The History of Two Octarian Civil Wars, a General's Tales

[Cephalobro]

Greetings citizen, my name is Anemone, but my troops refer to me as General Anemone. This "Turf War" sport is just that, a sport, many of you squid youths don't know what it's like to be in not one, but two real wars. I can already sense your curiosity as to which wars I'm referring to, and to answer your question, neither war is the Great Turf War. No, I'm referring to the two Octarian civil wars, the first of which I was originally referred to as Sargeant Anemone.

As you see, the Octarians were just one single people, a diverse group that looked more different from each other than you younguns might think, we had Octarians who were just a single tentacle, double tentacles, some were upside down tentacles, you name it, we had it. And yes, even the Octolings you have come to know of are also Octarians. However, the Octarian people started fighting amongst one another for living spaces, and the two communities decided to distance themselves from one another, thus causing the unfortunate genetic split into two Octarian species: The Crimson Octarians and the Ringed Octarians, I'm of the latter group. However, the Crimson Octarians attacked the Ringed Octarians, thinking they could subjugate us, but we fought back, and that's how the first Octarian civil war started.

At first, we suffered a lot of casualties, that's because the Crimson Octarians trained up an elite force of female Octolings, whom I will refer to as the Octamazons. We had not trained up an elite force of Octolings of our own, so we were at a huge disadvantage. This is when a particular male Octoling stepped up to fight the Octamazons, a friend of mine who not only already had an Octotrooper son, but also whose Octoling wife was pregnant. I yelled at him not to engage the group of Octamazons in battle as he had a family to be with, but he insisted on doing so. What happened next shocked everyone, Crimson and Ringed alike, he actually managed to defeat the Octamazons by himself. Good thing too because those Octamazons were going to octonapp his wife. With the enemy caught in a surprise that their elite force had been single-handedly defeated by an Octoling of our own, we fought the enemy back to their own land and destroyed their communication towers and supply buildings, causing them to surrender.

Enough story time, for now, I have to send a few Octarians to a mission, a mission that's classified, so don't follow them.

 

[Bennet]

(Nice job with this, this is great!!!)

 

[Cephalobro]

Before you hear of the second Octarian civil war, I will preface first what happened between them. We managed to recover our populations, my first niece was cut from her mother (she is my younger sister), whose husband is actually my brother-in-law. Then my second niece was born, this was great news to me. This wasn't just related to my family, in fact, that very same friend of mine who had a pregnant wife, well his second son was born as well, just one year after my second niece. Everything was going great as everyone started to recover, but there was something wrong, the domes we lived in started running out of power, and the Octo Energy Department gave us bleak news.

At first, they were able to find ways to stave off the loss of power, but some of the domes started to flicker. I knew what this meant, and so did both my sister and brother-in-law, they entrusted their children to my care after raising them for a good number of years, and from time to time, they would send things from the surface to my nieces. In the meantime, my friend took frequent trips to the surface, where he bought a few things from there, mainly for his second son who was just getting out of his octopus-like state.

However, the first few screens and a lot of debris started falling, and unfortunately, my friend and his wife got caught under said debris. I'm glad that at least their sons avoided that same fate, but now they were orphaned, so I contacted the orphanage to come pick them up. To make matters worse, the Crimson Octarians started cutting off all escape routes that we could use, and they only left one available escape route. This was unacceptable, they were willing to let an entire half of the Octarian population perish. This is when I decided to take matters into my own tentacles and recruit my own army. It was difficult, as I needed able-bodied Ringed Octarians who were willing to fight to escape the domes, so I started recruiting my nieces first, they understood that now, it's a fight for survival.

The first mission I gave my nieces was to find as many Ringed Octarians as possible to recruit them into my army, not only did I need as many fighters as possible, but I also dedicated my life to saving them from the collapsing domes. I went to the orphanage myself to find any children who grew too old to be adoptable, maybe they could help with logistics. I visited the orphanage from time to time before all of this happened, the kids there picked on my friend's younger son, while the older son retaliated with tentacle punches against them, doing all he could to defend his younger brother. Anyway, after I arrived at the orphanage, only my friend's sons were there and they became too old to be adoptable, one was 14 years old and the other was 16 years old, the other children were adopted, and the Octarian couple there didn't know what to do with the two remaining children. So I told them that I would take them off their tentacles and train them to be tough, so in other words, I recruited two more members of my army. I returned with the new recruits with me and saw many Ringed Octarians gathered up as a crowd, I could see my nieces in the middle there. This is when I started talking to everyone before their first-ever mission: Finding enough buses that can merge together to create a base.

This was a lot of setting up, but unfortunately, my story will have to take a backseat for now because I have some matters I need to attend to.

 

[Cephalobro]

I know you wanted to hear about the second Octarian civil war, but that will have to wait a little more, however, I promise it will start during this story, so don't feel discouraged yet, since I must tell you about what came immediately before. My friend's two sons were hesitant to follow my orders at first, and at least the younger one lacked the will to fight, partly thanks to his older brother doing all the fighting for him. But I'm an Octohurler who refuses to give up on a potential soldier who can become a menace to the enemy. His older Octotrooper brother had years of fighting experience, now it's his younger Octoling brother's turn to learn the art of fighting, and since he's an Octoling, that means he generates ammunition, so I intend to make use of that natural ability of his so he can be a member who fights enemies fearlessly. Upon enlisting the two brothers, I gave the younger one his father's Octo Shot, a request that the said father wanted his son to have the weapon that protected the family from evildoers and criminals alike.

Then I got to training both of them, I trained the older Octotrooper brother in the art of melee combat since he already spent so much time doing melee combat, and I figured that I should've trained him on the more advanced moves to defeat his foe. The Octoling was trained to use his Octo Shot correctly, at first he failed to hit even one target due to his initially bad aim, but again, I refused to give up on making use of his skills, so I trained him harder until he got the aim right on that fateful day in which he managed to splat all targets fairly quickly. On the days in which the two took breaks, they tried their best to socialize with others, however, only the Octorooper was successful, the Octoling was still too shy. This is when my younger niece, who's also an Octoling herself, started staring at him. I don't know what came over her, especially since she was too nervous to go and talk to him, which was a shame, because that boy really needed at least one person other than his brother to talk to so he could learn to work together with the rest of the army.

Nevertheless, my older Octobomber niece was annoyed that my younger niece kept staring at that one specific Octoling. This is when I had an idea, we just needed one more bus to get our journey to that single kettle that would allow us to escape Octo Valley underway, so I figured since I just trained the two brothers, I sent them on their first real mission. My younger Octoling niece was a little bit disappointed, she told me that she fell in love with the Octoling, but I couldn't take any more excuses, I had no time for petty complaints when we were literally in a fight for survival. So I sent her on a scouting mission so that she could do something useful for the rest of the army. That was unfortunately a mistake of my own as I sent her with no Octarian bodyguard. Thankfully, the two brothers I sent to retrieve that one remaining bus went to her rescue when they found her completely surrounded by Crimson Octolings, with a few extra help to boot. After the mission, we could finally have a base of our own to shelter in and not have to rely on tents that made us vulnerable to attacks.

I also learned of another truth, the Crimson Octarians squidnapped many Inklings to experiment on them. This presented a great opportunity for the Ringed Octarians, as we could get some extra help from the outsiders which our enemy brought in by force. And like us, the captured Inklings wanted to escape Octo Valley too, so the first mission on the day right after we got our base set up, we went to storm the first of the eight facilities controlled by the Crimson Octarians, with the objectives to rescue the Inklings first, then make the facility completely unusable to save on the already dwindling electricity in Octo Valley, usually by destroying said facility after the rescue objective has been accomplished. The Ringed Octarian army was unsure at first if they were going to succeed, but this was the risk I was willing to take, if we perished, we would've at least perished fighting. But thanks to our resolve, that wasn't the case and both objectives were accomplished, the second one being successful when the entire facility was evacuated.

I can tell you more, but right now, I must rest, I need to oversee the development of an improved source of electricity tomorrow.

 

[Cephalobro]

While we were successful in destroying the first facility and rescuing the Inklings trapped inside, the morale of my army was still low, but now they felt more confident that maybe, just maybe, we could win the second civil war. And to win it, we must escape Octo Valley. The road to victory was still days off, as we still needed to make sure there was enough power for us the escape these domes. Oh, I almost forgot to tell you about the uniforms, I must tell you about those as well because it's related to the second problem we would inevitably have: restoring our Octoling population.

Don't be fooled by the lies that the Crimson Octarians tell you about Octoling development, no tentacle Octarian can naturally become an Octoling, it's simply not possible. I'm an Octohurler and I'm not afraid to admit that I will never be an Octoling. What the Crimson Octarians do to their Octotroopers for them to get more Elite Octoling soldiers is torturous, something that I would never make my own Octotroopers go through just for more Octoling soldiers in our ranks. As you see, Octolings are the backbone of the Octarian species, they are needed to keep the rest of the Octarians in existence. Without them, we tentacle Octarians wouldn't exist. But unlike the other Octarians, the Octolings need both parents for an offspring to be brought into the world. So the way I designed the armor is meant for more Octolings to get together. And it worked, I saw many of my female Octoling members getting together with the male Octoling members, including my younger niece getting together with my friend's younger son.

Now where was I? Before the second facility, we already had a Crimson Octoling on our side. Before we got to the second facility, I realized that a second Crimson Octoling joined us. But regardless we did the same operation as the first facility in the second facility: Rescue first, destroy last. Little did I know that these two were the first of many Crimson Octarians who would defect to our side later on, and yes, even the tentacle Crimson Octarians would join us. With the torture they could've faced, I can see why they wanted to leave the Crimson army. After the second facility was destroyed, the first Crimson Octoling who joined us met the Octospartans, the elite members of my army, which are older male Octolings with the intent to ensure the enemy's defeat.

I apologize, I tend to ramble on the side details a little too much. Anyways, we had a little bit of downtime after destroying the first facility, so I went back to planning a new home for the Octarians who would escape to the surface. It's stressful, knowing that I would have to put such an important project like that at the back every time there was a new day. I would also often lose sleep because I feared one thing: the possibility of the Ringed Octarian extinction. This is why I made it such an important point to make sure that at least the Octolings would make it to the surface. Though I am sure the Octolings would also want the rest of us to make it to the surface too. But in a war, feelings are not the priority, action is, and escaping Octo Valley should be the ultimate action we do in this war, it's how we will win it.

I will tell you what happened after the second facility was destroyed, but not now, I have some diplomacy to get to.

 

[Cephalobro]

In the domes, the screen showed the sunrise, which meant it was time to get started with the day. I always made sure to wake everyone up by talking to the intercom. I decided to give my army a taste of Inkopolitan food, so I ordered the chefs at the diner of the base to look at the recipe for Inkopolitan food to make them. This would give my army yet another reason to escape the domes they were trapped in. I saw that they had enjoyed the food. But after that, it was time to get to work. So I gave them enough time to eat, then I went outside and waited for them to line up.

Seeing the Octolings already out wearing their armor meant they now knew what to expect at the start of the day, the tentacle Octarians formed one line, the Octolings formed another, and the rescued Inklings formed a separate line. I told them that we were about to start the journey toward the second facility, and they waited for further orders while the base split up into separate buses again. Don't worry, the chefs are fine, in fact, they left right after serving the food. Anyway, I have explained to my army to be prepared in case of an attack by the Crimsons on our way there.

As we journeyed to the next enemy facility to take down, I told my army a scary story about the Chainsaw Shark. I will let you figure out what such a creature is. The story was meant to make the Crimsons seem weak in comparison so the Ringeds could have much better morale when fighting them. After we have arrived, I ordered everyone to go outside of the buses, a part of Octo Valley collapsed right behind the final bus that joined us, but I assured my army that after this facility, we will have a lot more time on our hands. So they promptly lined up as the buses merged together again to become the base.

However, as I was about to give out orders, my younger niece and her boyfriend saw an Inkling in the distance and decided to leave the rest of us. I was angry at both of them for ignoring my orders. So I have waited for them to return, which they did return with some good news, that they managed to forge an alliance with some surface dwellers. However, I had to give both of them probation for ignoring my orders, but that would come later.

Oh looks like I have to cut this short here, I have some emergency to get to.

 

[Cephalobro]

Continuing on from where I left off. After I gave my orders, my army marched towards the second facility where I told them to wait for further orders as I was thinking of a strategy on how to storm said facility. As usual, it consisted of my Octocopter members placing signal jammers on the facility itself so the Crimson Octarians wouldn't be able to call for backup once we stormed it. There my army noticed yet two more Crimson Octolings who were not with the enemy. As for my strategy, I sent my older Octobomber niece as well as a few more Octobombers to drop Splat Bombs to distract the guards. Said guards were Octocommanders, so they would've devastated my army if the distraction wasn't done.

My army snuck in and started attacking the enemy, but the Crimsons had a trick I didn't think we would face: Brainwashing. I was worried about this as it meant the tentacle Octarian members of my army would be forced into the Crimson Octarians' ranks and fight the remaining Octolings who were not brainwashed. This would have also been devastating to my army, so the tentacle Octarian members of my army resisted the brainwashing effect as much as they could, hoping the Octolings to find a way to turn off the brainwashing signal before it was too late.

Thankfully, my Octoling members managed to do so, all the while rescuing another group of Inklings. Upon shutting down the facility, my Octocopter rescue unit blew a hole through the ceiling of the facility to pick up the two Octolings I sent to activate the shutdown and self-destruct sequence. All of them escaped the facility in time, which was not only good, but great because many Crimson Octarians were brainwashed, but turning off the brainwashing signal actually made them defect to my army. And when I say many Crimsons joined my army, I mean a lot. When things couldn't get even better, the power consumption was reduced by more than half, this bought us a lot more time, which was necessary for replenishing supplies.

But after this, I had a serious talk to my niece and her boyfriend about their probation, I told them that while the other members could take a break the next day, these two couldn't. So I gave them a choice of what task they wanted to do to get out of probation. The choices were changing the light bulbs in the base, cleaning the toilets in the base, or helping a supply crew I contacted for the supply run. They chose to help the supply crew, their reason for doing so was to see if they could gather more allies to help and to help get the supply delivered faster so they could get that break. So I sent them off with the supply crew. I took the time to give a tour of the base for the new recruits because our chances of survival were now stacked in our favor. Not long after, the supplies arrived alongside the supply crew, who were a group of Octocopters and Twintacle Octotroopers also arrived with the two Octolings I sent with them.

Enough story, for now, I have to monitor the activity around the Octarian town.

 

[Cephalobro]

A lot happened before the third enemy facility. After the supply crew returned, both my niece and her boyfriend decided to take a break. Both of them returned, but strangely, the boyfriend decided to take up a shift at Grizzco to maybe get a little bit of extra funds we could use in our journey. I wasn't worried, I knew he would come back after the shift because while the Grizzco building in Octo Valley did send its Octoling workers to the surface, those same Octolings couldn't leave the building on the surface. It seemed like everything was going great for my army.

Many Crimsons joined us, which included a few Octolings who visited the surface, everyone was calm, and certain about the future of their survival. I was giving a tour to even more new recruits who joined us, telling them how things worked. Overall, the morale was so much better. Unfortunately, it seems like good things simply can't remain good, there always has to be someone else or another group that ruins the good things for everybody else. Worse yet, it all started happening as I was giving the tour to the new recruits.

As I was giving the tour, we were about to be attacked by the enemy's Octamazons. Thankfully, the one in charge of the Octospartans called over all of the Octospartans to come and defend the base from the attack. What I did not expect was for the Octamazons to give up due to fear so easily, which was great. This all happened based on what I was told by one of my troops. Then one of the Octolings who was not part of my Octospartans unit came outside to see what was happening, he called me over to decide what to do in that situation. However, unfortunately, that wasn't even the worst part, no the worst part came when the Sanitized Octarians attacked us.

My army was already trained in the event of an attack at our base, so I called all of them to come outside to defend it. We managed to win that battle, but we suffered an unfortunate casualty in the process. Everyone was getting confused and even scared, it was chaos! That's when I decided that enough uncertainty was enough and made a mandatory test for all to take. This test was supposed to expose the traitor who caused the attack to happen.

Oh sorry for cutting this off here, I have to prepare defenses for a Big Run.

 

[Cephalobro]

Everyone took that test, and surprisingly, there wasn't a single Crimson Octarian who was a traitor. However, I wasn't going to exclude Inklings from that test either, better not to leave a stone unturned. So the Inklings were last to take the test to see who was a traitor, and I have never expected an Inkling to go this far in sabotaging our journey to the surface. My Octospartans severely punished him for it, and it was a really terrible sight to see, I will not tell you how terrible because it might be too much for you. So I'll say he was crippled with a little bit of blood (or ink?) loss. I actually did not command my Octospartans unit to attack him, they did it themselves. But I also said nothing when they did it because I don't tolerate traitors within my ranks of any kind, if I did, most of us tentacle Octarians wouldn't have made it to the surface.

Anyways, I spent the night figuring out a way to catch traitors and double agents before they could inflict any more casualties on us. It's unfortunate that the casualty was an Inkling who couldn't respawn. This is why I made the rule that the only room in which weapons could be used inside was the designated weapons testing room so that no tentacle Octarian would be accidentally splatted. Come the next morning, my army was just about getting ready to go to the third enemy facility. I was getting worried about living spaces, I had to accommodate so many Inklings we have rescued that I was worried we were starting to run out of space for any Octarian who was freed from DJ Octavio's army. However, my worries were alleviated not only by one of my most recent recruits at the time blasting Calamari Inkantation loudly in the dome, thus freeing many more Octarians, but also because of a surprise visit from Off the Hook.

What also surprised me was that Inkling who was splatted and couldn't respawn, was actually revived, though Sanitized. This visit from Off the Hook instantly raised my army's morale even more, and on top of it all, Off the Hook actually took the Inklings back to Inkopolis with them. However, I could see that the helicopter they were riding in did get crowded, so no Octarian, not even a single Octoling from my army came back with them. Getting the Octarians to the surface is my responsibility, no one else's, that's what the powers above seemed to show me at least. Since my army became excited to get to the surface, I immediately told them to ride the buses again, not wanting to let the opportunity to use this boosted morale become wasted. Everyone gladly complied, and so to the third facility, we went.

I will tell you a bit more another time, but for now, I must check in on a mission I sent my best two soldiers to.

 

[Cephalobro]

We went to the third facility to take it down, with many freed Octarians walking around thanks to Calamari Inkantation blasting out earlier, we stopped on the way to pick them up, which helped replenish our numbers in some capacity. Many of said Octarians picked up being Crimson tentacle Octarians, with some Crimson Octolings mixed in as well.

Anyways, after picking them up, we resumed our journey, eventually arriving at the third facility. After the Sanitized attack we had to deal with the day before combined with the headache-inducing facility on the same day, this third facility was really a breath of fresh air in terms of difficulty. I had some of the troops suggest that we would knock it out right after we arrived. After all, it had a sorry excuse for security, plus the wiring was a mess.

So I complied and we went off, storming it, freeing another group of captured Inklings, and getting a few more Crimson Octarians to our side. After everyone was out of the facility, I was going to have my Octocopters place explosives to destroy the third facility, but it seems like the faulty wiring did the job for them. There was some volatile substance in there that exploded if it came in contact with electricity, so an exposed wire caused the explosion.

I will stop here because the next place we journeyed to was so much more complicated to explain, and I'd rather keep all of the explanations in one story session if possible, I will also have to check on the preparedness for our next fight against the Salmonids.