Luco glared at the enemy troops. Wu Peifu had taken to using his remaining forces in surprise attacks against the outer flanks of the Alliance's troops. Luco had been finishing up the takeover of the Southwest of Hubei province when a bunch of tanks popped up on the radar.
With the tracking-spirits around, it wasn't much of a surprise attack, but Wu Peifu's soldiers simply made up for that by driving faster than the rest of Luco's brigade, leaving Luco to defend himself with twenty shamans until reinforcements arrived.
Climbing on top of his armored truck, Luco flung a fireball into the closest tank and used wind-spirits to bowl it over onto another tank as it exploded. He jumped off the roof of his truck onto a swarm of wind-spirits, swooping over the enemy ranks to hurl more fireballs at them.
He propelled himself back before letting the wind-spirits dissipate, waving impatiently for the shamans in charge of tracking-spirits to give their reports.
"Why are there no shamans with them?" Luco muttered to himself. Even with most of Wu Peifu's shamans holed up in Wuhan, there should've still been a number of them running around.
"Boss, they're retreating!" One of them shouted at him.
Luco squinted at the fleeing soldiers, who were tossing aside their damaged weapons and burning tanks as they jumped into the closest vehicle and hit the gas. There weren't that many of them, but there weren't that many of his shamans either.
"Have we found evidence of a larger force nearby?" Luco asked. The tracking shamans all shook their heads. Luco looked at the retreating troops and made a split-second decision.
"Alright, we've got to chase them or they'll be back. The last thing we need is for them to single out shamans and corner them," Luco ordered. "Everyone, chase the enemy!"
His shamans let out excited shouts, quickly getting back into their vehicles.
"Tell the reinforcements to catch up with us," Luco ordered. The communications officer was on it before the sentence was finished.
Luco needed to finish this without calling for additional backup – the closest reinforcements would have to come from the Shaman Council's 20th Shaman Brigade. The Shaman Council had already gotten Li Zongren's support and gained a huge advantage within the Alliance. If Taeyun's student had to ask them for backup, it would be too humiliating.
"We're in range, Boss!" His lieutenant shouted through the communication radio.
Luco grinned. "Attack!" He shouted into the radio. Dozens of fireballs shot through the air towards the enemy line and exploded into sparks. And then promptly fizzled out.
"Wait, shit," Luco shouted in alarm, "Everyone stop! Trackers, what the hell is going on over there?!"
The tracking team gave a swarm of confused responses before someone managed to respond properly. "Boss, they've got shamans!"
"Shit, retreat! They've definitely got more shamans!" Luco ordered. If they didn't, the soldiers would've never tried to lead them into an ambush. The cars swiftly made U-turns and began leaving at full speed.
There was a sharp ringing noise in his ears as his spine prickled with a sudden rush of anxiety.
"Defense wards!" Luco roared into the radio. He immediately threw one up, the others hastily joining in just in time to stop dozens of lightning bolts from hitting their cars. The ward shattered under the impact, leaving Luco's fingers feeling numb and stiff.
"Keep at it!" Luco shouted, promptly throwing up another ward. He whirled towards the tracking shaman next to him.
"Just how many are there on the other side?!" Luco demanded.
"We're definitely outnumbered, but we don't know by how much exactly," the shaman whimpered. "And the reinforcements aren't here yet!"
Luco cursed under his breath and focused on the ward. The enemy was advancing again, their positions reversed from earlier as Luco's shamans were pursued as they retreated. Lightning crashed against their ward again, nearly shattering it for the second time.
Alarm bells went off in Luco's head and he poured as much energy as he could into the ward. Before he could order the others to do the same, a giant bolt of lightning struck the center of the ward, breaking through and crashing right before a car with a blinding flash.
"Shit! Shit!" The car's driver screamed into the radio. "Boss! Did they hit us?!"
"They didn't, get the fucking ward up!" Luco shouted back. There was a giant patch of scorched earth right before the unfortunate car. No one was hurt thanks to the multiple protection wards woven into the interior, but the car had been rendered useless.
Luco threw up a third ward as the occupants hurriedly piled into other cars, desperately checking where the reinforcements were. They were definitely outnumbered by at least two to one, Luco was sure of that now. His arms felt numb from shouldering the brunt of the ward, which had been draining his energy like a goddamn sponge.
'I can't lose here!' Luco felt a surge of desperation. The pride of Hengshan, the pride of Lin Bo's legacy, too many things were at stake for him to even think about losing in a minor skirmish like this.
The hairs on the back of his neck stood up, and Luco knew that they were in for another attack. Gritting his teeth, he prepared to throw everything into the ward.
"Boss! Look over there!" His driver shouted. Luco looked.
A giant mass of fire swooped out of the clouds, a small figure in black riding on it. Luco gaped as the Vermillion Bird dove out of sight behind a hill with a giant explosion that shook the ground.
"It's Grandmaster Mohan!" The tracking shaman gasped. They all froze for a moment as there were a series of resounding booms and flashes of flame in the distance. Luco slowly rolled down his car window, wincing at the waves of heat that were coming in from the distance. He slowly rolled his car window back up.
"Everyone, turn around and prepare to meet up with Grandmaster Mohan," Luco finally ordered. They took another U-turn and headed back towards the enemy.
Or rather, the charred remains of the enemy.
"Luco!" Mohan greeted him, the Vermillion Bird still giant and on fire next to them.
"Grandmaster Mohan," Luco said politely. "Thank you for coming to our assistance." Mohan only chuckled and shook his head.
"They had fifty shamans," Mohan said thoughtfully. "But all of them were focused on attacking you guys, that certainly made my job easier. It seems that they really do see Taeyun's students as a major threat."
Luco winced. "Yeah, thank you again, really."
"Don't worry about it," Mohan said. After Luco thanked Mohan about ten more times, the older shaman lost patience and left, leaving Luco to stare down the remains of the enemy shamans and soldiers. He turned towards the communications officer.
"Report this to the Chairman," Luco said. "In detail."
////////
Luco ended up having to report everything in person at a hastily-called Triple Alliance meeting after Taeyun decided it would be a major problem.
"Better to say that Hengshan shamans valiantly defended against enemies despite being outnumbered rather than offer public apologies later for holding back important information," Helang had helpfully explained.
The meeting itself was rather unpleasant for everyone involved, especially Luco. The Shaman Council members managed to maintain the expression of someone looking at a cockroach for thirty minutes straight.
"Wu Peifu had over 400 shamans, and some of them are still unaccounted for. Not to mention that he could also borrow other people's forces," Taeyun said at the meeting.
Jia Xu managed to look suitably unimpressed, while Joyce had winced at all the appropriate times. After the meeting, Luco went to thank Mohan again, but the older shaman had already left. Luco accosted Spade instead to be polite and was soon walking down a hallway with the swordsman.
"It'll be rough if our shamans are caught without us," Spade grumbled. Luco winced.
"Is it alright to say that in front of me?" Luco asked.
"Why not? It's not as though you don't already know this," Spade said. "Better I say it now than to have Joyce say it inappropriately later."
"Joyce looked pretty worried," Luco said, belatedly remembering to call her Chairman Lee. "I mean, er, Chairman Lee."
"Of course she's worried, you know the state of our troops," Spade snapped irately. Luco winced.
"It must be hard for her, she was just a normal teenager before she came here and now she has to deal with all of this," Luco said sympathetically. Joyce probably hadn't had a peaceful moment since she arrived, even without all the drama going on.
"Normal teenager? Her?" Spade snorted. "What about her suggests she was a normal teenager before this?"
Luco blinked in surprise. He had thought Spade was the most protective of Joyce, but this was a rather unexpected response.
"She's not very traumatized," Luco offered.
"She's very well-adjusted," Spade replied.
At Luco's look of confusion, Spade only chuckled and shook his head. "Hang out with her long enough and you'll understand," Spade explained. As if on cue, Joyce rounded the corner tossing a grenade between her hands.
"Weapon safety," Spade said in a warning tone. Joyce immediately passed the grenade back to Kiyoko.
"Do you even know how to use a grenade?" Luco asked in concern. He dubiously stepped back a few steps.
Joyce shrugged. "Well, not really. I've only used it once back in my world. Right before I came here, actually."
Luco gulped, glancing at Spade. "You used a grenade back in your world?" Kiyoko asked.
"Yeah, but I accidentally pulled the pin off and blew up an Amazon Prime truck," Joyce said. "Oh, no one died though. But the driver was really pissed off and came after me with a chainsaw so I booked it."
"What the fuck," Spade said. "Never touch a grenade in front of me again."
Kiyoko lifted the offending grenade with an exasperated expression. "I'll toss this one out, I think the Chairman managed to break it somehow."
Luco looked at Joyce dubiously. "How did you outrun a guy with a chainsaw? I didn't think you were a fast runner," Luco asked.
"Nah, my older sister had a motorcycle," Joyce said.
"Oh, that makes sense," Luco began.
"But there were already three people on it, so I took the shopping cart she chained to the back of the bike," Joyce continued. Luco edged away suspiciously.
"Don't tell me you were hit by a truck or something?" He asked.
"No, the shopping cart flipped over so I just walked the rest of the way, it was a no-truck area," Joyce said.
"How did you get to this world if you weren't hit by a truck?" Luco demanded. It had been bothering him since he'd known she was a spirit-sent. Luco's first reaction was that Joyce was probably hit by a truck, but that evidently wasn't it.
"Oh, after I went home I went to sleep, and then I fell off my bed," Joyce said. "And then I tripped over my laundry while getting up and ended up here. With no shoes."
"Yeah, she was barefoot, I had to go back into the manor to get her shoes after we'd already made our getaway," Spade said helpfully. "Because we were broke and hadn't found gangsters to rob yet."
At that, Luco shook his head and decided he'd had enough of the Flying Dragons for the day.
"Nice," he said awkwardly. "I think I need to head back now." Spade put an iron grip on Luco's shoulder.
"Stay and eat with us," Spade said firmly. Luco looked between him and Joyce, helplessness and exasperation pooling in his stomach.
"Okay," Luco said, giving in as he eyed the bubble tea Kiyoko was holding with her non-grenade-holding hand. "Do you guys have any more bubble tea?"