Yuri and her forces continued to fall back as it was clear the war on their side was becoming too much to handle as she was being forced back and back as the students continued approaching her. She was looking for another hill to dig into to prevent Olivia from overrunning her again. Yuri began to send out a telegraphed message as she was wondering about their forces to see what their strengths are from the other side of the carrier.
"Brook you there? I want to make sure you're holding out, we've just been pushed back as we have an aggressive enemy driving down on us. You have more students at your disposal, Attack Kay's forces at once while we try to stall the advancing enemy. We don't want to get trapped." Yuri telegraphed to the other student as she wanted to see how the freshmen were doing but it was clear the message wouldn't reach her in time seeing how she didn't want to commit any forces and would instead let the enemy come to her.
"So Yuri is begging for help but if I commit my forces, I don't want to end up getting captured by Kay or lose a chunk of my army if they decide to counter attack. I'll be sitting here and remain there so once you reach Port Arthur, I demand you relocate to the other side of the ship and we'll catch them off guard." Brook spoke as she sent back as she wanted Yuri to abandon the port and take all of their troops and mass them to the northern end of the ship so they could let Olivia celebrate all she wanted but they would attack and head to the front end of the ship. Yuri was reading this as she began to radio back.
"No can't do, I refuse to leave Port Arthur, we have much strategic importance over there." Brook was hearing the radio calls as she began to get frustrated. She began slamming Yuri with radio waves as she wanted to tell her about this.
"It's not like Port Arthur is connected to the Trans-Siberian Railway so we are not staging a lot of soldiers in Manchuria to protect it. Now relocate from the port immediately!" Brook was on her tipping point as she was growing frustrated with Yuri not leaving the port to link up with her to continue fighting. Yuri radioed this in response.
"No." Brook soon disconnected from the call as she threw her phone to the ground. Her phone breaking into pieces as she was just pure up frustrated from all of this. After this, she huffed as she knew she began to speak as she didn't know what to do next.
"It's Yuri's funeral if she stays, might as well get the army organized and prepared to fight." Brook sighed as she headed off to brief the rebels and tell them to prepare themselves for Kay's attack that was rumored to be coming. Yuri was left all by herself to content with Olivia's swift moving forces.
Sure enough, a couple days later, Yuri did manage to find high ground as she looked down, her rebels were digging trenches and setting up defenses as she knew she was confident in holding but that day. Olivia had made a pause to gather sufficient numbers of students as well as supplies to keep the attack and the weather was on her side again as this particular day, left the ship in another thick fog bank. Perfect for her to attack, Olivia heard reports of another fog bank rolling in and blinding them to a few feet in front of each other. She knew she could sneak in and inflict heavy casualties onto Yuri's forces. Yuri was inspecting the trench works when she heard foot-steps coming from the fog. Yuri looked around but she thought it was nothing as she looked at the rebels that were digging the trenches. Soon the foot-steps were heard again as the students were still trying to troll Yuri. Yuri looked around and thought it was nothing as she decided to continue inspecting the work. Soon a scream was shouted as it was clear something was coming.
"Tenno Heika Banzai!" The scream shouted as the whirl of firecracker shots from various smaller calibers began to rain down on the hill position. Yuri looked up as she knew she was the first to leave. She ran as the shots began exploding all around them as she wanted to get out of there as fast as possible She looked back as she wanted to give orders.
"Hold them off as long as possible so we can reorganize and hopefully set up defenses on the Orphan hills just outside of the two hills they need to take where we are resupplying from one of the two ports. It's best we begin withdrawing." Yuri explained her plans that she had plans to withdraw to the port. The others nodded but she looked at them as they began to fire away to find out where they were going to attack.
Olivia was navigating the fog much to her advantage as she continued to use the fog for her advantage. Yuri's rebels were firing away but due to the fog, it was hard to see what they were hitting. Soon the attackers came from the fog like ghosts as they were hollering and screaming. They soon barreled their way into the trench as they tackled the rebels down. Olivia leaped up as she continued to the top of the hill and with their defenses still in progress; this wasn't going to be slowing her down any time soon as the fight continued to get chaotic. Olivia and the forces soon ran to the top of the hill as they spotted another one of the flags as she soon took her sharp knife as she began to cut the rope to take down their flag. Some of the other students were flooding in while others were retreating. Those rebels that chose to stay behind were getting beaten up no matter how hard they tried to resist. Kinuyo was pursuing and firing away from her Type-97 Chi-Ha tanks at them from the bottom as she was going to bypass the hill to make sure that they were able to get around to the other side. After several minutes of cutting, the flag fell from the fog as the rope draped down behind it. A student followed up behind as it was Naomi as she was carrying a box full flares and a flare gun. The flares were marked green yellow and red for various reasons. Red meant that they were beaten back and the rebels were on the counter attack. Yellow meant that the area was contested and needed reinforcements. Green meant the area was clear and the rebels were beaten to a pulp.
"Kaya, the flares are ready ma'am." Naomi told her as she presented the flare gun and the flares. Olivia grabbed a flare as well as the flare gun as she loaded it up and fired it off one of the flares as she wanted to give the message.
Kay couldn't see much for the battle as she was wondering what was going on. The fog prevented her from seeing very far but by now the fog was slowly beginning to clear up. Alisa and Kay were waiting for Naomi as she had gone with Kinuyo and Olivia to secure another hill. Kay soon looked up as a flare was coming up and it was clear they managed to fire off one in terms of what they were trying to communicate. In this case, the flare was green as Olivia and Naomi managed to clear out the hill in relatively short order. Kay began to speak.
"They actually did it." Kay began to speak and Alisa soon pulled up as she was seeing the green flare as well.
"Well we should wait for the results in terms of to see how many we got injured. Olivia took about 4,000 students with her and Yuri had between 3,000 to 5,000 students in the area. That Russian Themed Middle School will pump out students to the front lines until everyone is committed to fight for them since they are huge in terms of a school." Alisa told Kay as the radio began to buzz in. Naomi was on the other side.
"Kay, Olivia managed to take the hill in this battle as far as losses are concerned. 116 students from our side are injured and as for Yuri, we captured about 350 of her students as they just had to hold out for their commander, so it's a win for us again." Naomi told her as she managed to capture some of their forces and in this case, about a little more than a 10th of their army if the numbers reported to around 3,000 students of the forces. Kay nodded.
"Wow she's on a role, she managed to win all the battles she was involved and in this case she might as well pin Yuri in place as we might commit our forces to fighting Brook as she is gathering a large number of students on her end, we've sent out recon but in terms of this, her actions are still unknown and indecisive. We might have to bring the fight to her if we want to make sure we can keep her under pressure." Kay reported back. Soon Kinuyo broke through as she wanted to interrupt them.
"Hey Kay, this is Kinuyo we captured and additional 67 students from Yuri's forces as they must have been disorganized and got themselves lost." Kinuyo reported in Kay was additionally surprised.
"Additional prisoners we need to re-educate to Saunders way of life is the best, yeah we should. Good job there Kinuyo." Kay reportedly congratulated her. Maho was not too far as she was helping dry off some of the reinforcements as she knew that they were attacked. She wanted to give Kay the news.
"Kay, Erwin's worst fears are coming true; the Russian fleet at Vladivostok has arrived and attacked several supply convoys, delaying the transport of several siege batteries that would be crucial for trapping Yuri's forces. We might need to contend with the Russian menace as well as the rebels." Maho gave Kay the news as Erika was busy discussing the logistics of the war. Kay growled as she began to speak.
"Shit! We need to deal with Russia too?!" Kay shouted as Maho's reports were correct. Russia was in fact throwing behind the rebels as they were providing naval support and that led to the possibility of the school ships being attacked. Maho nodded but she had some good news from this as well.
"Well not exactly, the Japanese navy is sailing their ships to interdict the Russian fleet and keep them away from the school ships. However we need to end this war faster before the Russian army has time to mobilize and take out Japan as a whole. I am very nervous about this so we need to double down on the supplies and make sure that Yuri's forces are trapped before we engage Brook. Brook while not as aggressive as Yuri, is still a big threat seeing how more than half of their forces are under her command, and who knows she can either be a very good leader and stall us for a long time or be a terrible one and we can just claim victory much like Kaya-san whom I wish me and Erika would like to meet." Maho told her as she knew she was right. The Russian army was in fact mobilizing and this small skirmish between the schools was growing into something much bigger. Kay nodded as she began to speak.
"Well I know what you mean by this but with this school gaining in strength we might need to capture the old Saunders school building that Brook has under her control but we still need supplies so I can properly punish the bitch for backstabbing us in the beginning." Kay was slowly feeling her rage building up as Maho went to her.
"Kay, calm down, look once this battle is over we can find out what their true intentions were and give them the punishment they both deserve. It's always good to punish them later than now because if you punish them now, then it no longer becomes fun as it would get tiresome and you had the fun to begin with." Maho explained to her as she wanted to keep Kay calm and tell her to let her own rage get the best of her. Erika soon looked at why these rebels were doing so poorly against them as she began to explain.
"As far as the instruction in Marksmanship is concerned, a Sensha-Do student might as well just fire blank cartridge if she doesn't know where her bullet has struck or what fault she has committed in elevation or direction. In the end, the rebels shot badly and Kaya-San's forces shot excellently." Erika explained as these students weren't committing to their fullest. Kay nodded as she knew with this information, Brook would be much easier to take down but she was now waiting for a significant enough force to take her on seeing how Brook still held a 3 to 1 advantage.
Yuri meanwhile knew that communications between her and Brook were gone as she had no way of contacting her but in the end she wanted to stay in Port Arthur despite Brook's pleas to relocate. Yuri was getting news about ships that were entering the area. She began to read them.
"Oh the Pacific Squadron at Vladivostok has entered the fray as they are engaging shipping convoys heading to the school ships." Yuri began. She was super excited for this seeing how the Russian navy was now getting involved and she hope that it will turn the tides of the war and force Kay to sue for peace but with the Middle School ships being based around actual battleships and the School ships being massive, it would take a long while for them to be sunk. Yuri continued through her notes as she also found news before one of her students interrupted her.
"Czarina, Yuri, we got the reports from the battle, we lost that hill about 350 students captured and another 67 went missing. I'll assume that they have surrounded the missing students and captured them as well. We need to prepare the defense of Port Arthur, especially the fact that Olivia is now right at our doorstep and is preparing to assault us. We need to set up the defenses on the nearby Orphan, 174 meter, and 203 meter hills. If all three hills fall, we're doomed and we have no more supplies to keep holding out with." The student explained how this battle went. Yuri wasn't surprised as she began getting a message.
"The Russian Baltic fleet is on its way to Japan to help us out with this war. So plan, we don't take any territory and let Brook do all the work, tell the students that their objective is to hold out for as long as possible until the Baltic fleet sails to Japan to relieve us." Yuri told the student about what her new plan was. The student nodded as she looked out to think that yes, they were coming and we needed to prepare for them.
Things were going to get bloody for both sides.
[A/N]: Kay is still waiting for Yuri to be trapped in her own port while she gets a force significant enough to take on the freshmen and her huge army but Yuri has some tricks up her sleeve as she is going to hold out until the Russian fleets come to her aid. And with Olivia at her doorstep now, she is really going to be put to the test. That is all.