Chapter 20: Bug Boy

"Any news from the west?" Laura asked Xavier over her communicator.

"They've set artillery along the shore." He paused and corrected himself. "They tried to set up artillery along the shore."

"Tried?"

"We shot them with our own large artillery before they had a chance to finish."

Laura smirked at this, though the only person that witnessed her finding the death of others amusing was Kathrin. Thankfully the maid officer said nothing and continued to stand silently in the corner. Laura couldn't help but wonder if she looked like that when around Zenesha.

'It's kinda weird.' She thought, ignoring how hypocritical she sounded.

"Let me know if any new developments happen okay?"

"Yes Ma'am."

With that Laura ended the call and sighed. She really hated this, but to make things work out as smoothly as possible for Zenesha they need to go through these steps. If they didn't there was a good chance of large civil unrest in the future.

'Not like that'll stop it completely.' Laura thought. 'Just enough so it won't be a major problem.'

"Alright the city is secure." Laura suddenly said. "Let's gather our troops and continue our attack."

"Yes Ma'am."

"Make sure to leave the bare minimum of our people here. We'll regroup with some of the small school divisions, then continue to squeeze the enemy north until they're dead or surrendered."

"Yes Ma'am."

Laura stood and walked out of the office, Kathrin following her out, but once out of the office they went their separate ways. The Eagle Officer would carry out her orders first. Meanwhile Laura made her way outside City Hall.

Yesterday her people managed to track down the City Council, Mayor, and Police Chief. Currently they were all kneeling on top of a recently constructed wooden platform that sat at the base of the stairs leading to city hall.

Cameras pointed in their direction, including Laura's since she stood at the top of the steps. She looked down at the dozen or so individuals whimpering below her. Well the Mayor and Chief seemed composed at least.

"Fine people of the White Ash." Laura started as she slowly descended the steps. "You may not know me, so let me introduce myself."

Laura paused dramatically.

"My name is Laura Underwood, and I am Queen Zenesha's right hand." She explained with a smug expression. "Anything I do or say is by the will of her Majesty."

She reached the platform and took her place in front of the kneeling group.

"The people you see before you now are your Cities Leadership." She continued. "They tried to flee and leave you all." She frowned as if disappointed by their actions. "Worry not, for they will be served justice."

The wolf gestured for some of the soldiers nearby to line up behind every single person and point a gun at their heads.

"Let's say goodbye, yes?" She swung her arm down.

A moment later the sound of multiple guns firing overlapped each other. The color of bright red colored the wooden surface underfoot as multiple thunks from collapsing bodies sounded behind her. Laura smiled.

"This is what happens to leaders that try to resist." Laura said. "After all, the sins of leadership shouldn't be passed on to the citizens. Now that they're dead, we will soon release the police officers that had surrendered to us. After the war of course, since by then you'll be one of us."

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Scenes like that played out in every town and city that was captured by them. They weren't censored. The Zari Legion never censored their executions. They knew the White Ash also had similar practices so it shouldn't have been that shocking to witness for them.

After her second ever executions in this world Laura quickly finished her affairs in the city and went to continue her conquest over the small eastern corner of the White Ash. She trudged through cities and towns, and with the help of Iris and her people, including the army of New Veroso they managed to quickly make ground.

Before she realized it, a week had passed and they were now facing the last bastion of resistance in the area. Laura, Iris, and one of the General's from New Veroso were in their command tent directing the mixed army. Laura however was getting tired and annoyed.

She wanted this to be over already so she can head home and spend time with her girlfriend. Then a thought occurred to her.

"Iris." She said suddenly.

"What is it Ma'am?"

"I'm going." The wolf said, looking Iris in the eyes.

"I see." Iris said simply. "Good luck Ma'am.

"What are the two of you talking about?" Asked the General named Faylen.

Laura did bother answering and left the command tent.

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Barbra patrolled inside the fortress, a solid monstrosity made from essence reinforced concrete. There were three walls surrounding the main compound, each Five meters tall and three meters thick. However two of the three walls have already been breached.

She was deep in the compound, so the noise outside didn't penetrate her location. The woman also knew they were done for without having to see outside. Their General was held up deep inside trying to find a way to get out of this, but everyone knew it was pointless, the army outside outnumbered them. Greatly.

As she walked the hall suddenly Grew dark. She squinted and her eyes traced the lights lining the ceiling… and they were on. Every single one was on. Confused, she looked back down the hall, and there at the end stood a figure.

Sound seemed to become muffled, like she was hearing everything underwater. A sharp scent filled their air as her skin tingled, it felt as if the air itself was charged with electricity. Barbra took an unconscious step back as she pointed her gun at the figure down the hall.

The figure was hard to look at. It felt as if they flickered in and out, as if they were existing on a bad signal. Four large tentacle-like appendages rose from behind its back. The body of the figure was similar to a wolf Arves, but the arms were weird.

They were black with orange light swimming through it, like small flames in inky darkness. She couldn't make out the facial features, but the eyes… they glowed with the same orange light and they were focused on her. With delay Barbra shot her assault rifle down the hall.

The figure did even flinch, and before she could drain her mag of bullets, black inky tentacles came out of the floors and started dragging her into the inky depths they came from.

"Wait! No stop! Please!" She called.

Behind her the other soldiers that were standing in the long corridor with her also cried out in panic. The wails of despair filled the hall with their cacophony causing the creature to smile. The last thing Barbra saw before her world went black was the figure grabbing one of her colleges and removing a blue glowing object from their chest.

=-=-=-=

"That's another hall cleared." Laura said with a sigh.

She needed to blackout the halls and destroy the cameras to hide what she was doing exactly. She was also wearing her old wanderer outfit to make her silhouette a little harder to spot. She just wished her actions didn't take so much energy, but it was also efficient.

Laura started to take a step forward but paused when she felt something. She frowned and stopped moving and concentrated on the presence. It was void in origin, but it wasn't one of the sapiens.

"Those fuckers gave the-" Laura didn't get to finish because in the next second something smashed into her side, slamming her into the wall.

She looked up and saw an insect-like creature lumbering over her. It was bipedal with four long arms that ended in three sharp claws. Its head was similar to a praying mantis, its large black compound eyes staring at her blankly.

The large grey insect creature chittered then spit a black substance in her direction.

Laura moved to the side and quickly turned around and punched the thing in its body. She made it fly back, launching it down the hall, but her hand hurt.

'Right, it's from the void.' She'll have to have an actual fair fight against it.

"Bring it bug boy."