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Chapter 70
The Beginning of the End
Border town Alue, Mu
The border town of Alue is situated on a plateau. There are numerous flat areas on the plateau, but the town is built on a small hill rising above everything else. Outside the town’s old castle walls, which are useless against the big guns prevalent in modern warfare, grew patches of small grass with the bare earth showing up in some places.
On top of a small hill nearby was a forest where an artillery emplacement was installed, and there two soldiers were talking.
“Hey, did you hear? It seems that in the event the Gra Valkas Empire and Mu clash, Alue will become the frontline.”
Upon hearing the words of his comrade, gunner Arts Say shuddered.
One day, the Gra Valkas Empire suddenly manifested to the west of the Mu continent. In the blink of an eye, it gained total control over the countries surrounding it and smashed the superpower Leifor into oblivion. Despite that, Mu had leeway to be able to respond and face them
 However, Mu’s proud state-of-the-art fleet was dealt a catastrophic blow at Cartalpas. A severe shock ran through the military.
Afterwards, the World Union wherein even the Holy Mirishial Empire was part of, clashed against the Gra Valkas Empire. Carrying the will and pride of being the world’s top superpowers, Mu and the Holy Mirishial Empire fought with them. However, the fight ended in a draw with both sides backing down due to substantial damage. They have heard that the Holy Mirishial Empire was even forced to deploy the ancient sorcerous empire’s superweapons, but even those were sunk.
It seems that the military top brass is in a frenzy trying to fill in the hopeless disparity in technology. To the regular soldiers that have to fight, the legendary power of the Gra Valkas Empire has become the target of their fears.
“The enemy sure is strong
 But
 We are the guardians of the citizens of Alue!! As artillerymen, we will definitely strike down the enemy!! No matter how strong the enemy is, they’re still humans! When hit by a shell, they’re sure to die, so it’s impossible for them to have weapons that can withstand cannon fire!!!”
“But, listen to this
 There was this book from Japan that’s also being sold in Mu. Described in it was something called a tank, a weird weapon which is a car that has armor on it and is armed with a cannon. Japan seems to also be in possession of these things.
It also seems that the armor on them is strong enough to withstand shells fired from our guns. At the Cartalpas battle, one of Japan’s cruisers was sunk by the Gra Valkas Empire. That seems to be a sign that the empire is stronger than Japan.
If the enemy will actually use those tanks on us
”
As they strengthened their will to fight, the gunners were frightened of the immense shadow being cast on them by the coming Gra Valkas Empire invasion.
・・・
24th Task Force, Mu National Army, west of Alue
Stretching like snakes from Alue were a 20km system of trenches extending from the town’s west. A trench is a gutter or ditch dug out from the ground that is big enough to let people pass through, which allows them to avoid incoming cannon and machine gun fire, dramatically increasing the rate of survival in comparison to moving across flat ground.
Manning one of the trenches is infantryman Keynes who was looking at the direction of the border with binoculars.
“Wha
 What is that?!”
A cloud of dust was rising from beyond the unobstructed horizon. Eventually, many vehicles painted in black and green appeared from within the cloud of dust. If someone who has an interest in the old army were to see them, they would think that the vehicles were Type 97 Chi-ha medium tanks. Just as Keynes was about to report to headquarters the presence of the unfamiliar vehicles

The deep-bass sounds of the ground shaking, followed by sounds of violent explosions can be heard from behind them. He turns around to look at the direction from where they came from.
“Ah!!!”
Howitzer munitions hit the town and explode in rapid succession, producing tremendous clouds of dust in several places. The buildings that were directly hit rattled and collapsed almost entirely.
“They’re being bombarded?! That’s impossible!! They’re completely out of sight!!!”
Everyone was shocked

“Enemy attack!! Enemy attack!! All personnel to their battle stations!!!”
An obviously delayed report comes in.
Since the town that they were supposed to protect was being bombarded, Keynes prepares for the enemy coming in from the front.
The artillery emplacement
Enemy aircraft appear in the sky above them, circling around as if they owned the heavens. From time to time, the bombs that they accurately dropped onto the Alue Defense Base were powerful, producing huge flames protruding from the base.
Looking up at the sky, several of Mu’s proud state-of-the-art Marin fighters entered the fight, dauntlessly trying to shoot down the attacking enemy fighters. However, the friendly fighters that had come to intercept them were instantly caught from behind and shot down by machine gun fire, with the anti-aircraft guns that sporadically fired from the base on fire hopelessly missing the enemy fighters.
Fortunately, under the guidance of Japan, it seems that the camouflaged artillery emplacements placed in the forest to prevent them from being spotted in the air were still undiscovered by the enemy, and so they weren’t attacked. However, the artillery emplacements were now in a situation where they were pincered around like needles against a pin cushion.
“Black enemy wheeled vehicle spotted, likely to be a tank. They will be called tanks from now on! Get ready to fire!! I repeat, get ready to fire!!!”
Gunner Arts Say rapidly and precisely prepares to fire. The enemy tank has still not entered their range, but the Gra Valkas Empire was bombarding them from a distance far beyond that of the tank from them
 He laments their inability to return fire despite being the guardians of Alue. Gunner Arts Say can’t help but feel the disparity between their technology.
・・・
Mu town of Alue
An artillery shell lands.
People scream and die in several places within the town. Fierce explosions along with clouds of dust rise from the points of impact as buildings crumble into ruin. In a town devoid of air-raid shelters, the townsfolk, knowing that they’ll die when hit, run in fear from something they have never experienced.
There were numerous recommendations from the government to evacuate, but many among the townsfolk were under the baseless impression that the homeland of the world’s 2nd strongest power would never be attacked, and so the other residents and families that believed the government’s recommendations were slow to evacuate. Because of their emphasis on liberty, the government’s virtual power over the masses is weak, and thus the consequences of a government system that is unable to exercise force has now manifested.
The town plunges into a state of panic.
“Ynes
 I’m so sorry that you had to be caught up in our lapse in judgement
 You must evacuate ahead of us.”
The mother of the girl whose name is Ynes weeps in regret.
They were of the Pamell family, a noble family that resides in Alue. After the government began issuing evacuation recommendations, they struggled to have the townsfolk evacuated first. Due to their efforts, many townsfolk changed their minds, managing to save around 10,000.
However, the town is yet to be connected to Mu’s railway network and many of the residents do not own their own private cars. Government-issued vehicles were also inefficient. These reasons put many of the residents unable to evacuate on time and so the flames of war have caught up to them.
“Ynes, you know how to use the motorcycle, right?”
“Yeah.”
“Then, go!! It’s already gotten too dangerous here!! Take, Meln and run, now!!”
The 16-year old Ynes once admired the sight of her father riding the motorcycle and has recently been able to attain the ability to drive it herself.
“But
 But I just can’t leave you and dad behind!!!”
“I’m sorry
 but you have to run now!! You’ll die if you stay any longer!!”
“Mu is the 2nd strongest in the world!! There’s a base nearby so they should be coming to save us!!”
“Mu is strong, but the enemy is even stronger
 Not even the Holy Mirishial Empire could do anything about them
 They also seemed to have brought down the superweapon of the ancient sorcerous empire
 They’re monsters, all of them!!
Please, you and Meln are the treasures of the Pamell family, so we have to protect you even if it costs us our lives!! Go!!”
With tears welling up in her eyes, Ynes ran. Putting her 6-year old sister, Meln, on the backseat, she starts the motorcycle’s engine.
“Head east!! Go past the hollow mountains towards the town of Halgek and visit your uncle there!! He will help you!!”
Explosions resounded all across town as shells landed in various places. Ynes, with her younger sister Meln behind her, slowly opened the accelerator as she engaged the clutch. The 270cc single-cylinder bike made a rattling sound as it began to accelerate. The daughter of the Pamell household Ynes and her younger sister Meln escaped the town of Alue.
・・・
The frontline trenches
“FIRE!!!”
A small artillery piece manned by infantrymen bellows out fire and smoke, accompanied by a loud bang. The tracer round fired by the cannon lands close to one of the enemy tanks, kicking up a cloud of dust. The cannon could hardly hit any of the moving targets.
“FIRE!!! FIRE! FIRE! FIRE! FIREEE!!!”
Accompanying the artillery in the attack were autocannons firing in rapid succession. However, the autocannon rounds simply bounced against the armor of the enemy tanks, producing loud metallic clunk-sounds. Their large-caliber rounds were missing as their small-caliber ones were simply bouncing off. Despite this, the enemy’s march didn’t slow down, and Keynes shuddered at the rapid pace at which they marched on.
The enemy tanks kicked up clouds of dust as they advanced. Eventually, the enemy tanks fired.
“AHHH!!!”
At the same time someone shouted, a nearby trench was hit, killing several men. Reports of casualties came in one by one. However, they, who call themselves the guardians, could not afford to pull back.
Keynes, under a feeling of desperation, continues to fire their artillery. Eventually, the tanks came close enough for their engines to be heard within the trenches.
“AHH!!!”
Screams erupted from various places along the trenches. Eventually, the attacks coming from those same trenches stopped.
A shell lands nearby. Keynes looks up to the sky from the trench as his consciousness becomes faint. He doesn’t know where or how he was hit. Losing sensation in his body, only his consciousness remains.
The head tank passes through the trench where Keynes and the others were. The other tanks then came one by one as if they were no longer there and headed straight for the town.
“F
 fuck!
 The town
”
As his consciousness faded, Keynes tried to squeeze his words out.
・・・
The artillery emplacement
The artillery emplacements in the forest were now exposed to the enemy’s fierce attacks. The guns managed to deceive the enemy, but as soon as they attacked the enemy tanks, enemy fighters rained down attacks from the air. A moment after they thought that the enemy fighters had stopped attacking, the earth shook.
Continuous bombardment from the Gra Valkas Empire’s howitzers pummeled the artillery pieces besides Arts Say’s, scattering several corpses. In the midst of it all, the gunners under Arts Say prepared to fire a retaliatory attack. If they were to at least destroy one of the tanks, they might loosen the enemy attack.
They mustn’t let it come to the point that Mu couldn’t inflict a single casualty in a ground conflict. With that in mind, they continued with their preparations.
“The gun is loaded!”
“Aim for them properly!!!”
Gunner Arts Say manifests the greatest amount of concentration he has ever had in his life.
“
Now!!!”
“FIRE!!!”
A loud bang resounds as the large gun emits a magnificent show of smoke. Compared to modern guns, the guns of the past had horrible combustion efficiency and are unable to effectively transfer their combustion energy onto the shell, producing a lot of smoke in the process and making the gun look powerful.
The shell flies towards the target. It then miraculously lands on the 2nd enemy tank from the frontmost tank.
Immediately after the unpleasant clunk-sound, smoke and a fierce explosion appears. The enemy tank was engulfed in smoke.
However

The moment after that, the tank emerged from the smoke as if nothing had happened.
“W-what?! It should have hit!!!”
The tank’s gun turns to face them.
“!!!”
Followed by a thundering roar, a 57mm round exits the enemy tank’s gun. The shell rotates on its own due to the rifling on the gun, stabilizing its trajectory as it heads straight for Arts Say’s position.
“Agh!!!”
The shell lands and Arts Say loses consciousness.
On this day, the defense corps of Alue was annihilated and the town was overrun. Many prisoners of war were taken while many were executed. Those that lived in Alue met a gruesome end. The flag of the Gra Valkas Empire is raised in the city, expanding their territory.
・・・
The seas 20km west of Mu
At the front edge of the amphibious transport dock ƌsumi, which at first glance seems to resemble an aircraft carrier due to its flat deck, stood a single man looking in front towards the Mu continent which was slowly coming into view. The ocean was pristine blue and a comfortable sea breeze cooled his body.
“Lt. General, we have a message from home.”
Lt. General ƌuchida Kazuki of the Japan Ground Self-Defense Forces’ 7th Division slowly faces his subordinate.
“The Gra Valkas Imperial Army has invaded Mu. The border town of Alue became a battlefield with the Mu National Army’s garrison being annihilated and the town falling into enemy hands.”
ƌuchida closes his eyes. The comms officer continues.
“Looting, sexual violence, and executions have taken place in Alue. It is truly gruesome.”
The expression in ƌuchida’s eyes changed.
“We didn’t make it in time, huh
”
ƌuchida Kazuki, commander of the JGSDF’s 7th Division, once received an unofficial order to transfer to another post from his post as division commander due to the annual staff reassignment but due to a complete change in the state of things, the transfer was temporarily postponed and so he was given the opportunity to experience live conflict in the previous war with Louria. This time, in order to save Mu, he was once again given the responsibility of division commander.
Recruiting civilian ships, they would swiftly land on the Mu continent. After landing on the continent, they were then supposed to head for Alue after refueling from several Mu military bases.
“What about the ASDF?”
“Yes! They’ll soon be ready. We’ve been informed that they will certainly be ready by the time we reach the battlefield.”
“I see
”
“After the discussion with the Mu commander after we land
”
The subordinate begins to tell him of their arrangements.
On this day, Japan’s strongest armored division, the JGSDF’s 7th Division, lands on the Mu continent to save Mu.
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