"this must be it..."

Mars took a deep breath and walked into the tent, the inside looked like a cross between a mechanical workshop, a armor workshop and a dorm room with pieces of armor all over the room and what looked like 4 armor stands where 4 sets of armor were being worked on by 3 people, there was also 4 field beds one of them was occupied by a woman that was snoring loudly. as Mars steeped in one of the people working on the armor that looked like something out of Warhammer turned around and looked at Mars and quickly said

"just in time, hey come over here we could use a extra pair of hands"

"...sure"

Mars was busy looking at the persons face, she was a woman who's beauty reviled Chloe's with a perfectly balanced face and long flowing jet black hair, her eyes were also jet black giving her a impression of a sinister beauty but the warm smile on her face was anything but sinister, she wore coveralls that was slightly dirty with oil

"hey you coming or what?"

"...sorry I s.p.a.ced out for a second"

Mars stepped up to the armor and was quickly told where to put his hands as the beauty tightened some bolts on the inside of the armor

"hold this"

"yep, got it"

"you sure, it's kind of heavy right?"

"I happen to be kind of strong"

"...fine here you go then"

the beauty handed Mars a armor plate and told him were to hold it as she tightened some bolts to keep it in place, meanwhile the 2 others that was working on the armor looked at mars in disbelief until one of them whispered to the other

"hey he just lifted that armor plate right?"

"yeah and it looked like he was fine with it"

"which means..."

""he's a monster like the captain""

"hey you guys I heard that! work you hands instead of your mouths!"

""yes captain!""

Mars helped out for another hour and finely the 2 of them had finished a.s.sembling the armor

'...it really looks like something from Warhammer'

"thanks for your help... oh, I never got your name"

"I'm Mars, the general has a.s.signed my to the 7th active mana armor squad as of today"

the beauty paused before she showed an embarra.s.sed smile

"and here I thought you were just another mechanic... my name is Vanessa, I'm a half demon and the captain of the 7th active mana armor squad, and this over there is Gus and Hans"

Vanessa pointed to the 2 men that also was working on the armor, one of them had a lean build with blonde hair and blue eyes and was named Hans while the other had a muscular build and had short gray hair with brown eyes was named Gus

"nice to meet you Mars"

Hans offered his hand and Mars quickly shock it meanwhile Gus gave him a nod with a soft smile on his slightly handsome face

"...and the one sleeping over there is Nicole"

Vanessa pointed to the one woman snore concert that was still ongoing despite all the noise

"well she certainly is... something"

Vanessa looked a little embarra.s.sed and quickly explained

"she had night watch last night"

"oh I see..."

Mars gave a nod, he also clearly remembered what it was like to have the night watch so he admired Nicole's ability to sleep even with so much noise going around the tent

"by the way... what, or who is that?"

Mars looked back at Vanessa and saw she had spotted Victoria that was playing with some thrash on the ground with her paws

"oh that's Victoria, she's my... well I have a contract with her, so I guess she's my partner?"

"oh I see... well let me---"

"reporting!"

just as Vanessa spoke up a messenger ran into the tent and shouted

"about 100 cla.s.s 1 golems have showed up 1.2 kilometers north east of the camp, the general have commanded that the 7th active mana armor squad is to engage!"

Vanessa gave a salute to the messenger

"orders revived, the 7th active mana armor squad will now prepare to engage"

the messenger gave a salute and left the tent leaving the 5 people alone in the tent, Vanessa looked first at Mars then at Hans

"Hans wake up Nicole, Gus suit up and Mars come here and help me suit up"

""yes captain!""

"okay"

Mars receiving instructions form Vanessa quickly helped her suit up, meanwhile the others including a newly awaken Nicole also jumped into their armor suits and quickly got ready

"let's head out!"

"""yes captain"""

"oi Mars where's your response?"

"yes captain!"

"very good, now let's go!"

Mars followed after the 4 of them while he inspected their armor

'2,5 meters tall... weight of close to 250 kilogram... powered by 3 mana stone each... but most importantly their look like s.p.a.ce marines'

Mars found himself grinning as a small child as he watched the 4 armors move out of the camp

"we're going to pick up speed now Hans pick up Mars and let's get going!"

"yes captain"

"no need I can keep up"

"...fine, you better not fall behind"

as Vanessa spoke the sounds of 4 engines winding up sounded out around Mars as the 4 active mana armors powered up

"let's go!"

setting off as the first Vanessa's armor suit set off followed by the others and gradually picked up speed as it approached 45 kilometers an hour, Vanessa looked back and was slightly surprised by Mars that easily followed after them despite the high speed, he also gave her a little wave to show that he was fine causing her to become confused and used her communicate to speak with Hans that followed 2nd after her

"just what is he?"

"captain?"

"I'm talking about Mars"

"well he's most likely like you captain, half something"

"...yeah I think your right Hans"

agreeing with Hans Vanessa s.h.i.+fted her focus back to the front and saw off in the distance what looked like a mob of people and activated her loud speaker so the rest of the squad including Mars could hear her

"heads up, here they are!"

Mars looked forwards as he ran with break neck speed and saw the mob in the distance, transforming his eyes he got a closer look at the mob, they were people or more precisely they were people at some point

'undead...'

rotting flesh, exposed bones and missing eyes and limbs, besides the mana stones that was glowing ominously in the middle of their chest the cla.s.s 1 golems looked exactly like a group of b-movie zombies as they walked along on the hot desert sand, as the group was about 300 meters away from the cla.s.s 1 golems Vanessa raised her hand and signaled the group to stop and looked at Mars, he could feel her jet black eyes looking at him though the helmet for a moment before she activated the speaker

"are you fine Mars?"

"yeah I'm good"

"okay... you are a tactical cla.s.s mage right?"

"yes captain"

"then please fire the opening shot... look they are coming"

Mars looked at the mob of cla.s.s 1 golems and noticed the distance had already decreased to less than 200 meters while they were talking

"okay then..."

Mars raised his arms and 3 small flames appeared at the tips of his fingers before they quickly grew in size to 3 small suns that quickly condensed into a single small bright white fireball

"...go"

Mars pointed towards the mob of cla.s.s 1 golems that was rus.h.i.+ng over and the fireball flew off and when it reached the middle of the crowd it exploded in awesome fas.h.i.+on swallowing up over half of the cla.s.s 1 golems in a the explosion as the shock wave blew around the the rest. the 4 soldiers were stunned into silence, sure they had seen tactical cla.s.s magic before, but the short time it took for Mars to cast it overwhelmed them all along with the destruction it caused as a single spell had almost wiped out the group of almost 100 cla.s.s 1 golems, the first one to recover was Vanessa that quickly praised Mars

"good job Mars, tactical magic sure is something else... looks like it's our turn, squad let's wiped them out!"

"""yes captain!"""

Mars watched as Vanessa unsheathed a giant sword from the back of her armor and led the charge into the group of disorganized mob of cla.s.s 1 golems and raved havoc along with the rest of the squad, in all honesty it looked like a bunch of grown men kicking around children as they quickly wiped out the rest of the cla.s.s 1 golems and returned to where Mars was waiting with Victoria that had jumped out of his shadow in the meantime, Mars raised his hand and gave a salute to Vanessa

"good work captain"

Vanessa removed her helmet and showed Mars a warm smile before she turned to the others

"let's head back to camp"