If There Are No Bullets, Make Them

"The city's entrance is narrow. Their numbers are vast, but the force they can push through at any one moment is limited."

I drew a series of red X marks across the map.

"We hide using the buildings as shields. When tanks come in, we punch through their flanks with the 88mm. ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠When infantry comes in, we cut them down with machine guns and grenades. However many division-strength troops they have, this cramped urban terrain creates a bottleneck — they can't project more than a single battalion's worth of firepower at a time."

In theory, it was the perfect doctrine for urban warfare — the same tactics proven at Stalingrad back on Earth.

"All we have to do is grab them by the collar and drag them down with us."

I brought my command pointer down hard on Rosenheim on the map.

"If the distance between us and the enemy shrinks to within fifty meters? All that fancy artillery support of theirs becomes useless. Fire at us, and their own shells come raining down on their heads."

"Th-that's... you want to force them into close combat? Into a brawl?"

"Precisely. Building rubble makes excellent trenches and shields. In the narrow alleys, a tank is nothing but a coffin made of steel — its superior range and firepower rendered meaningless. All that's left is infantry against infantry, a bloody war of attrition."

Brigadier General Dietrich's eyes wavered.

"But... our own casualties will be enormous."

"Better than annihilation. And they're fighting the enemy of time as well. In the end, we're the defenders. Hold out until reinforcements arrive, and this becomes a battle we can't lose."

I drove in the final wedge.

"Brigadier General. Heroes aren't born in comfortable offices — they're born in the most desperate mud there is."

Dietrich swallowed dryly. In his terror-frozen eyes, a grim resolve began to smolder.

"...Fine. We'll do it your way."

He slammed his fist down on the table.

"I'm issuing orders to the entire brigade! We hold until reinforcements arrive! Clamp your teeth on their trouser legs and never let go!"

The fighting was brutal.

Shells fell all through the night. Buildings collapsed; trenches were overturned. But the men of the 7th Brigade — 2nd Company at their core — held on with a savage tenacity.

"Hannah! Positions!"

"Twelve o'clock! Multiple mana signatures approaching — looks like a special forces unit using concealment magic!"

"3rd Platoon! Second floor of the building on the right flank! Those are mages — open fire!"

Hannah's Mana Sense proved its true worth in the darkness. The moment she called out a direction, I confirmed it with my Minimap, and a waiting machine gunner swept the spot clean.

DRRRRRRT!

A spray of blood burst into the empty air, and the once-invisible figures came crashing down to the ground.

"GRAAAAGH!"

But the real crisis came from within.

"Ammunition! We're out of ammunition!"

Major Hermann came scrambling into our building, coated head to toe in dust.

"Jäger! We're out of shells for the Acht-Acht — the 88s!"

"Already?! I thought I ordered you to raid the air force depot earlier!"

"That was everything there was! Why on ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠earth would an anti-aircraft unit be stockpiling armor-piercing rounds in the first place! All we've got left is high-explosive!"

BOOM! KRAKA-WOOM!

The distant artillery was growing closer by the minute. Glancing at the Minimap, I saw red dots flooding in, thick as a plague. This time it was a genuine main force — infantry in tow.

"High-explosive won't even scratch those medium tanks! Without armor-piercing rounds, we're nothing but a big fat target!" Hermann shouted, frantic.

The situation was grim. The 88mm's power lived and died by ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠its shell type. High-explosive rounds, with no penetration, could never kill a Reinhardt tank.

But there was more than one way to skin a cat.

Status Analysis.

And all around me lay the debris of ruined buildings.

Keep the casing and propellant from the high-explosive shell... and swap out only the warhead?

It wasn't impossible. A transmutation rather than a true creation would drain far less mana.

"Major, buy me some time."

"Time? With what — we're out of shells!"

"I passed something on my way here. In the basement of that collapsed building over there... the remains of an old army supply depot."

"A supply depot? In this wasteland?"

"I can't be certain, but I think I saw boxes of old armor-piercing rounds. I'll go check it out — keep them at bay with high-explosive fire until I'm back!"

I ran out into the darkness without waiting for Hermann's reply.

"O-old armor-piercing rounds?! Now hold on, Captain Jäger!"

I ducked into the ruined building. Inside, empty high-explosive crates discarded by the airmen earlier lay strewn about, along with a few unopened boxes of shells.

"Whew..."

I pried open one of the boxes. Stubby warheads banded in yellow stripes stared back at me.

Material Conversion.

I gripped a high-explosive shell in one hand and a chunk of hardened concrete threaded with rebar in the other.

With a faint tremor, the mana drained out of my body like an ebbing tide.

My head swam. Lv. 1 efficiency really was terrible. But it was far more manageable than creating something from nothing had been earlier — the casing and propellant gave me a base to work from.

Sssssh.

The yellow stripes vanished. The warhead turned a dark, gleaming black, its tip sharpening into a point.

"Ha... hahaha..."

Laughter bubbled out of me at the sight of it. Cosmetically, the thing was laughably crude. The surface was rough and pockmarked like a leper's skin, and instead of a metallic sheen it carried the dull gray cast of a paving stone.

But it didn't matter.

"Hey! Anyone out there? Over here! Come this way!"

Drenched in sweat, I bellowed toward the outside.

Before long, Gunter and a handful of company men came thundering in, gasping for breath.

"C-Captain! You found something?!"

"Damn right I did! Look here! By pure luck, one of the old munitions depots is still intact!"

Feigning excitement, I pointed at the boxes of converted shells. In the darkness, the finer details of their condition were hard to make out.

"Whoa! They're actually real?!"

"Our captain really is a ghost! How on earth did you find these?"

The soldiers burst into cheers the instant they saw the shells. Doubt? That was a luxury. When bullets to feed your rifle had just appeared right in front of your eyes, who cared where they'd come from?

"Still... Captain, these look a bit off, don't they? The surface is incredibly rough, and the color's kind of..."

One quick-eyed soldier cocked his head, turning a shell over in his hands. I shrugged, calm as could be.

"They're old stock. They'll have sat in that warehouse for years — they'd be weirder if they hadn't corroded."

"Ah, true enough! Must be leftover from the Great War a decade back."

"Save the chatter and haul them! Shells that go bang are all the same!"

"Yes sir! Hey, you lot! Get these to Major Hermann, on the double!"

"FIRE!!"

KRAKA-WOOM!

A dull, thunderous report split the night sky. My specially procured antique armor-piercing round left the muzzle of the 88 and tore through the darkness.

KAANG-! KRA-BOOM!

"Direct hit! Enemy lead tank halted!" Major Hermann cheered, eyes glued to his binoculars.

"WAHAHA! It pierces! It pierces! We're turning them into nothing but scrap!"

Internally, I was chewing my nails as I watched through Status Analysis. They'd said penetration was twenty percent below the genuine article — if the round ricocheted, it would be a catastrophe.

But it was an unfounded fear.

KRAJIJIK!

The shell punched clean through their flank armor without the slightest difficulty. And there was an unexpected bonus effect as well.

"Huh? What's that?"

The instant the round penetrated, a cloud ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠of blue-gray dust erupted from inside the tank.

Status Analysis.

A standard armor-piercing round often punches through cleanly and passes on through. Mine, thanks to its shoddy composition, had burst apart inside the hull like a shotgun blast.

Major Hermann went speechless at the sight.

"Is... is that some new type of shatter-round? You called it old stock, but it's even more vicious than the real thing!"

He turned to me with undisguised admiration.

"Captain Jäger... where on earth did you dig up something like that? There's nothing like it in any Imperial Army manual!"

"...As I said before. It was sitting in a corner of the collapsed depot."

"Heh, the modesty! One look and I can tell — it's a prototype they were squirreling away for special operations! I get it, I get it. Classified, eh?"

Hermann was writing his own novel, all by himself.

"Don't worry. I'll write it up in the report as locally procured armor-piercing rounds and nothing more. I'll remember this favor of yours, and remember it well!"

...Well, it wasn't a bad misunderstanding. Come to think of it, it wasn't even all that wrong.

But there was no time to relax.

"Captain! Three o'clock! Infantry!"

The red dots on the Minimap had begun to fan out.

"They're burrowing between the buildings!"

It was the sequence I'd expected. With their tanks stalled, they'd fallen back on their armor for cover and committed their infantry.

The 88 was devastating, but useless against infantry crawling right up into your lap. From here on out was my true domain — the realm of infantry combat.

I checked the Minimap.

A chill crawled up my spine. Between the tanks and the buildings, countless red dots were multiplying.

It looked like a swarm of red ants swallowing the city whole.

"GRAAAH!"

A friendly trench at the far end of the defensive line was wiped out in an instant. The blood-red flame of a flamethrower lit up the night.

"They certainly came in generous numbers."

I racked the charging handle of my submachine gun.

"Fix bayonets, everyone."

I gave the order quietly.

"It's time to receive our guests."