There have been many wars where I have had to face the Goddess of War, given our desnes, it is only right. Nevertheless, they were all rather short and pithy, I would call them conflicts rather than wars. That is save for the last one, the Great War, where I had to wield a dysfunctional coalition against Kassandora. There, I have learned to face the Goddess. The rule of unpredictability is still true, Kassandora is able to construct leaps of logic in supernatural ti, it is almost as if she works retroactively from victory, rather than building upon reality step-by-step.
However, whilst the Goddess of War is skilled and outshines everyone in a general sense, I have to wonder how Arascus has not gone mad with her around. It is true, she brings about victory, but it is a victory vicious and terrible and quick. She has no sense of scale and her stance towards heroism is ambivalence. If a fortress is under siege, Kassandora would prefer to march out and simply recall the troops, unless it is seen that the casualty ratio will be grossly favourable to her or that the ti required to siege a fort be used to tie down an enemy force.
In the realm of defensive campaigns, I can see how Kassandora would fail. The greatest general in Arda’s history does not consider a stalemate to be anything more than a tactical reality. The Great War, I have learned, stretched on for so long because it was Arascus who declared that they fight to the bitter end. Kassandora was planning offensives up until her day of capture, even when the Imperial Army was non-existent. They were excellent plans, of course, and had they worked, they would have inflicted great damage upon us, but what the Empire needed in that ti was a spiteful, bitter defence, not a hopeful counter-offensive.
It is an overwhelming mind combined an overwhelming style of warfare. My words are obviously going to be taken as heresy but I shall call her lacking. Her reliance upon offensive doctrine is enabled by Arascus’ civilizational supremacy, not the other way around. If anything, then Arascus has to bend for her, her track record is impeccable of course, even the defeat in the Great War has been wiped off her na. The Empire lost the mont that other worlds joined the war. Had the Empire dug in, then I certain they could have stretched it on further.
Even in Ainai, the idea of fortifications and battlelines were my propositions. Kassandora herself wanted to wage the war from a purely strategic perspective, using the desert as target practice for her nuclear weapons. The choice is not wrong, but it is not the sort of civilizational binding victory that a young nation being founded should possess. The populace needs their heroes.
It is saddening almost.
Kassandora would have been better in the White Pantheon whereas I and Maisara would have suited the Empire.
- Excerpt from “Spectator of the Surface War”, written by Goddess Fortia, of Peace.
Admiral Callaghan looked over at the… He didn’t know what to call it exactly, the amalgamation, the parody of an ancient fortress that had been created on the Ainai shoreline. This was the position that Kassandora and Fortia had both predicted would see the largest amount of Tartarian traffic. Officially, it was Port-Fort Red, unofficially, and what everyone had taken to calling it because of the rhyming na: Pfip.
Callaghan at least could tell he was looking at a fortress. He didn’t even need the caras of the INS Kassandora to zoom in. Monitors flickered, lights and dials blinked as they updated their readings: the depth of the waters here, the wind speed, global coordinates, the whole lot. One of them turned amber: they were approaching shallows. No one on the massive bridge of the Kassandora, overlooking the grey Eparika sea as if they were on a tower, paid attention to it.
Instead, they all gazed upon Pfip. Not trenchlines but moats had been dug out, already filled by shimring seawater, still dirty from the amount of ash within it, but glimring with sparkles on the surface. Five channels already stretched into quarter circles across the land. They were carving islands out of the desert, connected only by massive, prefabricated steel bridges which bounced from one sand ring to another. And in the centre was a battery of cannons, all pointed upwards in unison like a phalanx on display. A smaller transport ship was docked to the floating dock, vehicles rolled off it and onto the desert.
It was the pair of cruisers though that drew everyone’s attention. They had been beached, or maybe docks had been built out for them. Two cruisers, bristling with weapons, made a wall on one of the base. The heavy FSS shielding on them was being replaced by a swarm of magicians in Imperial black and Arcadian red-purple. They were being switched out, from the Fortress-Shields that would protect the ship as it rode through the Ashfront to the Fortress-Shields that would withstand enemy artillery fire. Each one had a new set of radio towers, topped off with halos of white diamonds instead of radar.
And in the centre of it all, a massive ICDT tower. A lighthouse to the blue skies above. The first in a chain, the stockpile that was slowly being built up for Esberia was being sent here instead. Callaghan readjusted his cap as he stared at that massive silver-grey structure which pulsed to a heartbeat of blue. The sky would ripple whenever it released another wave of energy, the sha shimr that sand which grew too hot during the day carried. The amber light flicking from amber to red and playing an alarm finally woke the bridge up from their trance. “N! ATTENTION! WE’RE STRAYING CLOSE TO SHORE!”
A planet that should have remained a rock.
Kavaa walked through Camp Dawn. There had been a discussion on what to na the camps, Kassandora, as always, had wanted to go with so terribly inhuman system that was perfectly logical: to na them after their coordinates on the map. Maisara had agreed, Fortia and Kavaa had to step. Soldiers needed nas, it was the sa reason that hospitals in the Empire had their own individual nas and weren’t simply called City-Hospital.
n were digging trenches the patch of dry sand that lay here, in the distance, troops covering the entire area with mines. New toys had been designed, mortar launchers that could blast the mines over a distance. Progress was fast, a helicopter was in the air, it scoured the ground and scouted ahead for any movent in the sands. There was none, of course. Kavaa turned to the camp, an array of tents Kassandora-style, not Fortia style. A dozen circles a few tents each around a campfire because sohow, Kassandora in all her sociopathy had figured out that the n worked better when they grew bonds with each other.
The defences were all the sa as Kavaa had seen in the White Pantheon. Artillery in the back, magicians and combat engineers were constructing walls. Stone was being pulled out of the ground, sand was scoured into a black glass, resembling slippery obsidian beyond them. Overlapping firing lines with forward posts for soldiers, that was all Fortia style. It was a much more human form of defence than Kassandora’s exhaustive rolling retreat or unbreakable wall. Trenches connected the forward posts to the lines behind them, set up with a machine post so that automatic fire could clear the hole in case it was ever lost.
The Kavaa-Siren, as Kavaa had taken to calling it, rung again. Another two trucks of soldiers had arrived. They were jumping off their wagons although the drivers knew at this point not to even bother turning their engines off. Every soldier that passed through Camp Dawn left a Cleric. Every single last one would live to twice their natural lifespan, or would die in these sands. The situation was simply too crucial to play picky as she did with civilians.
Kavaa walked towards the n in their yellow fatigues, rifles on their backs, pistols on their belts, sheathed swords on the other side bouncing against their legs. That was Maisara’s addition, the Empire did not lack for steel. Kassandora had seen no point in it, Kavaa didn’t really either, but a sword was cheaper than a rifle. And maybe it gave the n hope. Kavaa turned around to look at desert again, through the gaps in walls that hadn’t been finished yet. Maisara giving n hope? Who would ever think that would happen?
Sowhere past that horizon, uncountable millions were marching on them.
Populated by beings that should have never existed.
Tanit stopped and looked up at the sky. Behind her, the team of soldiers that served as her backup fanned out into formation. The Goddess of Ibya stabbed her spear into the ground as the helicopters in the air put more distance between them. The sand that fanned out from the wind and the horrendous whir of their blades would not disturb the spirits, but it did disturb Tanit. She held up her fist in the sa way that Olonia did when ordering the One-Seventeenth to co to a stop.
They were here, Tanit could sense it. She took another step forward, there had been a ti when she feared these spirits. Now though? After the Ashfront? After marching with the One Seventeenth? After seeing Arascus and Asmodeus duel? There was a reason they were called spirits and not Gods. “Reveal yourselves sandspawn!” Tanit waited for a mont. She felt the sands shift below her feet. The collective breath from her squad and the change in the ground said it had materialized behind her. “I have co as representative of the Empire ifrit, to tell you that everything you hold precious is going to be wiped away by the hordes of Tartarus, as your kin in the Sassara were wiped away. Do not threaten a Goddess who has survived the ash that will drown you.”
A mont later, the ifrit shifted, Tanit felt the shift in the sands as it glided around her to reveal itself. A desert-demon, but one of Arda’s. Its skin was scorched red as if on fire, its hair was a brilliant orange fla that burned without a single dash of smoke or shimr of heat around it. It was wide, too, and far too wide to be a human, but shorter than Tanit still. As she had been told, there was a reason these creatures were re spirits and not Divines. “We know Tartarus cos.” The ifrit replied.
“As do we.” Tanit said. “That is why we now build in your sands and it is why I co here.”
The demon’s red eyes shifted, he looked Tanit up and down. “To protect us?”
“No.” Tanit replied. “To call you to protect your ho as we protect ours.” She put a hand on her chest. “I am Goddess Tanit, of Ibya, my land has already been swallowed by their ash.”
The ifrit inclined its head. “I am called Jiira.” He said. “My condolences Goddess, you have my attention.”
“Then know this, the Empire has not co to harm you, tell the others what we have co for. Those who will stand by my side will march with back to Ibya, and you will have the entire Sassara to claim for yourselves once this is over. Those who stand by shall be left alone. Those who decide that Imperial soldiers make for fine als shall face the full fury of the Empire. My land is lost already but my life is not. I know how to walk these sands.” Jiira stared at her for a mont. His orange hair blazed and shifted.
And he nodded. “I will tell the others Goddess. Tartarus is a scourge. We have wept for the lost in the Sassara already.”
A mistake, perhaps?
Maisara clasped her hands behind her back and stared up at the massive cannon planted into the sand. It was called the Longbow apparently. She had seen longbows in the past, this massive monster of steel, larger even than her, did not resemble the bow whatsoever. But she stared at it and she turned around. “May I hear that again Sergeant?” Around her, the desert was being fortified. More camps were appearing, all within range of each other, being dragged out of the ground by magic and by engineering. The desert itself rumbled with the sheer amount of tectonic activity going on here.
By her side, less than half her size and standing in the desert fatigues that were standard issue to the soldiers here, Sergeant Hochheim coughed. “A range of forty-five kilotres Goddess.” This was the forth ti she had heard him say it. It was one thing to see these things in Esberia, when enemies were spotted within single miles, but here? Under clear skies?
“Forty-five kilotres.” Maisara finally said it to herself. “That’s in the reports, right?”
“Ahhh…” Sergeant Hochheim stared at her. “During testing, we pushed it to forty-eight when the wind worked with us.” Maisara’s silver eyes grew wide. She turned around and looked at the horizon, the desert here was spotted with mines. Forty eight? How far was that here even? Ten horizons in distance? She turned back to the Longbow artillery piece. And the man said he tested himself! So it must be true!
“Sergeant, what a magnificent piece of technology you have here.” She shook her head. “Do you know of the Binturongs?” She turned to look down at the Sergeant.
“Ahh…” He trailed off. “Yes?” He asked.
“How far could they fire?”
“About ten.” About ten. He said it as if it was a disappointnt. As if two horizons worth of distance was nothing special. Well when they were working with ten, what was so special about two!? Maisara released a deep breath and shook her head.
They were never going to succeed in the Peacekeeping Operation of Kirinyaa back then. Not when the technological difference looked like this. She looked out onto the horizon. And now Tartarus would be facing the sa wrath that she had to deal with. “What’s the rate of fire sergeant?”
Hochheim shifted from leg to leg. “Officially, it can pump out eight rounds a minute but the barrel will lt. In this heat.” He looked around. “I’d estimate… a round a minute? Maybe one and a half, every forty-five seconds?”
Every forty-five seconds. The man had just told her one of the most amazing things she had ever heard and he sounded disappointed by it. “Say that again Sergeant, I must have misheard you.”
Dreams of Starspawn should not possess consciousness.
Fer took another step, feeling the tickling hot sand under her bare foot. Humans needed boots, boots got sand into them, feet got scraped, so on, so on. Fortia had explained it, Kassie had explained it a thousand years ago too. Fer had not paid much attention now or back then, it wasn’t very important information frankly.
What was important information was that a warherd had been shipped over from the Empire and she had her pack back. She looked at the beastn maintaining a jogging pace along the flat ground, their fur lined with sweat. Past them, about a mile away, an Imperial armoured company of forty tanks and forty more vehicles to support them was keeping up.
Kassie may have been the best, but if Kassie was new, no one would follow her. The morale from serving under Kassandora ca from the knowledge that a man was serving under Kassandora and that Kassandora never lost a battle. n would stand for months in trenches because they were under the certainty they would win. Fortia had no such skill, so Fortia actually had to maintain morale. Fortia needed sothing called doctrine that was just well Kassie will win the war.
A rolling retreat, a defence in depth, whatever it had been called, it was Fortia’s plan. Fer would be at the very front throughout all of it. To spot enemy commanders, to pick off scouts where she could, to spill as much blood as could be spilled. And she would not be alone, as Kassie loved to send her out. She would be with a pack and a company. Fer turned around, the ears on top of her head bounced as she looked up the small satyrs in light yellow shirts, their legs covered in brown fur that glistened with sweat. The larger kin had to be left back at the battlelines, the minotaurs and those were covered entirely in fur. Those would overheat and collapse in this sun.
Humans needed boots, beastn had hooves. The sand was of no issue to them. She chuckled to herself as how fantastic it was. They could carry radios, they could keep track of their locations, they could do all the important call outs and everything that hated doing.
The Goddess of Beasthood sprinted ahead, putting another between herself the pair of convoys before, one a line of beastn, the other fashioned entirely of steel. She stood up as she could and then jumped into the air to see just a little further. Still nothing but desert sands. Disappointing. Then there was nothing to call for, the convoy could advance as it did. She turned around and watched her pack maintain that jog. It would be getting dark soon, they could light campfires and break open the at-truck then. Tomorrow, there would be more advancing. Each mile claid now was another mile they would have to thin Tartarus’ numbers before they crashed into the battlelines.
Fer looked down at her arm. Maybe she’d get a tan!
Yet it was given to them.
Fortia looked over the map in Camp Midnight. It was far into fourth line, she could not believe that Kassandora had actually been convinced to hand over the ground command to the Goddess of Peace. Instead, that Goddess would stay behind and organise the flights from Kandai and maintain control over the Strategic Missile Corps, whereas Fortia actually got the chance to prove herself with the ground warfare. Surely it had to be Arascus, he must have rang. Or maybe it was Fer. It couldn’t have been Kassandora herself, could it?
She looked over the lines. They could have the mages enchant the sands to make quicksand, that was a standard battlefield trick. The mortals had not thought of it yet. She made a note in her small notebook to ring Elassa and make sure that the magicians coming knew the art of destabilizing the ground and went back to the maps. “GODDESS! GODDESS!” One of the Imperial Generals ran in without even saluting. “You…” It was Allesandri, a Rancais man. The tall man blinked, then stood up straight. “Apologies Goddess!” He said and drew the Imperial salute. “General Allesandri reports, you said to ignore protocol and call you when the first flyby was happening.”
Fortia returned the salute. “At ease General, I did indeed.” The Goddess chuckled to herself. These Imperials were sothing else, she had to give that to Kassie. Her own Guardians would never follow an order as farcical as ignore protocol. “Is it coming?”
“It’ll be over us in a minute.”
“Very well.” Fortia leaned back from her table. A few minutes break would not hurt. She needed to see it tooas well. The Goddess of Peace smoothed down her black Imperial coat and walked out of her command tent. Camp Midnight’s fortifications were growing, slower than the camps in the first lines, but growing nonetheless. They weren’t going to be needed anyti soon.
Fortia looked up at the ICDT tower in the middle of the camp. That was sothing that the White Pantheon would never do. They would have tried to push Elassa into that massive world-ritual and they would have failed in it. And Arascus had simply cut his losses and decided that good enough now was better than perfection later. She looked up at the clear skies above her. The air doctrine had been changed entirely. Lines of ICDT towers would be set up within each other’s range. They would not be working clearing the atmosphere, they would be making flight paths for air support.
A pristine, cloudless sky. Sothing Fortia had thought she would not see again when she first saw the Ashfront. Here, they were close to the Sassara that the skies should be grey.
And then, she heard a sonic boom from the north. Everyone in the camp stopped and looked up at the sky. The planes would be doing flybys everyday, to tell the n that they were back in the air. It was good for morale. Fortia caught the pair of black specks shoot across the sky like a cot, those booms must have been breaching the sound-barrier then, they were moving too fast for standard gets. A wave of cheers followed, so loud that the Goddess was taken aback. Surely morale was not this bad? “I’m glad the n are happy.” Fortia said to Allesandri. The man had taken off his cap and was holding it to his chest, the smile was practically splitting his face. “But I didn’t expect them to be so ecstatic.”
“It’s a sign of good luck.” Fortia looked at the man and then at the pair of planes disappear across the horizon.
“Is it?”
“Raptor One and Two, everyone knows them.”
A waste of a good soul.
- Inscription found upon an unknown plate, found by Goddess Paida, of Rancais, during the Aris expedition.
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