Scathing of South [UST - Kithium League]

[Greywall]

Casualties

UST: 14,035

Kithium: 7,395

[VoxApocrypha]

The field marshal drove hard into the UST's rear lines, and she forced that line formation into place even as fighting still raged around them, preparing to meet the retreating UST. More soldiers from the southern approach were on their way still, helping to further secure the new line being formed right in the path of the USTs retreat. The Kithium following the USTs retreat kept racing to catch up with them, their dragoons slamming into the rearguard forces with sabers, maces, pikes and stolen repeaters and other assorted weaponry, mauling their enemies even as they died in droves - fanatically resisting their opposition with a new raging ferocity.

"Kill them all!" Shouted the Kithium commander of the offensive, once their forces were rapidly closing in, and her marines began to close the distance now too, charging with bayonets drawn and rifles barkings, letting out a war cry as they raced towards them.

[Greywall]

UST commanders now panicked pulling their best troops to wedge a full retreat West, abandoning the vanguards to their fate. Artillery opened full salvo not being told that it would be unlikely that the guns could be saved. The blood bath at the front was a traumatizing event for the Union soldiers who received no mercy from the Kithium even if they tried surrendering. Fear drove the UST to then fight to the death, some in firefights and others in almost medieval melees.

What followed was madness. Just butchering madness.

[Greywall]

Casualties

UST: 34,567
Kithium: 23,678

[VoxApocrypha]

As the marines and dragoons fell into a melee with the UST's own troops, they'd have their own cohesion effectively dissolved, giving into a feral lust for blood. The Festria were the worst of it, entering a state of near psychosis that sent them raging, reaching for the blue uniforms that stood in their path with only the intent to maim, murder and kill. Men were torn apart, others beaten to death with maces and bear hands, some stabbed so many times that it disemboweled them. A lot of Kithium took rocks to their enemies if their bayonets got bent or broken, and inbetween it rifle and sidearm shots barked out, the air full of smoke and debris, the ground awash with blood.

And during this, as the UST's best troops were brought together, they would be hit by the full force of an all-out artillery attack against their advance, the second Kithium army commanded by the now likely infamous Field Marshal Nihlus launching their own offensive forwards to smash the UST back into the raging horde they were retreating from, the Field Marshal herself holding the flag of the League in one hand and a pistol, a single modernized Roskanan Semi-automatic handgun, ordering her soldiers to slaughter the UST. There would be no escape for the UST if she could bloody help it.

As the melee raged on, the rest of the force from Ishu'Kaalak'shi had entered the fight behind the marines and dragoons, charging in with bayonets, while the artillery from that force as well started to fire at the USTs own field guns, targeting those that were already firing.

[Greywall]

There was no hope, the breakthrough failed putting the UST into a fight to the death, the bleeding of Union soldiers and young men who were drafted against their will fought to simply live as long as possible. They fell to the last trench network around their artillery full encircled now and began facing their dark demise.


Some men curled up on the ground waiting for it to end, their mental state shattered and no longer capable of fighting anymore. Others went to blood primal rage fighting for their lives.

[Greywall]

Casualties:

UST: 12,467
Kithium: 9,452

[VoxApocrypha]

The Kithium encircled them gradually, forcing them into their last holdout now, isolating the last pockets of resistance outside of it and slaughtering them in horrific fashion. When they had them surrounded, their artillery and mortars rained shells into their lines, blasting into trenches and onto the no mans land that was rapidly forming as the Kithium rained everything from small caliber bullets to the largest artillery shells they could fire from their field guns. Their infantry kept firing, gattling guns and maxims, blazing towards the USTs last positions. They would eventually stop their bombardment of the southern area, and start to advance against it, using gattling guns on wheels to provide suppressive fire so their infantry could close and enter the trenches, using hand grenades and sticks of dynamite to clear the trenches out before jumping in.

[Greywall]

A couple hours passed of fighting, firing and brutality before the remains of the UST stained the grounds of those western fields in the Kithium League. The Offensive shattered to pieces and Okeena's last large army South was wiped out after some bloody work.

The remaining defenders in Veneshy didn't know the fate of the large invasion, but knew something wrong had happened when supply mules came back frantic reporting Kithium had cut off the main force. "They've been lost" one rider said, "No how many remain" asked the general. The mule rider simply repeated. "All. Have. Been. Lost." he ignored his orders and rode for home. Many of the citizens saw it now, the UST had lost the war. The General ordered riders to Noscovo but he knew they had nothing left to pull up. He sent riders to Juaz, Taronki would have to stop his war in the North. The unfathomable loss of men was insane.

[Greywall]

Casualties

UST: Remaining forces
Kithium: 34,546

[VoxApocrypha]

The Day After the Battle of Ishu'Kaalak'shi.

---

1931.

 Kithium soldiers picked over the piles of corpses that lay strewn across the battlefield, fires raging in the distance. Wagon carts and trucks were loaded with the corpses, one after the other, piled to the highest they could go and still move. Half a million. That was unfathomable to witness on such a scale. When the smoke had cleared, the bodies were all that was left, the Kithium army had done to the UST what had previously been inflicted on it. It was a massacre, the bloodest battle in the history of the League by far, and the most one sided slaughter ever experienced. There were no prisoners taken after this. During it. Or before. 
There were no prisoners to take. 

There were no living men in blue. 
Just bodies. And a vast expanse of ditches and pits, grass and shrubs, frosty dirt.. stained crimson red. 
Stretching to the horizon. The fires that were lit were not battlefield debris. Or now they weren't, in many cases. They'd been made into vast piles of burning corpses. 
Again and again bodies were loaded onto trucks and crates, with Kithium soldiers wearing perfume laced rags over their muzzles and faces to block out the smell of death, feces, urine, and burning flesh that quickly rose to fill the air for miles and miles in every direction. 

 It was horrific. 
And even a day after the battle they were still finding Kithium soldiers who'd died in the fighting, or who had fallen into a post-psychosis stupor, many wandering the battlefield covered in dried blood, tears, and vomit. It'd been a challenge to collect them all, and a lot of bodies were just.. unidentifiable. Many had been burned alive. Many were just bits and pieces. A lot of the Kithium's ranks were sent back to the city to receive medical treatment for a variety of wounds, physical and as well some psychological. 

 But ultimately, the battle had been a stunning victory for the Kithium League.. and a immense, brutal defeat for the UST. 
And it'd be where the Kithium truly began their campaign of conquest and destruction against their hated enemy. 
They had no reason to hold back now. They'd came to their land wanting to murder, rape, maim and destroy. 

The Kithium were going to return to the UST, with an army much larger than the one they'd started this war with. 
And when they did, first they'd burn Veneshy to the ground, sacking it. 
And then they'd burn the south to cinders and ash. 

 And hang Okeena by his entrails for the suffering he'd caused. 
Of that, Field Marshal Nihlus Lysander of House Gaalsian, was sure. 

 In the midst of the slow cleanup, other units were as well salvaging UST equipment, and a lot of it.
Field guns, 1255 of them. Some mortars, gattling guns, puckle guns, a small handful of exotic weapons, and their rifles. Along with a lot of the ammunition, most of it sourced off of corpses before they got tossed into the fire. It was the only thing worth taking off the bodies - they wouldn't need it. And in war, everything counts.. as well, it didn't hurt that all of that could be sold down the line. 

---

Late Summer - 1931, two weeks after Battle of Ishu'Kaalak'shi

The Army that had won the battle of Ishu'Kaalak'Shi was redeployed, sent south. But another army began to assemble in the north, forming from the force that had previously blocked the UST's retreat and pushed them back into the battle that'd gotten them slaughtered, commanded by the Kithium General Sabbat of House Aderaxia. 

 Nihlus was gathering her army in the south, quickly bringing the numbers of soldiers she had to around 400,000. She'd been given particular instructions by the Empress. 
Sack the UST. Take their treasury, every ounce of wealth that could be stolen, should be. The UST's gold reserves in particular were the main target of the offensive. But if they stole other things of value, then that'd be overall the end of it. 
It'd pay for what they wanted anyway, and given that trade on Touli did not give a rats ass about 'misbegotten goods' it didn't matter. 

 There'd be no negotiated peace treaties this time. 
It was victory or destruction from the get-go.

 The Southern Army was joined by the majority of the Razu force, adding another 90,000+ while about 20,000 stayed on Razu. After securing the Island, they'd sent the majority of their troops back north, and after refitting and rearming from the time they had gotten off the ferries and as well, resting, they'd begun to reorganize into the Southern Army, headed by Nihlus. 

Overall, as the final preparations were made, the Kithium army in the south numbered 500,000 Strong. 

 In the North, the northern force was now 320,000 strong, and as well a third army was being assembled to assist the Valderan Republic with their hostile neighbor, though it only numbered 150,000 strong and was still assembling on the other side of the country.

- Figures outdated, updated in next post

 NORTH ARMY:
299,000+ Infantry (86,000 Marines, 18,000 Standard Infantry, Rest Light Infantry)
18,000 Dragoons
1800 Field Guns, 3000 Mortars

 SOUTHERN ARMY:
 470,000+ Infantry (110,000 Marines, 3,800 Sciamachs [SF], 36,000 Combat Engineers, 25,000 Standard Infantry, Rest Light Infantry)
14,000 Dragoons
1500 Field Guns, 2000 Mortars

[VoxApocrypha]

1931 - Two weeks, four days since battle of Ishu'Kaalak'shi

---

Northern Force, two days before the launch of the 2nd Veneshy campaign

 The trains arrived in the midst of the night. 
They were arriving by schedule but not carrying the expected rations, not that they needed more of them after the last 20 loads had been delivered. 
No, they were carrying something else. Train cars stacked to the ceiling with ammunition, new bolt action rifles, and then flatbeds holding new cannons. No, not cannons.

Howitzers. 

 200 of them, delivered alongside almost 90,000 new bolt action rifles, one load at a time throughout the day and night for two cycles of the moons and sun. The weapons were being distributed to the marines, rather than the regular line infantry. They were the breakthrough force, and while they'd not do the majority of the fighting, they'd be the ones who did the slaughtering. They as well were the ones of whom would be better suited to actually utilize the weapons. 
As well, the force received its first fresh binocualrs in almost a half a decade, replacing the old ones of which would be sold as surplus or just scrapped, thrown away, or sold to private citizens. Whatever worked, a lot would likely end up in warehouses like so much of the war loot would be. 

---

Southern Force, Two days before the launch of "Scathing Retribution"

The southern force received an additional 50,000 bolt action rifles, and the ammo as well via train, but only about 40 howitzers. This was not a particularly rough out come for Nihlus. She imagined that real resistance would be centralized around Veneshy now, the last real bastion of an army for the UST after they'd lost so much, and experienced what was likely the worst military disaster in Ouhiri's history. 
If there were more, they'd have been sent anyway. 

So she figured that by now all of this had likely actually obliterated the demographics of the UST too, alongside draining them of fighting age men.
Or older than fighting age too, she figured. It'd not be a cake walk, or she would not treat it as such anyway. But she didn't expect significant, fierce organized resistance beyond Noscovo itself. And she'd not let anything stop her from getting to Okeena. She would put a bullet in that subsapient garbage herself, or at least blow his office up with a cannon if she damn well could. 

The rifles were given to her dragoons and some of the marines.
Beyond that, the additional machine guns would be given out where she felt it was worth taking them - but they had so many gattling guns that really, as good as Maxims were, she didn't actually NEED the maxims if she wanted to utterly drown an area in bullets. So a fair portion were put back on the trains and shipped to be stored. If she really needed them the couriers would relay that message anyway. Preparations continued, until she felt she was truly ready for the true and proper conquest she sought. 

---

ACTION -
Three Weeks after Ishu'Kaalak'Shi.

 In the North, the Veneshy campaign was launched.

The Kithium army crossed the border, and sent its dragoons ahead of it like before. But they were ordered to be quiet, to sneak in as close as they could to the city, and to try to site the defenses so that they could use the artillery against the defenses. The army itself closed on the city, spreading out into several groups that'd aim to first encircle the city by cutting off its southern link, and then would as well have a large force swing north to cut their northern link off, engaging in a blockade of the city. 


 In the South, the Kithium crossed the border, marching straight for the city of Pozhal.

They sent dragoons ahead to gauge its defenses and to figure out the situation in the city's surrounding area, and it iself, but would not be ordered to attack unless they had no choice but to engage to defend themselves - their goal was recon.

[Greywall]

Veneshy had not wasted its time in preparing for the worst, as weeks passed with no word from the invasion force the city perfected its defenses and the last fragments of Union competency was spent flowing what remained of the UST army in a network between the South, Veneshy and Juaz. Heavily entrenched gatling guns, field guns and infantry were given lots of cover thanks to conscripted locals forced to make wooden defensive structures.

Veneshy had little over 100,000 men left to stave off league assaults and keep Taronki's supply lines secured to the Northern war. All the men were young and older than ideal serving age, the Union had millions of men to draft but lacked the equipment and logistical support for more. In some bitter way, the war in the 20's against the league didn't help them much.


---Pozhal---

The dragoons would find an eerie quiet land before stumbling to a new battlefront of distant gunfire. The Bian were on the verge of taking the city and with it the Southeastern region. One of the dragoons would softly have a rifle pointed at them, "my my cat, you're a far way from home." It would be the Bian rebels, "come with us, Zhang wants to talk to you."

[VoxApocrypha]

The Dragoons sent ahead arrived in the midst of the night. They used light pollution as a gauge of general distance, and took their time getting into position around the city throughout the night, using the light of dawn then to catalog the positions of fortifications onto maps they'd been given, and then they would begin to move back to the army proper. It'd stopped to set up about 12 kilometers from Veneshy itself, and the first part of the plan was enacted - they were already setting up blocking positions on the roads and either killing or capturing supply units.

When they got the maps back to their command, they would put their howitzers to use against a specific target - Veneshy's field guns. They picked those in particular, any big concentrations of them were the main target for the bombardment from the Gaelic howitzers, while the Kithium began to swing north, and would move almost 100,000 troops into position on that roadway, to block it and prevent travel into the city. With them was as well two more batteries of Howitzers, which would start to hammer the city's defenses from the north, and from the east/north-east would be the rest.

---Pozhal---

The Dragoon would stare at the rifle barrel for a moment, and then a moment later, turn their black furred muzzle away from them, scanning their surroundings briefly before looking at them again.
"Not a particularly good opening to diplomatic relations, isn't this?" She asked them, keeping her rifle down in her lap as she used her feet to tell the horse to turn slightly.
"You ought to start guiding me to them then."

[Greywall]

The last day in Veneshy prior to the fighting was a quiet late Summer day, the heat wave of summer was slowly coming to an end as the soldiers waited for anything it be word from the South on reinforcements, the war ending or the Kithium coming from the East. They got their answer.

Artillery strikes slammed the city hitting where their field guns were and some infantry sending the entire force to be alert and to defend their positions. Given the long reach of the artillery strikes, it was assumed the Kithium had brought different guns in this engagement. "Move our field guns! get them moved!" UST soldiers shifted the field guns from being destroyed. Union commanders assumed enemy scouts had gotten past patrols and reported their positioning.

Supply wagons moving up the road from the South would be intercepted by Kithium soldiers cutting the supply line off.

--Pozhal--

"Now now, don't be testy, you are invaders after all." The Bian soldier lifted his rifle, a Berdan UST service rifle, away from the Kithium. "Come, he's expecting you."

The Dragoons were escorted closer to Pozhal, here the gunfire would be much louder, seized UST field guns hammered the Western region and the display of the Bian forces was far too disciplined for rag tag rebels. The dragoon leader was taken into a building, an old store where several men and Inselni were assembled around a table, one of them wearing a longcoat over his shoulders turned his head and side eyed the Kithium, "So the league has entered our empire." the man dismissed the others leaving just him and the Kithium in the room.

"I am Lai Zhang, and this is my Bianjingren rebellion. Why are you here?"