The Saga of Tanya the Evil, Vol. 5: Abyssus Abyssum Invocat by Carlo Zen and Shinobu Shinotsuki

Author:Carlo Zen and Shinobu Shinotsuki [Carlo Zen and Shinobu Shinotsuki]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Yen On
Published: 2019-03-19T00:00:00+00:00

OCTOBER 5, UNIFIED YEAR 1926, AFTERNOON, IMPERIAL ARMY BASE

“Colonel, the battalion’s return is complete. We’ve also sent the injured to the rear and made arrangements for the articles of the deceased.”

People who were fine this morning are gone by dinner.

Major Weiss makes his report in an even voice, and Tanya responds calmly, “…It really is a horrible loss.”

A full complement is forty-eight. We lost ten people. And not just ten people. They’re the kind you would never treat as disposable, because they’re difficult to replace—they’re elites. They were elites.

They were the cream of the aerial mage crop. Setting aside their coaching ability and basing it on their skills alone, my subordinates could be employed tomorrow as aggressors in the instructor unit, they’re so capable.

Objectively speaking, my subordinates have the most impressive combat experience in the Empire.

“We essentially lost a company. That’s enough to say we were partially destroyed.”

They may have escaped death, but the severely injured still had to be counted as out of commission. That means a company’s worth of our invaluable personnel has dropped out—a company’s worth of truly matchless elites.

Just the thought of reorganizing and replenishing our numbers has me at wit’s end.

Replace nearly a quarter of my highly trained unit with newbies?

It’s going to be hard to cooperate for a while, even if we try.

Julius Caesar hated replenishing units with new recruits and made whole new armies instead; he was right. No, I’m sure the nugget of historical knowledge that crossed my mind just now…was escapism.

“…Maybe I was arrogant. Maybe I thought…that if it was my—the battalion I trained, that if it was the 203rd Aerial Mage Battalion, that amid any enemies…”

“It’s not your fault, Colonel. We…took them too lightly, too. We thought if anyone could take them, we could…”

“No, Major Weiss.”

The one in charge exists to take responsibility. Of course, if it’s not my fault, then…I need to find the offending son of a bitch and make them pay.

But who believed the numbskulls in Intelligence? Pretty sure that was me.

Believing those freeloaders, in other words, was my mistake. It’s undeniable that I was provided faulty intel. But that’s only something to take into consideration. It’s not a reason to exempt me.

These putzes who flee responsibility are utterly contemptuous of the fundamental modern principle of trust…

I took action according to my own judgment. So ultimately, it’s my responsibility. I’d rather be deemed inept than a despicable degenerate.

“Laugh at me. Scoff. It was my mistake.”

“It was the army’s orders… It wasn’t your fault.”

“It was a mistake to try a hit-and-run with a unit that was worn out from a long-distance flight. We had been in the air for hours, and then in that exhausted state, we plunged into combat—numerically disadvantaged, at that. I’m sure any manual would tell us to avoid all that.”

I know I’ll be ridiculed as a classic fool.

“It’s not as if we accomplished nothing.”

“Major Weiss, it’s as good as nothing.”

“But we carried out the minimum requirements of the mission. We slowed them down! In the photos we took before we left, you can definitely see that we hit the engine.

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