PATH OF THE STAR HUNTER

At this point, even Desmond’s squad had begun to look nervous as the defensive forces on the north wall were seemingly being overwhelmed little by little.

Desmond on the other hand already had an idea why the situation had come to be what it was so he grabbed the radio with his right hand and with a serious countenance began yelling into the radio: “Commander, this is Lieutenant Astryd, It seems to me that Lieutenant Clay gave orders to reduce the offensive in hopes of lengthening the time our supplies would last but he failed to anticipate the size of the mutated beasts’ offensive so we have been overwhelmed; With the commander’s permission, I would like to employ a certain plan that I have in mind to reverse the situation.”

Without even waiting for an answer Desmond was already pulling out one of the 40mm grenade launchers and by the time the radio chaos and response arrived, Desmond was already loading the grenade launcher with some special ammunition that he took out of the huge metal case he brought with him long ago.

“Lieutenant Astryd, whatever you do had better be good or you’ll share the blame with Lieutenant Clay.” The one who responded was none other than Commander Rundert who made it clear that he already blamed the current situation on Clay who didn’t even have a chance to defend himself.

“As if I’m going to fail,” Desmond commented to himself as his squad looked at him strangely.

It couldn’t be helped, it wasn’t just the fact that Desmond’s facial expression didn’t match his speech and tone of voice when he communicated with the commander, but the fact that Desmond already seemed prepared for what was happening.

Finishing loading the grenade launcher with six cartridges without military serial numbers, Desmond stood at the edge of the defensive wall and looked down, aiming the grenade launcher’s nose at the place with more mutated beasts.

Puck*

.....

Letting out a somewhat odd sound, the cylindrical projectile shot out and made a short parabola before hitting the center of the horde of mutated beasts which was followed by a brief, somewhat anticlimactic silence... that was until all hell broke loose.

It was as if magma erupted from the grenade and set fire to everything around it, sticking like glue to any nearby mutated beasts and setting their bodies ablaze, soon every mutated beast in the area became a living torch serving to further spread the fire due to how packed all the beasts were.

Without pausing for a second, Desmond emptied the rest of the projectiles into the area surrounding the one hit by the first shot, turning that area into a small sea of ??flame.

The shrieks and roars of pain from the mutated beasts were audible even from the top of the north wall and anyone could see in the distance the small patch of flame that continued to devour everything around them.

Desmond immediately began loading the grenade launcher with more shells as he wryly thought to himself, “And to think Sasha called it a failed product.”

It turned out that the grenades Desmond was firing were the brainchild of his trusted alchemist, Sasha, who deemed these a failed product despite its obvious destructive power.

Although she had her reasons for believing that, originally Sasha had wanted to make use of her discoveries to increase the explosive power of the original alchemy grenades but failed spectacularly according to her.

Originally Sasha had added a highly flammable mineral powder to one of the two alchemical mixtures that are part of the grenade which in theory should have increased the explosive power of the grenades, but it didn’t.

Somehow, this new ingredient showed an unexpected reaction when interacting with the second compound inside the grenade, generating a gelation effect that she did not expect. In the end, this new grenade turned out to have a lower explosive power than its original version, although in the process it acquired characteristics that made it an excellent Napalm-style weapon.

It was because the effects were not originally intended that Sasha considered this new formula for the alchemy grenade a failure, in the end, she stored the entire batch and it was Desmond who decided to do it in containers compatible with the 40mm grenade launcher with a new impact activation mechanism; all because Desmond thought it might prove to be a useful weapon in a siege.

It had to be said that strangely not everything Desmond had told Lieutenant Clay was a lie, at least the part about Desmond having this gun just in case turned out to be true.

Not that it mattered now that Desmond had stabbed Clay in the back when the latter was preparing to do the same thing.

Soon Desmond had fired the fifty projectiles he brought with him and managed to create a gigantic wall of flames in front of the north defensive wall, it must be said that even Desmond did not expect his plan to work so well as he did not anticipate how flammable the fur of the mutant beast was that had now turned to charcoal.

“That was hard.” Desmond let out an exaggerated sigh of relief as he wiped the sweat from his forehead, not bothering to hide his easy smile.

Completely ignoring the expressions of annoyance on the faces of his squad members, Desmond swung the radio over his shoulder and unashamedly feigned a tired tone of voice as he spoke, “Commander...the strategy has been successful although I have exhausted much of my armory, I hope that gives Lieutenant Clay enough time to restructure the defense on the north wall.”

Both Silvia and the rest of the squad members had to look at Desmond again after rubbing their eyes not believing that this shameless and cynical person was their lieutenant, it was clear that Desmond was not only reporting but also demanding compensation for the expenses of his ammunition at the same time that he seized the moment to emphasize Lieutenant Clay’s incompetence.

The reason why Desmond seems to have a grudge against Lieutenant Clay is unknown but it was clear Desmond was the one winning the fight.

Soon orders began to pass through the chain of command and both the artillery and defensive machine guns on the north wall went on the offensive as soon as the wall of fire began to die down.

And so despite the ups and downs and personal clashes involved, Desmond’s little maneuver had bought the north wall at least an hour’s worth of ammunition, which was already an exorbitant amount.

From then on, the battlefield was quiet again for a few more hours without any particular event that endangered the defense of the city, but Desmond was not quiet at all during this time.

On the contrary, the more time passed without incident the more worried Desmond became, he didn’t dare think of this attack as an endless wave of stupid beasts without a plan.

Desmond knew that mutated beasts with superior intelligence existed and were capable of employing relatively complex tactics, the mere fact that this attack occurred during the winter when defenses are weakest was enough to test Desmond’s beliefs.

Because of this, Desmond firmly believed that the worst was yet to come and that the longer it would take for the mutated beasts to make their move, the worse things would be.

.

As if trying to prove that Desmond’s beliefs were correct, it was none other than Revna who was still hidden in the shadows who whispered to Desmond: “Master be careful, there is something strange in the shadows”

Almost reflexively Desmond turned back to look at his shadow and answered quietly, “What do you mean?”

“I couldn’t tell, this power is still new to me, but it feels like... like there are other presences in the shadows,” Revna answered with uncertainty clear in her voice.

As soon as Revna’s voice reached Desmond, the latter could see from his peripheral vision how something strange emerged from the shadow of one of the men who were operating the artillery.

It was simply too fast and too perfect, at this point, everyone was tired, after hours of enduring sunlight reflecting off the snow, the weariness of non-stop combat, and the constant roar of guns had brought the soldiers’ stress to a very high level.

Tired and with their senses dulled, practically no one reacted to the strange phenomenon in the shadows, Desmond was no exception. After all, he was also human, and even with his superior physique, he was also susceptible to stress and exhaustion; among other things.

Furthermore, the strange phenomenon did not occur near Desmond who might have noticed it with his almost bestial senses and instead occurred directly on the people who manned the artillery being the most vulnerable to a sneak attack.

Human blood soon painted the snow on the city walls of Green Seed Town and with it more than half of the artillery was disabled in a single movement, the corpses still did not touch the ground when these creatures emerged from the shadows already they were in a killing frenzy.

And as blood continued to be spilled and human lives lost at an alarming rate, these beasts were exploiting the element of surprise to the fullest by wanting to take as many lives as possible.

“I didn’t see this coming,” Desmond said bitterly as he stepped on the corpse of what looked like a pseudo-humanoid black panther which was bleeding to death with its entrails spilling out as he glared at Desmond.