November 2nd, 626

Larissa’s eyes flashed as the tanks before her went to full activation. Shields flared around them and the enchantments glowed with such strength that she felt her very blood tingle with mana saturation. 

She, John Cooper, and Umara Talerria stood behind the Command Tank. From its hatch poked the head of the General whose eyes were wide and dilated, a terse grin on his face. 

The Scourge was charging, clustered and wholly unaware of what was before them. 

He screamed, his Psyka carrying his voice. 

“FIRE!!”

Larissa flinched as the tanks erupted with cataclysmic power. Fire bloomed from their cannons as projectiles were pushed out at unkowable speeds, the shockwaves from just the propelling explosions causing her to lose control of the air in her lungs. 

She had seen the videos of these things in action. But being before these towering metal behemoths, as a tiny woman of nothing but weak flesh, was an experience of such visceral intensity she couldn’t have previously fathomed possible. 

She had seen warlocks and knights perform feats of god-like power, walking around like portable natural disasters. She had heard the legends, had seen the catastrophic results of high Authority combat. 

None of them could compare to this. 

Perhaps it was because she knew that it wasn’t just magic. When she looked at the tanks she could see both the magic imbuing them with power as well as the sharp display of engineering and science. What came out of that barrel wasn’t just a ball of flames from a warlock spell. 

It was a heavy metal projectile carrying a high explosive payload. It flew through the air without guidance, and therefore it also demanded precision in the manufacture of the barrel itself. 

These tanks were sending the world’s most powerful arrows through the sky at speeds she could only comprehend with a number, with accuracy demanding that the hundreds of people involved in its design and construction were each far smarter than a warlock throwing mana towards his enemies on a whim. 

So many moving parts, so many variables, so much money, all culminating in not just the war machine she stood behind, but the other couple hundred beside it. 

She watched as the projectiles exploded in the distance, bursting in the air and sending dense waves of superheated explosions to all the monsters around it. Larissa couldn’t see the holes being punched in the lines of monsters but she could hear and feel each of them, knowing that if she were anywhere close she’d simply cease to exist. Forces like that wouldn’t even leave ashes of her behind. 

Just a year or so ago, such explosively powerful magical items were nearly non-existent. Such power could only be displayed by the highest Authority Crystals, and those were always in the hands of warlocks and knights with similar power, supplementing them. 

Now, each of those projectiles was being fired by a summoner like her, people who were in those tanks because their intellect was more valuable than their brawn. 

A magical tool that did the fighting for you, protected you. Summoners were all seen as weak, and yet John Cooper had made these obscene weapons and saddled them with the very summoners that the rest of the world’s Magi felt provided no value to the fight against the Scourge. 

When Larissa started feeling like she was going deaf, John Cooper took out a device and put it in her hand. Once activated, she felt a field bloom around her, dampening the sound. She could still hear every explosion, but it no longer made her ears feel like bursting. 

The General in the Command Tank screamed, pointing forward, the tanks starting to roll. They moved and fired, the Scourge still charing forward like they didn’t see their kin being reduced to mist. 

“Walk with us.”

He spoke, Larissa and her assistant stepping as John and Umara moved. They walked with the tanks, which were rolling at around triple their speed. 

They pulled ahead, the Scourge getting within range of the turrets. The turrets fired with tangible eagerness, bolts of flame sparking off the barrels at a rapid pace. The scattered monsters that started to get close were focus-fired and mauled, unable to even touch the shields. 

They simply followed John and his fiance, who didn’t seem to care that they were technically in the middle of a battlefield. 

Larissa had never been on a battlefield before. She certainly would’ve never guessed that these would be the circumstances of her first time. 

For several minutes the tanks rolled forward, sometimes stopping to dump more fire into the incoming hordes. The Chariots around the place were normally hanging behind, but as some Scourge slipped past the wall of fire and piled on the tanks, they released their troops to cut down the aggressors. 

Sometimes, the turrets form other tanks would fire on their friendly armor in order to kill off the swarming Scourge as if they were dusting off bugs. 

For a time, the only thing Larissa could see was fire. The detonating shells from the tank cannons started going off sooner, closer, as the Scourge closed the distance. Umara put up a barrier to protect against the heat, knowing that it was more than hot enough, even at a distance, to scorch skin. 

Then, after walking a bit more, Larissa’s foot crunched on something underneath. 

She looked down, lifting her boot to see fragments of opaque rocks. They were brownish black, covered with sandy particles. 

She looked forward, seeing craters of murky glass, already cooled and reflecting the sunlight. They weren’t large, but they were frequent, each explosion of the tank shells creating one. Bits of flesh were charred to the craters coming from corpses tougher than most, some other craters crushed and ground by the treads of tanks. 

Larissa struggled to imagine how much concentrated, instantaneous power was released with each explosion. 

She looked up as she heard something from behind. Above her head was a gunship, armed with six quad-barrel turrets that rained fiery hell upon the remaining hordes. Pods on their small wings occasionally launched long tubes that flew into the distance, targeting the Royals lingering in the backlines. 

The Bombardos had been eradicated first thing, so none of those remained. 

At some point, the tanks stopped firing and let the Chariots take lead. They swept through the remaining Scourge and deployed their warlocks and knights, two summoners on each heavy vehicle firing more turrets as they drifted across the battlefield. 

 When the tanks finally came to a stop, no longer firing, John and Umara walked to the front. Larissa and her assistant gazed upon the glassy wasteland, previously their desert, stained with carbon and blood. 

The last of the Scourge was wiped out, nothing but blasted corpses of the 20 thousand strong army of monsters remaining. Larissa still felt some ringing in her ears, stunned into silence at how insane the battle was. 

How easy the battle was. 

All without a single casualty. 

“General Larissa.”

John called, Larissa turning her head to face him. 

He was still smoking that cigar, smiling, without a care in the world. 

The icon of engineered death raised his arms. 

“Welcome to mechanized warfare.”

……

…

The day passed. After I got everything arranged at Stronghold Echo, making sure my General was given all the deference I demanded, Umara and I were on a plane out of the base. 

That battle against the Scourge had been won with a 48% kill efficiency. It was decent, being this regiment’s first fight detached from their larger whole, so I decided to cut the Brigadier General a break and just leave. Besides, it wasn’t like I hadn’t given him the green light to be a bit wasteful. That battle was moreso about putting on a show. 

It had been won with a mere few injuries. Not a single Stronghold soldier had to step forward, and not a single one died. For the first time in their lives they witnessed a victory against a Scourge army that was achieved without a single dead ally. It was unheard of. 

Because it was previously unheard of, none of those soldiers could fathom such a thing being possible. But now that I had shown them it was, they would associate the lack of death with my Heavy Metal. From now on, every battle they would face would be compared to what we showed them today, as well as every battle that regiment participated in henceforth. 

They’d start desiring a bit more preservation. They’d wonder why they couldn’t use the same tools, why they couldn’t go a battle without any deaths. 

They’d question their generals about why they couldn’t have Heavy Metal of their own, and sooner rather than later, would question why the generals, and the military as a whole, refused to buy life saving machines of war. 

My machines of war. 

It would force the Kingdom to reconsider their approach to warfare, as if my Iron Legion’s performance wasn’t already doing that, and in the end, they’d be begging Sawn Industries for armament. 

And I’d be a very happy camper. 

There was still a month left and yet I could already feel the discontent brewing. The only issue I’d have to face in the near future was the ‘media coverage’. I was sure that the Kingdom would be manipulating the press in order to keep themselves from looking bad. I would need to keep publicizing in order to fight that. 

Thankfully Sawn had already started a media company. So long as the Third Claw didn’t make any drastic moves, it would serve my purposes for now. 

After arriving at the Black Spider Hotel, Umara and I settled into my room. We washed up, ordered dinner, and enjoyed ourselves for a while, cuddling on the couch and simply recovering. 

Out of the nearby window wall we could see the dark night sky and the lights of the city all around. Taking peeks outside made me melancholic, so I turned my attention to the advancement formation in my hand. 

Umara laid on my chest, her grimoire closed next to us. When my advancement formation flashed in the air she looked up and took a couple glances at it. 

“How far along are you? I feel like you haven’t had any time to work on it.”

“I haven’t, but I’ve still managed to get about halfway. Being able to remember everything perfectly is obnoxiously useful. Not to mention that our time on Continuance pushed my comprehension forward a major step.”

“That’s good. How long until you reach Authority 8?”

“Hard to say.”

I looked over the formation, staring at the arrays I hadn’t yet understood, but was working on. 

“It could be another year if I remain this busy. I’m not able to study for hours every day anymore. There’s always something to do, even if I’ve delegated much of the work.”

“But advancement should take a higher priority. I think you need to start setting things aside. Take at least 3 hours everyday.”

“I agree. Thankfully things are starting to settle. I’ll have more time anyway. Won’t be hard to work things out.”

I sighed and crunched a few more arrays. 

For now my advancement was still smooth sailing. But I could still see that great golden wall along the horizon, somehow even through the walls of my room. 

A perpetual barrier that I had only seen once elsewhere. 

While Nonnen was killing that King Blood. 

I had a faint idea of how to break the barrier because of that. I would also get a better idea in time. But if I were to be the first summoner to ever break that barrier, I’d need to be careful, because that was assuming even the Mantle had failed to produce any summoner that could break it. I would need to, therefore, surpass the best of their legacy before I could hope to break that wall. 

It would be no easy task, but I was arrogant enough to believe I could. After I turned that into confidence, I’d be set for paving my path. 

Because Maxwell’s advancement formations would stop after I reached Authority 10. 

I knew it was foolish to pressure myself with that future, especially with how far away it seemed, but we were already approaching a year since the fall of the Treehouse and it was as fresh in my mind as today's new experiences. 

I could feel myself losing track of time, despite every minute feeling like a day. In fact, I was no longer thinking in terms of timeframes. Each day was a series of events and tasks to be completed one after the other, each successive millisecond another set of data to be burned into my brain alongside the countless others. 

This was to say that Authority 8 would be here before I knew it, because even I could get distracted by the thousands of occurrences I had an interest in each day. 

Dare I say, I had actually forgotten for a time that advancing should be my top priority. Of course, I knew the value of creating the Iron Legion and industrializing Sawn Industries, but I had let myself get caught up in the fine details for too long. 

I had people for that. I needed to stop focusing on the dots of the wall painting that was the big picture and take some steps back. 

I combed some of Umara’s hair absentmindedly, stroking her scalp and feeling her relax a bit more. 

I needed to advance as well as handle my own personal technological advancement. I needed to handle things with the Heart at Continuance and integrate the new Neural Gem from that Death Shrine into another, more refined SEER Knife. While the analysis of the Heart would likely end up falling into the hands of the Wonderland teams we sent over to the island, everything else was a personal project I’d need to spend time on. 

Thankfully my Psyka could extend my lucid and active hours well beyond a full day. I didn’t have any combat on the horizon so chances were I’d be able to allocate my energy elsewhere. 

If I really focused my efforts, Authority 8 would be here sooner. I was looking forward to it. 

Authority 7 had already handed me modern weaponry, advancing the era of available spirits by decades. If it kept up, Authority 8 should be reaching beyond even the most cutting edge of what I knew on Earth. That was also considering Kwon and Song were from my future on Earth. 

The Scourge didn’t leave much room for variation in terms of weapons. A bullet was a bullet and empowerment equalized my summons so there was often little need to reach beyond my core loadouts. Totenstahl remained my most powerful weapon and would likely continue to. His volume of fire would be unparalleled until I managed to get my hands on a minigun, if that day ever came. 

But in the modern era, warfare changed. Technology got good enough to provide soldiers with more than just a gun, some camo, and a ceramic plate over their chest. While I didn’t need things like night vision, there were creative pieces of personal gear that would, in fact, help me if the tech was growing where I expected it to. It would be auxiliary, but in this magical world without modern conveniences, I would take anything I could get. 

That also reminded me. I needed to work on the ability to pass off summons to others. 

I’d like to see my fiance in some combat gear someday. 

My eyes glanced at Umara, who was starting to drool on my chest. 

And I turned back to my advancement formation, filling the air with Psykic arrays.