Scathing of South [UST - Kithium League]

[Greywall]

Casualties

UST: 45 Field guns, 124 infantry

[VoxApocrypha]

The Kithium's barrage continued for several minutes, before the attack would come to a close.
The commanders discussed briefly, aware that by now the enemy would probably try to move the positions of their guns to avoid them being in the area targeted for shelling. So they decided to switch to some of their secondary targets, blasting areas that might serve as bases for more field guns with their artillery while the Kithium army began to slowly constrict around the city.

--- Pozhal ---


"I mean, I guess that's fair." The Kithium said, rolling their eyes.
When they would eventually arrive in the store, she would have her hands cupped around a cup of a blood red liquid, waiting.

"We're here in pursuit of the destruction of the UST." She said simply. "Pozhal was to be the first stop, but it seems you guys already have that handled." She said, before lifting the cup and taking a sip of the drink.

[Greywall]

Veneshy continued the deal with the barrage, Union commanders relocated to an Ux Voshoz church using its underground facility to avoid the blasts. Many hid as best as they could as the artillery decimated buildings. Union command in the city assumed they would be surrounded and face an assault at some point, informing lookouts who braved the shelling to alert defenders the moment Kithium forces moved.

--Pozhal--

"Destruction of the UST. To what end? What will you do once the UST is gone? Take your forces home? OR are you here to stay?" Zhang kept his tone professional but clearly didn't trust the Kithium.

[VoxApocrypha]

The constant bombardment would shift targets on a semi-regular basis, plastering the trenches with more high explosive shells from those howitzers. The Kithium army as well keep squeezing, and squeezing, and squeezing, until the outlying defenses were in contact with significant numbers of Kithium marines armed with bolt action rifles and machine gun teams.

---Pozhal---

"I don't know. I'm not really in the loop as to what the stance is among my command. I'm a scout, mister Zhang." She'd tell him. "As far as I know however the overall aim is to take Noscovo and to hang Okeena by his entrails, if what I've been hearing Nihlus say is to be believed. I don't think she'll want to burn Pozhal to the ground if you're the ones operating in the region, so long as you aren't going to interfere with us using it to move supplies through the area." SHe'd say.

"After that I imagine they'll want us to leave and return back to the League, rather than occupy whatever is left of the UST when we're finished."

"If you want more conclusive answers you'd have to ask my Nihlus herself or a foreign minister from the League."

[Greywall]

Casualties

UST: 342
Kithium: 94

[Greywall]

--Veneshy--

The enclosing of Kithium forces were given UST resistance, the exchange of gun fire rapidly across the battlefields and defenses of Veneshy devastated both sides. Kithium howitzer guns pulverized UST forces in the city as more and more buildings were destroyed, civilians the Union flat out didn't bother evacuating were caught in the fire and slaughtered.

--Pozhal--

"Then i'll speak to Nihlus, this is Bianjingren land. And we will depose the UST."

[VoxApocrypha]

The Kithium picked specific points of the city's outlying defenses, and quickly rushed field guns and gattling guns up to those areas to support their infantry, using them to target and destroy these specific points with absolutely overwhelming firepower - often more than a hundred guns striking the heavily fortified areas in particular, before eventually all of the Kithium's field guns were being put to use. Then as more Kithium entered the battle, they were starting to rapidly and quickly employ the massed use of mortars against trenches, while the kithium howitzers started to actively support the offensive more directly by targeting dense points of the defenses with a lot of bodies and equipment, suppressing them in concert with the field guns, machine guns, gattlings and mortars. More Kithium began to enter the battlefield now too, sending more troops to reinforce those already in the field, and to add their firepower to the attack.

--- Pozhal ---

She'd turn to leave, simply heading out. She memorized the area, and after leaving, a few hours later a few more dragoons and a small company of infantry would arrive, led by a woman in their front ranks, a Festria with glowing red eyes and scars abounding her face, all that was visible of the Festria's real self, the rest of her hidden behind a tunic and webbing.
Nihlus.

[Greywall]

Casualties

UST: 232
Kithium: 345






--Veneshy--

The Union soldiers caught onto the Kithium's lack of taking prisoners by now and were fighting to the death, harsh resistance was given in the heavily entrenched city. The outer trench line was heavily pelted by enemy fire, Union commanders felt it would fall soon forcing the fighting into the city itself. UST field guns worked around the clock firing back at enemy infantry unable to do much of anything back to the Kithium artillery.

--Pozhal--

Nihlus would be taken to the same shop walking into a discussion Zhang was having with his officers, "We're about to crack their defenses in the Western district. Not sure its there but our scouts are still in the field." Zhang nodded before having his people clear the room for just him and Nihlus.

"Well, will you tell me your intentions? Kithium. Or will I have to politely ask you to leave?" Zhang kept his back turned until he finished speaking, his eyes going into hers. No fear, he had seen her before. This gave Nihlus a key detail about Zhang, he was a veteran of the UST-Kithium War.

[VoxApocrypha]

The Kithium began to harden themselves into place, digging into makeshift trenches as they moved. Rather than firing at numerous targets with their artillery, as the battle wore on the Kithium would shift the focus of the attacks. The artillery began to focus on the weakest point they could identify in the outer defenses of the city, and marines massed to make a push against it. Field guns and gattling guns on wheels with bullet proof shields were brought up with them.

The bombardment against this weakspot continues for about half an hour, before they'd switch to the use of smoke canisters, and start to fill the area with them. When the area was sufficiently saturated, they sent forward the marines, blowing a whistle loudly to signal the charge. Thousands of marines poured forwards, racing for the UST's defenses, while the artillery switched to bombarding the defenses further back to block UST reinforcements from being able to get into the trench behind them.

--- Pozhal ---

"Well aren't you a pretty sight." Nihlus said as she took a drag on her cigarette. "Well Zhang. I'll tell you this. If I intended to destroy you AND the UST then I'd have already stormed this place and likely burned the city down. But I haven't, so I think that should be enough to tell you that if I wanted to fight with you It'd have started already."

She'd blow the air away, turning to put her back to him, looking out a window while a pair of her guards would similarly turn behind her, both being Sciamachs.
"I've been authorized to give you assurances by the League's government that we don't intend to occupy your land. But we have to use it, though. Because we've got a mission, and you're kind of right in the fucking middle of the path of.. well, most resistance." She'd say.

"I'm not about to turn an entire army around, and I've got to get to and through Noscovo, so. Tell me, are we going to have an issue with me using Pozhal to transport men and supplies? Because if there is an issue, you best tell me now."

[Greywall]

Veneshy

"Fall back! Fall Back!" The UST forward defenses were simply hammered too hard pulling what they could to the more insular defenses of the city. Men that fought knowing death waited regardless had a funny kind of courage in that in they hoped to kill the Kithium enough to force their assault to cease but when told to fall back they didn't question getting out of the fight.

Getting all the men into the inner defense ring wasn't possible, but getting gatling fire laid down wasn't an issue.

--Pozhal--

"Hmph, typical Kithium diplomacy, or lack of. If you want to use this land you'll need to help us finish off the guard. More importantly I need this." Zhang picked up some photos and handed them to Nihlus, they were of a train station and a locomotive. "That locomotive is one of the last operating ones in the entire country, I want to seize it and use it for the assault on Novya Bukhta. We're going to armor it, arm it and take the UST base of operations out in our region. Once we have Novya Bukhta, you'll be clear to Noscovo."

He poured some clear liquid into two clear glasses and offered one to Nihlus, "We're about to take Pozhal, what's your answer?"

[VoxApocrypha]

Veneshy

The Kithium were soon in the trenches, overwhelmingly surging through them.
More smoke canisters were soon falling on the trenches further back along the line, with the Kithium tearing into the defenders with feral brutality like they had before. Maces, claws, teeth, swords, knives and handguns, intermixing with bayonets and bolt actions. The Kithium sent across their light infantry after them, as the Marines began to fan out and clear through the entire network of trenches, and as well surged up towards the back trenches through their translation points. Grenades as well were used liberally to clear points of resistance.

The artillery kept pouring down smoke to obscure the trenches from view to make assisting fire as difficult as possible.


--- Pozhal ---

She would roll her eyes, and take the photos when he handed it to her. "If you want brand-name diplomacy you should have asked for a diplomat."
She'd go over each one, one by one absorbing the details as she took another long drag on her cigarette.

"..Why do you want to use a locomotive to assault that base?" She'd ask them. "That's an expensive investment, and if you lose it you won't get it back. That could be really important for your economic development going forward once you're independent." She'd hand the photos back to them.

"I can send some men to help, but you'll have to give me more information on what exactly they're facing."

[Greywall]

—Veneshy—

The outer trenches fell after bloody work, the city defenses fired a vicious array of rifle and Gatling fire at the kithium as they tried to survive the onslaught of small arms fire and artillery shelling. The streets had long been dug into burrows for union soldiers to traverse and avoid oncoming fire, wooden palisade walls absorbed enemy bullets and fire to some degree. Inside the city wounded piled up, medical supplies vanished in the first days of fighting as cloth and amputations were made the primary treatment. Doctors worked around the clock in exhaustion, covered in blood and forcing themselves to overlook the screams of their wounded patients.

Infantry sustained fire from within cover of the city as what few survivors escaped the onslaught in the trenches.

—pozhal—

“You haven’t scouted far ahead have you? The city of Novya Buhkta is heavily fortified, except for the railway. If we take the city we have a clear shot at the capital. But using this train to bypass those defenses is ideal over a frontal assault.”

[Greywall]

Casualties

UST: 2,945
Kithium: 3,653

[VoxApocrypha]

The Kithium began to move field guns up to attack the city's walls, while the artillery would start to shell the city proper, aiming mostly for the targets around the walls or the walls themselves in support of the field artillery. More infantry began to advance against the city, while machine gun and gattling gun teams fired at the tops of the walls and at any openings they saw fire from, spraying bullets at them to suppress the defenders as best as they could.

---

Pozhal

"We'd have scouted further, but you decided to kind of derail that." They'd say. "But I guess that'd make it workable."
She'd turn to leave. "Work with my liasons, and we'll get the train."

[Greywall]

Veneshy was a shredded shell of its former self, not a single building stood without some kind of damage as the soldiers rushed below in the dug out streets to the front avoiding the oncoming fire as it came without end. UST field guns fired back as civilians attempted to find shelter wherever they could. In the Ux Voshoz church they huddled praying for the battle to end.

The front was hell, bullets flying everywhere made it difficult to return fire as UST soldiers bravely returned fire when possible. Wooden plank buckets of 10mm bullets for their Berdan rifles were brought up. Soldiers grabbed handfuls in hastened panic to return fire and suppress the enemy as best as they could. Behind wooden palisades gatling guns fired without much end, "We need more ammo!" the runners covered in sweat despite the cool autumn air filling about. They ran back avoiding troops being rushed to the front and the falling of enemy artillery fire. Some civilians knowing the reputation of the Kithuim were reloading muskets and handing them up in wheelbarrows to be fired and rushed back for reloading. The desperate defense of the town was felt on the shoulders of the Union commanders, they still believed somehow the Union would send someone, anyone, but no one was coming.

--Pozhal--

After setting up an agreement, Zhang would assemble his forces, 34,000 Bian soldiers that were well trained and armed after a year of fighting in the Southeast and taking UST armaments from nearby supply bases. He turned to Nihlus, "We'll launch a full assault on the Western section of the city, with your support Pozhal will fall and we should seize the train at the station."

Bian artillery batteries opened up sending the thundering horde of infantry forward yelling, "TAKE YOUR HOME BACK!" Zhang yelled as they charged at the UST positions.

UST guardsmen opened fire, many of them had been pulling out of the city toward the central region with the war against the Bian going poorly. But now they faced their last stand in Pozhal.