In a place high above the surface of the planet, there existed a fleet of heavier-than-air airships. Held aloft via a mix of magic and technology, each of these flying warships would put a certain Elder’s obvious attempt at compensating for something to shame in terms of survivability and firepower. Among these ships, there was one out of them that was a very special creation indeed.

The two children/ preteens who held the reigns of this singular airship had made certain… adjustments to the design and production of the ship, swapping most of the conventional weapons and ordinance for tools of a different kind. To make sure these new tools could even function, the excess space opened up by removing most of the weapons and ammunition storage was replaced by larger and more numerous magitech reactors.

The twins on board were practically dying to test out their toys, but they had been given information that prevented them and their fleet from moving too much farther than where they had been up till now. For, you see, after having opened up the Tyrkish Straight for the Naga to pass through, they had been tasked with preparing the rest of the Not!Balkans area for the armies that would follow. After that, they were supposed to receive instructions regarding where and when to strike next, but after both Zalga and C’thylla got bodied by the superpowered beastman woman they were instructed to simply provide fire support.

That would certainly have been a nice thing to do, but the forts and other bastions of the New Sultanate had long since been pulverized and the soldiers and militia alike had either died or had made a ‘tactical withdrawal’ across the Straight. The twins had been thorough in their duties, and what little resistance that remained in their area of operations was too disorganized to be much of a threat. With no new orders coming, the twins and their fleet were forced to wait and hope for new orders from on high.

…

An army of several tens of thousands emerged from a Dungeon Gate that had popped up near the original Darksol-Arbiana Border. These soldiers were living, mortal men of the Mortal Auxiliary, a force formed by Erwin Krueger with the express purpose of giving Darksol a more ‘human’ face. Following these living souls were the main bulk of the counter-invasion force, and if you guessed that it was made up of a metric fuck-ton of undead you would be correct.

The total force crossed the border with no trouble at all before splitting up and moving to achieve their assigned objectives. The undead would be the sword and shield of the counter-invasion while the Mortal Auxiliary would be the face of it. The undead were to be the main attacking and defending force, sweeping any combatants from the field and from their mortal coil while those who were still very much alive would essentially be a militarized public relations department. It was to be their job to make sure that the civilians and non-combatants did not have to deal with the oftentimes unnerving and mute undead whenever possible.

With the undead and living troops splitting off like branches of a tree, the once-massive force suddenly became a bunch of far smaller ones. However, the people controlling the undead had almost universally experienced the massive war that had come before, and the Mortal Auxiliary were trained to fight against any number of opponents despite their intended job being that of a PR Team that doubled as Military Police. Each ‘branch’ eventually split into smaller branches as the force continued to split up. Perhaps they thought that things would be far easier than they would be, but whether that assumption about their assumptions was true or not would turn out to be irrelevant.

Arbiana had absolutely no intentions of letting their Not!Balkans fall into Darksol’s hands. While there had been those who had withdrawn across the Straight, the lack of a follow-up by the sky-bound warships gave the Sultanate time to build up a response to the counter-invasion. It certainly wasn’t a huge force but compared to the individual branches that the Darksolian force had split into it was positively enormous.

If Darksol’s counter-invasion army stood together, the numbers would be on their side, but as things were now there was not a snowball’s chance in hell that any single detachment would be able to stand a chance in a typical engagement. As the Darksolian forces swept out across the land, they had no idea that there would soon be a time where they would have to fight for their lives/ unlives.

…

Even as the Naga continued to ravage the Sultanate’s coastlines, there were some places that the aquatic women simply would not touch. One of these places was a fortress-city standing on the opposite bank of the now destroyed city of Istantinople. The place was too heavily fortified and the number of warships and sailors that it serviced and supplied made even the masters of the deep think twice about attacking any of the ships that ran across the water’s surface. This would turn out to be a good and bad thing for the Arbianans, as it meant that they had the ability to gather their strength in a single point.

This was all well and good, but when Zalga moved through the Straight it had caused no small amount of damage to the fortress-city of Constanbul. Thankfully for them, the walls that kept the majority of the city isolated from the docks were strong enough to hold back the water, but the fact that the gates and doors that were supposed to protect everyone were open at the time had led to quite a number of ‘protected’ areas being a bit waterlogged.

But the areas everywhere else aside from the slums were fine, so what lasting and costly harm had actually been done? Despite the damage to the docks and some of the ships, the planned response to the Darksolian counter-invasion had not had its timetable altered. Over half a million fanatics were getting ready to bring the wrath of Solinaye to the infidels via fire, sword, scripture, and a whole lot of prayer. However, just as with the forces loyal to our story’s protagonist, these zealots would find that their job would be a lot harder and more dangerous than they assumed.