The mud of the Lowlands was a living thing. It swallowed boots, dampened spirits, and smelled of old blood and wet wool. I am Hans. In the records of the Great Empire, I am simply Private 402. To my mother in Bavaria, I am the boy who liked to draw birds.

I didn't understand the maps. I didn't understand the "strategic imperatives" the Colonel shouted about during the morning briefings. All I understood was the weight of my rifle and the constant, gnawing hunger in my stomach.

We were told that the valley of Oakhaven was the key to the province. We were told that the enemy was hiding in the woods and that we must push through the narrow pass to flank them. I remember the way the trees looked—ancient, gnarled oaks that seemed to be leaning in, listening to our footsteps.

"Keep moving!" the Sergeant screamed, his face a mask of red clay. "Don't stop until you hit the ridge!"

I was in the middle of the column. I remember the sound of a thousand boots marching in unison, a rhythmic thumping that felt like the heartbeat of a dying giant. Then, the world changed.

It started with a smell—something sharp, like turpentine and pine resin. Then, a single spark leaped from the brush. In an instant, the forest didn't just catch fire; it exploded.

The fire was a wall of gold and crimson that slammed into us from both sides. I remember the sound first—a roar like a thousand lions, followed by the screams of the men around me. The air became a solid mass of heat that scorched the lungs. I saw my friend, Peter, reach out for me, but his sleeve caught a spark, and in a heartbeat, he was a living torch.

I ran. I didn't know where, only away from the heat. I tripped over a root and fell into a ditch, pressing my face into the cold, wet mud. From my hiding spot, I looked up.

High above, on a limestone cliff overlooking the valley, I saw him.

A man in a pristine blue uniform. He was standing perfectly still, his arms crossed, watching the valley burn. He wasn't shouting. He wasn't cheering. He was just... observing. He looked like a god watching an ant farm, his expression one of mild, intellectual curiosity.

I stayed in the mud for hours, listening to the fire consume the valley. When the silence finally returned, I crawled out. The valley was a graveyard of blackened charcoal. Thousands of us had been erased in a single afternoon, not by a great battle, but by a calculation.

I survived, but I never stopped seeing that man on the cliff. Every time I close my eyes, I see the blue uniform and the cold, distant gaze. I realized then that to the men at the top, we are not soldiers. We are not even people. We are just numbers in an equation, and sometimes, the equation requires a few thousand of us to be subtracted.

*** OTMES_v2_Code: [M1:9.0, M7:8.0, N1:0.1, N2:0.9, K1:1.0, K2:0.0, TI:68.0, theta:225°]