rest of the division moves up on their flanks. They really liked how the last operation went, and we’re seeing how well it works against the Netillians.”

“These guys aren’t like the Sosaldtians, though,” Big Von Rotehof said darkly.

“We’ll see. We don’t have to do what the other units are doing anyways.” Vehrlors pointed to the map where you were, “Tonight, the Flammpanzer platoon are going to come to our position, and in the morning, there’s going to be an attack on the fort on the hill to the north. That’ll be our new strong point that’ll even us out with the lines to the east. The Republic Infantry are going to attack there with ours and first platoon’s support. Our job,” He moved his finger north, “Is to secure their flank to their east. We’ll have the support of Republic Infantry ourselves, but we aren’t to move up further than necessary. The main effort is in taking that old fort. Once we’re up far enough to cover the flank, Republic engineers will start digging everything in, including some guns the unit’s captured, and once they’re done, we can leave it to the chocolate soldiers. They’re getting reinforced tonight for this.”

Did one of the guns captured include the one you’d brought back, you wondered. The Republic had a critical lack of anti-tank assets, so the possibility you’d helped with that even a little gave you some warmth.

“We can’t bring up Big Von Rotehof’s tank for this,” Vehrlors said, “I’m taking the chance to send it back to see if it can’t get repaired by the Maintenance Company. That means we’re going in with three tanks. Same designations as before. Von Tracht, you’ll be second in command.”

“But-“ Little Von Rotehof objected but shut his mouth immediately after a single syllable- he wasn’t about to debate it. Less a matter of disrespect, and more of ambition, you’d presume.

“Big Von Rotehof is still second in command of the unit, but he won’t be along for the operation,” Vehrlors nodded to the other auburn haired man, “Our own artillery’s busy with the east and west, so any support’s going to be the Republic troops. I’ll get a liaison for talking with them so we don’t have to work alone if we don’t have to. The timing for the start of our attack will be right after an air strike by ground attack planes arranged for next morning. After it’s done, we’re in action. Understood?”

“That vehicle with the big gun from earlier will be around, won’t it,” you put forward, “That might be trouble.”

“It might be, it might not be. I think it’d have more important places to be. What’d keep it here?” Vehrlors must have encountered worse to be so relaxed about that thing. Maybe he’d change his tune if he’d been shot at with it. “Scouts aren’t reporting much in the way of armor along where we’re supposed to go. There’s no reason this should be anything but simple, but don’t let your guard down.” Vehrlors stood up again, “We’ll go over this again next morning before we head out. Try to take a nap or something before this. Dismissed.”

>Do anything in particular before the operation starts next morning?
Also, after this excursion, I plan to have a perspective shift, so if you want anything in particular, you can throw that in as a pseudo-vote. Don't know whether or not to have it be long enough to be from a playable character perspective, we'll see.

>>4760873
>Go to the medics and check up on our burns.
I'd like to know how our homie Rondo is doing.

>>4760873
>Do anything in particular before the operation starts next morning?
I don't mind skipping forward.
As for perspective shifts, seeing what's going on in Almize since the last aside there would be cool, though honestly I've liked all the shifts so far.

>>4760873
What can we do other then rest. I doubt theres any sort of field modifications we can do overnight that we wouldnt already have done. Possibly another mg pintle mounted to the rear of the turret if any brave republican wanted a ride.
Speaking of, they'll be our only infantry for this assault. Hopefully their fruitless attack hasnt deterred them from further operations.

>perspective shift
Netillian commander trying to blunt the offensive :^)
Im always down for more wizard perspectives or any of the other mystical stuff. Not opposed to the Almize stuff either.

>>4760873
>Do anything in particular before the operation starts next morning?
Check on our wounds, write a letter to home and Maddy, try to turn in early to get some rest.

>Perspective shift
I'd honestly rather not have to play through it, but either way I'd like to see what Rondo is up to.

>>4760873
>Do anything in particular before the operation starts next morning?
Does Richter still have that tin with the hungry darkness living inside it or did Maddy take it at some point?
We should probably check on it privately (i.e.: quickly bury it in a hole in the dust) just in case it soaked up anything it shouldn't have after we voted to use that Hellfire.
>perspective shift
What are Honnrieg and Bat Company up to while this brewing "international incident" goes on?

>>4761193
>Spoiler
Oh man that's a good one. Been wondering what those crazy fuckers have been up to.

>>4760873
>Do anything in particular before the operation starts next morning?
Get our bandages redressed and rest well.
>Perspective shift
>>4761193 has a good one, Almize is also nice as well

Alright then.

>>4760910
>>4761034
>>4761681
Get checked out. Incorrigible, you can't stand to be too far from a heavy chested woman for too long, can you.

>>4761193
Check your chocolate can. Yes, you still have it. It's pretty portable and innocuous.

>>4760941
See if anything can be done to your tank. You're not engineers by any means, but maybe something can be done?
Additional armor is not generally a good idea for the m/32. The m/32B is already overloaded weightwise because of it.

>>4760910
>>4761034
Vonnie Ronnie

>>4760912
>>4760941
>>4761681
Almize News

>>4761193
>>4761370
>>4761681
Bat Company Blues

Alright then, writing. Though the asides will be after the op, because time will have to pass, of course.

As you went back to your tank, you thought about what you could do with the rest of the day- and night. Could you improve your tank in some way? Unlikely in only a day, but it couldn’t possibly take too long to make some convenient adjustment with some creativity and a welding torch, could it? If you were going to be working with infantry, perhaps a pintle-mount for a machine gun on the back of the turret? Not like you’d be able to fire such a thing well.

A look over your tank, and within it- you saw a beaten old chocolate tin in the personal items cabinet, and blinked as you remembered what was in it. The Hungry Darkness, the little, ineffectual Presence creature ostensibly useful for detecting whether a spiritual threat or (well, such as) a Soulbinder was around. As far as you knew, it wasn’t an intelligent creature nor was it a feeling one, so forgetting it like this probably didn’t mean anything, but you did feel bad for it, just in case you managed to find a way to starve one. Could a blotch of blackness starve? You’d have to find out.

…In addition, you weren’t sure if firing the Hellfire shell might have done something to it. Could you be too careful?

The caution was unnecessary, you learned as you opened it out of sight of any nearby and saw the thing. It looked like a night localized entirely within the chocolate tin, with blank, white pearlescent spheres swirling about, fading and brightening. It looked rather like a stray cat being found in an alley, as much as something with as few features as it could seem like that.

Was it supposed to try and branch out or reach up or anything like that, you tried to recall as you stuck a finger in to prod it, to try and pull it out, but something so immaterial did not struggle to resist. It was quite happy staying in the can, thank you very much. Closing the tin again, you looked around suspiciously. Was the Hungry Darkness (you forgot if you named it- one of your crew did, but nobody had liked the name, you recalled) merely being modest, or was something around to spook it?

A wind blew from the north, and drew your eyes to the cold touch. A thought of the other former can-occupant, now in that direction- you still had the ration can you used to keep Emma in, but it had been empty for a long time now. Maddalyn had said that possession was a safe end point, relatively. The alternative, “best” solution would have been to “dispel” Emma, so yes, this was better, and the person she was possessing, the Duchess Von Katski, had been a twisted person. Yet…you hoped you hadn’t ruined anything, still. Maddalyn had also said that possession that took place for too long combined the souls in some way, didn’t she? How exactly would that occur? Had you simply killed Emma again in a more roundabout way?

You needed to write a letter to Maddalyn. Not to ask her what was happening, but to take your mind off exactly that. Who knew when she’d receive it, but you had to nevertheless. You’d talk about what you’d done- that you’d been wounded again, but that you had trustworthy allies, comrades.

Should you say that you fired off the Hellfire shell? You’d decide that later, as the thought of your burns provoked them into making their presence known quite loudly. They’d gotten better, but they still were uncomfortable, and it wouldn’t hurt to have them checked on. If you weren’t supposed to be called up specifically until tomorrow morning anyways, perhaps you could get a short reprieve back to the Medical Company? Yes, you’d ask Vehrlors about that, and then maybe you could write something once you were there.

The answer was for Vehrlors to call the Company commander- a few short words, an assurance of who was asking- yes, yes, of course. He ceased his communication and gave you permission to head over to the Company Headquarters with a couple of your crewmen, so long as they were sent right back. The Medical Company’s ambulances and transports would be picking up some wounded Panzergrenadier who had been deemed unable to move along to support their fellows where they were redeploying, but weren’t hurt enough to need to be moved immediately. You’d catch a ride with them back to the headquarters, still at the town of Ganzenacht.

A short salute and thanks, and you were soon on your way. Much as you’d like to have had a staff car deployed, you could understand that you couldn’t demand such accommodations, considering the situation and your relative unimportance here.

When you went out with Jorgen and Malachi, you were feeling strong and confident in your ability to carry yourself, but the burns were felt more and more still as you went on- Jorgen offered to carry you, but you couldn’t accept that offer. Even though you were staggering and limping by the time you arrived at the Company Headquarters, and you’d quite obviously caused a delay as the Medical Company convoy idled about in a line behind the headquarters entrenchments. A thanks and a farewell to your crew- good thing you were plenty far enough behind your lines to not have had to worry about Netillians sniping at you the whole way.

A short snooze as you were all driven back. None of the panzergrenadier in the back of the truck were in a talking mood, except one with bandages around his eyes that asked occasionally where you were, though he had an acquaintance who kept him informed when requested. The blinded man seemed like he shouldn’t have been delayed, but what could you know of his situation?

“Hello,” you said to a Medical Company staff officer at the worn hut you’d been directed to once you were all offloaded, after having waited for the others to be attended to, of course. “I’m just here to see if I can have these burns I’ve had attended to can be looked at. Maybe have the bandages changed…”

“Do you have your wound form from before?”

“Er.”

“Is it serious?”

“I just want to make sure nothing’s going gangrenous.”

“Your name then, please, on this form,” the staff officer requested adroitly. “...Von Tracht. I see.” He gave you a tag, “Go to the building with this number. You should be attended to by Republic medical personnel.”

You couldn’t really complain, and nodded, though you were rather certain you had been to the same number before. Indeed you had, as you recognized the building. Would you get the same…staff?
This particular building had convalescing troops in it- people about as badly hurt as you, expected to return to the front after a short recovery, and there were many Republic Troops here as well. Most weren’t even in beds- a clear shortage of cots, but it wasn’t a problem here. Perhaps the shortage here meant there wasn’t one elsewhere.

“Nurse!” a grizzled bonesaw called as you walked in, “We’ve got another one! Get him squared away!” He gave you a squint, “Damn, are you fucked.”

“I’m not here for my face,” you said, now missing your mask you left back in the tank, “I just need bandages on my arms and legs changed. I was burned badly there, see…”

“I’m here!” the nurse arrived, and you were…relieved, to see a familiar face. “Ah!” Alina covered her mouth as she spotted you again, and looked away, “Oh, I’m sorry, yes, I’ll handle this one.” She took you by the arm and hurried you…down the hall, to another row of cots, and she sat you down on the middle of one, all in such a hurry you didn’t think of what to say.

Though somebody else did- another person sitting at the head of the ratty, beaten cot with a threadbare sheet to claim for a blanket, not that the occupant was actually resting under it rather than atop it. Another familiar face- directly related to the one who had brought you here, assuredly on purpose. You hadn’t expected to be attending this particular family’s meetup.

“Huh. Didn’t expect to see you so soon.” The nasally voice, tired, and level.

“Me neither,” you said to the blonde, scar faced woman who was staring blankly at you, caught off guard and searching for what to say. She seemed like she had something to ask about, but had been caught completely off guard.

“Thank you very much,” Alina sighed, and took a seat on the last third of the cot, holding your hand, “For sending her back here. She had a leg wound that nobody had properly looked at.”

Anya said nothing, and had bent forward, staring at the floor with her hands knitted below her chin, resting her arms on her thighs.

“She wasn’t ready to bite my head off either. I’ll assume you’re responsible for that.” Alina smiled at you in a weary way; she was doing her best to put on a pleasant face, but the dark circles around her eyes told something her chipper tone didn’t. “Your timing’s lucky. We’re going to be setting her loose next morning. Something’s happening that they need couriers for.” Alina blinked, and looked at Anya, staring at the floor. “…Aren’t you going to say anything, Anya? Not even a hello? Just your surly oh I didn’t expect you, is it?”

“Shut up.” Anya said, with a deep frown on her face. “I didn’t…look, this is a lot of shit all at once, got it?”

“Anya-“ Alina tried to urge, but got a bad response.

“Fuckin’...Would you piss off?” Anya snapped, her eyes wide at her sister, but she saw you looking at her as well, and she snapped her gaze back to the floor, gritting her teeth.

She wouldn’t say it, wouldn’t ask it, but you knew what your retinue was so nervous about. What she was in absolutely no mood to delay on, hesitant to hear about in front of even her kin.

Thankfully, you didn’t have to be the bearer of the news she anticipated…

>?

>>4763534
>?
"Magnus should be fine."

>>4763534
>>4763554
Mags is ok, and we didn't find any more burning tanks to crawl into.

>>4763534
Didn't see him directly, but I managed to keep our promise, I'm pretty sure.

>>4763534
And here I'd almost say she isn't happy to see us.
Magnus wasn't hurt, the worst he could do was cheekily throw a smoke grenade at us since we wrecked his tank. He's gonna be relatively safe and sound now.

I'm sure Yumil can help Mag feel better back home. He just needs to grab his turret and crank it back together against the hull. A little polish on the shaft and he'll be as good as new.

>>4763554
>>4763603
>>4763663
>>4763609
Your promise is kept- he's fine, and (not vain at all) you totally won, absolutely.

Writing.

“Magnus…” you referred to him by his first name, and almost said should be, but that wasn’t in keeping your promise, was it? “He wasn’t hurt. I don’t think I saw him directly, but he’s okay. He didn’t manage to hurt me, and all I did was disable his tank’s cannon. The most he could do was throw a smoke grenade on my tank. He’ll be off the line, and safe. Relatively.”

Anya continued to stare at the floor, slowly exhaled, then crossed her arms across her lap and buried her face in them. She said nothing, but you were sure she was relieved, in some way.

“Is this person the one you were talking about?” Alina asked the side of her sister’s head, “He’s on the side of the people you’re fighting against?” She asked that of you. “She said hardly anything about him, but she came around here so stressed.”

“It’s pure circumstance,” you said, “Anya and I became acquainted with the man while we were in Ellowie. Then, we fought on the same side. He came to our rescue at times. Anya encountered him while she was doing her courier work, and…” you weighed on whether to tell, but this was Anya’s sister. Didn’t she deserve to know? “I found her after that, she was resting at one of our bases after having made it back. She told me about how she had encountered him, and asked me to…try not to harm him if I encountered him.”

Alina stared at you, furrowing her brow. “You would harm each other after all of that?”

“No, no,” you said quickly, “But we’re both tankers. We wouldn’t know we were fighting each other. Or at least, he wouldn’t know it was me. He wouldn’t even have cause to know I’m here, or what tank I was in. I had to evade a few of his shots, even.” You only evaded one. Anya didn’t need to know you had taken a square hit that might have very well killed you if your tank was not specially armored. “We encountered others in his unit there, too, but we managed to fend them off without killing any of them, I’m sure, or any of my allies being killed. It was very close.”

Anya remained still, but straightened back up, rubbing her eyes, and she gave her head a rough shake before sniffing loudly. “Yeah. Lucky. If he threw a smoke grenade on your tank, he was close enough to do something worse. I’ll have t’…thank him.”

“What about…Richter? Richter, here.” Alina interjected, “Shouldn’t you thank him?”

“I already did,” Anya said flatly, “When he said he’d do what…he ended up doing. I thanked him then.”

“Well, do it again,” Alina said, as though she were advising a child and not her older sister.

“Why?” Anya asked, looking across you to Alina, “He said he’d do it. I trusted him to. That’s all there needs to be. I just didn’ know if,” she frowned again, and she fell backwards onto the bed, slipping her hands behind her head, “If I was askin’ too much. If, even if he got back, I made him…lose somethin’. Just because I asked.”

“…” You should have had something to say to that, but that, even though you were inferior to what you were before, she still trusted you so, it…touched you.

“Well. Still.” Alina crossed her arms in a scolding gesture, “You can do more.”

“Like what?” Anya turned her head and gave her sister an irritated glance.

“A kiss on the cheek, maybe?”

“The fuck? No.” Anya whipped her gaze back towards the ceiling, her frown etching deeper, “Making this weird the way you do.”

“It’s not weird, Anya, it’s completely normal. You insist on meaning where there’s none.”

“Piss off.”

Alina sighed a rough, aggravated groan and rolled her eyes. “Fine, fine. Watch. Richter? Thank you for helping my sister. It means a lot, to both of us.” She pushed your face to the side and planted a short peck on your cheek. Convenient that it was the clean one, and not the mutilated one. “You see, Anya? It’s nothing. You’re so immature. Now do it.”

Anya had closed her eyes and bared her teeth. “Nah, you pucker up again. So you can kiss my ass.”

>Really, it wasn’t necessary. Tell Alina to leave her sister alone with this. It *was* weird, if it was the two of you. You really didn’t want Anya’s nasty spit on you anyways.
>Alina was right. It was weirder to have some sort of issue with it than it was not to. You had qualified for it, hadn’t you?
>Tell Alina that a Retinue was not meant to engage in such activities with their superior officer. It would be unseemly for one even if it was innocent for most.
>Other?
Also
>Write anything special to Maddalyn?
>Tell Maddalyn through your planned correspondence that you fired off a Hellfire?

>>4763861
>Really, it wasn’t necessary. Tell Alina to leave her sister alone with this. It *was* weird, if it was the two of you. You really didn’t want Anya’s nasty spit on you anyways.
Richter's engaged anyway.

>Write anything special to Maddalyn?
Just an update that we're still alive and all.

>Tell Maddalyn through your planned correspondence that you fired off a Hellfire?
Should probably do since we don't know if there's any other after effects.

Hey tanq do letters from the front get examined for censorship purposes or does the privilege of being nobility bypass that?

>>4763867
>Hey tanq do letters from the front get examined for censorship purposes or does the privilege of being nobility bypass that?
The privilege of being nobility does apply, but it's not your nobility, it's Maddalyn's nobility. nothing sent to anybody adjacent to a territorial lord is going to have things screened out.

>>4763861
>Tell Alina that a Retinue was not meant to engage in such activities with their superior officer. It would be unseemly for one even if it was innocent for most.

>>4763861
>>Tell Alina that a Retinue was not meant to engage in such activities with their superior officer. It would be unseemly for one even if it was innocent for most.
We just got done explaining how we aren't fucking Signy, let's try to not start any new rumors.
>Write anything special to Maddalyn?
Dear Maddy,
I apologize about the quality of handwriting in this letter, my hands have been partially burned from assisting in the rescue of an overturned tank. The tank you have provided me has kept me safe on multiple occasions, along with my crew and comrades. Insert appropriate amount of reference, insinuations, promises of butt molestations here.
P.S. Shot a hellfire shell at some normal people, hope that doesn't get me or you into any magical trouble.

>>4763861
>Tell Alina that a Retinue was not meant to engage in such activities with their superior officer. It would be unseemly for one even if it was innocent for most.

>>4763867
>>4764066
Tell Maddalyn about your continued status of being biologically alive. Justify your crappy left handed burned handwriting, thank for tank, and then spend the rest of the letter threatening her rear end.
Also you blasted people into shadows, that's no big deal. Perhaps write that more discretely.

>>4763867
Yes, it is weird. Get that spit away from you. You've had her bodily fluids on you before anyways.Mixing your blood together that one time was probably worse than anything you could have possibly done, really.

>>4764055
>>4764066
>>4764069
Explain it in an official way- you wouldn't kiss your driver on the cheek, would you?

Writing. Going to assume anybody not explicitly mentioning the letter is neutral on it.

>>4764665
>you wouldn't kiss your driver on the cheek, would you?
W-well, maybe if he didn't cover them up all the time...

>>4763861
>She pushed your face to the side and planted a short peck on your cheek.
Isn't this rape? She didn't acquire our consent first.

“Alina,” you put yourself verbally between the bickering sisters, “That sort of behavior is inappropriate between a retinue and their charge. It might be innocent for most, but it’d be unseemly in this case.”

Alina had a doubtful look on her face, and when you looked to Anya for support she was squinting at you like your excuse had been something that was about as clever as a river stone. Well. Yes. Your behavior with her wasn’t exactly flawless, but Alina didn’t need to know that.

“All that I’m seeing is that you’re both overthinking it,” Alina said with a small shrug of her hands, “If you don’t want it, though…mm. I don’t think this retinue thing could be that serious.”

“It is quite official, a retinue is meant to be one who is trusted and capable, professional…” You spoke easily of what it was supposed to be. In truth…well, as far as your family went, the female scions of Von Tracht who sought the battlefield through retinue service did not adhere to such ideals. At least perishing in the line of duty had a way of cleansing their reputations. The only female relative you recalled who was a direct descendant (the only ones who were not martially inclined were those who married in and were thus not of Von Tracht blood) that didn’t have at least one or two rumors of dalliances was Jana Von Tracht, who had apparently begun her time when she was younger than the required service age anyways.

“Anyways,” Alina stood up, “There’s nothing in your rules or whatever they are saying that you can’t have your wounds treated, is there? Come on, Anya, you can help me change his bandages.”

“Don’t try and fob off work on me,” Anya said, refusing to sit up, “Fairy boy already does that enough.”

“Who?”

“The guy you’re sitting right next to.”

“Fairy boy?” Alina repeated, then looked at you, and frowned, “That’s…not a name I’d have gone with…” She looked uncomfortably away from your scorched face. “Maybe before…you know.”

“Still that way under all that.”

Alina took away the bandages covering you from your fingers to your elbows, and a few beyond that. It didn’t look as bad as they did, but it didn’t look pretty, either. “It looks alright, but…Have you been moving a lot?” She gingerly picked up your arm and looked closely, “It should have healed more than this.”

“I’ve been busy,” you said, without elaborating. “I fight from in a tank, it isn’t as though I’m running about doing cartwheels.”

“Anya used to fight in a tank too, you know,” Alina said, “Before she was with you. Did she ever tell you about that?”

“With the Iron Hogs, yes,” you said, “She didn’t say much about when she was with Todesfelsen.”

“’Cause it was boring,” Anya said, “Not a lot happened worth talkin’ about. Busywork. Bandits run off quick from tanks, and shagherds aren’t much problem either. Mostly was the latter.”

“A shagherd?” you asked, “Are those animals?”

“They’re boney, wooly bull things,” Anya said, “They get into big balls of fucking every so often and they’ve got shitty tempers all the time when they’re like that. The fuck balls get big enough, they start drawing in the strays, and then they go around fuckin’ eating everything and attacking whatever they see. Good merc work in mowing them down. A single automatic cannon shell puts them down if you hit ‘em right in the center.”

You’d never heard them called “shagherds,” but you got enough to figure out what she was talking about. Anya’s description of a Great Wooly Gurteltier’s mating season behavior was crude, though accurate. Though you didn’t know they ranged this far north. As large surly creatures that were often as big as bears, using a tank to deal with them was probably not unreasonable if they were angry. Nasty looking ugly animals more congealed than grown, and not particularly dangerous save for when they were herding and aggressive, they’d never been anything you had aspired to hunt.

“Anya says she’s seen them come out of caves by the dozen,” Alina said as she washed your burns gently, “I wonder why they leave? There isn’t much up here for them, with how angry they get.”

Cave pioneering wasn’t an appealing job. It attracted a strange sort, though there was suspected to be much to discover.

“They’re just cunts, Alina,” Anya said, “They come up and get shot and ground into sausage, and if you don’t do that they start screwing and fuck everything up.”

“Is it good sausage?” you asked as you rolled up yours pants to let Alina get at your feet and legs.

“Not really, but it’s better than if it’s whole. Batter fried with sauce, then it’s fine.”

“I thought you’d have told me about that,” you said, “Did you say, and I forgot?”

“Nah,” Anya said, half closing her eyes at the ceiling, “Just hasn’t come up.”

“Good thing they only herd in the summer,” you said as Alina looked down your other leg, “We don’t need them along with the Netillians, right?”

That gave Anya pause for thought, and she opened her eyes again- a revelation had struck her. “…Y’know, I wonder what’d happen if you hit one of those pieces of shit with a munitions caster…”

Alina called over the superior doctor for one concerning instance, but it turned out to be nothing. Well, “nothing,” though a poultice was still put on the offending discoloration after it was cut shallowly with a knife. All your bandages were replaced, and though nothing really changed, you felt better for it.

“Will you be staying and resting?” Alina asked. “You certainly need your laundry done. Anya came in smelling like a trash sack…”

“No,” you said, pulling your boots back on, “I have to get back to my people as soon as possible. I just want to write a letter to my fiancée and pass it off here before going back.” You stood up and put your cap on, “Thank you for your help, though.”

“I see, I see,” Alina didn’t sound glad that you were off so quickly- though considering your last interaction, it seemed more for the sake of her sister than for you. “Good luck out there.”

“Bye, Anya,” you said down to the reclining retinue, her sleek midsection doing its best to draw the eye. A bizarre temptation to scratch her belly like she was a cat; she was stretched out like one. “I’ll see you around. Stay safe.”

“Yeah,” Anya said, arms still behind her head, “You too.”

That was all there had to be.

-----

Writing to Maddalyn turned out to be harder than you thought it’d be. Not only did you have to write with your left hand, something you had yet to get used to, but the burns and the thick bandaging made your handwriting utterly farcical. The letters turned loose and childlike, and you could only hope that your fiancée wouldn’t mind so long as it was at least legible, which for some words you’d written, was tragically questionable.

Your initial writing concerned yourself. Yes, you’d been fighting. Yes, you had been hurt saving a comrade from a burning tank, but you were getting better. A reassurance that the tank your wife had given you had been instrumental in keeping you whole and hale- though you had had to “use a special thing,” one time. A safety measure- a glance by anybody peeking in would assume you meant some vice or drug, rather than what you hoped Maddalyn would understand- your use of the Hellfire shell. It felt important that she should know. After all, she’d know best if there might be other effects, that were worth being concerned about. Besides the shadows, and wakened voices. Hopefully, those were the worst of it all.

The thanks for the m/32B were not exaggerated, and didn’t need to be. It was her family and her work that had kept you and your crew safe, on multiple occasions now. She could be proud of that, even if it was only partially her responsible for the tank being in your possession. The Judge knew that she needed more to be happy with herself about.

Including her butt. Her round, pert and tight butt. What shame was there to wax on about it? You allowed yourself to get carried away in writing- how you remembered fondly every time you had groped it, most of all during that one night, where you had both retired to a hotel room and pleasured one another long into the night, falling asleep in one another’s arms, reeking of passion. Her breath hot on your neck, her budding breasts pressed into you, the tips of your fingers trailing across the soft skin of her naked bottom. Her beautiful blue eye, her deep orange hair, frayed and frizzy from your actions.

Yet you hadn’t done everything, hadn’t gone all the way. She hadn’t wanted to. Yet…you thought of something else, as your mind fixated on her pale rear and soft thighs. Damn yourself for getting burned on your hands, there was plenty of privacy around here if you looked for it. That bum, though…There was something else, wasn’t there? That you could still…no, she surely wouldn’t accept that. Would she? However…

You looked down at your writings and stared at what idiocy you’d managed to write just there while distracted. In stupid looking loopy scribbles, ”I love your bottom so, that I wish to make love to it, to bury myself so deep I’d lose myself.” Yes, very poetic, Richter, you thought as you wondered whether you could cross it out or if you ought to re write the whole damned thing. Maybe next time you could just write I’m gonna stick my dick into your bum right before tripping over your own bootlaces and cracking your head open on the corner of a crate.

>This would be the most embarrassing last letter to send to your loved one possible. Rewrite it and chop out the parts where you wrote like you had a hand on your crankshaft.
>It was fine. This was honest, true, if crude. Was there anybody more appropriate to be this perverse with than your spouse, anyways?
>Other?
Also-
>You’re at a logistics and resupply and repair base. Is there anything you want to pick up or try to have delivered to your tank for field modification? Measure your expectations- you only have an evening to do it in, and you don’t want to put too much weight on your tank.

>>4764707
>Isn't this rape?
That depends on how you'd define what Hilda did.

>>4765302
I demand a belly up catgirl Anya pic.

>>4765307
>This would be the most embarrassing last letter to send to your loved one possible. Rewrite it and chop out the parts where you wrote like you had a hand on your crankshaft.

>>4765307
>>It was fine. This was honest, true, if crude. Was there anybody more appropriate to be this perverse with than your spouse, anyways?

>>You’re at a logistics and resupply and repair base. Is there anything you want to pick up or try to have delivered to your tank for field modification? Measure your expectations- you only have an evening to do it in, and you don’t want to put too much weight on your tank.
Smoke/FOG grenades (or whatever equivalent to a fast obscurant grenade exists) and flaregun rounds if we haven't restocked on them.

>>4765307
>>Other?
It's fine, just slip in a little alternative fact that someone must have jabbed us with some morphine while we weren't looking and it must have come into effect when writing the second part of the letter. Sorry about that, its safe to ignore that part, it totally didn't come out as intended... unless?.
>You’re at a logistics and resupply and repair base. Is there anything you want to pick up or try to have delivered to your tank for field modification? Measure your expectations- you only have an evening to do it in, and you don’t want to put too much weight on your tank.
Other than smoke grenades for throwing, maybe look into a jury rigged mount for a machine gun on the turret, or we could see about getting the Von Bum emblem stuck back on the tank somewhere.

>>4765362
While ive been wanting the Emblem stuck back on for some time now, it seems they've deployed some actual dedicated heavy AT to this AO, and we're already somewhat infamous.

Also during the time skip did our turret ring get looked at/improved?

>>4765367
That's true, I've played enough Ace Combat games to know everyone really gets fixated on a main characters distinguishing feature. Probably best to keep it inside the tank for now.

>>4765367
>Also during the time skip did our turret ring get looked at/improved?
It's been about as well repaired as you can get in the field. To get things as good as new it's going to have to go back to Strossvald and be rebuilt, frankly.

>>4765307
>Other
"Once I see you, I'll take a look under your armored skirt while you check my barrel and turret."

>>4765307
>>This would be the most embarrassing last letter to send to your loved one possible. Rewrite it and chop out the parts where you wrote like you had a hand on your crankshaft.

>You’re at a logistics and resupply and repair base. Is there anything you want to pick up or try to have delivered to your tank for field modification? Measure your expectations- you only have an evening to do it in, and you don’t want to put too much weight on your tank.
More flares, maybe coloured smoke for signalling if that's available.

>>4765307
>>This would be the most embarrassing last letter to send to your loved one possible. Rewrite it and chop out the parts where you wrote like you had a hand on your crankshaft.

>>4765307
>This would be the most embarrassing last letter to send to your loved one possible. Rewrite it and chop out the parts where you wrote like you had a hand on your crankshaft.

>>4765330
>>4765753
>>4765843
>>4765902
Abort, you don't need to be anal about this.

>>4765353
Don't be so anal retentive.

>>4765362
Anull the proposition.

>>4765439
An all in approach.

>>4765353
>>4765362
>>4765753
Smoke, flares, see if you can bum a machine gun off somebody.

Writing.

>>4765330
>I demand a belly up catgirl Anya pic.
We'll see.

>>4765916
>catgirl Anya
A~nyaa

I know the dumb meme we're seeing next thread.

>>4765916
What kind of MGs does Strossvald use for the light/medium/heavy role?

>>4765992
Uncertain of which dumb meme is being referred to.

>>4766137
>What kind of MGs does Strossvald use for the light/medium/heavy role?
It's been mentioned here and there, but the standard light machine gun for Strossvald's infantry is the Von Muse (Siegfried) Machine Gun, designed by, of course, the Von Muse company, owned by an eccentric nobleman firearms craftsman and his sons who, besides military contracts, design and sell contraptions specially ordered by discerning clientele. It's a fast firing, accurate and effective machine gun that uses a side loaded thirty round magazine or seventy five round drum- when it isn't feeling temperamental, which it often does if it's not kept quite clean, and it has a complexity to its mechanisms that makes it problematic to service in the field. Not to mention that it's a relatively costly weapon, but such hasn't been much of an issue during its service.

The line between medium and heavy machine gun doesn't exist for Strossvald- the "heavy machine gun" still uses the standard rifle caliber (as is normal on the continent). The standard company support machine gun is the Von Muse Machine Gun as well- rather, the Von Muse (Erich), named for the Archdukes whom they were "made for." Archduke Erich being the Archduke before the current one, of course, and this gun being the Von Muse patriarch's original claim to fame. It's a sturdy but quite heavy water cooled machine gun, though its rate of fire is rather slower than the VMS even though it has been improved over its thirty years of service. Like its descendant, it's not a cheap weapon. It has the unflattering nicknames of "hunchback" or "moonfish" because of its appearance without its cooling jacket.

>>4766799
So Strossvald doesn't have a belt-fed air cooled machine gun? What's our m/32s coaxial using for example?

>>4766886
>So Strossvald doesn't have a belt-fed air cooled machine gun?
They're in use, but they aren't standard for the line infantry. Troops with more money put into them might get the newest stuff on the lot, but most of Strossvald's army just doesn't see the necessity despite the benefits. It's not like most of the materiel on the market's a colossal improvement besides the, you know, lack of need to carry around a ton of water.

>What's our m/32s coaxial using for example?
As the m/32 is a Naukland designed tank, its coaxial gun is part and parcel of the licensing process. Thusly it uses an air cooled belt fed (though such belts are contained in drum containers themselves) machine gun of Naukland make.
Could one just buy these guns separately and then and use them as medium machine guns with some adjustments to fit onto proper tripod mounts? Well, yes, but that would be a breach of licensing agreements and very naughty, so surely nobody has done that.

Sorry for the delay people, update'll be out soon.

With a swift, snatching claw, you crumpled the paper up in a fist and tossed it on the floor. What if this was the last letter you sent home, you thought, were you going to make the last words you said to your fiancée a lewd threat to violate her behind? No, Richter, rewrite it, try harder on the handwriting, and exempt those parts where you clearly had half a hand on your crankshaft. A cold shower would do you well, especially with the layers of dust and grime on you. Just because you were (mostly) filthy didn’t mean your thoughts had to be.

That was a good idea, actually. You’d try and do that. This was the headquarters area- there were facilities for it by now, with the front line moving up. The Silver Lances would eventually move out and be replaced by more and more Republic personnel, but even Sosaldtians took showers.

It wasn’t a proper washing. With your bandages and your manipulation impaired as it was, you were really only letting water run over your head, but it was something, at least. Back to the writing.
Everything copied over, in nicer writing, and you wrapped it up with a cordial bow instead of whatever the last thing could be called. Earnest but unwelcome? Anyways. You assured Maddalyn you’d be fine- that you were protected not only by your superior armor, your expert crew, but also by your comrades in your platoon and company. There was naught to fear from any enemy you faced.

Haughty words in the face of the truth, but though the Silver Lances had taken many casualties these past days, you did have superior materiel to them, even if you were far, far, far from being among their most capable commanders, let alone fighters.

The letter was passed along. Given the penchant for the Silver Lances to stray far from the Archduchy, they commissioned very capable courier services for the sake of the men. Unlike in Elllowie under the Intelligence Office, you could expect responses, as well. None would have come by now, of course. You had learned that the first you could expect mail would be in…around three days from now. Was it wise to already look forward to it?

Your allowed time for messing about back here was growing thin, you thought as you saw the sun well on its way down towards the horizon. There was just one thing left you wanted to take care of here- first, to the Maintenance Company. You had an idea to put something on your tank to help out the infantry- rather, for the infantry to use to help you out, and thusly them. You’d seen pintle mounts for machine guns stuck on the panzergrenadiers’ armored trucks sometimes, and even on vehicles not expected to see combat. Field modifications were supposed to be approved by a company commander, but in practice, few seemed to care so long as it didn’t destroy the company’s equipment. A pintle mount was a lightweight allowance, and it was simple enough to get one from Maintenance- rather, the heavy bag of kit parts for it, and a blow torch for spackling on solder. You could put the Von Blum emblem back on your turret with that, too, but you reconsidered actually doing that- making yourself more recognizable didn’t seem smart with the anti-tank vehicle presently in your sector.

While the pintle kit was easy, when you asked after the thing meant to go on the pintle kit, your answer was in two parts. Ask Logistics, and also don’t bother because they wouldn’t give anything to a lieutenant. The implication was clear. You’d probably need to acquire the weapon to use, in the field, or through a favor. In the present state of things, nobody wanted to give up the firepower of a machine gun.

Not that other ordinance wasn’t available. When you did go around to logistics, there was no objection to your requests for things you had been missing- smoke grenades, and replacements for your flare pistol. Smoke grenades were encouraged for use by tank commanders, but oftentimes they didn’t use them in favor of fast movement and, if vision blocking was needed, it was preferred to be delivered en masse with artillery. Be that as it may, you still took a bandolier of smoke candles. They were slow to deploy, but they were what was available. You’d rather have had something that deployed quickly, like the shells on the old X-80, but that wasn’t what was being handed out to people in your place on the ladder.
>Flares refilled
>x4 Smoke Candles obtained

The instructions on the white painted, green topped steel canisters were very clear in not breathing the smoke for an extended period of time. Was it poison gas? Not explicitly, but there was a “possibility” of “long term side effects.” Not that you needed to be kept from igniting one and breathing deeply.

Back to your platoon, then. You caught another ride, this one a resupply convoy to your company. Lovely timing- but it was an awful lot for what you were expecting to do. Perhaps it’d all just be overpreparation. There wasn’t any reason to read too much into it when the Reserve Battalion wouldn’t even have the difficult task coming up.

-----

The prey was out there, ignorant, unassuming. Their repute was a challenge, but the beast? Mixed accounts. One exciting, the other completely plain. This was a gallery only rivalled by the potential to the east. Judge Above, would that have been an incredible time, but it was not the hunt in these times. The Archduchy’s finest would have to do, for now. They’d certainly made a mess of the metal that Kampt had brought south. The Kommissar’s power play hadn’t gotten the quick and simple smashing victory that everybody had wanted, but that would have been dull, anyways. Dull like killing the great beast had been, distracted on two sides as it had been. Those who decided when to wage war never understood the point of it all.

The decorations of others jangled in the wind, against the breast. Non uniform, but like the broad brimmed black pioneer’s hat and the identically hued longcoat with its grey furred collar and hood, splayed to the shoulders, anything besides the green uniform was something earned as a sort of recognition. Once, that recognition had been a goal. Now, the apparel was merely a marker. Come and get it, if you dare.
The best you can hope for is to be a trophy worthy of a place of honor.

-----

Morning came, or rather, the appointed time for “morning” came, though it was still dark. Cold coffee was passed around the platoon- the Pervitin cases were distributed, but Vehrlors said to save them for when it was absolutely necessary.

“It’ll ruin you,” he said to you in particular as he held up a flat metal case with sterile printing on its face, “It feels good, but the moment you start wanting it, I’ve seen men go mad, do things they’d never do. Only for life or death.”

Even still, you looked between the case and the tin cup of cold coffee in your other hand, held roughly with two remaining fingers, and still had to think about it. Never had you imbibed something you so utterly despised with such frequency- it defied logic that coffee remained so awful, that you never got used to it.

Last night hadn’t been a restful one. You’d skimped on your Blackflower for the night, to try and extend it even though it wasn’t short quite yet, and you’d been thrown tumbling into a void. A void where the demiphantom’s voice took on a familiar tone. You could swear it sounded like Narr…but that was impossible, and idiotic. Your subconscious was collaborating with a spirit beast to disrupt your sleep for some unknowable reason. Combined with the meager breakfast of canned bread, same as it ever was, and a slab of cold, salty pork fat, you weren’t in a pleasant mood, but you were at least awake by the time the sun began to rise. The ground attack strikes would come with the sun’s ascent over the hills- then, the attack. In the meantime, the work to set up the pintle was finished- the corner of the turret wasn’t a fantastic place, but it was what was available for a theoretical gunner standing on the hull. The apparatus, once its baseplate was in place, could be folded down, and adjusted for a variety of guns- you just had to find something to put in it now.

Ellowian troops came around- forward observers for the ground attackers scheduled to come. You hadn’t actually seen one of their infantrymen around, or at least, you didn’t remember seeing any. Even the ones you encountered on your way back from Sosaldt to Ellowie that one time had been in incomplete uniform, especially the surgeon. These men had fog-grey uniforms, round steel helmets, leather boots- all beaten and faded, looking very much the part of the dress of men who had been run out of their country months ago, but had clung to their bearers still.

“Huh,” one of the Ellowians looked at you by your tank, the engine sputtering and warming, “Hey, you, with the fucked up face.”

You had to get that mask back on. “Me?” you said back, taking a few steps.

The trooper looked at you incredulously. “Yeah. Anyways, that jacket. Where’d you get it?”

Ah yes, your Ellowian tanker jacket. It had taken a decent beating itself by now. “I bought it,” you said, “It was being sold in a clothing store. It was looted from a storehouse, I suppose. The jacket I liked more I gave to my Retinue.” Who’d had it stolen from her afterwards.

The man stared at your jacket with a wistful look. “Was sort of hoping I’d found another of ours, is all, but the cap’s wrong.”

A shrug from your shoulders. “Sorry. You won’t ask what sort of store would be selling Ellowian military surplus?”

“That is strange, but, no. Don’t got the time for every detail. Besides, you Archduchy lot are covered in all sorts of things that don’t make much sense without a long story.” The man waved, “Maybe another time.”

Another time would be unlikely at best. He was right, it was a long story. He left and caught up with his people who had walked on, and you hauled yourself back up onto your tank.

A far off droning of plane engines from the south- those observers had best hurry. It seemed the pilots were impatient today. Or…no, they increased in volume, and soon were over you. They didn’t look like Ellowian attack planes. Fighters? One was a gaudy shade of crimson red, the other with its wings painted golden yellow, like they had snatched their coloration straight out of the Emrean Liberation’s flying corps.

They stayed high, and moved on. A fighter sweep to make sure the way was clear, perhaps.

“Four Three, Four Five, radio check,” Vehrlors crackled over the line.

“Four Five, copy.”

“Four Three, I hear you, Four Five.”

“The infantry’s moving out now, but we’re only heading forward once the planes withdraw. Anything with wheels or treads past our line’s designated a target, so keep nice and still. I’ll say again when we’re ready.”

You’d finalized the planning beforehand. Whilst the purpose of your participation in the coming offensive was to keep enemy vehicles off the flanks of the hill fort assault, you did have to push the lines up there in the first place- and support the infantry on the way up. To that end, it was decided…


>You’d split yourselves over the line to spread your support out. It’d let you act more independently, help more allies, and after all, what was going to be around that needed the platoon’s whole firepower?
>The Platoon would stick together. Concentrated firepower able to handle whatever you might handle. The radio might be good now, but who could say if the Netillians might bring in another black sphere device thing?
>Have two of you in one place, whilst the other goes to another place in the line. Von Rotehof the Younger would be the second of whatever pair, with the weakest gun- but it’d mean you could spread out some but also be able to deal with enemy armor well enough.
>Other?

>>4768015
>>The Platoon would stick together. Concentrated firepower able to handle whatever you might handle. The radio might be good now, but who could say if the Netillians might bring in another black sphere device thing?

>>4768015
>The Platoon would stick together. Concentrated firepower able to handle whatever you might handle. The radio might be good now, but who could say if the Netillians might bring in another black sphere device thing?

>>4768015
>The Platoon would stick together. Concentrated firepower able to handle whatever you might handle.

If it isn't a tank, then it's meant for artillery, mortars or airstrikes to take care of.

>>4768015
>The Platoon would stick together. Concentrated firepower able to handle whatever you might handle. The radio might be good now, but who could say if the Netillians might bring in another black sphere device thing?

Boot, don't spatter.

>>4768015
>>Have two of you in one place, whilst the other goes to another place in the line. Von Rotehof the Younger would be the second of whatever pair, with the weakest gun- but it’d mean you could spread out some but also be able to deal with enemy armor well enough.
Vehrlors with Von Rotehof, us alone. We are the better equipped to go alone, and if there is something we can't handle we get help.

>>4768015
>>Have two of you in one place, whilst the other goes to another place in the line. Von Rotehof the Younger would be the second of whatever pair, with the weakest gun- but it’d mean you could spread out some but also be able to deal with enemy armor well enough.

>>4768015
>You’d split yourselves over the line to spread your support out. It’d let you act more independently, help more allies, and after all, what was going to be around that needed the platoon’s whole firepower?

>>4768015
>The Platoon would stick together. Concentrated firepower able to handle whatever you might handle. The radio might be good now, but who could say if the Netillians might bring in another black sphere device thing?

>>4768015
>The Platoon would stick together. Concentrated firepower able to handle whatever you might handle. The radio might be good now, but who could say if the Netillians might bring in another black sphere device thing?

>>4768015
>>The Platoon would stick together. Concentrated firepower able to handle whatever you might handle. The radio might be good now, but who could say if the Netillians might bring in another black sphere device thing?
Hopefully Richter remembers his signal flag reading skills

>>4768081
>>4768105
>>4768127
>>4768138
>>4768547
>>4768763
>>4768898
All together now.

>>4768144
>>4768268
Go it alone, again. You can handle it, right?

>>4768467
The skinny line.

Writing.

>>4769079
Did Big von Rotehof's tank get fully fixed?

>>4769255
No, hence why it is not present in planning.

The entire platoon holding together throughout the operation wasn’t what the infantry wanted, but you knew better. Keeping yourselves in the same place would let you concentrate firepower, and even if other parts of the line lacked for tank support, your mobile ball of armor would be able to quickly handle whatever it encountered, and if it ran into something it couldn’t roll over, better to deal with that with a platoon of tanks rather than just one.

Everything arranged beforehand, you all sat waiting atop your hill, in the forward fighting positions, though the Mittelsosalian troops had long gone forward of them. The Ellowian ground attack planes were blocky, graceless things, and when they swooped down on their targets below they moved more like charging drunks than anything, but you had to imagine they were doing well for themselves. The Ellowian Air Force did not have an unearned reputation.

Through some favor, after the first two trios of planes had come through with their strikes, a second set took their places, though this group was of a different type of plane- more ground attackers, from the bulbous shapes under their wings and fuselages. Vehrlors didn’t announce anything over the radio- the order must have been to go after the strikes, however long they persisted.

A development, however. Whilst the Ellowian planes were swooping down and dropping bombs and strafing their targets with cannon and machine guns, from the north, other planes came-surely Netillian ones, as they weren’t the odd colored planes from before. Straits would have been dire for the Ellowian support, only that they were reinforced with perfect timing from the south by the arrival of further fighters. Rather too perfect timing. As the ground attackers fled, messily dropping whatever ordinance they had left on seemingly no target just to lighten their load, the fighters above squared off, looping wide over the field of battle.

“That’ll do,” Vehrlors said over the radio, “Let’s head out. Four Five, on my left, Four Three, my right. Echelon Left formation, we’ll adjust for terrain. Take us forward, Four Three- straight north.”

Off you went- though besides the sounds of infantry combat, there was little readily apparent of what you’d be attacking. As before, you’d just move forward until something was unwise enough to be caught in your sights.

Though the Mittelsosalians had been reinforced, now that the planes buzzing overhead were not raining hell upon the enemy, their progress became much like it had been the other day. Though wherever your tanks were, the enemy began to melt, directed by the expert hand of your platoon officer.

“Four Five! Pin that position to the three-five-zero with your machine guns. Four Three, advance to the right flank and flush them out!” The target was a tiny hill that gave a commanding view of the terrain for a good half a kilometer in all directions, with a copse of scraggly trees to its north, and a sweep of tall grass all along the south that covered your infantry accompaniment’s approach as they huddled behind your vehicles.

Your position at the left of the echelon formation meant that the block in your turret keeping it from traversing to the front-right was hardly a hindrance. Your crew needed little direction as you gave them targets, relayed orders, and watched the situation unfold. Von Rotehof went around the side of a tough, dug in machine gun position as your guns shot over it to keep everything inside. A burst of dust and rubble as he drove up around and planted a pair of high explosive shells into the position.

“Got ‘em, Four-One!” Little Von Rotehof reported.

Vehrlors popped out of his cupola and shouted something down to the Mittelsosalian troops behind your tanks, and they scrambled forward and occupied the position in no time at all. Wherever you were, the progress was quick.

Everywhere else was slow, though, and it was readily apparent even to the headstrong Von Rotehof.

“Our right’s looking like there’s not much brown, Four One,” Von Rotehof said as your formation was rearranged into an arrow instead of an echelon.

“We’re causing an imbalance in the lines. We’ll stay here a little bit to make sure our boys don’t get shoved off the place we just pushed them on.”

An implication you wouldn’t be staying very long. Given what you were doing, you wouldn’t be surprised if the Netillians had already painted a target on your lot, so it did sound smart to not make your presence something well known for over long.

Yet, you hardly noticed it at first, but the Mittelsosalians close to you were being…peeled away.

You kept low in the cupola, but you saw one Republic soldier in the cover nearby, utilizing the trenches dug by the Netillians that had been blown out of the position, get shot through the chest and splay out on his back, and before his partner could react, a bullet went through him as well, and he slumped to his knees, then forward. You swallowed hard witnessing this, but shook it off, only to blink and see that you were the only friendly entity around. Any brown uniform around you seemed to belong to an incapacitated or wounded body, and the sharpshooters would do their damage before you responded in kind. Enemy casualties were reported, but the replacements to the troops around you had stopped with astonishing speed.

The effects became apparent quickly, as you scanned behind and saw…

“Four One!” You said over the radio, “They’re behind us!”

“Already? Shit, the officer was right here and he said…” a pause, “For fuck’s sake, he’s gone. Better have a bullet in him instead of fleeing. Rgh…I’m calling for reinforcements.” Vehrlors wanted to keep this position, and it was a strong point, but if you were isolated…maybe you ought to suggest something? He didn’t sound certain of what to do.

>You couldn’t stay here, and all of you knew it. Maybe you could all break back south?
>There wasn’t anything to do but to try and hold the position. Reinforcements would come- and you could hold out against an enemy that didn’t have tank support.
>The position was too valuable to just give up, but you wouldn’t get help without weakening the enemy. Volunteer to go help the southern front link up with the hill.
>Other?

>>4769555
>The position was too valuable to just give up, but you wouldn’t get help without weakening the enemy. Volunteer to go help the southern front link up with the hill.

>>4769555
>The position was too valuable to just give up, but you wouldn’t get help without weakening the enemy. Volunteer to go help the southern front link up with the hill.

A stopped tank is a dead tank, if the enemy can't anticipate what the hell we're doing all the better. Plus we can tell the soiled brown pants infantry to hurry up.

>>4769555
>The position was too valuable to just give up, but you wouldn’t get help without weakening the enemy. Volunteer to go help the southern front link up with the hill.

>>4769555
>The position was too valuable to just give up, but you wouldn’t get help without weakening the enemy. Volunteer to go help the southern front link up with the hill.

>>4769586
>>4769593
>>4769594
>>4769602
Volunteer yourself to go and link your position up again. How noble of you.

Writing.

This position was too valuable to just give up. The imbalance in the lines would collapse if you abandoned it, and the advance would be stalled- who knew, perhaps even enough to impact the operations to the west. That wouldn’t do- this needed a swift solution, but Vehrlors hesitated on which to go for.

So you volunteered yourself, your tank, your crew. “Four One,” you said over the platoon radio, “Reinforcements won’t arrive if we don’t weaken the enemy. Let me go south and help affect a breakthrough. The Republic troops need to get up here.”

“Do it,” Vehrlors shot back immediately, “Right now. Four Three, turn about and cover Four Five’s movement. I’ll handle the front arc.”

“On it. Quit dawdling, Four Five!”

You didn’t respond to that, as you only caught it right as you were switching to the tank intercom. “Mal, turn us completely around and take us south, on the double. We need to get back to the Mittelsosalian lines and help them up to this hill. Schafer, Hausen, shoot at anything that moves. We’re isolated and the only friends we have here right now are in tanks.”

Affirmations came back in, and your driver did as expected- make it utterly impossible for any of your weapons to be trained on any targets, or allow you to keep steady in your seat. Thrown back and forth, you barely recognized anything that was happening, let alone what targets to direct fire towards. Good thing Little Von Rotehof was quick on the draw- the blasts of high explosive shells landing ahead and near were, for once, appreciated.”

“Ahpead,” Malachi chirped over the intercom.

“Yes, I see them,” you said as you steadied yourself in the commander’s seat and looked forward through the cupola’s forward viewport. “Pull us up by them.” A loud crack from behind- somebody with an anti-tank rifle was upset with your passage. An ear-splitting clank came from beside as it ricocheted off the edge of the top and the rear hull and whistled into the sky. Whoever was holding an anti-tank rifle when the tank was turned around would get the first bullet.

A temptation to go over the top of the cupola was quelled soundly by rifle cracks over top of it, in quick succession. Automatics- the Netillians here practically had ever edge over the Republic troops, combined with munitions casters, and potentially armored personnel carriers elsewhere…

You pushed your way past your crew and opened the turret door to face the Republic troops from inside the tank- they were in cover, huddled, though not cowed as a machine gunner and his crew continued to return fire. There couldn’t have been that many Netillians, not as many as there were Republic troops, you quickly noticed as you looked up and down.

“Who’s in charge here!?” You demanded irritably. It wasn’t hard to sound furious, with everything going on and what was before. An invigorating feeling to empty your lungs into. “We need reinforcements at that north hill, right now! Get your commander the hell over here!”

A message passed down the line, and some thin looking man ambled over in stumbling spurts of unsatisfactory speed- you noticed a leg wound, but felt no pity in the moment.
“Who the hell are you?” He demanded in a thin voice, made raspy by having to shout. “What’s going on?”

“I am Lieutenant Richter Von Tracht, and former Kommandant of the Republic of Vang,” you leaned fully into your history- it had a decent chance of swaying opinions, you’d found. “Republic troops and my platoon are surrounded on that hill north of us, and you’re going to move up and push those Netillian bastards back!”

The Republic officer balked when you mentioned your (former) title, but wasn’t keen on cooperation still. He proceeded into a whine. “We’ll be slaughtered if we just charge in! Can’t you just hold on a little longer? We’re keeping them occupied for now. My platoon’s already had to be combined with what’s left of the people we were sent up to replace!”

>If they were going to hide in their holes, then you had to lead by example. Show them how a Silver Lance fought- even if you’d surely be throwing yourself into trouble…
>If this officer didn’t want to accept responsibility, then you sure as hell would. Time for you to get out of your tank- again. Your crew could take care of themselves in supporting.
>Move somewhere else- find troops that weren’t hesitant. This lot wouldn’t be of help even if they wanted to attack.
>Other?

>>4770365
>If they were going to hide in their holes, then you had to lead by example. Show them how a Silver Lance fought- even if you’d surely be throwing yourself into trouble…

>>4770365
>If they were going to hide in their holes, then you had to lead by example. Show them how a Silver Lance fought- even if you’d surely be throwing yourself into trouble…

File: norsupyssy.jpg (172 KB, 1024x683)

172 KB JPG

So what do these AT rifles look like? The shitty Boys, the trashy Soviet ones, the Polish/German WWII ones, the T-Gewehr or the Finnish sci fi gun?

>>4770365
>>Move somewhere else- find troops that weren’t hesitant. This lot wouldn’t be of help even if they wanted to attack.
These guys sound like they have their hands full, let's find some fresher troops to lead into the attack.

>>4770426
They aren't massive like the one in that pic, and are reasonably man portable (as much as an anti tank rifle can be) but Richter has seen the standard Netillian Anti-tank rifles before. With a top loaded magazine and a 13mm round (the same caliber as Strossvald's anti tank rifles) it'd be most similar to a Boys, though.

>>4770365
>If they were going to hide in their holes, then you had to lead by example. Show them how a Silver Lance fought- even if you’d surely be throwing yourself into trouble…
They're the closest, and from the sounds there might not BE any other troops nearby that'd be more willing.

>>4770365
>If they were going to hide in their holes, then you had to lead by example. Show them how a Silver Lance fought- even if you’d surely be throwing yourself into trouble

>>4770365
>If this officer didn’t want to accept responsibility, then you sure as hell would. Time for you to get out of your tank- again. Your crew could take care of themselves in supporting.

>>4770365
>If they were going to hide in their holes, then you had to lead by example. Show them how a Silver Lance fought- even if you’d surely be throwing yourself into trouble…

Is there a map for this battle?

>>4770382
>>4770418
>>4770476
>>4770482
>>4770522
Back up to the front with you- good luck.

>>4770436
Seek greener pastures in this red dust.

>>4770498
Get out of your tank, it smells in there.

Writing.

>>4770522
>Is there a map for this battle?
There will be, with next post.

File: brushbreak_1.jpg (575 KB, 1500x1250)

575 KB JPG

Fine, then. If they wouldn’t motivate themselves, it’d be up to you. Poor candidate that you were for such a thing, but you had the m/32B and your capable crew. That at least was enough to claim the boast you gave.

“Then watch, from your holes, how a Silver Lance fights!” You announced as best you could, before retreating back into the turret and getting into your seat. “Driver, take us forward. The infantry needs some inspiration.”

“We’ll have a stupid death ‘f we don’ go with support…” Stein grumbled, “They at least do us the favor of spotting any targets?”

“They did not.” You raised your head into the vision blocks and scanned about- you saw disconcertingly little. Tall grass was before you in all directions save the rear, and though not far off there were impressive fires brewing, caused by bombs, such erasure of cover was not taking place here. Most of Sosaldt wasn’t so densely covered by grass as this region- and thinking about it, the dusty dryness of the place did have quite the potential for flammability.

The Netillian infantry here was good- they kept down, and now that the tank was turned around, they weren’t making themselves obvious.

From your break down here and the sounds you heard while shouting at the Republic troops, you had a vague idea of where the enemy was, but not an exact one. Especially if they had decided to keep a low profile. The cover was absolutely everywhere, and you could only imagine you stood out like a sore thumb not only to the enemy here, but to others not even close. The Republic Infantry, for their lack of motivation, hadn’t been driven out of their positions or all slaughtered, so the enemy couldn’t have had that strong a position here.

You merely had to do something decisive. Something that was so much easier to say than to do.

>Start loading shells and firing them places. It’d have an effect or demand a response quickly enough, no? (Say where and what shells)
>Become a tempting target. Roll out, right along, and see what happens.
>A flare pistol was a dangerous thing in this terrain, wasn’t it…
>Other?
This map is not to a particular scale, but it is very local- you can assume to be able to shoot over the whole of the map with the main gun, and about halfway with the rifle caliber small arms.

>>4772023
Richter just had to say something like that...
>Other?
Head 3 hexes East , turret towards the north and then:
>A flare pistol was a dangerous thing in this terrain, wasn’t it…
Just behind the closest suspected concentration of enemies.
They are likely very, very close to us, I don't recommend we get closer without a clear line of sight. We hide in the bush as best we can while we try and flush them towards the Brownpants with a growing fire.

>>4772137
Supporting this, load canister for when the Nets are forced to move and mow them down

>>4772137
This sounds like a plan!

>>4772137
+1
Some tracer rounds from our machine guns should help as well

>>4772137
>>4772285
>>4772317
>>4772339
Move east, and start a fire. Load canister.
Updating!

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“Driver, three-quarters right, take us straight east, seventy meters! Gunner, orient the turret north, load canister!” The tank’s human mechanisms responded immediately and efficiently to your orders, and you let everything move beneath you as you stayed as observant as you could up above. The cupola hatch was still open- being able to turn out was a necessity from a training you didn’t remember, but the accurate fire of the Netillians this close up kept you low, kept your vision limited to the vision blocks.

The Netillians had the advantage of cover, but you intended to deny them that. The grass was clearly flammable, and you might not have been as knowledgeable about weapons as you once were, but even the idiot you were knew that flares worked through quite hot burning fire. If you waned to, you could set a fire at will wherever there was grass. From the looks of the bomb fires, it would spread decently quickly, too. You just needed to be in position to properly help funnel the enemy into the Republic positions…

Suddenly though, as you grew close to where you intended to solidify your own position, you heard a CHOOMPF from the north, and a shape like a hurled stone flew out and burst apart just near your tank in a cloud of dense off-white smoke, followed by another CHOOMPF much, much closer, to the front of the tank, and the smoke began to spread up and over the tank. Smoke...no, tear gas. You needed to get your masks on, but there couldn't be time for that.

“Enemies front!” Hausen reported as the tank bounced and scraped to a sudden slowing. You looked through the vision blocks, and indeed, close enough to see them, there were Netillian troops of a sort you’d never seen. Glimpses revealed gas masks, round helms shaped like smooth tortoiseshells, combat armor harnesses, splotches of color like camouflage. Much closer than you wanted them to be.

Shit. You couldn’t carry on with your plan with them there. Not unless you wanted to be shot. The turret already turned with Schafer’s reflex to Hausen’s warning, but you needed to do something as well rather than gawk like a startled grouse hoping its hunter didn’t see it.

>Get the hatch closed. The Netillians couldn’t hurt you if the tank was locked up.
>Start throwing grenades. Don’t stop.
>Order Malachi to move backwards. Get the hull gun sweeping the right way.
>Other?

>>4772411
>Start throwing grenades. Don’t stop.
then
>Order Malachi to move backwards. Get the hull gun sweeping the right way.

>>4772411
>Get the hatch closed. The Netillians couldn’t hurt you if the tank was locked up.
While not true, it definitely mitigates the risk of a skillful grenade taking us out. Also it might help by letting less gas inside the tank.

>>4772411
>Start throwing grenades. Don’t stop.
>Order Malachi to move backwards. Get the hull gun sweeping the right way.

>>4772411
>Start throwing grenades. Don’t stop.
>Order Malachi to move backwards. Get the hull gun sweeping the right way.

>>4772411
>Start throwing grenades. Don’t stop.
>Order Malachi to move backwards. Get the hull gun sweeping the right way.
I guess better we spotted them then have enemies flank us and the Browns. Who knows maybe we can get a fire going here!