Hello dear readers! It's been a while, hasn't it? Well, I apologize for that, and I can promise that I in no way intend to stop writing this story. The next chapter is already 4000 words in the making, so I should be able to finish it for next Saturday.
Anyways, I'll leave you with the chapter and the beginning of the biggest operation yet!
Beta Reader: Jkdelta38
"5h55," Yang whispered just loudly enough for the girl to her side to hear, "we're just a bit early."
She pressed the power button on her Scroll and shoved it back in the inner pocket of her coat before pulling the zipper back up, glad for the recovered warmth. To her left, Nora chuckled excitedly, and Yang didn't have to see the feral smile on her friend's face to know it was there.
The slightest bits of sunlight were starting to waltz their way through the thick foliage of pines and firs, but it was still a while away from dawn. Yang lowered the night-vision goggles back onto her eyes before turning to smile at Nora.
The pink Huntress already had her shifting Warhammer in hands, of course, and the smile she wore was just as unnerving as expected. She was seemingly shivering, but Yang knew that wasn't from the cold; the cotton wool padded coat she had gotten from the Mistralian supply depot was more than warm enough. No, the small girl was trembling with eagerness.
"Make sure you don't bring your finger too close to the trigger just yet, alright?" Yang teased. "We wouldn't want this whole OP to go to shit just because you've got the shakes."
Nora nodded, moving her index finger up and down the trigger guard of her weapon. "I know, I know. It's just… it's not often I have a target so close to me and can't jump at it. I'm getting impatient."
Yang hummed her agreement.
It was rare for the two girls to be forced into a passive role, even for just a few minutes. Most of the time they either charged at the enemy on sight or let the stampeding fools rush to their own demise. Having to wait in cover while an entire horde of Grimm lay only a few hundred paces away… only the knowledge of the importance of following the plan could have forced them into such a situation.
They had been traveling on the back of all-terrain vehicles for nearly four hours too, so the moment they could stretch their legs running could not come too soon.
The entire Hunter Platoon and dozens of other units had left the camp of the Pravda Brigade at exactly two in the morning, entering the forest a few minutes later and following the trails formed by earlier Grimm incursions when they could. Units had split off from this advancing group as they arrived at their predetermined positions, and soon enough only twenty-odd vehicles were still moving forwards through the trees.
Four duos of trainees had been part of this last group, and even they had separated at the very end of the trek. Yang and Nora went the furthest West, Pyrrha and Ruby a bit less, Coco and Yatsuhashi slightly the other way, Arslan and Nadir due East. With them were a few Valean units in their Humber Scout Cars.
They were now at the edge of a clearing in the forest, and through the trees a gently rolling hill was visible. On and around this hill was spread out the largest mass of Grimm Yang had ever seen. Hundreds and thousands, they were, all lying down onto the dirty snow and trampled grass, seemingly sleeping.
Yang knew she should have been terrified, being a few hundred meters away from such a horde of enemies and two hours from any possible reinforcements, but that wasn't the case. Two days ago, Jaune had presented the battleplan to them filled with confidence, and that was enough to fill Yang with the same determination. Their Platoon leader had never failed them, after all.
The battle plan was also quite endearing in its simplicity, something that helped boost Yang's confidence. The basic idea was to herd the Grimm army onto a prepared path and then to throw as many roadblocks in their way as possible in as quick a succession as possible, all much before reaching the main defensive lines. At each stop, the Grimm horde would be whittled down by a consequent amount, and by the time that the main defensive lines were reached by the fighting retreat, it might be possible to hold firm.
As she was idly playing with one of the Dust containers attached to her grenade belt, Yang finally heard the beautiful sound that she had been waiting for playing over dozens of speakers at full force.
"He was our gracious king / A true warrior king / Our last true king / Always victorious / Fearless and glorious / Long he reigned over us / Our last true king."
The national anthem of Vale played through the many speakers installed near the edge of the forest by the Valean scouts, sending waves of sound at the Grimm to wake them from their slumber. To make certain that even the deepest sleepers understood that nap time was over, Yang and Nora sprang up and sprinted to the edge of the trees.
Yang snatched one of the makeshift grenades from the belt wrapped around her shoulder, secured her grip on it as she ran past the last trees, and threw it in a curved arc with all the strength her years of training gave her.
Up front, the Grimm were just starting to climb to their feet. Their awakening was rude.
Yang's Dust container struck a Beowolf straight in the face and ignited under the force of the blow. Flames engulfed the monster and many of its brethren, illuminating the area for a few seconds. Nora's own explosives came down all around; stunning some Grimm, maiming others, and making pulp of many more.
To the East, the heavy sounds of gunfire could now be heard. Yang could easily recognize the rhythmic bangs from Crescent Rose and the sharper detonations from Milό. Coco Adel fired her weapon at such a rate that it stopped sounding like a gun and started sounding like the world's most violent fan. Dust grenades exploded deep within the enemy lines, Yang and Yatsuhashi and Arslan outperforming each other with each new throw.
Dozens of dead and dying Grimm turned into scores, then into hundreds, all in the span of a few seconds. But those that were still standing were now aware of what had fallen upon them, and they started rushing down the hill. It was time to run.
"Alright, kids, let's get back on our doom buggies." Coco Adel called at them through their earpieces. "It's time for a rabbit chase!"
Yang laughed at the double meaning of Coco's words as she ran back to the waiting scouts on their Humbers. The Grimm already had their prey on their radars and would continue the pursuit in earnest, but the trainees would have to play hide-and-seek to find their rabbit.
Ruby pressed the trigger of the gun for two full seconds, sending a dozen bullets into the pursuing swarm of Grimm. Two beasts in the first row were brought to the ground, and many others tripped on them as they tried to keep up with the retreating vehicles.
They had no chance of actually catching up, of course, but their zeal was admirable nonetheless.
The Humber Scout Cars like the one Ruby was currently sitting in could drive at twice the speed of a medium tank while on road, and their off-road capabilities were nothing to spit at either. The fact that the Grimm had been moving en-masse through this forest for months now also helped; their stampeding had created many paths void of trees or even stumps. Ruby's driver had an easier time reaching high speeds here than on the pockmarked valley directly North of the Ice-River.
Shifting her position in her seat and turning her Bren gun a bit to the right on its rotating turret, Ruby sent another burst of bullets at an ambitious Boarbatusk that had almost caught up to her vehicle as it slowed down to move across a stream. The Grimm had its left eye pierced and its right elbow shattered, enough to bring it down to be crushed by its siblings.
To her right, another Humber smashed through a few bushes and moved to her flank. This Scout Car had Pyrrha sticking out of its turret, and the Mistralian sent Ruby a small wave before reaffirming her grasp on her Bren gun.
Further to the East, to Ruby's right as she continued to face North, the vehicles on which the duos from teams CFVY and ABRN were riding could be seen moving through the trees. To the West were Yang and Nora, their screams of jubilation at times being heard over the howls of the Grimm.
The howling was unending now, as it had been since the trainees had started their retreat. How long had it been now? One hour? Two? Ruby didn't exactly have time to look at her Scroll. She could only tell the passage of time by the rising of the sun and the number of magazines she had discarded.
Pursuing their laughably small convoy was the densest mass of Grimm Ruby had ever seen, and taking her eyes off them for more than one second at a time did not seem like a good idea.
Looking North-East to North-West, all there was to be seen was this horde of monsters. Beowolves and Boarbatusks and Ursai and Shriekers and Creeps, much too many to count or to keep track of. A tsunami of flesh and bone.
There were larger beasts further down the formation, but the youngest and quickest were the ones leading the charge now. For that Ruby was thankful; she knew a Bren gun would not slow down the charge of a Goliath or an Aspis.
As she sent another burst of .303s into the mass of Grimm, each shot echoing into her arms, Ruby was taken out of her rhythm by a voice she had been eager to hear again.
"Okay, kiddoes, I hope you've had your fun filling the Grimm with bullets cause we're about to meet 'em close and personal for a change." Coco Adel explained through her radio. "Our rabbit chase is over; she was even kind enough to leave us a marker in front of her lair!"
The Scout vehicles crashed into a narrow valley between two parts of the forest, rapidly converging so they drove flank to flank. Ruby twisted her neck to look over her left shoulder, and she saw the marker Coco had promised. At the edge of the next bit of forest was a large boulder painted a bright pink.
Ruby smiled and fired the last bullets of the Bren's tenth magazine into the crowd of Grimm still in eager pursuit. She stood up in her seat as they passed the treeline, and she jumped down onto the earth at the very moment the fight begun anew.
As the Scout cars rushed past the edge of the forest and continued South, she kept her eyes on the stampeding horde. There were already hundreds of Grimm onto the valley. The beasts followed the path of the vehicles and converged into a single column before crashing into the tree line with impressive momentum. None of them took the time to look up.
Blake Belladonna jumped from her seat in the high branches of a pine tree at the very moment she heard Sun's sharp signal through her earpiece. Unsheathing Gambol Shroud as she entered a clockwise spin, she came down on the unsuspecting Grimm with immense force.
The sheath of Gambol Shroud broke through the thick skull of an Ursa and shattered it like a pumpkin, the blade pierced between the shoulder blades of the beast and ravaged all its internal organs. Blake felt the impact of the blows reverberate through her body as she landed on the collapsing corpse of the large Grimm.
That might have been an overkill, Blake thought. But that wasn't an issue. She loved starting a fight with fireworks.
Ripping her weapons out of the ravaged carcass of the Ursa, she went to work slaughtering its brethren. Her job was to cause as much damage as possible in as little time as possible, and she had no intention to disappoint anybody. And with how many Grimm already encircled her she wouldn't lack for targets.
Running across the battered ground, Blake threw her right-hand weapon in an arc while holding her ribbon firmly. The blade struck a Beowolf in the face and sliced it halfway off. The force of the impact made the weapon shift into its pistol form, and with a sharp yank on her ribbon Blake sent it flying again; this time firing bullets left and right. The lightest of tugs on the ribbon were enough to press down the trigger of the pistol to keep its momentum going.
Two more Beowolves were shot down by the weapon, its recoil keeping the momentum going, before the blade on its backside crashed into the neck of an Ursa and penetrated its trachea.
Blake reached the Grimm as it was starting to choke on its own blood. It fell on its knees and paws, gurgling and spewing out tar. The Faunus tore her weapon out of the monster's throat and used its back as a platform to jump over the chaos of the underbrush.
The girl spun in the air and looked at what was happening underneath. Her allies in the Ambusher Core had fallen upon various points of the charging column of Grimm and had used the element of surprise to wreck havoc upon them. Further South, the trainees that had been retreating were now turned around and smashed into the confused Grimm like an armored fist. Flashes of bright yellow and pink light made it easy to know where Yang and Nora were in that chaos.
Blake shook her head and looked at what she was about to fall into once again. Dozens of Grimm were converging on the position where she was about to land, all looking upwards with their soulless red eyes.
A contested landing then. This should be entertaining.
A feral smile made its way onto her lips as she slammed her blade back into its scabbard and grabbed two vials of Dust from the pouch on her left hip. Weiss had given her this Dust the day before, and both had been aware of the irony of the situation; being given Dust by a member of the family from which she had stolen her Dust for so many years. She would need to thank the heiress again later.
A few seconds before landing in the middle of the mass of Grimm, Blake activated her semblance and imbued her shadow-clone with Fire Dust. The clone was struck in mid-air by a jumping Beowolf, and it exploded in a dazzling white firestorm.
Blake closed her fist roughly and broke the second vial of Dust, unleashing the wind trapped within. Forming a shield of sorts around her body, the wind let her pass through the twirling inferno to land upon the scorched ground.
Walls of twisting and shifting white flames expanded ever outwards, claiming new victims from the mass of defenseless Grimm.
All around her, the furious howls of the beasts had drastically changed in tone; shrieks of pure agony now came from the throats of all still able to form any sounds.
The few dozens of Grimm closest to the epicenter of the firestorm had died quickly and painlessly, their flesh and bones turned to ash before any signal of pain had time to reach the brain. The others were not so lucky.
Dozens of Grimm were burned so badly that the overwhelming pain overtook their bodies and had them convulsing uselessly on the blackened earth. Others were still able to crawl on the few functioning limbs that remained them. They all tried to move away from the blaze, most likely driven by the survival instinct that even the soulless Grimm sometimes demonstrated. It was a futile effort, however, for the firestorm had extended its tendrils to all sides, and now the forest itself was aflame.
Blake was thankful for the bubble of safeguarding wind that still hung around her; she was never one to enjoy heat so much. She was also certain that the air around her would by now be filled with the smell of charred flesh, and that was not something she wanted anything to do with.
She was also glad that her allies had kept to the plan and stayed far away from her own position until she unleashed this inferno. Then again, the plan had been created by Jaune himself, and nobody in the Hunter Platoon harbored any doubts that he was the best strategist of any of them, so of course everybody would follow the instructions.
Unsheathing her blade once again, Blake ran South and towards her friends. She had no issue with leaving the half-dead charred Grimm behind her. They would die sooner or later, and she had other things to worry about now.
Her allies were still a few hundred paces South, fighting the mass of Grimm that had entered the forest before she landed upon them. There were still a few hundreds of them, but significantly less than two minutes ago when it all started.
With the inferno she was leaving behind, she could only assume that the advance of the Grimm would be slowed down considerably. This should leave them enough time to slaughter the remaining beasts in the forest before they continued their retreat.
Blake saw Ruby launch herself into the air in a storm of rose petals before coming back down like a crimson tornado to cut the Grimm to pieces. She saw two versions of Sun throw Neptune deep into the ranks of the monsters. She saw Beowolves and Shriekers sent flying through the air by explosions of pink and yellow. She saw the bright pink aura of her team leader and the black glow of Pyrrha's semblance around the weapons of many. She saw the members of team CFVY fighting back to back and cutting down Grimm by the dozen with the levels of efficiency that only came with great experience. She saw Arslan breaking the bones of any beast that came close to her partner Nadir and saw the boy shoot down Grimm after Grimm from a distance.
She also saw that some Grimm had decided to block her own path back to her allies, and she laughed out loud at the stupidity of this endeavor. A group of four Beowolves and two Ursai stood shoulder to shoulder in front of her, and two Shriekers were not far behind.
Dismissing the shield of wind that had protected her, she started running at full speed.
When she was about twenty paces away from the group of Grimm and still sprinting, she created a shadow clone underneath herself and used its energy to propel herself upwards. As the Grimm were just starting to lift their eyes to follow her, she brought into existence a second clone behind her, thus propelling herself directly at the monsters.
The sheath of Gambol Shroud dug a path through the skull of an Ursa and into its neck. The blade was thrown to the right and crashed into the eye socket of the second bear-like creature. Yanking on her ribbon with all her strength, Blake managed to rip the blade out of the Grimm from a distance just as she jumped back into the air and away from the counter-attacks of the Beowolves. One of the beasts came so close to striking her that she felt a rush of wind under her feet from the air displacement from the paw swing.
She came back down behind the four Beowolves and the corpses of the Ursai, entering a roll to soften her landing. As she got to her feet, she spun on her heels and swung her weapons in front of herself. Gambol Shroud's two halves caught a Beowolf right in the temple as he jumped at Blake. The blow broke the beast's skull and sent it crashing to the Faunus' right, a threat no more.
Seeing that killing the last three Beowolves before the Shriekers caught her in the back would be best, Blake jumped at them with a cry which was halfway between pleasure and anger; Yang would have been proud.
She ducked under the arm of the first beast as it tried to punch her head off and swung her blade upwards, slicing the tendons of the armpit. The second creature jumped at her face first and received a mouthful of metal for its effort; the sheath of Gambol Shroud breaking all its front-row teeth. She barely had the time to slit its throat with her blade before its last brethren came to the rescue.
Quickstepping right and out of the way, Blake easily dodged the downward strike of the third Beowolf, and the beast instead sank its claws in the back of his friend with the crippled arm. The girl ran back towards the beasts with her blade held high, bringing it down on the nape of the healthy one before twisting it out and shoving it in the throat of the cripple. She was standing at the ready when the Shriekers finally got to her, screeching and chattering as if they thought they were intimidating her.
She did not like insects, that was true, but that only made her want to kill the gigantic Mantis even more.
The first insect swung its six spear-like arms at Blake in one motion, so she rushed forwards leaving a shadow-clone in her place. Having made it through its guard, she slammed into the beast shoulder first and thrust her blade upwards with all the force she could deploy. The weapon pierced the weak scale armor of the atrocity's under-chin and plowed its way into its brain, only being stopped by the top of the skull.
Blake ripped her weapon out and jumped back from her dying prey as it slumped on its four knees. The last creature seemed undeterred by the violent death of its brethren as it continued its charge without stop… until it suddenly crashed forwards with a large hole blown in the back of its skull.
"Hey, partner!" Yang called out happily as she jumped over the corpse of her last victim. "Nice barbeque you had back there! You should have invited me!"
"The main course ended up overcooked, so I don't think you'd have enjoyed it!" Blake replied, prompting a hearty laugh from the blonde brawler.
Blake used this lull in the fighting to turn on her heels and examine the battlefield.
About one hundred paces behind her, the forest was still burning with the passion of Dust. The heat was strong enough to be greatly annoying, even at this distance, and the roar of the flames was nearly able to overtake the howls of the Grimm in volume.
The silhouettes of dozens of these beasts were still seen within the inferno, and hundreds more were trying to get around the epicenter of the firestorm. The flames were spreading almost as fast as a Grimm could run, however, so it still served as a mightily effective roadblock.
Some Grimm which had been on the Western and Easternmost points of the horde were able to skirt the flames, but these were still a few minutes away from reaching Blake and her allies.
This only left the 300 or so creatures which had made their way into the forest before Blake fell upon them, and they were barely still a threat. The combined efforts of fifteen trainees had reduced their numbers from hundreds to mere dozens in minutes, and the last few were getting cut down just as Blake watched.
It was thus time to mount up and retreat. To lead the Grimm to their next roadblock.
Jaune was sitting on the stump of a freshly cut tree, staring into the distance and trying to control his nerves through meditation. Sitting beside him was Weiss, her controlled breathing forming shy clouds of mist in the cold air. The partners had stopped their idle discussion in favor of this relaxation a while earlier, the usual pre-battle nervousness making it difficult to enjoy a normal conversation.
Around them, Hunter trainees and Valean soldiers alike were trying to keep the tension at bay by various other means. Some were talking, some were fidgeting with their weapons, some needlessly checked up on the traps they had constructed as if they hadn't done it five times already in the past two minutes. With so much stress and anxiety orbiting around the gently sloping hill, Jaune knew that the troop of a few hundred individuals would have been a true beacon for the Grimm to rally around even if they weren't already being led there.
This force was formed of the St-Gloriana tank company under leadership of Major Darjeeling, of two companies of Valean infantry including the sixteenth platoon of Lieutenant Stone and Sergeant Saunders, of dozens of Humber and Fox armored cars, and of the eight trainees of the Hunter Platoon not part of the ambushing squad or the strike force that made contact with the Grimm at the first light of dawn.
They had entrenched on the top of a solitary hill now mostly devoid of trees about ten kilometers North of the main army at the Ice-River Fort. The foliage on the hill had been much denser a few hours earlier, but now dozens of trees had been cut with axe or chainsaw. The trunks had been piled high in ten different bunches on the Northern edge of the slope and secured with ropes and pickets, thus serving both as a barricade of sorts and a big surprise for the Grimm once the trap was sprung.
All at once, the mindless chattering of soldiers and trainees was taken over by startled gasps from a hundred throats and then by a short and stunned silence. Down the hill and several kilometers deep within the trees, an immense fireball rose over the foliage in a sudden explosion. Jaune jumped to his feet, a smile of amazement and relief on his face.
"The ambushers have made contact!" Jaune exclaimed as others started cheering around him. "That means it'll be our turn soon! Get to your posts, everyone!" The six trainees from Mistral that were with him nodded their understanding and ran to their positions, and so did a few Valean soldiers that Jaune was sure he didn't have any formal authority over.
The Platoon leader turned to his partner who was still standing by his side. She wore her usual frown of calm determination, and only the slightest hints of doubt could be seen in her eyes. Jaune knew that there were more worries buried deep under this façade, but he understood that so soon before battle it was best to maintain a look of confidence. If you did it well enough, you might even manage to fool yourself. He would know, he was trying the exact same thing at that very moment.
Jaune put his hand on Weiss' shoulder and sent her a small smile. Instead of returning that smile, she reached out, grabbed the front of his coat, and pulled him closer to her. Now Jaune was leaning forward, his forehead touching that of Weiss, and both partners were gazing into the other's eyes.
"We stay side by side no matter what happens, alright?" Weiss's tone was serious, even authoritative, proving just how important this was to her. She wore no smile and waited for Jaune to answer.
"No matter what happens." Jaune promised, dropping his smile for an instant so Weiss would know he too was serious. The Atlesian brightened up slightly at his answer, and the Valean beamed back. He wanted to kiss her to add power to his words, but he resisted the temptation. That was a bit too much affection to be showcasing in the middle of an army. "Now let's get moving, Snow Angel."
Those last words were said just above a whisper, and he received a fond smile from Weiss in response.
Jaune made certain his earpiece was well in place and walked at a brisk pace until he was at the very front of the defensive formation, at the edge of the slope of the hill. To the North, the fireball that had risen over the trees had now vanished, but its flames had spread to all sides and seemed in no hurry to peter out. The cold and wet weather the region had been experiencing lately made it unlikely that this blaze would continue for long, but its sheer intensity brought uncertainty.
Any minute now, Jaune thought, more worried than perhaps he should be. Come on, Coco, don't leave us in silence.
Finally, the voice he had been so anxious to hear since eight in the morning came to his earpiece.
"Jaune, can you hear me?" Coco Adel called over the radio. "The plan worked to perfection! We had to ask our drivers to slow down a bit so the Grimm could catch up to us after the beating we gave 'em!"
"I hear you perfectly, Coco!" Jaune smiled so widely he wondered if he would snap a muscle in his cheeks. "And damn it's good to learn that things went as we planned! How long do you think it'll take you to get to my position?"
"Five minutes top!" Coco answered cheerfully. "We're back at full speed now, and we just passed the markers we left a few hours ago."
"Perfect. We'll be welcoming you in style!"
Jaune only took the time to nod to the members of his Platoon to confirm that they had heard the communication between him and Coco before changing the frequency on his radio and speaking into his handpiece once again.
"St. Gloriana, Arc Force actual," Jaune called out, "contact pending. ETA 5 minutes."
Darjeeling, Major of the St. Gloriana tank company of the Valean tank reserve, answered with the same level of military formality. She then relaxed her tone and spoke more naturally.
"Tell me, , should we expect a skirmish or did your subordinates manage to lure the entire enemy force to our position?"
Jaune grinned. "Knowing Coco Adel, I have no doubt that she'll have every Grimm within a day's travel gnawing at her heels by the time she gets here. Appointing most of my Platoon to that mission with her was probably an overuse of resources, actually."
"Very well, then. I will alert nearby units of the approaching enemy. Out." Without wasting more words for a longer farewell, Darjeeling ended the conversation and instead sent her voice out of the radios of the units around the hill. Jaune paid little attention to what the Major said here, already knowing the following parts of the battle plan for having been a large part of its preparation.
Instead, Jaune kept his senses focused on the North. The fires were slowly subsiding, but there were now other proofs that the horde of Grimm and Jaune's Platoon were approaching. The sounds of explosions and gunfire were heard deep within the trees, as well as ever-increasing levels of howling and screaming from the Grimm themselves. Moreover, Jaune could now see the forest tremble; both from monsters quite simply crashing into trees and the quake caused by the charge of thousands of beasts at once.
By the time that Coco sent him another message saying that they were mere seconds away from the clearing, Jaune could feel the earth under his own feet shaking.
The Humber and Fox armored cars on which his Platoon members were riding emerged through the trees at great speed and converged into a column three vehicles wide as they started moving up the hill. His friends were firing the Bren guns attached to the turrets of the cars, hundreds of bullets being sent beyond the treeline. They were evidently beyond caring about sparing ammunition by now.
Precisely ten seconds after the teams exited their patch of forest, the entirety of the long-range weapons on top of the hill were fired into the trees. The twenty tanks shook the ground itself with more strength than the Grimm-quake as they unleashed the power of their big guns. The mortars spread through the troop sent shells into the sky at a low arc. The high-caliber rifles fired again and again and again.
And so, at the very moment that the horde of Grimm got to the edge of the trees, they were welcomed with the best of Valean hospitality. Much like a punch to the face of a marathon runner, the volley of heavy shells and bullets brought the Grimm to a crashing halt. Dozens of Grimm in the front ranks were torn to shreds while those following were stopped by the power of the blow. Trees which had been weakened with axes in the hours before were now brought down by the explosions and fell on the mass of Grimm from all angles. Beowolves were sent flying in all directions like ragdolls, Boarbatusks were crippled and sent to the ground, Creeps were blown to pieces.
The effects were especially deadly since the Grimm from the flanks of their formation had slowly been converging on the middle in the last hours due to the manoeuvres of his Platoon members on their vehicles. The Grimm had been packed tight as they charged, and that made for the perfect target.
But it won't be enough, Jaune thought, just like we expected, there are just too many of them.
Indeed, even as a second volley ripped through more Grimm in the front lines, many more managed to run onto the open ground. The Lee Enfield rifles and various machine guns of the troop started firing, breaking through the weak armor of the small Grimm that made up these front ranks, but no matter how many were killed there were always more to continue the advance.
Finally, the members of the Hunter Platoon which had been riding the armored cars made their way between the barricades of tree trunks and were dropped off at Jaune's position. They were met with cheers and accolades.
"Bravo, everyone!" Jaune greeted his allies with energy. "By the number of Grimm you've brought with you, I can tell that you did a wonderful job!"
His enthusiastic praise seemed to invigorate some of his Platoon members, precisely what he had hoped for. Eight of them had been fighting and retreating since six o'clock, nearly six hours earlier, and so they were understandably looking exhausted. Jaune's acclaim and the knowledge that it was deserved managed to give many a second wind.
Yang moved close to Jaune and spoke over the ruckus of screams and explosions, a hopeful smile on her face. "So, Jaune, don't you think we deserve some time to relax because of our great work?"
Jaune smiled sadly. "You would deserve it, but we just don't have the time. The Grimm will be up on this hill in less than 10 minutes whether or not we put up a defense, so we can't afford to stay idle." Yang's smile started to drop, but Jaune reacted promptly. "But that doesn't mean you don't get a reward right now!"
As Yang looked at him in confusion, Jaune walked to a tree stump where he had dropped a bag earlier, picked it up, and threw it in Yang's arms.
"I got you a company's worth of Valean ration bars from the Fort's supply depot. The best of the best, chocolate and fruits galore." Jaune chuckled as Yang's expression went from confusion to utmost joy in an instant. "Give a few to each of our friends. You should have enough time to eat one right here if you hurry up."
As nearly the whole Platoon converged on Yang like a pack of hungry Beowolves, Jaune climbed on the tree trunk and brought his gaze back North.
The floor of the plain was thick with the smoking corpses of Grimm, each successive wave bringing their dead closer to the defensive line. Nearly all weapons were firing as fast as they could, not conserving ammunition like in most engagements, but that mattered little. This was a perfect example of a mass assault with overwhelming numbers. That tactic had rarely gone well for humans in the last centuries, best demonstrated by the foolish human wave offensives of the Great War, but Grimm had been experts of it since the dawn of time.
The Grimm were now nearly at the foot of the hill, and finally, the signal of retreat came through the radios all along the defensive line. Major Darjeeling ordered all units to climb on their appointed vehicles and rush South at all haste. Only the Hunter Platoon stayed in place as soldiers ran to tanks and armored cars or finally sprung the traps they had been preparing since morning.
The ropes holding the ten piles of logs in place were cut, and all at once scores of tree trunks came rolling and bouncing down the Northern slope as soldiers ran the opposite way. The Grimm were visibly confused for a few seconds, and then came the panic.
The front ranks of the herd of beasts vanished in an instant as thick logs came tumbling from all angles, crushing even the largest Ursai into gory bits. Grimm tried to run away from this impending doom, but few succeeded. All at once, the tide of darkness changed direction.
"TIMBER!" Yang cheered happily from behind Jaune, her cry taken up by many others.
Jaune looked around himself, glad to see that all his Platoon was assembled behind him. They were now the last of the defenders still on the hill, all soldiers and vehicles already down the Southern slope and on their way to the Ice-River Fort.
With the Grimm pushed back to the middle of the plain and concentrated in a dense mass as more Grimm arrived during the logfall, Jaune couldn't have hoped for a better target.
"Weiss, you know what to do!" Jaune told his partner as he himself lifted Grey Dusk from behind his back, scabbard and all. "Nora, I'll give you the honor of pulling the trigger!" He reached into one of his pockets and tossed the detonator he found inside at a jubilant Nora. "Everybody, put in your earplugs now!"
A feral smile came to Jaune's lips as he grabbed a Cristal of Ice Dust from another pocket and jammed it into the adaptor of his weapon, seeing the power of the mineral wash over steel to form a thick coating of ice. He grabbed two earplugs and jammed them where they belonged, one of them going over his radio earpiece to block all sound from the exterior without stopping him from conversing with his allies via radio. Finally, the Platoon leader gave a last look to the mass of Grimm pilled at the bottom of the hill and struck his weapon at the ground in unison with his partner.
A wall of ice thicker than a bunker's formed in front of the Hunter Platoon, and Weiss even managed to create a translucid ceiling over their heads. Without a second wasted, Jaune spoke into his radio.
"Nora, blow them away!"
Nothing seemed to happen for about half a second, and then the world itself shook from the power of one of the largest explosions since the Great War.
The Dust mine had been the result of weeks of work by Weiss, Ruby, and Nora. They had assembled supplies from their own reserves of Dust, from the depots of the base of Blackcliff and the Ice-River Fort, and from donations from soldiers here and there. This made up about five metric tons of Dust of all qualities and originally meant from usage in artillery shells to blowtorches. All this had been contained in a thick shell of Mistralian steel from the remains of a BT-7 tank and had been buried in shallow earth at the edge of the forest down below, just deep enough so that shells from tanks would not affect it.
Now, it released as much power as two thousand tons of TNT.
Jaune's eardrums did not shatter, but he felt the vibrations of the soundwave like a punch on all his body at once. The shockwave struck the wall of ice with such strength that the construction visibly budged and leaned back. To the sides, stumps and bushes and equipment left behind by the Valean force were ripped from the ground and sent flying. Acting purely on instinct, Jaune put his shoulder to the wall and pushed on it so it would not fall. He was joined by half-a-dozen of his allies just as a second push was felt from the other side. This time, it was a wave of heat, and it blackened the ground on either side of the wall. Even behind the structure, the temperature rose from a freezing cold to a suffocating heat in an instant.
Jaune barely kept to his feet even as he continued to push against the wall of ice. He turned his head to look at his allies and saw that all of them were as shaken as he was by the sensory beat down. They were all still standing, however, and that was what counted.
The boy stumbled back from the wall and took out his earplugs, gesturing to his Platoon members to do the same. He saw Yang pull out of Blake's four earplugs since the Faunus had been too disoriented to see Jaune's instructions.
As the Platoon leader pulled his sword out of the ice structure, he heard a loud thump from debris falling on their ceiling. Earth and boulders and the twisted carcasses of trees showered the teens under their protection as well as the entire area around them. A whole tree trunk struck the ground to the group's left and shattered into hundreds of shrapnel-like fragments, but Weiss was quick enough to block them with a glyph before they hurt anyone. Jaune ground his teeth and walked outside of the protecting structure. What he saw kept him in his speechless state.
The plain was gone, as was a good acre of forest. The falling trunks and the Grimm could only be seen in bits and pieces flying through the sky. In their place now stood a twisting and churning cloud of debris and Dust, already tall enough to hide the horizon from view and growing by the second. The cloud was mostly grey with charred earth and crushed rocks, but sequentially and sporadically showed all the colors of the rainbow as Dust mixed and merged and created aftershocks to the main detonation.
From the highest portions of the cloud came an especially powerful explosion, one that blinded Jaune for a few seconds, and then rain started falling upon the hill.
Ice and Fire, Jaune chuckled as he felt the light rain patter on his face. It was impressive what the mixture of minerals could accomplish. His smile faltered at the first thunderbolt.
The Fire Dust had melted the Ice and formed clouds of water vapor high in the sky, and this made a perfect conductor for the Lightning Dust. This made for a massively concentrated thunderstorm.
Bolts started falling on all sides, striking deep within the trees and the top of the hill without mercy. After a few consecutive hits nearly collapsed the Ice-Bunker of the teens, they all followed Jaune out of its now inefficient protection. The Platoon leader caught a few of the bolts on his sword as he held it over his head as a lightning rod and was glad to see that the wrapping of rubber around its handle still protected him from shocks. He forced the energy out of his weapon with a push of aura before turning to address his allies.
"Alright, our job here should be over!" Jaune yelled over the roaring of the storm. "I just want to stay a few more minutes to make certain the Grimm will still follow us."
"They will follow, I have no doubt." Blake moved past Jaune, her gaze fixed to the North and her brow furrowed in concentration. After a few seconds, she looked back over her shoulder and explained herself to a confused Jaune.
"I can hear the horde faintly, just enough to make out a general mood." Blake said. "They are angry, very much so. They would chase us to the gates of Vale itself."
Jaune nodded at the insight of the Faunus. Even he had learned to recognize the differences in the temper of a horde by the sounds of their screaming – from fear to anger or the general frustration that seemed to be their default – so he had no doubt that Blake and her heightened senses could have mastered it.
"Alright then, we should get moving quickly; the Fort's guns should start shelling the area in a few minutes to keep the Grimm occupied. It's only a short run to the next defenses, but everybody still needs to stay in formation. I want a single column with JWPR and RYBN as the rearguard, get to it!" Jaune turned back to the North one last time as his Platoon moved into formation.
He could barely see beyond the mushroom cloud of soot and Dust, but he knew very well what was there regardless. In the last six hours his Platoon and supporting units had cut down the Grimm horde by a large number, probably managing to at least decimate it in the original sense of the word, but most of the fight remained ahead of them. Fifteen thousand Grimm at the very least, enough to make this the largest battle in the short history of the Ice-River Fort and the last century of the Mistralian 2nd Armored Division.
Jaune was frightened, as he knew most people would be in this situation. He was also confident, however, something he could only hope some of his allies were as well. Hundreds of officers had worked for hours on creating the best possible battle plan to face this seemingly unstoppable horde of Grimm. Every bit of recon they had access to was analyzed twice over to find all exploitable elements of the horde. Each facet of the plan had a backup in case of failure or the unexpected, and every backup had a backup of its own. In this battle where tens of thousands of individuals would be involved, everybody had a role to play and nobody was indispensable. They were putting all the odds on their side.
The guttural roar of a gigantic Grimm which had once frozen Jaune in fear was heard in the distance, and the boy turned back to his Platoon. This was going to be a tough fight.
And voilà! This chapter was packed with action and good ol' military tactics, just like I love them. The basic idea of prompting a large Grimm horde to follow a retreating unit only to throw roadblock after roadblock in their face is something I reckon would work pretty well. The Grimm usually perform best in situations when they have the mobility advantage and can just swarm their foes' defenses, so this tactic simply works by refusing them this advantage for as long as possible. Highly mobile Hunter units can output massive amounts of damage on the horde and continue the retreat without being bogged down and forced into a lengthy engagement where the Grimm could win using their high numbers.
We'll be seeing many more interesting tactics in the next chapters. The Hunter Platoon and their allies will try to keep the initiative on their side when possible, but they will also have to act in response to Grimm movements in many occasions.
Anyways, that's all I had to say for now. I'd love to hear what you thought of this chapter, of the strategies, and of anything else! I'll be answering every review in PMs just like I always do!
Adios!