Chapter 40
Plundering cities, burning houses, and carrying out massacres.
That was one of the Aikamad Tribe’s specialties.
Their way of fighting was to instill overwhelming fear so plunder would become easy.
Innocent lives were never among their considerations.
Because killing was merely a means to achieve the goal of "creating fear," there was no room for emotion to get involved.
That was why they were used to burning cities.
...No one had expected it would become their own settlement, though.
With a sharp whistling sound, one tent exploded. It had shown signs of people just moments ago.
No one wanted to think about what fate the tribesman inside had met.
They were too busy trying to keep themselves alive.
"Fight back! If you just stand there, you'll die... Agh!"
BOOM-!
The person who had been standing there shouting was blown apart on the spot. In a place where shells fell every few seconds, not moving meant death.
"The warriors went to fight. If it's them..."
Some even entertained vain hopes.
But that kind of hope vanished quickly.
The moment the warriors bravely went out beyond the settlement, the air filled with screams accompanied by a terrifying thunderclap.
The tribespeople decided not to imagine what fate awaited the warriors who couldn't even get the shaman's help.
They simply ran.
"Abandon the settlement and flee! Right now, survival is what matters!"
The steppe's history had always been a struggle of taking and losing. There were no eternal conquerors, and land that had been taken once could always be reclaimed with time.
That was how the Aikamad Tribe had survived the Empire's war of conquest on the steppe.
As long as they survived, there was hope.
Their power wasn't infinite. Someday, once their main force withdrew, they could take the land back.
First, they needed to inform the other tribes and make them prepare.
With that thought in mind, a large number of cavalrymen rode out through the back gate.
The unfortunate thing for them was that dozens of military trucks, heavy infantry, and guard infantry were already stationed at the back gate.
The men with machine guns mounted on the trucks switched on their headlights the moment they spotted the fleeing enemies.
"Enemy spotted. Engaging."
And on the vast steppe, there was nothing to hinder the trucks' movement.
As the headlights lit up the night, the machine guns all spat fire at once.
For the Aikamad tribespeople, it was pure insanity.
"Aaaagh!"
A dazzling white beam from the headlights poured into eyes adapted to the pitch-black night. The cavalrymen covered their eyes in shock, and bullets rained down.
Cavalry was helpless against 7.62mm bullets.
Even if they tried to turn their horses and get as far outside the range as possible, it was meaningless.
"Twenty enemy riders are flanking. We'll pursue."
The mage-engineered engines of the military trucks could unleash a staggering 20 to 50 horsepower.
There was no way mere horses could outrun that.
When the truck gunner pulled the trigger, a crimson line sliced through the darkness with the eerie shriek of a chainsaw.
- Neigh!
The horses, confronted with guns for the first time in their lives, lost their minds. Horses that bolted on their own without listening to their riders were quickly caught in the crossfire and vanished.
"Flanking enemies neutralized."
Thud.
The heavy infantryman leapt from the truck, landed in the middle of the field of corpses, and aimed the machine gun in his right hand.
"I'll carry out a confirmation kill."
When he pulled the trigger, the pile of corpses riddled with bullets shook violently.
Some of them were enemies who had been hiding among the corpses.
"Aaaagh!"
They charged at the heavy infantry with daggers or short spears, but it meant little.
Bladed weapons didn't work on a walking human tank.
"Confirmation kill complete."
The same thing repeated everywhere.
Whenever the barbarians fled in every direction, the trucks with machine guns herded them together and gunned them down.
It was a method the Aikamad Tribe knew very well.
This was a method the Aikamad Tribe often used when attacking the West. It was a drive hunt.
"Are we really wiping them all out?"
"The Grand Duke said it couldn't be helped. Those barbarians are impossible to win over."
If the Aikamad Tribe had shown even a little restraint,
if they hadn't accepted the enemy's surrender and carried out massacres in countless western territories, this would never have happened.
But over all this time, the Aikamad Tribe had rejected the Empire's mercy and crossed the line too many times.
If they were enemies who could still be forgiven and truly repent even now, they would already have taken the many hands the Empire had extended to them.
"If we hesitate here, next time our own families in the Empire will be the ones who suffer this."
The Aikamad Tribe, burdened by the consequences of its own actions, was brought down by the Imperial Army using the very methods it had always wielded.
None of the tribespeople who fled through the back gate survived.
The Imperial Guard soldiers looked at one another, then turned their gazes toward the settlement's back gate.
"Once the bombardment stops, we'll move in."
The men who had finished their mission stood still and waited there.
***
"Cease bombardment."
Before long, about thirty minutes had passed since the indiscriminate bombardment began.
Each field gun had already fired nearly a hundred shells.
Because some somewhat underpowered 76mm guns had been mixed in, we deliberately fired a lot more, and the effect was undeniable.
There were no buildings left visible inside the settlement.
The large stone buildings had been the artillery's concentrated targets, and buildings like the stables and armory had already been smashed to pieces by shells.
The nomads' tents?
Those had been blown away by the blast and burned up in the spreading fire, vanishing without a trace.
No trace of any building could be found anywhere inside the settlement anymore.
Even the remaining ruins?
"The illumination flares are dying out. Should we fire more?"
"Why bother?"
They would only become kindling for the blazing flames, lighting up the dark night sky.
It had taken barely thirty minutes to wipe out the Aikamad Tribe, which had once driven the West into fear.
And now, it was time to finish things.
"The goal of our army is to bring the war to a swift end."
What matters on the steppe is not winning the war, but quickly breaking apart hostile tribes and occupying their land.
That was why no one could be allowed to know what had happened to this tribe.
It wasn't even an age with telephones, and barbarians didn't have Imperial magical tools like scrying orbs.
"So make sure there are no survivors."
The 1st and 2nd Divisions advanced toward the settlement already reduced to rubble.
The soldiers, who had plenty of experience fighting directly under my command, simply carried out their assigned roles in silence.
The infantry divisions entered the settlement.
To finish off the enemies the bombardment hadn't fully killed.
At the same time, the guard troops on the opposite side also began moving into the settlement.
"Give them back exactly what they did to the Westerners."
Under that order, gunfire continued to ring out even after the battle was over.
And so, at half past five in the morning, as the heavy curtain of night draped over the steppe began to lift.
After the final gunshot rang out, the dawn sky began to brighten.
"There are no more life signs being detected."
"What about the mages' detection magic?"
"Nothing is coming up."
"Good. Then let's withdraw."
In the distance, the sky began to turn blue.
Where the smoke was clearing, there was a scorched steppe.
A gray settlement stripped of all greenery. A blood-soaked plain. The flames still had not
been extinguished, and water mages were still working to put them out on the steppe.
The scene where the bombardment and fighting had taken place was utterly horrific.
"If the Westerners, who cherish the steppe like their mother, saw this, they'd go berserk."
Honestly, I hesitated for a moment.
Nomads regarded the steppe like a mother. There was no way public sentiment would remain calm after the steppe was burned and ruined like this.
Wouldn't it be troublesome if they pushed back?
'No, if they push back, that would actually be better.'
And they dare think of objecting after seeing this horrific scene with their own two eyes?
An enemy like that could never be absorbed into the West, so the correct thing was to crush them without mercy.
In that sense, this might actually serve as a good warning.
"Leave the scene as it is. Do not clean it up."
"Huh? But... if we do that, the steppe tribes' backlash will be severe."
"Backlash? Tell them to go ahead and try if they want."
Until now, the Empire had lacked the power to rule the steppe.
To be precise, it had none of the power, manpower, or technology needed to overwhelm the steppe's enemies.
That was why the Empire had to curry favor with the steppe tribes.
But we were not.
Our army had the ability to sweep the steppe clean.
"If there's anyone who can still object after seeing a scene like this."
With that, I turned my gaze west.
The two remaining tribes, Borkan and Serelkis.
Toward the place where the two giant tribes hostile to the Empire remained.
"Leave the 1st and 2nd Divisions to rest, and get the allied forces that were resting in the rear moving."
Now that we had shown them our power once, it was time to let the Western Army fight directly as well.
If we wanted them to fully feel the power of the technology they possessed, first we had to let them wield it themselves on the battlefield.
The Western Army, after seeing the firepower of machine guns, probably wouldn't dare even think of betrayal.
Because the moment they became our enemy, they would realize their position would become the same as the barbarians they themselves had killed.
"This time, we'll give the Western Army a chance to fight directly."
"Yes, Your Excellency."
"Teach them that those who stand against the Empire only get burned."
Whether barbarians or Westerners.