Several gunboats circled low overhead like carrion birds, casting patchwork shadows. Large-caliber heavy explosive rounds rained down into the rainforest, felling swaths of trees that had grown for centuries, along with the mutated amphibious creatures hiding beneath the canopy and water's surface.
Aparajita raised a fist, and the knights behind him immediately halted and aimed their weapons forward. They moved as lightly as hunters in the shadows, the servos in their Power Armor joints reduced to their lowest volume, making almost no sound that might raise the alarm. Like an explosive being ignited, battle erupted in an instant. The knights pulled their triggers, and dense volleys tore through the trees to strike the shadows charging through the jungle. The brief flashes of Mass Explosive Round detonations illuminated multicolored scales and bodies shattered beneath immense kinetic force.
"Free engagement. Hold the line." Aparajita wore no helmet, but his command still reached every knight through the built-in communicator on his gorget. Gunfire erupted all along the battle line stretching for kilometers, accompanied by the whine of Chainsaw Sword engines and screams strangled in throats. Within two minutes, the gunfire gradually died away. Other than the smell of burning propellant and the stench of cold-blooded blood filling the air, the rainforest returned to silence. "Continue advancing." Aparajita lowered his Explosive Rounds Gun and secured it in the magnetic holster on his thigh. "Flight formation Zeta, advance toward operational quadrant Alpha-4."
"Vulture acknowledged."
The company gunboats dived once again, blanketing the airspace near operational quadrant Alpha-4 in the containment zone with firepower. The Hippogriff Assault Boats used their powerful main cannons to clear an open area strewn with splintered trees through the dense forest. Immediately afterward, artillery strikes landed precisely around that clearing, forcing every creature concealed within the operational quadrant to turn back.