Artemis and his two Elite Androids were walking through the forest on their side of the line. As the situation went on, the greenery of the forest has started to fade due to lack of sunlight and it was only a matter of time before they would stumble upon the scorched areas of the forest. The scorched areas were the place of battle, where man and machine fought against one another, where magic and science clashed.
Artemis has decided to temporarily ignore the supposed evolution of his two Elite Androids, as long as he was always on alert, he was in no risk of being jumped on by his own Droids. Along the way, however, he and his Androids conversed as if a senior officer was talking to two other soldiers lower in rank.
As they walked through the forest, the sounds of war became ever more louder. This gave Artemis the idea to inspect the front and how his army was doing.
"Splendid idea! Our master is ever so thoughtful," Michael said in his british accent, Artemis decided to call the Androids by names.
(Anyone who read Curing the Multiverse, the two robotic idiot twins are back!)
"Master, how shall the army behind us respond if a line near us is breached?" Johnathan asked as they strode through the forest. He has a deep but a seductive male tone, if he was a human in nature, he'll immediately get his own personal harem. Unfortunately, that seductive male voice was interrupted by his robotic sound.
"Simple, the army is to respond immediately, we can't risk breaches since it would threaten the integrity of the front," Artemis answered.
"Master-"
Artemis raised his right hand as a signal to stop moving. The three then knelt onto the floor and took their weapons.
"For one, please call me commander, it's more fitting and also you are not my slaves, don't call me master," Artemis asked the Androids, it was more of a direct order but Artemis wanted them to feel that it was a simple request. But of course, he does not know how to make it sound like a simple request.
"Yes, commander"
"Aye, commander"
The Androids were able to comply immediately, it seems like everything Artemis says is an order to them regardless of the tone or the sarcasm if Artemis was ever going to sarcasm at least.
"Now, stop talking and observe the trees in front of me,"
The Androids followed Artemis' order and scanned the foliage in front of them.
"Commander, we are near the middle line"
"Aye, Johnathan, we can see several of our own fighting in the distance,"
"Several?" Artemis looked at Michael and asked. He was confused, the middle line should have the most concentrations of Androids due to the fact that the middle line served as the backbone of the line.
"Yes, commander, we can only see several of our own, other forces are nowhere to be found," Johnathan replied.
"Oh no," Artemis whispered.
It was at this moment did Artemis finally realize the threat that was upon them, he didn't really think it would happen but it seems like it has become a reality. The line has been spread too thin. The front has spread too thin for the Machime Empire's mere tens of thousands of Androids to cover, it was a miscalculation and a disaster.
But Artemis didn't know that this was not the case, they had more than enough manpower to hold the lines regardless of how far the Theocracy stretched it since the Theocracy itself could not accomplish such a feat of covering a massive front line, let alone maintain a front line. In this medieval and magical world, front lines were not a thing, at least not as in the modern definition.
These kingdoms relied on huge army engagements and city sieges, Artemie, however, was applying modern warfare of front lines to cause a war of attrition that would cause the enemy to back down or exhaust themselves faster.
The plan seemed fool-proof but there was divine intervention. Artemis and Caitlyn devised this plan and accounted for the power of the mages but did not account for an external malevolent force to put their plans into disarray.
The Blue Goddess has blessed the mages of the Theocracy and has launched attack after attack along nothern, middle, and southern lines. The north and south lines held off but the middle line took most of the damage. Their forces have dwindled and the next reinforcements were a few hours late, the middle line was on the brink of collapse.
And then they heard it, an explosion blasted its way through the forest prompting the three to duck down in reflex.
"Attack!" A voice rang in the distance followed by the shouts of hundreds of men. They appeared from the burnt foliage brimming in armour and fighting spirit. The few Androids that were there to immediately respond to them raised their Battle Rifles and fired.
The battle took only a minute as the knights, although extremely weaker than the Androids, outnumbered them with help from their divine blessings. With their stats enhanced and mages to back them, the Middle line has finally been breached.
"No," Ehispered under his breath.
"Commander! Orders!?" Michael asked.
"Commander! The army is on stand-by, orders?" Johnathan added.
In this dire situation, Artemis needed to be decisive, will he join his forces in combat or does he let the Androids do the dirty work while he watches comfortably in the distance while barking orders? Seeing that there was obviously external intervention, he did not want to risk to lose more of his Androids.
And so, he decided to launch a counter-attack at that very moment along with the one thousand Androids that followed him there.
"Order an attack, now!" Artemis barked his orders at Michael and Johnathan
"As you wish!" They both answered.
The calls were relayed to the nearest station and the order was soon routed to all other armies in the front. An all-out offensive was to ensue! They were to fight! To advance! The demise of the petty Theocracy that dared taint and halt the advance of the Machine Empire is nigh!
Or so the order was relayed, Artemis merely wanted to secure the middle front and really had no intentions of launching a full-scale offensive into the Theocracy. He realized his mistake too late and the order was followed immediately by all commanding drones.
The offensive has begun.
Across the entire front between the Machine Empire and the Theocracy, bombing raids began, aerial strike, and mass assaults of infantry, motorized and tanks ensued with what could be called as the bloodiest engagement in this region's history.
Artemis stood from the soft ground and stepped on the dead stick that crunched under his weight.
"Engaged!" He shouted in full force and behind him emerged one thousand Androids than stormed out of the foliage and into the scorched plains to meet the enemy. Attack Drones flew overhead as Androids, Drone Vehicles, and Mech Walkers ran at blazing speeds towards the knights, mages, Griffin riders, and remaining Airships who stared in shock.
They fired as they ran, their Battle Rifles streaking through the air in dazzling red light that either killed or incapacitated their targets, none of them missed.
In the sight of such an enemy, some knights routed while others stood their round and readied themselves for the inevitable battle! They went and formed a shield wall composed of thousands of knights with mages firing spell after spell and Airships shooting their cannons at the Machines from behind the defence.
But the Attack Drones would place them into much disarray, they swept high or low towards both ground and air shrieking in terror and defiance of the wills of men before unloading package after package of death and destruction upon the enemy air support and ground troops that cowered under their weak magic shields of their Airships and cried for their puny deities to save them.
Bodies flew and tears fell.
Who would survive and tell?
That men were defeated in battle.
Riders pushed from their saddles on their Land Dragons.
Lo, the heavens opened and they came.
Nothing shall ever be the same.
At this day and hour.
There shall be a new power.
The two sides met and clashed, sword versus gun, metal versus flesh, magic versus science, and man versus machine.
And the machines were victorious. With each hack of the sword, three knights would fall, with each cast of a spell, a mage is shot. It was not a battle, to begin with, it was a strategic victory. Artemis joined in the battle and fought, taking on hundreds of the enemy at once and emerging unscathed. While doing so he coordinated the army in the attack barking order after order at Michael and Johnathan that relayed the orders to their fellow Drones and Androids.
And thirty minutes of fighting came to past and only the bloodied corpses remained of their enemy. Their weapons lied on the floor and tens of wreckage of Airships on the ground on fire with the dead forest that they themselves were the murderers of. It was not a battle, no, it was a massacre.
Artemis did not really count how many they killed during the initial engagement but an estimated 300,000 knights, 200 Airships, and 50,000 mages were killed and thousands more routed in a panic into the scorching blazes.
Artemis walked through the battlefield with his skin tainted with the blood of his enemies, the dirt of the soul and the ashes of the forest. His machines were no different, they too were covered in the remains of their enemies. They walked over their corpses, burned them, killed those who thought they could sleep and pretend. There was no escape.
The other fronts were no different, for long they were only there just to hold the enemy off. Their main objective was to make them exhaust their manpower and the overall war effort, a long but ensured victory. But the circumstances have since changed and the war has begun to take a sharp turn.
Across the entire front, battles were fought and the machines would emerge as the victors, they were ruthless, cunning and downright terrifying in the eyes of their enemy.
"This deserves a celebration!" Michael was enthusiastic.
"Agreed, comrade!"
This is unheard of, my Androids are slowly becoming more human
Artemis thought with an unease, sure his Androids becoming more human was making him uneasy but what made him more terrified was the fact that.
"Wait, why are my Androids developing more into becoming like humans while I myself can't achieve it?" The words escaped his mouth.
"Eh?" His Androids stared at him.
"..."
The sky was still covered by the clouds of ash and smoke, Artemis longed to see the sunshine once more upon the forest. He looked up towards the sky and saw flashes of light, red, white, yellow, all three colours flashed in what could only be a battle in the sky.
"The Attack Drones seem to be engaging the enemy air force," Michael commented as he is viewing tens of Attack Drones finally finish destroy few enemy Airships and onto the Griffin riders who didn't stand a chance against the Attack Drones.
"It's quite an insult to call flying beasts as an air force, they're merely abusing wild-life because they don't have the brain to even figure out simple physics," Johnathan replied to Micheal.
Woah
Artemis thought. That was one hell of a roast.
And the roast was somewhat factual, even when they captured supposed scholars from the fortress city there was no mention of any advanced science, not even simple physics! All of their knowledge revolved around magic and how magic does this and that.
It could be said that magic was somehow an inhibitor to the world's progress in technology, that or the brilliant minds of this world were not as brilliant as he thought.
Albert Einstein said, "If you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree then the fish would forever think that it's stupid,"
Though, it's true in a sense, in this world Artemis thought of it as..
"Fish thinking they can do anything with magic so they decide to try and use to climb the tree, it works! And then they forget how to swim,"
As such, Artemis' expectation of any sort of advancement in this world that does not involve magic was once again dashed and he was forced to endure the apparent intellectual disability of this world's humans.
However, Airships does counts as technology because simple wooden ships with different types of magical stones as their reactor. It sounds like it was made in technology but the reason the human in this world are dissapointed in technology was that the whole human nations in Fordalt didn't made this but a race called Dwarves who are work for each nations and do all of the technology work. Humans in this world are quite disappointed, except for the dwarves who are very intelligent in this world. Artemis gives them credit for that. Pretty much the dwarves are his favorite race in this world.
The Dwarves made this in their knowledge of technology but as for humans who piloted this didn't seen this as technology but some magic like any other, quite a dissapointed for them according to his readings. Clark's 3rd law strikes hundred billion times.
With this initial victory, Artemis wanted to rest but the victories at the northern and southern fronts would make him postpone this much-needed rest. The war has finally turned in his favour, how could he not exploit it?