Combat Unit Formation and Introduction of the New Mass-production Machine Lanius A1 Part 1

[previous_page]

[next_page]


Translator: SFBaka

Editor: Thor’s Stone


It was decided that an emergency meeting of the main members of Metal Iris would be held inside the Aristides on Fortress Area P336.

Kou told everyone about Asia and Dike’s predictions. Astraea’s existence still needed to be kept secret, so Dike was the one who came forward instead.

「An A-Class Development Engineer actually joined the enemy. And a precarious stalemate huh. It’s certainly true that the Stones suddenly stopped conducting invasions. Even if they need to make up for the forces they lost, they’re being too quiet.」

「We thought they were refraining from attacking because they were devoting their efforts to enticing Fortress Areas and Defense Domes to their side, but they were actually augmenting their military strength huh.」

Jenny and Robert were convinced. It was true that the Stones were being far too silent lately. Them acting shocked after the surprise attacks Metal Iris conducted against them was just a façade.

「So, they pretended to be shocked by the consecutive defeats and focused on producing more new weapons huh. They really are hateful bastards.」

Barry muttered with a sigh.

「What do you plan to do, Hidden Boss?」

「We’ll also focus on production. As long as the performance of our weapons is close to equal, we’ll counter numbers with numbers. We’ll continue recruiting mercenaries as well.」

「The Mercenary Association did complain that we were recruiting too many though.」

「If the enemy’s intentions are really also mixed in with their opinions, they’d at least say that much. In the first place, they’re basically just acting as a job agency, so they don’t have the right to complain since we’re actually the employer.」

Kou inadvertently spat bitterly as he remembered the unscrupulous job agencies back on Earth.

「Sound reasoning. Are you there, Dike? Does Okeanos actually place a limit on the number of mercenaries one can recruit?」

『I am connected. Okeanos has placed no such limits. It is a statement that can be said to be overstepping bounds.』

「Right. Of course. It seems the Mercenary Association isn’t exactly an enemy, but it isn’t our ally either. I’ll just treat them as damn death merchants then.」

Barry quipped mockingly.

「However, we might face tens of thousands or even hundreds of thousands of Murders. We only have a limited number of personnel and resources. Let’s consolidate and share the weapons of the corps assigned to the Cimon-class and the Aristides as much as possible.」

「You can’t exactly go to war with the mercenaries still using personal weapons and prototypes after all.」

「It’s because Underground Forces are basically collections of individual mercenaries who band together in groups. A Force that operates on the premise of serving in a mothership has never appeared before until we did. You can also store a lot more weapons inside a mothership. There are probably no other Underground Forces with the same level of equipment standardization as us.」

「Exactly. That’s why I want to propose the reorganization of our forces and the introduction of new mass-production machines.」

Rick nodded happily after hearing Kou’s words.

「It’s simply impossible for any other place to provide ace machines like Lanius B, Tachycineta, Badb Catha, Epona, and Thunderstorm to the troops all at once.」

It was truly an extravagant lineup. Jenny couldn’t help but chuckle.

「Anyway, what’s with this standard equipment list? Seriously? Carrier-based Silhouette Lanius A1, and a newly developed mass production machine for base personnel, the Shrike?」

Of course, the number of weapons the Cimon-class and Aristides-class can carry is limited. Among the official members, only those who have excellent compatibility with Familiars are selected to be directly assigned to them.

「The Lanius A1 is equipped with a metallic hydrogen storage tank that makes use of armor muscles. The Shrike is a simplified mass production version of the Lanius that was jointly developed with TAKABA. It’s a machine that only employs electromagnetic armor on its critical components and not its armor muscles. But the parts used to manufacture it are almost the same with Lanius.」

「Hm? So, you won’t get the versatile Falco huh. And I thought you were the type to not let personal feelings get in the way of things like that.」

Kou smiled bitterly after hearing Barry’s words.

「What personal feelings? With the gradual spread of aircraft equipped with electromagnetic armor, the effectiveness of long-range shooting weapons has decreased, so there’s a need to expand in the area of melee combat instead.」

「Fumu. The U.S. military endorsed settling air combat with missiles alone back in the 20th century, and when the Vietnam war came along, their planes were shot down one after another by enemy fighters that engaged them in dogfights instead of long-range missile shootouts. Later fighters adapted dogfighting capabilities in their designs again, and no matter how many fighter planes advanced and evolved, they were always equipped with machine guns.」

Rick delivered a little military history lesson.

「I see. Only popularizing electromagnetic armor and not improving long-range weapon technology is still fishy, but that does sound reasonable.」

「I do feel the aim to gradually transform basic Silhouette combat into melee engagements using swords, but I won’t pry any longer.」

Kou’s forehead dripped in cold sweat after hearing the two’s snide remarks, but it looks like Jenny and Rick were satisfied for the most part.

「There are more Silhouettes to be provided. Licensed cavalry tank and exclusive Silhouette model. They even made an exclusive model?」

「Yeah. But it mainly makes use of the additional armor system anyway, so the main focus is the tank.」

Barry pointed out. Kou had decided to officially license the heavy Silhouette model Heifuu and the cavalry tank Yema for production.

Since they acquired the production license, the names of the machines were changed to their immediate English equivalents, Black Tiger and Wild Horse.

「The combat engineers will be receiving the Caledonia Crow, and the ones in charge of battlefield construction will receive the Battle Pecker.」

「You really made exclusive machines for our combat engineering corps. Thank you very much!」

Fuyuki was surprised and delighted. He did mention that Badb Cathas were a waste on combat engineering troops who didn’t really excel at direct combat. Right now, they were being used by a special unit and Kurt Maschinenbau employees.

The combat engineers who wanted their machines to be capable of more precise operations saw the work Silhouette Woodpecker that Marl and Flack were using and instantly fell in love. They were eager to get similar machines as well and went to beg Kou.

The Caledonia Crow was a Badb Catha-based engineering machine that was named after the only crow that’s known to use a tool to obtain food. Its load capacity, which was the base machine’s weakness due to incorporating armor muscles, has been improved.

Pecker. In addition to woodpeckers, the word was also used to refer to a person who uses a pickaxe. The Battle Pecker was a Lanius A1-based engineering machine that was suited for front-line supply and construction missions.

Kou wanted to thank Fuyuki for all of his help and decided to design these engineering machines for him and his corps.

「Quattro Workers are also being mass-produced. And we’ve already completed production of 200 Epos units. I was told I had to prepare at least this much for two warships.」

If it was limited to humans, there would have been a shortage of personnel, but Fortress Area P336 also had a large number of Familiars, Therianthropes, and Nereids.

The equipment list took them all into consideration.

「The main battle tanks equipped with electromagnetic armor, tracked armored vehicles, wheeled armored vehicles, and half-track light armored vehicles we have available have already been converted for Familiar use huh. You’ve even taken into account the ease of converting them for anti-air or indirect fire roles.」

「Electromagnetic armor-equipped armored vehicles have also been planned to be provided from the start. About 70% of all the weapons mentioned earlier have been procured. It would be a race against time for the remaining 30%.」

「It seems you’ve been preparing for a long time, Kou. In other words, you’ve already started production before this emergency happened. And this emergency only made you move the plan forward.」

「It was just to prepare for whatever would happen. It wasn’t really something so concrete. These are ultimately going to be carrier-based equipment. The main focus should be the Familiar and mercenary ground troops, and the proper logistics system to support them. The logistics system has already been prepared.」

Kou transferred the relevant materials to everyone’s devices.

「That’s about all I could come up with. I’ve only managed to come up with all that with Dike’s support anyway.」

「You did great. If you were trained well, you’d probably make a pretty good frontline commander.」

Kou panicked after hearing Rick’s scary proposal.

「That’s not something suitable for me. Next would be air power, but it’s gonna be a contest on just how many aerial machines each side will be able to prepare.」

「The enemy should be preparing aerial units as well. We might have shown them off too much.」

「Before, the only aerial units the Stones could deploy were insect-type Murders. But now that they’ve incorporated the technology they got from John Arms, large-scale metallic hydrogen generation facilities are already being built by them at various places in Asia. They will definitely deploy new aerial machines once the fighting starts.」

「Aerial combat huh. So, the sky is gonna be a battlefield again too.」


[previous_page]

[next_page]


Become a VIP
Question icon
Become a VIP and enjoy the benefits of being able to read chapters in advance of the current release schedule.

  • Read +1 extra chapters (inc. Ad-FREE experience)
    $5 / month
  • Read +2 extra chapters (inc. Ad-FREE experience)
    $10 / month
  • Read +4 extra chapters (inc. Ad-FREE experience)
    $20 / month

Novel Schedule

Assault Colossus of the Nemesis Warfront

Schedule will be reduced when the goal is reached

Balance: 0

Comment (0)

Get More Krystals