Kyle was talking with some logisticians when a strangely painted truck pulled into the rainy and mud-covered vehicle pool. On the front, a huge grinning skull was painted and the sides were plastered with reapers covered in gold jewelry wearing rings that spelled out words like “gangsta” or “deadly”. All in all, a slightly cringy and unprofessional statement to make, especially because the truck itself was a crappy, spindly interwar-era supply truck with an ugly frame and wheels that looked like they belonged on a bicycle.

  “Bariyon, what the hell is this?” An embarrassed looking driver in the other seat rolled down the window, and Bariyon’s combat synthdroid looked out of it. “It’s my new ride! Ya like it, eh?” “No. No, I actually really hate it.” “Ach. Whatever. I’m basically working for you for free, ya know that? Le’me have some fun. Anyways, I came to deliver these mana mine detectors I made.”

  He stepped out of the truck and walked away to see the sights of the frontline. A few men rushed over and began unloading crates of clay tablets engraved with runes. “Thanks, I suppose.” But the reanimated menace was long gone, probably off breaking something.

  ——

  The next battle on the way to link up with the combined Maduwan/Cussonian front was on a small muddy plain near a river. The recent rains had generally made a mess of the ground everywhere.

  As the legionaries marched onto the field in their 10-deep battle line followed by the riflemen, Kyle instantly spotted the impending crisis.

  On the field, a ten-foot tall figure clad in black chitinous metal armor wielding an estoc stood before a detachment of nearly 1000 drones. It’s almost like they’re trying to counter me.

  Kyle pulled out his pocket antimaterial revolver, and fired two rounds at the figure from 400 meters. His armor's aim-stabilizing servos and his own implants allowed his aim to be spot on, but the figure deftly dodged or deflected the bullets with a small angular buckler on his arm.

  Kyle holstered the revolver and pulled out Daphne. “All mortar teams, use shrapnel. Cover me, I’m going to duel the enemy elite unit.” Kyle sprinted across the field while deftly spinning the warhammer in his hand.

  The estoc was an interesting medieval weapon. It was basically a mini-jousting lance for use by infantry to puncture the armor of knights, a weapon expressly for stabbing and useless in swings.

  The dark insectoid knight responded with a charge of his own, and the two met thunderously. Kyle was confident in his PAST-III armor, but the estoc looked dangerous at the very least. Kyle delicately dodged stabs and made sweeping swings with Daphne, but the opponents seemed to be mostly evenly matched.

  That is, until Kyle pulled out a trick he had designed for fighting threats similar to the adventurer Dante from a while back. Explosive pocket sand! Basically a flashbang in a bullet that could shoot out of a small literally welded-on expendable gun port on his helmet. While he expected it to have very limited impact on the clearly very-not-alive golem, any amount of distraction would be enough.

  After knocking a stab aside with Daphne’s haft, he activated the simple distraction with a thought. The armor interpreted the brain signals in microseconds and sent the signal through the wire to the canister. In under a quarter of a second, the device had impacted the golems face and stunned it for a fraction of a second.

  Kyle capitalized on this massively. Readjusting his grip on the hammer, he brought it directly onto the golems left hip in a cataclysmic impact. He would have preferred to shatter a limb or go for the head, but the golems free arm was dangerously close, leaving only one area open to impact.

  The runes on the hammer activated and propelled the hammer forward to an absurd degree, infusing it with a titanic amount of anomalous kinetic energy right before the impact. The sheer discharge of energy from one object to another easily vaporized a tiny area on the hip and melted a huge area behind it.

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  The alloy the golem was made of was clearly advanced, but the destruction of such a large area and the damage dealt to so many runes instantly shut the automaton down. Magic could do many things, but robotics would always remain a field dominated by raw science.

  The rest of the small supporting force lay around their churned-up circle of mud from the duel, riddled with mortar shrapnel. “Alright. Sergeants, continue the march.” Receiving his orders on the radio, the men started collecting magazines and casings and the legionaries started to strip the robot corpses of metal or other valuables.

  Hmm. I assume this was a test, but if they deploy enough of those, I’ll be forced to use my limited supply of railgun slugs against them. Not even mentioning the other fronts; how would they deal with these things?

  The army prepared to make camp next the battlefield so the stripping could continue.

  ————

  A few more roving bands of 100 or so drones came across the convoy, but usually one full magazine of bullets from the nearest riflemen took care of them. Sistertine guided them using his corps of diviners to the major stronghold of the Western District.

  The Iron Scourge was split into 6 districts for gubernatorial purposes. One for each cardinal direction, one on the northern border facing Veskaya, and one to the east that was colonizing outwards. The army was pushing south into the Western District.

  The first main factory-city of the district was a place called Lionel’s Grave, named after the king who had died defending it against the scourge decades ago. Of course, the Scourge had some numeric name for the fortress they had erected there, but it didn’t matter.

  ————

  The city of Lionel’s Grave was heavily fortified. 40-foot walls of black metal lined with dozens of energy turrets and sentries encircled the logistically important city. The walls were a strong defense, but the real danger was the battalion of artillery drones stationed in the city.

  Kyle had seen them at Pirezohn, and he knew that they needed to be taken down as fast as possible. It was time to unveil the Sky Destroyer-a siege zeppelin, the first of its kind. Without the advent of the fighter plane to put them out of commission, Kyle expected zeppelins to be a constant fixture of his forces until he could create some sort of gunship.

  Over the horizon, the Sky Destroyer swiftly flew towards the city. Below it, a convoy of trucks carrying fuel and a few spare parts coiled through the forest along the roads paved by the Scourge. Turrets along the wall quickly let loose bursts of purple bolts, but they harmlessly dissipated against the manasteel sheathing on the canvas and the basic runic redirectors on the hull.

  Turning to face parallel to the city wall, the airship delicately drifted up and down while taking the fusillade from the walls stalwartly. Eventually, the scopes lined up and both heavy field guns below the crew compartment fired thunderously. A thin purple magical shield blocked the first shot, but the second one punched through and pulverized a section of the ramparts.

  The turrets themselves looked like black boxes with four crystalline staves pointing out of them. Across the wall, turrets turned to the airship and let loose with purple magical spells from their staves.

  However, Kyle had more than just the airship. Hundreds of thumps from the backline signaled the entire mortar corps firing, and seconds later the walls were coated in flame and smoke. Several volleys later, every turret on the half of the walls facing their approach had been taken care of.

  The artillery drones inside had finally organised and began returning fire, but the mages managed to sheild all of one volley before many collapsed bleeding from their eyes and noses.

  One volley was more than enough time for return fire to wipe out the artillery drones. The airship was packed full of spotters and radiomen who had cleanly directed the mortar corps into the cleared area where the artillery drones were operating.

  Slowly moving the infantry towards the shattered walls, a series of explosions suddenly racked his lines, killing nearly 50 men instantly.

  “MINES! Bring the minesweepers forwards!” Teams of men with runic plates on long poles pushed through the recoiling army and began to wave their sweepers around. In a ten meter radius around the plates, any mines misfired and simply released a burst of acrid purple smoke.

  Kyle had no idea how the magic worked and neither did Carkh or his command staff, but as long as it worked it was good enough for him. Eventually the teams reached the walls and mines stopped misfiring, but they had to assume the entire city was mined thoroughly and would keep sweeping.

  With combined losses of only 250 from both the mines and some artillery drones that hadn’t fired at the zeppelin, in exchange for an important logistical hub and countless hundreds of drones, Kyle was satisfied with the battle.