86 - Volume 1 - Chapter Pr

No country would ever consider it an act of evil to deny a pig human rights. 

Therefore, if you were to define someone speaking a different tongue, someone of a different color, someone of a different heritage as a pig in human form, any oppression, persecution, or atrocity you might inflict upon them would never be regarded as cruel or inhumane. 

—VLADILENA MILIZÉ, MEMOIRS 

COQUELICOTS BLOOMING ACROSS THE BATTLEFIELD 

<System Start> 

<RMI M1A4 Juggernaut OS Version 8.15> 

A rumbling cacophony mixed into the noise of the radio transmission. 

“Handler One to Undertaker. Enemy interception force is visible on radar. We’ve confirmed a battalion-size unit of Anti-Tank Artillery types as well as a force of Dragoon types of similar size.” 

“Acknowledged, Undertaker. I can sense them from here.” 

“Command is transferred to the commanding officer on the field, effective immediately. Show gratitude to your homeland with your flesh and blood and defend the Republic with your very life.” 

“Roger.” 

“…I’m sorry, you guys. I’m so sorry.” 

<End transmission> 

<Cockpit sealed> 

<Power pack activated. Actuator engaged. Joint-lock mechanism released.> 

<Stabilizer: operating normally. FCS: compatible. Vetronics: off-line. Enemy scouting mode: passive.> 

“Undertaker to all units. Handler One has relinquished command. Henceforth, Undertaker will take command of the operation.” 

“Acknowledged, Alpha Leader. Same as always, right, Reaper? What did our cowardly wuss of an owner say in the end there?” 

“That they’re sorry.” 

The voice at the other end of the Para-RAID burst into laughter. 

“Ha, those white pigs never change. They drive us out, lock us up, and then plug their ears and say they’re sorry? The hell… All units, you heard him. If we gotta march to our deaths anyway, at the very least, it might not be so bad with our trusty Reaper there to guide us.” 

“Sixty seconds till contact with the enemy… The bombardment’s coming. Break through the enemy’s bombardment zone at maximum combat speed.” 

“Let’s do this, boys!” 

<Open Combat Maneuvers> 

<Enemy Unit Detection set to Bogey 1> <Set to Bogey 2> <Bogey 3> <Bogey 4> <Bogey 5> <Bogey 6> <Bogey 7> <Bogey 8> <Bogey 9> <Bogey 10> <Bogey 11> <Bogey 12> <Bogey 13> <Bogey 14> <Bogey 15> <Bogey 16> <Bogey 17> <Bogey 18> <Bogey 19> <Bogey 20> <Bogey 21> <Bogey 22> <Bogey 23> <Bogey 24>?… 

<Engage: Bogey 210> 

“Delta Leader to Delta squadron! Don’t try running around—we’re taking them out here!” 

“Charlie Three! Hostile on your ten! Dodge it— Shit!” 

“Echo One to all units. Echo Leader KIA. Echo One taking over command.” 

“Bravo Two to all units. Sorry… Looks like this is the end of the line.” 

“Alpha Leader to Alpha Three! Hold on just a minute longer! I’m on my way! Alpha One, take over command for me.” 

“Roger that. Good luck out there, Alpha Leader.” 

“Thanks… Hey, Shin. Undertaker.” 

“What?” 

“You still remember your promise, right?” 

“…Yeah.” 

<C1 Signal Lost> 

<Friendly Units:  0> 

The officer’s voice, mingled with static, issued from his removed headset and disturbed the dusk breeze. 

“To…units… Handler One to all units. Do you read? Respond, first unit.” 

He leaned against his unit’s fuselage—an organic-looking thing, similar to a chrysalis—and reached into the cockpit’s opened canopy and pressed the radio’s transmission button. 

“Undertaker to Handler One. Enemy interception force exterminated. We’ve confirmed the enemy forces’ retreat. Operation complete. Returning to base.” 

“…Undertaker. H-how many will be returning—?” 

<End transmission> 

It was a foolish question with nothing to be gained from an answer. Before the other person could finish speaking, he cut the transmission and returned his gaze to outside the cockpit. 

The scene was illuminated by the sunset with a coquelicot glow, casting shadows on a battlefield littered with flickering flames and the remains of crouching metal beasts and quadruped spiders, mechanical viscera protruding from their frames. Those were the remains of friend, the remains of foe, the remains of everything. 

Not a single trace of life remained on this battlefield except for him. Look as far as he might, all he would find would be corpses and the ghosts of those who lingered even after death. The silence was unsettling. Across the fields, the sun set into a shadowy mountain range, casting red, level rays of light his way. 

In this dying world bathed in crimson, or perhaps dyed over by shadow, he and his unit were the one thing that could still move. The unit’s long limbs were designed after an insect’s arthropod legs. Its discolored armor was decorated with countless scars, and it was equipped with a scissorlike high-frequency blade and a back-mounted main armament. 

Its silhouette was that of a prowling spider, but its quadruped nature and the cannon on its back likened it to a scorpion. Lacking anything that could be considered a head, its form was reminiscent of a beheaded skeletal corpse, crawling along the battlefield, searching for its missing crown. 

Sighing a single breath into the air, he reclined against the armored fuselage as it cooled against the dusk wind, turning his gaze up to the terrifying brilliance of the sunset sky. 

A distant eastern country once told of a flower born from the blood of the mistress of a great king, who ended her own life. Or perhaps that flower bloomed from rivers of blood spilled from knights butchered by barbarians. 

The crimson of those coquelicots that blossomed as far as the eye could see, illuminated by the sunset that burned all to nothing, was as beautiful as sheer madness.