Chapter 226: The Line Narrows

Chapter 226: The Line Narrows

The Astragoths spotted at the end of the previous battle reached the goblin positions before the soldiers could finish improving the cover around the machine guns. The first shots came from the tanks, which targeted the armored creatures moving with the attack.

Machine guns opened on the ordinary Astragoths around them, while the RPG teams waited for any armored creature that survived the tank fire. The attack ended before the Astragoths reached the weapon crews, but the soldiers had little time to recover before observers reported more movement ahead.

The men used the brief pause to pull wounded soldiers away from the firing points, check damaged weapons, and bring ammunition closer to the crews that had fired the most. Several soldiers had begun stacking broken stone around exposed machine-gun positions when the officers called them back. Another attack was already approaching, and this one had several armored Astragoths at the front.

Two tank shells killed the first armored creatures. An RPG destroyed another, but one survived and continued toward a machine-gun position. The crew kept firing at the ordinary Astragoths until the larger creature came close enough to threaten the weapon. The gunner shifted his fire onto its upper body and hit the same area several times, but the Astragoth still reached the position.

Its tail struck the machine gun and knocked it sideways. The gunner and assistant moved away from the weapon as riflemen around them fired into the creature. Several rounds entered scales already damaged by the machine gun, and the Astragoth finally fell beside the firing point.

The gunner dragged the weapon upright and tried to fire again. Nothing happened. He opened the firing mechanism and checked the parts he could reach, then tried once more without success.

"The mechanism is damaged," he told the officer beside him. "I can strip it down and find the exact break, but I need tools and more time than we have here. It will not fire again during this attack."

The officer glanced toward the next machine-gun position, where another crew was still firing. "Then leave it. Take the ammunition and your rifles and join that crew. I am not keeping men here to protect a damaged weapon."

The crew took what they could carry and moved to the working machine gun. When the immediate attack ended, the riflemen who had been protecting the damaged weapon followed. No one remained at the firing point because there was nothing there that justified keeping a separate group of soldiers.

The same problem had appeared elsewhere. One group of riflemen still occupied a position where its machine gun had been destroyed earlier. Behind them, another position still had a working machine gun, an RPG team, and a tank close enough to fire on armored targets. The local commander watched both positions during the next attack.

The better-equipped position stopped two armored Astragoths before they reached the soldiers. The tank killed one, and the RPG team destroyed the other. The machine gun stayed on the ordinary attackers, while the riflemen shot at those moving outside the gunner’s field of fire.

The position with only rifles had a harder fight. Its soldiers killed several ordinary Astragoths, but one armored creature kept advancing. Their shots damaged its scales without stopping it. The officer in charge watched the distance close and knew his men would be forced into close combat if they stayed where they were.

"First group, move to the machine gun behind us," he ordered. "The rest of us will keep firing until they are in place. Once they start shooting from there, we follow. Do not wait for that armored one to reach this position."

The first soldiers pulled back while the others continued firing. When they reached the machine-gun position, they turned and fired toward the approaching Astragoths. The rest of the riflemen then left their position and joined them.

The armored creature crossed the empty firing point and continued after them. A tank fired before it reached the larger group, and the shell killed it. The machine gun returned to the ordinary Astragoths behind it, while the newly arrived riflemen spread along the position and covered the ground the gunner could not watch alone.

The local commander kept those soldiers there after the attack. Their former position had no machine gun, no RPG team, and no tank close to support them. Sending them back would only leave them facing the next armored Astragoth with rifles until another weapon moved up to help.

He divided the new arrivals around the existing weapons. Several stayed near the machine gun, others watched the open ground beside the firing lane, and a smaller group remained close to the RPG team. The extra soldiers also helped carry ammunition forward, allowing the original crews to stay with their weapons.

Other officers began making the same choice. Soldiers left firing points where the machine guns had been destroyed and joined positions where heavy weapons still worked. The commanders stopped placing men back into empty positions simply because those locations had been used earlier.

The next attack showed the value of that change. Several ordinary Astragoths moved away from the main advance and approached outside the machine gun’s firing lane. Riflemen assigned to that area opened fire immediately. The gunner did not have to turn away from the larger concentration in front of him.

At the same time, a tank and an RPG team engaged two armored Astragoths. The tank killed the first. The RPG team destroyed the second after it continued forward. Once both larger creatures were down, the machine gun and riflemen finished the remaining attackers before they reached the weapons.

The combined position stopped the attack without losing another gun, but the arrangement also meant that every working heavy weapon was supporting more soldiers. If a machine gun or tank was damaged, more men would lose the support they had been relying on.

That happened during the next prolonged attack. A tank was firing at an armored Astragoth directly ahead when another approached while the turret was turned away. The crew began rotating the gun, but the second creature reached the vehicle first and struck the side of the hull with its tail.

Riflemen around the tank opened fire at close range. The Astragoth struck the hull again before several shots entered an area where its scales had already been damaged. It collapsed beside the vehicle. Once the immediate fighting cleared, the driver tried to move the tank and felt one track drag against the ground.

He stopped before forcing the vehicle farther, climbed down, and inspected the damage. After checking the track, he returned to the officer.

"The gun is still working, but the track is damaged. I can move the tank if I have to, but I cannot promise it will go far. If the track comes off, we stop wherever that happens."

The officer looked at the soldiers still fighting around the vehicle. "Keep the tank here while the infantry is here. If I order the men to move, fire the shell you have ready and get the crew out. Don’t get trapped inside a tank."

The tank remained in action and destroyed another armored Astragoth. It could no longer move to support soldiers farther away, so another tank had to cover those attacks. The commander moved an RPG team closer to the soldiers beside the damaged vehicle, which left another firing point with only riflemen and a machine gun against armored targets.

Instead of waiting for that weaker position to be attacked, the commander moved its riflemen to a larger position where a tank was already operating. The soldiers left before another Astragoth attack reached them and spread out around the working heavy weapons.

Noah noticed the change when the updated reports reached him. The goblins were stopping attacks, yet the number of occupied firing points continued to decrease. He contacted the commander responsible for the area.

"You are emptying positions even after the attacks are stopped. Is that because of casualties, or because the weapons at those positions are gone?"

"Mostly the weapons," the commander replied. "Several machine guns are destroyed or damaged. One tank can still fire but cannot move, and the RPG teams are covering more soldiers than before. If I leave every group where it was, some of them will have only rifles when the armored Astragoths reach them."

Noah studied the marked positions. "Then stop treating those locations as permanent positions. If a firing point has lost its machine gun and has no RPG team or tank close enough to support it, move the soldiers before the next attack reaches them. Keep them with weapons that can still stop the armored ones."

The commander agreed and passed the order down. Riflemen from damaged positions moved toward working machine guns, tanks, and RPG teams. The heavy weapons were kept close enough to support the larger groups without forcing their crews to fire across friendly soldiers.

The next attack reached two nearby positions almost at the same time. One had a machine gun, an RPG team, and a tank. The other still had a machine gun, but its nearest RPG team and tank were already fighting elsewhere. Two armored Astragoths approached that second position with ordinary attackers behind them.

The officer there knew the machine gun could damage the armored creatures, but the crew would have to spend most of its fire on them while the ordinary Astragoths continued forward. He decided to move the weapon before the attackers closed the distance.

"Take the machine gun to the position behind us," he told the crew. "We will keep the ordinary ones off you while you move. Once the gun is firing again, the rest of us will follow."

The crew leader looked toward the two armored Astragoths. "We can move it, but we need the riflemen to stay here until we are clear. If they move at the same time, we will not get the gun out before those two reach us."

"They stay until I hear your gun from the next position," the officer replied. "Get moving now."

The crew carried the machine gun and its ammunition away while the riflemen continued firing. As soon as the relocated gun opened fire from the larger position, the soldiers withdrew. The Astragoths crossed the empty firing point and continued toward them.

The combined position now had two machine guns, an RPG team, a tank, and the riflemen from both locations. The tank killed the first armored Astragoth. Machine-gun fire damaged the second, and the RPG team finished it before it reached the soldiers. Both machine guns then stayed on the ordinary attackers while riflemen covered the ground outside their firing lanes.

The attack ended before the Astragoths reached either machine gun. The soldiers remained in the combined position afterward, and no one returned to the firing point they had left.

Later, another attack forced the infantry around the damaged tank to move. The tank crew fired one final shell at an armored Astragoth approaching the soldiers, then climbed out. The damaged track prevented the vehicle from following, so the crew left it and joined the infantry on foot.

The loss of the tank required another change. The soldiers who had depended on it were divided between two nearby positions with working heavy weapons. One group joined a machine-gun crew supported by an RPG team. The other moved close enough to one of the remaining tanks to receive support against armored targets.

By then, the goblins occupied fewer firing points than they had at the start of the fighting. The positions that remained held more riflemen and more of the surviving machine guns, RPG teams, and tanks. The empty positions were places where the weapons had been destroyed, abandoned, or moved elsewhere.

The next attack reached one of the larger positions. Three armored Astragoths advanced with ordinary attackers around them. The tank killed the first creature, and the RPG team destroyed the second. The third continued forward while both machine guns concentrated on the ordinary Astragoths.

The tank reloaded and fired again before the third armored creature reached the soldiers. The shell killed it. The machine guns continued firing into the ordinary attackers, while riflemen covered the ground beside the main firing lanes. The attack ended before any Astragoth reached the weapon crews.

Noah reviewed the next report after the firing eased. Several firing points were now empty because their machine guns had been destroyed, their tanks were disabled or moved, or no RPG team remained close enough to deal with armored targets. The soldiers from those positions had been moved beside heavy weapons that were still operating.

The change made the remaining positions harder to attack, but the goblins had fewer machine guns and tanks than before. If another heavy weapon was lost, the commanders would have to move another group of soldiers and combine it with a position that still had enough firepower.

Before they finished adjusting the latest troop placements, observers reported another Astragoth attack approaching. The remaining tanks turned their guns toward the armored creatures, machine-gun crews prepared to fire at the ordinary attackers around them, and the riflemen spread around the weapons that were still operating.