The Defense of Sarsen Port (3): The End of the Myth
"Aaaaaagh!"
Every time an anti-aircraft gun roared, another wyvern knight plummeted from the sky.
The gunners seated at the batteries, the loaders frantically slamming shells into the breeches, and the fire control officers pointing out targets with their batons were all working in a frenzied blur.
Amidst the chaos, there was one group of men who were only just preparing for their turn to fight: the gunners manning the 20mm autocannons. For a brief moment, they forgot their duties, their eyes locked onto the black trails of smoke blossoming across the sky.
"The wyverns..."
"What in the world am I looking at?"
A thousand years ago, the First Emperor of the Empire brought an end to the Age of Myth, uniting the continent into a single, massive nation. Standing before the leaders of the five great powers that had gathered to form the empire, the First Emperor declared the dawn of the Age of Man.
Yet, the remnants of that mythical era did not fade so easily. Human technology, still in its infancy, could not hope to match the sheer mystery of magic.
Thus, the wyverns remained—the last lingering vestige of myth to endure for over a millennium. They were the only means of flight permitted to a humanity bound to the earth. Before these rulers of the sky, human infantry had always been utterly powerless.
But no longer. Not when the weapons forged by the advanced technology of the South—and the brilliant mind of Lord Kyle Leopold—were quite literally grinding the beasts to dust.
"Fire!"
Thud-thud-thud-thud!
The continuous, deafening roar of the anti-aircraft guns reverberated across the plains. The 76mm shells tore through the sky, exploding into deadly clouds of shrapnel that wrote the final, definitive period at the end of the Age of Myth. Looking at the mangled, falling carcasses of the wyverns, there was no longer any room for terror.
A thousand years after the First Emperor founded the Empire, humanity had finally conquered its primal fear of the beasts of the sky.
"Hostiles at fifteen hundred! What are you bastards doing?!"
"Ah! Returning fire immediately!"
Looking up, they saw several knights glowing with brilliant aura. They were the persistent few who had somehow managed to slip through the relentless curtain of anti-aircraft fire. The autocannon gunners squeezed their triggers, aiming at the rapidly approaching targets.
Rat-tat-tat-tat-tat!
The autocannons, boasting a rate of fire of hundreds of rounds per minute, unleashed hell in unison. Against this overwhelming wall of lead, even a knight pushing their aura to its absolute limits was utterly helpless.
"Aaargh?!"
One unfortunate knight found himself caught in the crossfire of three quad-barrel autocannons—twelve barrels in total. In less than a second, both man and beast were shredded into mincemeat. The mangled remains that plummeted to the earth were so horribly disfigured they were barely recognizable as human.
The others fared no better. No matter how formidable their aura was, no human body could withstand hundreds of bullets flying faster than the speed of sound.
In the end, the only one who managed to claw his way within five hundred meters of the air defense position was Eisen, the Commander of the 12th Wyvern Knights Division.
Screeech!
With a mournful shriek, his exhausted wyvern crashed into the dirt. Eisen stumbled to his feet, swaying unsteadily. What met his gaze were dozens of gun barrels pointed directly at him. For a man who had lived a life devoid of knightly honor, there would be no honorable death.
"Ah..."
The moment he exhaled his final breath, five anti-aircraft guns fired simultaneously, erasing Eisen's very existence from the earth.
From start to finish, it had taken a mere two minutes and thirty-five seconds for the elite Western Wyvern Knights to be completely annihilated before the air defense line.
The infantry marching behind them were the ones plunged into the deepest despair. The moment the knights had charged forward, a deafening bombardment had erupted, and the sky had filled with mysterious streaks of light. Against those blinding streaks, even the legendary knights and their terrifying wyverns had been brought down like helpless flies.
Faced with an incomprehensible horror, the infantry had only one strategy left: retreat.
Panic-stricken, the soldiers turned on their heels and began to flee back the way they came. But there were those who had been waiting for this exact moment: the two air defense ambush platoons lying in wait.
"Move it, move it, you bastards!"
Lahan, the commander of the two platoons, barked orders as his men scrambled to reposition the anti-aircraft guns and light anti-air weaponry. The orders he had received from the Grand Duke were simple: The moment the enemy infantry crosses the canyon toward Sarsen Port, block their escape.
They had spent the last two days in ambush for this very purpose. Since their job was to cut off the enemy's retreat, they couldn't afford to be even a second late. The main air defense position had already begun unleashing its devastating firepower. But they had no time to stand around and gawk.
"Whoa, the wyvern unit is literally melting!"
"If you've got time to watch that, stack another barricade, you idiot!"
Lahan spat, stepping to the very front. He personally began dragging carts, military vehicles, boulders, and timber to construct a makeshift barricade. With their commander leading by example, not a single soldier dared to complain about the frantic pace. Thanks to their frantic efforts, they managed to erect a decent barrier during the two minutes it took for the wyvern unit to be wiped out.
"Lower the elevation of the anti-aircraft guns! Fire the standard shells without the proximity fuses first! Those proximity fuses use magic crystals and are expensive as hell, so conserve them!"
"Mount the autocannons on top of the barricade! Five should be plenty!"
"Everyone got enough ammo? We're going to shred the retreating infantry, so double-check your magazines one last time!"
Thanks to their frantic preparations, a two-meter-high barricade was completed in the blink of an eye. Once the anti-aircraft guns and autocannons were mounted on top, it looked like a formidable fortress. It was just then that the vanguard of the fleeing infantry arrived.
"Fire!"
Thud-thud-thud-thud!
Four anti-aircraft guns roared in unison. Though designated as anti-aircraft weapons, they were originally 76mm naval guns used on the Dreadnought—weapons perfectly optimized for obliterating ground targets. The infantrymen who reached the canyon first were instantly vaporized, leaving not a trace behind.
"Sweep them away!"
As the crimson tracers of the 20mm autocannons swept through the infantry ranks, shields and armor were punctured like paper, and the soldiers collapsed in heaps.
Having finished off the remaining wyverns, the artillerymen from the main air defense position began advancing with their guns. Although the 230 men stretched thin to form a perimeter, the overwhelming range of their firearms rendered any gaps in their line completely meaningless.
In front of them stood a barricade blocking the narrow pass, bristling with autocannons. Behind them advanced the air defense artillerymen who had just unilaterally slaughtered sixty wyvern knights. To their left was the deep, unforgiving sea; to their right, a sheer, vertical cliff.
By the time the five thousand infantrymen finally snapped out of their panic, they were already completely surrounded by a mere three hundred Southern soldiers.
"Aaargh!"
"Break through the canyon! Fuck, if you have to, push through with your bare bodies! We have five thousand men, and they only have a few dozen!"
"We can't! We can't even get close!"
"What kind of bullshit is that?! Where the hell are the shield bearers—"
Boom!
With a terrifying whistle, an artillery shell slammed directly into the officer. The ground erupted, sending mud and gravel flying into the air. A dark shower of dirt rained down, mixed with something thick and sticky. It didn't take long for a nearby soldier, wiping his cheek, to realize that the sticky substance was blood.
Eeeeeeeee—
A high-pitched ringing drowned out his hearing, muffling all the sounds of the battlefield. The desperate screams of his comrades, the roaring of the cannons, and the terrifying crackle of the weapons spitting light—all of it felt distant.
Everything on the battlefield seemed to move in slow motion. The crimson flashes of light slicing through the crowd, and the men struck by them collapsing like lifeless scarecrows.
Boom!
Another massive explosion rocked his vision. Yet, the soldier didn't even flinch. The concussive force of the bombardment had long since robbed him of his sense of direction.
In this living hell, where officers and common soldiers were ground to dust with absolute impartiality, there was no room for reality. He simply stumbled forward, driven by pure, primal instinct.
The elite legion that had triumphed in countless battles across the West over the past decade was melting away. Even an army that had brutally slaughtered and oppressed the indigenous tribes of the Western frontier was nothing more than dust before the true malice forged by human technology.
"Ah..."
A flash of his life passed before the eyes of the half-delirious soldier.
Ah. This is divine retribution.
We are finally paying the price for a decade of mercilessly pillaging and slaughtering the natives.
Having lost all grip on reality, the soldier stopped in his tracks. He stood there, frozen, waiting to accept his impending fate. Fortunately, fate was not entirely merciless.
"Cease fire! All units, cease fire!"
Shouts echoed from both the canyon barricade and the main air defense position. Instantly, the terrifying weapons that had been grinding men to pieces fell into a miraculous silence. Then, their commander stepped forward and bellowed:
"The Western army, which dared to violate the lawful treaty between Count Sarsen and the South to seize this port, deserves nothing but death!"
"However, our merciful Grand Duke has chosen to grant you a second chance!"
"Throw down your weapons and surrender! Do so, and I guarantee your lives will be spared, in the name of the Grand Duke!"
Anger over lost comrades could only be felt against an opponent of comparable strength. To the Western soldiers, the Southern army—which had carried out a one-sided slaughter from hundreds of meters away—was not an enemy, but an incomprehensible monster.
Having watched their comrades get pulverized and expecting to be next, every single soldier threw down their weapons. It was a favorable outcome for both sides. After all, being ground down as cogs in the Southern factories was far better than dying here.
And so, the first battle before Sarsen Port came to an end. The engagement had lasted a mere fifteen minutes. The Western army had suffered sixty wyvern knights lost, approximately fifteen hundred casualties, and thirty-five hundred captured.
The Southern army, on the other hand, had suffered not a single casualty. It was a flawless victory, forged by human technology and built by Kyle Leopold and the South.
Only then did the light of the crystal ball projecting the battlefield finally flicker out.
In the dead silence of the conference room, Kyle Leopold spoke.
"So, do you have anything else to say, Charles Raymonds?"