20 - Renegotiations

Merlin ignored the yelling merchant as he walked back towards the tanks with Geo and Jane at his side, then once he reached the tanks he sighed and looked back at the group of adventures and still fuming merchant before he asked his two companions

"How did I do?"

Jane and Geo exchanged looks before they both gave thumbs-up as Geo spoke in praise

"Excellent"

Jane nodded and spoke

"Yeah, you did good Merlin… But what's the plan now?"

Merlin showed a smile before he gave a mental command for the tanks to power on their engines, then under the noise-cover of the tanks he spoke, Jane and Geo soon showed nasty smiles as they glanced over at the Merchant convoy, then they all climbed up on the King tiger that then led the convoy of tanks away as they speed down the road…

Half a day later the Merchant convoy was once again attacked by a large group of bandits, a melee soon ensued and while there had not been that many casualties on the adventures side yet it was clear that they were unable to hold back the bandits for long, at that moment did the bandit leader called out from atop his horse

"Hold it there men!"

The bandits quickly retreated, then the bandit leader showed a wide smile before he yelled to Erik

"Hand over half of your merchandise and I'll let you live!"

Before Erik managed to say anything something came flying from the side and landed in between the two forces, both sides looked slightly confused before Erik looked to the side where the projectile came from and saw on a distant hilltop stood Merlin's tanks, they were all lined up in a firing line, Merlin stood on the ground in between the two king tigers and looked at the convoy with his binoculars and spoke

"Range is good, send it…"

Back at the convoy, Erik saw the distance muzzle flashes from the cannons and all the hair on the back of his neck rose, then one of the adventures yelled

"Take cover!"

Then came the whistle of the shells before pandemonium descended over the battlefield as the first shell exploded on the bandits' side of the battlefield, as shell after shell impacted the bandit's quickly scattered and tried to escape, the adventures were a little better well disciplined and didn't flee they simply moved back and held a formation around the carriages while watching the pandemonium around them, back at the tanks Merlin yelled

"Suppression Phase complete, Group one advance!"

Then half the tanks began advancing while the other half kept up their fire, Merlin controlled each and every tank in the group to make sure there was no friendly fire as he rained down shells on the bandits, once the first group, exactly half of the tanks reached their designated point they stopped in a fire line before they opened fire at the bandits, then the 2nd group began moving, Merlin yelled from the copular of one of the King tiger's

"Nothing like a basic fire and movement!"

Soon Merlin's tanks rolled up beside the Merchant convoy, as the tanks crushed the pieces of what used to be people under their tracks Merlin opened the top cupola hatch of one of the King tigers and popped his head out, and looked over at the people of the merchant convoy, then he crawled out and sat down on the turret as he spoke

"So… Fuckface Er-something or whatever your name is, those shells weren't free"

As Merlin spoke the turrets of the tanks turned towards the merchant convoy, the tank commanders' jacket began absorbing coldness from the mangled corpses that had been plowed into the ground by the earlier bombardment which gave Merlin a strange 'attraction ' as he spoke, Erik walked out from the crowd and after a bit, he asked

"How much?"

Merlin showed a smile

"You see, fuckface, I am a big person, I'll see past the fact that you threatened me and offer you the low price of… A quarter"

Erik's face paled before his face flushed red with anger, though he kept his mouth shut as he remembered that the tank barrels all were pointed at the convoy, Merlin noticed his anger and was about to speak when one of the tanks opened fire, it was sharpshooter that fired at one of the bandit corpses, or not quite as it gave a scream of pain before the autocannon fired again, cutting the scream short, then came another shoot and another before the cannon finally was silent, Merlin turned to look at Erik and asked

"So… What's it going to be?"

Erik's face changed from red to green before he finally sighed and spoke

"Fine… But payment has to be delayed until we arrive"

Merlin smiled and spoke

"That was my intention… Gerta, turn turret 80 degrees right"

Merlin narrowed his eyes, reflected in them were a bandit on horseback fleeing, Merlin pointed towards the fleeing back as he spoke

"1… no, 1,5 kilometers out…"

The other people in the merchant convoy also looked after the fleeing bandit, then Merlin spoke softly

"Fire when ready"

The roar of the cannon momentarily deafened the people present as the shell took 1 and a half-second to impact where it hit the fleeing bandit directly in the back and when straight through him before it hit the ground and the fuze was set before it exploded blowing the corpse of the bandit backward, then Merlin spoke

"Nice to be working with you Erik, now then we'll form a defensive formation ahead, the adventures will deal with anything coming from behind as well as the night watch, deal?"

Henry realized that Merlin was talking to him and quickly refused

"We can't take all the night watches that's too much"

Merlin shrugged before he clapped the King tiger on the top of the turret and spoke

"Despite being the biggest of cats, this doesn't see well in the dark, how would I be able to tell if it's a bandit sneaking up or some bloke returning from taking a piss?"

Henry nodded before he sighed

"Fine we'll take night watch, but only if we can borrow a tank as rearguard"

"Sure, I'll give you a brand new one too… Let's see… system, how much for a Centurion Mk. 3?"

[Ding! A Centurion Mk. 3 costs 280 points]

"...Buy 3"

"Merlin!"

"What?"

"Do you really need 3 new tanks? I thought you were saving on points?"

"...Buy 2 x Centurion Mk. 3"

Before Jane could object more two new tanks appeared next to the King tiger they stood almost as tall as the King tiger at 3 meters tall, they weren't as wide either at 3.3 meters wide though they were a little longer than the King tiger at 7.6 meters, they were equipped with an Ordnance QF 20 pounder anti-tank gun capable of firing Armor-piercing-discarding-sabot, High-explosive, Smoke and Canister shells, but most importantly they were one of the first production tanks to be equipped with a full gun stabilizer which allowed for the gun to be almost completely stable while the tank were moving, the keyword being almost, with it being more precise the slower the tank moved this allowed for somewhat accurate firing on the move, it was also equipped with a new kind of armor-piercing shell, the APDS or Armor-piercing-discarding-sabot which was essentially a sub-caliber shell packed into a sabot which would discard mid-flight before the armor-piercing shell core would impact the target, this allowed for higher velocity of the shell since it weighed less and was smaller which meant less air resistance, the new shell had a muzzle velocity of over 1.400 meters a second

"These will do as rear guards, I name them Timmy and Tom!"

The people from the merchant convoy all thought that their minds played tricks on them as they had just seen the two tanks appear out of thin air, Henry looked at the two new tanks and the king tiger and noticed something which he muttered out loud

"Different designs? Now that I look at them they're all different designs..."

Merlin nodded before he spoke

"That's right, they're all built for something different and by different countries… Well they're not of this world anyway"

Erik quickly realized what Merlin was saying and yelled

"You are a wanderer!?"

Merlin showed a smile and nodded

"That's right shit for brains, now then don't stand in the way of the tanks, unless you're tired of living, that is, advance!"

Erik watched Merlin's tanks advance and then he suddenly slapped himself as he felt cold sweat down his back, he had nearly driven off a wanderer from the Engir kingdom, one with amazing potential

'I need to butter him up and help build a bridge between him and Lord Edwardo… If Lord Edwardo had the backing of a wanderer he would be sure to become the next king… I need to do my best to make that happen, even if I have to lay down in front of one of those tanks it would be worth it!'

Erik's face burned with near fanatic worship when he thought about his Lord becoming the next king