Sometimes, a little "survival wisdom" from the bottom rung could prove deadlier than the most sophisticated tactics.
Night fell.
After a full day of torment, Blue Team's morale had hit rock bottom. They were exhausted, hungry, furious, and on the verge of a breakdown. Valerius forced himself to stay calm. He knew Eli was doing this to provoke him into making a mistake.
"Everyone, rest where you are! Stay alert!" he ordered, deciding to conserve their strength and wait. As long as they held their ground, Eli's little tricks would be useless. Once daylight came, they would regroup and attack.
Yet he still underestimated just how low Eli would stoop.
At midnight, when Blue Team's members were sleeping most soundly.
A strange gurgling sound, seemingly rising from the depths of hell, came from beneath the ground around their camp.
Then dozens of sewer covers disguised as rocks and tree roots were shoved open from within by an enormous force!
"For the barbecue!!!"
With that full-throated, utterly baffling battle cry, Eli and his pack of "sewer rats" burst out of the ground!
They were covered in black sludge, with only their eyes showing, gleaming in the darkness. They did not fire, because the flashes from their Lasguns would give away their positions.
Each of them held a... Toilet Blade.
These had been dismantled from the academy's abandoned toilets, sharpened at the tips, and "thoughtfully" coated in a thick layer of violently foul-smelling... unidentified yellow-brown substance.
"Launch the bayonet charge!"
At Eli's command, Red Team charged toward the sleeping Blue Team, howling and waving their "biochemical-grade" melee weapons.
What followed could no longer be described as "war."
It was an act of... brutal abuse, filled with screams, sobbing, and retching.
The noble scions of Blue Team had never encountered anything so disgusting.