Warlock of War: My Ares System

"*sigh*... Was he watching over me then? Is that the reason I survived?" I muttered as bullets whizzed past the top of my helmet.

"What'd you say?" Luna asked as she lay next to me, smoking a cigarette that she recently picked up from my lieutenant.

"You know that's bad for you,"

"I don't care… Makes it easier to cope with this shitty situation, so how about you shut up and focus on yourself,"

"Well damn… Do you have another?" I asked, and she slowly handed me another one from her pocket, and it was drenched in muddy water.

"Kukuku… I'm just kidding. Here," She said before taking out another one and flicking it towards me.

I caught it and placed it in my mouth before Luna lit the end.

"*cough* *cough* *cough* *cough*... What the fuck…." I muttered as I took out the cigarette, and Luna watched me cough up everything I had inhaled.

"Don't worry. You'll get used to the burning feeling soon enough,"

…

Another few weeks passed, and we were currently fighting on the front lines until the lieutenant came up to me and told me to gather my party.

"Is there a reason?"

"We received a mission from the general, and since you all are more proficient with weapons, I'll let you go full fill it,"

"You're not even gonna tell me what I need to do?"

"Just hold on a second. Gather your party so they know what else to do," The lieutenant ordered, so once I had brought everybody over, he finally began to explain the mission.

In simple terms, we were supposed to kill a few lieutenants and create an opening for us to charge in instead of this slow trench war where one side slowly moved toward the other or slowly moved back.

"That's easy enough, but how are we supposed to get close to them?" Cy asked a finally reasonable question.

"Luna is proficient in illusion magic, so you'll be able to infiltrate far enough to sneak attack some of the higher ranking guys. It took a while, but we've finally managed to take down their new mage platoon leader, so that is why we finally have this mission. If you don't succeed, ya'll are going to have so much more trouble than getting an earful from the general,"

"Yes, sir," We all monotonously replied.

"Wait, I have a comment," Luna suddenly spoke up just as everybody was going to gather their things.

"What is it?" The lieutenant replied.

"My illusion magic isn't all-powerful. I know the previous leader of the mage platoon is the only one who could see through my illusion, but that's not the problem. I can't hold an illusion that's very strong for more than five minutes. Especially across all of us,"

"That's… a problem then,"

"Though, I think I might be able to work around it. I can decrease the strength of the illusion and hope none of the other mages detect us. I could also make it like a blanket around us, but that means if we get discovered, we'll be like sitting ducks clustered into an easy flesh bucket,"

"Go ahead and do that. Bella, you're in charge of commanding the group," The lieutenant said, and everybody was a bit surprised, even Luna, who rarely cared.

"Why not Orion?" Bella asked.

"You led the mage platoon for a while. I assume he does have some experience leading a group, but now, you have much more experience,"

"I disagree. I feel like Luna or Orion should be the captain. Just cause I have more experience doesn't mean I make the best decisions,"

"No, you may not, but the best decisions come after a moment of thought. If you hesitate even once when directing them, you'll either get one killed or the others killed as well,"

"Oh… Ummmm… How about we just work as a team instead of establishing a captain,"

"*sigh*... Do whatever the fuck you want. Just make smart decisions and send the same signal if you succeed. Vertical line for success and cross for failure,"

"Yes, sir,"

After gathering our stuff, we made our way toward the edge of the battlefield where the war thinned out, and we slowly saw the front lines fade away.

After reaching the walls of Amlas, I suddenly had a realization as we got rid of anybody who might see us getting ready to use the illusion.

"Amlas… is a fortress…." I muttered.

The walls, the enormous moat, and the mountains surrounding the city… were a tactic used to create natural fortresses.

But, as I had to focus on something else, I pushed this thought to the back of my mind and slipped under the invisible blanket Luna had made for all of us.

We were all tightly packed together, butt to butt.

"Cy, you better not fart," Aisa said.

"I took a shit before we came here,"

The stupid trio all bantered a bit before eventually dragging Bella into the joke and attempting to drag Luna and me in.

Anyway, we made our way to a relatively empty trench after about fifteen minutes of walking and took off the invisible blanket that disintegrated into thin air.

"Foooooo… That was hard," Luna muttered as she bent down, hands on her knees, breathing heavy and solid breaths.

Seems it took a lot of concentration to pull that off.

"Alright, we'll all move in through the trench. We already know where some of the lieutenants on the front lines are, so we'll sneak attack them there… No complaints?" I asked the group and everybody just shrugged.

These… whatever. At least they know what we're doing.

[Name: Orion]

[Race: Human]

[Class: War Spearsman]

[Level: 32/35] (95/200) XP Needed

I'm so close to classing up… I wonder how close the others are?

"Hey, are you guys close to classing up-"

BOOOOOOOM

But before I could ask my question, we had reached the muddy and blood-tainted front lines… and the air around everybody was tense once again.