March 1st, 628
“Everyone listen up!”
Faey perked up, but remained standing in place. A summoner, dressed in armor just like every other soldier on the base, intelligence agent or not, inspected her armor and brought out a tablet. Its screen flashed when its scanner washed over her, throwing out codes and alarms on the screen.
The summoner simply brushed them aside and moved her to a nearby wall to stand by. Unlike the others, she wouldn’t need to get fitted for armor.
She decided to focus on her instructor’s words. She was a tall woman, a knight with exquisite features but an awfully mean face. A Chief at Authority 10 and with another rank denoting her strategic capabilities, her very presence was oppressive, every word that came out of her mouth sounding like they were divinely ordained.
Her name was Instructor Bria.
“Here at Iron Legion, we do things in a superior manner compared to those at other Strongholds! Iron Legion does not boast excess numbers, our paramilitary standing at only 50 thousand strong. However, our firepower is entire magnitudes greater than even the richest Stronghold the Kingdom can proclaim! This enables us to wage war against Scourge forces multiple times larger than our own! However, such destructive efficiency is only possible with the knowledge to wield the weapons around you alongside every other soldier on the field of battle!”
Faey watched the Magisterium students all get scanned and personally curated measurements. Then, the armorers started bringing out standard issue sets of armor.
The armor was complete, brand new, and in nearly every case, offered entirely superior protective abilities than each student's personal armor.
Instructor Bria continued.
“All of you are currently getting fitted with standard issue armor curated for each type of Magus! Knights are offered heavier protection to take advantage of their strength! Warlocks are offered lighter armors with strength augmentation and Mana concentrating abilities! Summoners are offered the same light armor as warlocks, with the same strength augmentation, but with superior versatility for wielding personal weapons! All armors also come equipped with a few standard protections essential for maintaining health on the toxic battlefields! Full environmental isolation, temperature regulation, Adaptive Camouflage, and integrated TACNET systems! All of these will keep you alive and informed, because Iron Legion does not fight by spending lives! We fight with machine and fire!”
Faey felt her skin tingle as Instructor Bria smiled.
“To prove this fact, in the 3 years since Iron Legion became fully operational, we have slaughtered over 750 thousand Scourge! In exchange, only five hundred of our soldiers have given the ultimate sacrifice to date! That means for every soldier that has died, over 1500 Scourge have died with him! So when we say that Iron Legion is the greatest fighting force this world has ever seen, we fucking mean it!”
Faey felt herself get emotional, Instructor Bria calming herself after getting a bit excited.
Soon after, all the students were equipped with their armor. Although they weren’t completely custom designed and fitted like Faey’s was, they were still better in every way than what they had, even if not in value. They all offered a protection level of three Authorities higher than the Authority of the wearer. Combined with the quality of the armor, it was gear that most students wouldn’t ever touch for another decade at minimum even if they had the money for it further down the line.
Yet not only were they receiving it for free, but they would keep it with them even after they left Iron Legion. According to Instructor Bria’s words earlier, the Magisterium was footing half of the bill, the rest being covered by John Cooper personally.
When everyone settled, Instructor Bria grabbed their attention once more.
“Even with superior protection than anything the Kingdom will give you, none of you will be allowed anywhere near the battlefield until you can properly integrate with those around you! The bare minimum expected of you all is that you don’t get in the way! We will do our best to not only facilitate your presence, but impart proper knowledge and training. In exchange, every one of you will be expected to absorb what we impart and act accordingly!
“The first step of your training will involve learning to follow directions and learning what it means to live on Iron Legion grounds! There will be places you cannot go, things you cannot do, and procedures you must follow. While all of you are offered a certain amount of leniency, and those who matter are aware of your presence and how to treat you, certain expectations will be maintained according to what will be demanded of you on or around the battlefield.
“And we start now! Everyone line up and file out! The Commander built a training ground just for you all, and we’re going to put it to thorough use!”
Faey jumped up and hurried into line, everyone still in their armor.
Although it would just be the basics for now, she was eager to learn as much as she could. This place was owned by John, after all. She was curious about the details of what made it so amazing.
……
…
“Oh my God. I’m gonna stab someone if they give us another book…”
Faey heard her friend groan in frustration as an alarm rang through the dorms, in agreement as they both crawled out of their beds.
There was little to no physical training. After an entire week they had done nothing but learn and learn.
For the first five days it was all about rules, regulations, doctrine, procedures, and oddly enough, some philosophy. After that it got more interesting, thankfully. They were required to learn about all the tools, weapons, vehicles, and equipment that would be around them.
Faey quite enjoyed learning about the organization of troops and armor, like Heavy Metal, Air Ops, and Combined Arms. She was especially interested in all the different kinds of technology that riddled the equipment and vehicles. From high density reactive armor to cluster bombs, from the M300 Superheavy Battle Tank to the F-88 Sky Screamer, everything she learned about had concepts and ideas that she could never have conceived of before.
Well, extremely few people had, which was why John was the one to benefit from it all. He was the first to bring these ideas to life, and more than that, the first to field it all against the Scourge.
Faey knew there was far more to it all. Her mother had talked about some of the impossible technology John had created and developed, technology that not even she could understand.
Still, despite the novelty of being on Iron Legion territory wearing off, she was excited about what little she was being exposed to. Nobody else outside their circle was able to learn what she was. It felt exclusive.
The two quickly got ready and left their rooms, heading down the building among all the other students and lining up in the plaza. Along the way they glanced at the time and found that it was a few hours before sunrise.
Instructor Bria was there to greet them in the dark of early morning, standing there quietly with a few other armored individuals. What caught Faey’s eyes though was John, standing there with the Instructor and Puppet Master.
He was dressed curiously, wearing a dress shirt and pants, suspenders over his shoulders and his tie clipped halfway, fluttering with the morning breeze. The pants were white, the shirt and tie were hot pink for some reason, and his arms bulged from within rolled up sleeves.
Faey, as well as every other student, perked up in attention. The fatigue of their interrupted sleep washed away, curious about what John was doing there after not appearing for a week, and why he was dressed as such. Though despite the odd color combination, Faey was enjoying the eye candy.
Once they were all there and silent, John spoke instead of the Instructor.
“Good morning, everyone, and apologies for the display. I recently finished a nice date with the missus before acquiring an opportune piece of information. Instructor Bria has informed me of the adequate level of information retention you all have displayed. This is to say that you’ve learned enough to move on to some more practical learning exercises. During your time here, none of you will ever be put into the position to personally fight the Scourge. But I intend to show you why, and through your experience you will understand the kind of war we wage against our enemies.
“A short time from now there is going to be a moderate engagement with the Scourge on the frontlines, and you all are going to be there. It’s short notice and I’ve been warned by the commanding General that bringing students to the battle might place them in an unnecessary amount of danger, but since I’m personally going to be there, I’m betting your safety on my life. Now, our forces move in two hours, so we have little time to waste. Instructor Bria, if you may.”
The Instructor stepped forward, John stepping back with the Puppet Master, who looked like he was suddenly expressing his own concern over the sudden change of plans.
John just laughed as the Instructor yelled.
“You heard the man! All of you need to grab your personal gear, equip your armor, and return to the plaza! You have 10 minutes, so get moving!”
Faey started running with the rest of the students, she and her friend scrambling back to their room to grab their gear.
This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.
Faey already made it a habit to always have her gear on her, the bracer and bracelet containing her armor and spear always on her arms. Because of that she could instantly dress in her armor, saving her the time to gather everything else.
She was the first person to return to the plaza, the only one out there with John, the Instructor, and the Puppet Master. John turned to her as some vehicles parked themselves nearby for transport.
He smiled at her.
“Having fun?”
She nodded quickly, feeling the excitement for the upcoming battle. They’d finally get to see everything they’d been learning about in action.
John laughed.
“I’m glad. This next part is gonna be exhilarating.”
Faey smiled brightly behind her helmet, other students gathering around her.
They were subsequently filed onto the transports, being sped through the base and toward the airfield where helicopters were waiting. They jumped on a fleet of those before taking off and flying across the desert.
After around an hour of flying, they made their approach to the frontlines. Faey could see the lights around the base they were going to, as well as the explosions from artillery behind the walls. The base looked active, and Faey felt her heart beating faster, realizing that they really were entering a battlefield now.
They landed soon, other helicopters armed to the teeth taking off around them. Faey saw halos of light around the ends of the spinning helicopter blades, sparkling with by unknown means as they rose into the air.
Once they touched down, they were rushed into armored transports and driven to the edge of the base where they went beyond the wire, artillery behind them releasing constant volleys.
That’s when Faey saw her HUD flash, her communicator being roped into a new TACNET along with every other student.
She heard John’s enthusiastic voice.
“Greetings, ladies and gentlemen! Looks like contact was made sooner than we expected, so we’re going to catch up! Be ready to disembark. We’ll be pulling up to the secondary layer of the entrenchment where we can get a good view of the show!”
The vehicle shook as it charged across the desert, the sound of constant explosions echoing in the distance.
Soon they got louder, Faey not realizing how close they were until the vehicle suddenly stopped, the hatch dropping and slamming onto the ground.
“All trainees, file out!”
Instructor Bria yelled over the comms, Faey running out with the other students around her.
The sound of cannonfire slammed into her body. She looked to the side, seeing the dense lines of tanks and APCs. There had to be at least 500 Superheavy Tanks on top of several times more Light Tanks.
Helicopters up above unleashed snapping bolts of hellfire from turrets and tubes across their bodies, aided by streaking artillery shells that exploded amidst the enemy lines with towering plumes of fire and shrapnel.
The tanks around them fired with concussive power, the two barrels on each Superheavy Tank firing as fast as they reasonably could. Despite that, the lines of charging Scourge had advanced comfortably close, the turrets on the tanks firing without end.
Faey could see beyond the line, the flashing explosions giving her glimpses of the sheer density of monsters charging toward them. At some point, some nearby teams of soldiers fired some smaller mortars, shells flying into the air before flashing with their magic, illuminating the battlefield.
It revealed tens of thousands of monsters, not an inch of ground to be seen between them.
John's voice chimed once more.
“Welcome to the frontlines, trainees! Today, we’re facing down a force of roughly 70 thousand Scourge! They’ve been getting rather rowdy recently, and this is just another attempt by them to break our lines! Unfortunately they’ve made the fatal mistake of allowing us to plant our flag! Buckle up, trainees! Today is going to be a long day of carnage!”
Right as he finished, a plane did a low flyby, barely able to be seen by the illuminating flares in the sky above. It released hundreds of bombs, all of them releasing clusters that exploded amidst the dense Scourge hordes.
The wall of fire was so large that it nearly turned night into day, Faey’s eyes unable to be torn away.
Suddenly, all the knowledge she had been fed over the last week seemed to fly out the window. She couldn’t fathom attempting to aid this battle in any way. If she tried to go and fight herself, she’d either be killed by the stampeding monsters or the constant detonations of fire crystals among them. In this place, she really was nothing more than a child to be babysat.
She hadn’t the slightest idea what was going on despite seeing it personally. She had learned roughly how the different kinds of armor worked around each other, but there was so much going on that it seemed like total chaos.
She couldn’t hear anything but the explosions, couldn’t see anything but the fire. Her senses were overwhelmed, the air starting to taste like smoke despite the environmental seal.
Her HUD was identifying the many tens of thousands of threats in front of her as well as the thousands of allies around her. It was throwing out status reports about the temperature flashes coming from the detonations, the density and toxicity of poisonous mana in the atmosphere, the estimations of the strength of combatants in the enemy army based on their number and the density of magical energies in the area.
As she wondered what the hell she was supposed to do, she was startled by a large hand that landed on her armored shoulder.
She jolted and turned, seeing John standing there smiling. His tie fluttered with the wind, cigar in his mouth, face illuminated by the constant flashes of fire. She wondered how he was breathing in the air despite her toxicity reports putting out dangerous numbers.
She heard his voice just fine, even over the nearby explosions.
“Makes you feel alive, doesn’t it?! I bet nothing the Puppet Master ever trained you for could prepare you for this!”
Faey shook her head.
She felt completely out of her depth here. It felt like none of her training, nothing she had ever done throughout her life, had any applicability here.
And yet, the man standing before her had invented it all. It wasn’t just the tech either.
He had reinvented war.
A light suddenly flashed, Faey turning her head to see the shields on the tanks in front of them deploy. Some emplaced shields sprang to life as well, and that’s when massive globs of poisonous matter came streaking down from the sky.
It filled the air around them with red gas, obscuring vision but accomplishing nothing else. Every person on the battlefield was equipped with armor that protected them from all airborne contaminants.
At the same time, Faey was beginning to understand why John had made her armor with waste disposal systems. If the battlefield were to be filled with poison, and the battle wouldn’t end for the entire day, then she would have no opportunity to even take off her helmet.
It wasn’t sounding so disgusting now.
“All trainees gather! This field trip is educational!”
John called everyone over underneath a shield, the couple hundred students all clustering around.
That’s when Faey noticed something appear behind him.
It was a large suit of armor. After John stepped into it, the armor closed around him, mechanical parts moving to clamp over his body and protect it with interlocked metal plates.
There were all sorts of components around his body, none of which Faey knew the purpose of, but it looked menacing and it made him almost an entire foot taller. He towered over everyone nearby, a weapon appearing in his grip.
“Alright! What you’re seeing now looks like nothing but chaos! But I can assure you, every single tank, every single APC, and every single person is in their spots for a very good reason! All of these tanks are working together in a manner that ensures no group of Scourge can march past our killzone without taking bulk casualties that break apart their clusters! But once they start getting closer, other weapons must be engaged! Fire must be focused on individuals, and that’s what you have turrets for! Only if the Scourge manages to break past every line of fire do soldiers start engaging personally!”
John started marching across the backline, the students all following and watching around them. After getting over the shock of what was going on, they started observing and seeing past a field full of fire.
They saw the layers, including what happened behind the cannons. They saw lanes of lights every so often that armored cars charged down, carrying supplies and troops. Faey remembered learning about those. One had to be careful moving around those lanes, especially when it was dark and you couldn’t see a barreling hunk of metal very well.
“There are plenty of moving parts, more than just the tanks on the front! You have the artillery coming from five miles away! You have the helicopters providing sustained explosive fire in areas of high resistance! You have planes overhead providing both eyes in the sky as well as the occasional bombing run for taking out stubborn groups of enemies! You also have logistical support, everything from medical to ordnance delivery! And all of it hinges on communication!
“In any war, communication is almost always the most important factor determining victory or defeat! In normal Kingdom battles, communication isn’t as important because they aren’t the ones with giant machines of war to coordinate! Technology begets new ways of conducting battles, and that’s why Iron Legion has the most sophisticated communication infrastructure known to this world! Aerials being jammed by mere Scouts are an issue of the past! They can’t silence our words, they can’t hide from our eyes up above, and they certainly can’t worm their way around the might of high explosives!”
Faey smiled at his words, thinking back to her Magisterium education.
She had been taught plenty about the Scourge as a whole, and she knew that having your communication cut by a Scout was a bad situation to be in. It meant that there was a group of enemies nearby and that you had probably already been seen, not to mention the fact that you couldn’t call for help.
Now it looked to Faey like such a trivial issue. She wondered why the Kingdom hadn’t solved the problem yet. In just a few years John had done so, and in front of everything else he had done, it was a mere footnote.
A problem to Iron Legion looked more like the battle in front of them, a 70 thousand strong army raving for their slaughter.
They were walked down the battlefield, John explaining all the different parts of the battle lines. All the while, the battle only picked up in pace. Cannons fired faster, every turret was engaged, and more helicopters and planes made their strafing runs.
There was never a single dark moment on the battlefield. There was always a bomb going off, a plume of flame rising into the sky, a shell flashing with high explosives and pulverizing all the Scourge within several dozen feet.
At some point though, Faey felt some massive Auras erupt from the Scourge backline.
John stopped talking, turning as two large figures crested a hill.
Faey’s eyes constricted when she recognized the silver armor of an Unholy Light King Blood.
But then a cannon fired, the King Blood being launched into the air when the shell slammed into its chest, exploding.
The other King Blood looked at where its friend had just been before it too received a shell to the chest, its body disappearing in the distance, sent straight to the Scourge backline where planes were dropping cluster bombs.
“Hahahaha!”
John started cackling, Faey wanting to laugh with him, but struck dumb by how such menacing monsters were just handled.
She didn’t believe they were dead, but it was obvious that even on this battlefield ruled by machines, they weren’t capable of simply doing as they pleased. That wasn’t even mentioning the fact that Iron Legion had plenty of its own high Authority hitters that could meet King Bloods on equal ground, especially with enhanced weapons.
John raised his arms.
“Welcome to Iron Legion, trainees! While you won’t be fighting during this introductory trip of yours, hopefully by the end of it, we’ll be able to find you a place to contribute! Now come on! Let’s find a spare turret that you guys can try out!”
They all continued walking, wholly unconcerned about those two King Bloods, shields and fire lighting the world around them.