Chapter 340: In the Lens of the Commander - I

Hans was sitting inside the Strategy Center when the latest report from Silverpeak arrived.

He was reviewing production requests when the notification appeared, accompanied by Brandon’s updated operational summary.

"Another one?"

Hans opened it.

The report was longer than the previous ones. It included the latest casualty figures, damaged vehicles, and several recordings taken during the northern formations’ advance toward the central Hive.

He skimmed the first few sections before stopping at the part concerning the buildings.

"Wait, what?"

He enlarged one of the recordings.

The footage showed a street surrounded by tall buildings, with several Guardian APCs and infantry formations advancing through the area. Infected contacts filled the upper floors, something the Advanced Radar had already detected.

Then the infected began throwing themselves out of the windows.

Dozens of them fell toward the soldiers below, followed by hundreds more from the surrounding buildings.

Some smashed against the pavement, killing themselves on impact, while others struck vehicles or landed directly among the infantry. The soldiers returned fire at once, but the first wave caused casualties and disrupted the formation.

Hans watched another recording.

This one showed another street where infected were attacking the lower sections of several buildings.

Shortly afterward, the structures collapsed.

"The infected are actually bringing down the buildings themselves?"

He checked the accompanying assessment.

Southern Command believed the infected were trying to deny the Golden Eagle Army access to the central Hive.

The Advanced Radar still tracked the concentrations beneath the debris, but the collapses blocked several routes and left others too dangerous for Engineers to clear.

And the Hive itself was still alive.

Hans leaned back in his chair.

"How clever. Very clever."

He expected the infected to become more dangerous as his army approached the center. After everything he had encountered in Grefort, it would have been foolish to assume Silverpeak’s Hive would wait to be destroyed.

This was becoming both interesting and ridiculous.

The infected were willing to sacrifice thousands of their own just to slow his advance. Worse, they were destroying the very buildings and roads his soldiers needed to reach them.

Hans looked over the northern formations’ positions before checking the casualty reports again.

Several soldiers were killed during the advance, while others were receiving treatment or awaiting evacuation. A number of armored vehicles sustained damage, with Engineers and recovery teams attending to those they could retrieve.

The casualties were unfortunate. Unlike his fabricated soldiers, the survivors fighting alongside his army had their own families and lives before joining the Golden Eagle Army.

He didn’t consider his System soldiers disposable, either.

Still, it wasn’t as though he expected to fight a Hive containing millions of infected without losing anyone.

Hans let the thought drift away, then returned to the operational map.

"How are you planning to deal with this one, Commander Brandon?"

The problem wasn’t that his army lacked firepower.

He could send more Raptors, bring in the Phantoms, or have the artillery crews bombard the entire area until nothing recognizable remained.

But that wouldn’t necessarily expose the Hive.

If anything, he might end up burying the bastard beneath another mountain of concrete.

And unlike the infected, his soldiers couldn’t simply crawl through every collapsed passage and broken building without worrying about what might fall on them—or come up beneath them.

Hans considered the situation for a while longer.

There were other ways to approach the problem, but Hans wasn’t about to issue tactical orders while Brandon and his officers were assessing the situation themselves.

"I’d better leave this to the experts."

After all, Brandon had been commanding soldiers long before Hans received the System. There was no reason to interfere with his work simply because the Hive had managed to delay the advance.

Besides, the rest of Silverpeak wasn’t going anywhere. His soldiers already controlled a substantial part of Silverpeak, and Southern Command had enough manpower and equipment to hold its positions.

If the Hive wanted to bury itself beneath the city, then it could keep doing so for now.

Hans closed the Silverpeak report and returned to the wider strategic map.

Marianne’s latest reports showed continued infected activity around the frozen city of Pylow.

Even after the disturbances surrounding the PCL sites had subsided, much of the area remained covered in frost. And strangely enough, some of the infected had adapted to survive the extreme cold.

Several infected had been found standing motionless among the frozen streets, their bodies covered in ice and snow. To an ordinary observer, they would have looked no different from the numerous frozen corpses scattered around the city.

However, some were still alive.

They remained motionless until a person approached, only to attack when their prey came within reach.

If not for the Advanced Radar information available to Northern Command, some of those encounters might have ended with casualties.

"Even the frozen ones are learning tricks now, huh?"

Hans moved his attention farther northwest.

Conrad’s naval forces resumed their advance toward Anchorage, clearing the eastern approaches to the city’s northern coast.

Marine creatures still threatened the approach waters, forcing the task force to clear them before advancing.

Meanwhile, the Albian forces and civilians were still recuperating in Saicine.

There were no urgent developments, apart from a few disagreements between the Albian arrivals and the local authorities.

Hans briefly checked the harbor reports before moving on.

Simon Bond was also preparing his forces for further operations east of Horjus, where the roads led toward Ashington’s eastern mountain and forested-upland barrier.

The highlands had long served as part of the country’s natural defense against threats from farther east. There were roads and passes through the mountains, but moving an army through them would be far more difficult than crossing open plains.

The barrier wasn’t continuous, either. There were other approaches farther northeast near Pylow and another opening toward the southeast.

Hans had no intention of leaving those approaches unattended, especially with Valeria beyond the eastern frontier.

He returned to the national overview.

Despite the enormous territory the Golden Eagle Army had already secured, Hans found that his military was still growing enough to support its expanding responsibilities.

He didn’t lack Engineers to repair damaged units and maintain his installations.

There were enough infantry formations to secure the territories under his control, with armored vehicles available to reinforce threatened positions.

His air units could also cover enormous distances and respond to emergencies far more quickly than any ground formation.

And with the Strategy Center operational, the commanders no longer needed Hans to approve every ordinary production request personally.

If someone needed more of something, such needs could be met faster than any bureaucratic means.

It was becoming easier to manage the growing army.

That reminded him of something.

"Ah, right. The recruitment."

Hans remembered the announcement he had authorized several weeks ago. The last time he checked, there had already been more than a thousand applicants, ranging from former military personnel to researchers, technicians, and ordinary survivors.

He left most of the screening to Dianne and the recruitment staff.

It had been weeks since he last checked.

"Dianne, how’s our recruitment program going?"

"A few more days, Commander, and the first batch should be ready for their Integration assessments."

Dianne opened a folder and read through its contents before continuing.

"We’ve identified fifteen promising specialists so far, including engineers, scientists, and experienced professionals from several industries. I believe you’ll be pleased with some of them."

She handed Hans the folder.

He went through the applicants’ dossiers one after another.

There were electrical engineers, industrial technicians, former university researchers, and several people who had worked in Ashington’s larger manufacturing and infrastructure sectors.

Some of their skills would be useful for the reconstruction work across his territories.

And then Hans found something interesting.

One of the applicants had previously worked for Project DAEDALUS.