Emily steps through the front door of the Silver Moon rcenary Company three minutes before her eting ti. She heads towards a receptionist who doesn’t have anyone waiting before him.
“Hello, how can I help you today?” he asks as Emily steps up to his counter.
“I need to be pointed towards my assigned squad,” Emily explains.
“I see, one mont please,” the receptionist says, reaching under his desk to pull out a cube with several magic crystals in the centre of each face. “Please inject so mana into this crystal.”
The receptionist holds the artefact out, presenting an empty crystal that Emily fills with a drop of her own mana. The receptionist pulls it back and shuts his eyes, pushing a small strand of his own first circle mana into it.
His eyes snap open a mont later and he steps out from behind the counter.
“Just this way Miss Coldstone,” he says, gesturing for her to follow.
She follows him as he guides her to the far corner of the room where a short, gruff-looking man is sitting at a table, glaring at four other people sitting silently around it. The man’s gaze snaps up as the receptionist and Emily approach.
“Is this our last mber?” he asks sharply.
“Yes,” the receptionist responds without batting an eye at the hostility. “I shall update your contract status to ‘in progress’, and you’re now free to leave.”
The receptionist turns, bowing to Emily once before hurrying back to his counter.
“Tsk,” the angry man clicks his tongue. “You took your sweet ti.”
Emily looks at the man silently. She feels his weak first circle presence and scans his equipnt, so unenchanted tal plating and a clockwork rifle slung over his shoulder, gauging his threat level as low.
“I’m now exactly on ti,” Emily says without looking away, tilting her head slightly. “What’s the problem?”
The man visibly shivers, unsettled by her unruffled deanour, but he grits his teeth and scowls through it.
“You’re a newbie. You should show respect to your seniors and arrive early when assembling as a squad,” he says, raising his chin as if he’s explaining sothing important for her to rember.
“My senior?” Emily asks with a raised brow.
Maybe in age, but not much else. Can he not even tell my circle? I’m barely holding my presence in. Pathetic.
“Yes, your senior. I’m a D rank rcenary, Crackshot, and I’ve taken the job to lead this squad on a single deploynt to guard an outpost on the main front. Now, get up everyone. Thanks to this one we don’t have ti to chat. We need to head to our transport.”
Emily glances at the other people standing up around the table. There are three unawakened n of varying sizes, two of them between Emily and Crackshot in height, and the last one a head taller than her with a shining bald head. The bald man has an axe and a shotgun crossed on his back, while the other two have a rifle and pistol, and a pistol and a bandolier of grenades on display respectively.
The last mber of the group is a short woman, matching Crackshot at Emily’s chest height, with soft features and a short, icy-blue bob. She’s wearing a cloak to cover the rest of her gear, but she emanates the telltale mana fluctuations of a first circle mage.
Every mber of the group is carrying a bag of so form, filled with spare clothes, ammo, and equipnt.
Crackshot leads the way out of the building, with the tall, bald man following close behind him, and Emily lags at the back of the group with the other woman.
“He’s been in a terrible mood since before I arrived,” the woman says with a faint, willowy whisper. “I’m first circle, Ice Petal. It’s nice to et you.”
She noticed at least.
Emily realises the woman has sensed her circle the mont she introduces herself with her own, trying to draw confirmation from her.
“Third circle, Emily.”
Ice Petal blinks in surprise at her lack of a codena, but quickly recovers.
“Have you been to the battlefront before?” she asks as they enter the station and head down onto the platform.
“No,” Emily responds, shaking her head. “But I’ve fought plenty. What about you? Any combat experience?”
“I received so combat training in the academy, but this will be my first ti fighting anything other than captured beasts.”
Emily’s curiosity is peaked by the ntion of captured beasts in the academy, but Crackshot shouts at their squad over the low din of the platform before she can ask about it.
“Right, now that we’re waiting for a train, let’s introduce ourselves,” he declares, gesturing for everyone to stand in a circle. “You already know I’m D rank, Crackshot, so introduce you-“
“Don’t you think we should include our circles?” Ice Petal cuts in, shrinking back slightly when Crackshot’s glare is turned on her but pushing forward nonetheless, her voice almost being drowned by the chattering of nearby pedestrians. “It’s important to have a solid idea of the strengths of our team, right?”
“Tsk, damn fresh graduates,” Crackshot mutters under his breath, quiet enough that only Emily hears him. “Fine! I’m first circle, Crackshot, D rank. Now you!”
“First circle,” the young mage replies despite the bite behind his second introduction. “Ice Petal, F rank.”
“You’re a variant?” Crackshot asks, gritting his teeth when the woman nods, imdiately turning his attention to the bald man beside him. “What about you?”
“Unawakened, Doomaxe,” the man grunts in a deep voice. “F rank.”
I wonder how good he is to make it his codena.
Emily’s eyes drift to the axe handle visible over the man’s shoulder, wondering if they will have ti to spar on the journey.
“Unawakened, Demo, F rank” the man with the grenades says next after a glance from Crackshot.
“Unawakened, Thrashereye, F rank,” the final mber of the squad says, leaving only Emily.
“Third circle, Emily, F rank,” she says, watching Crackshot’s face blanche imdiately.
The three unawakened n beco cautious, a stark change from the reaction she has grown accustod to recently, and no one says anything for a few monts until Crackshot snaps out of his surprise.
“Well, anyway, now that introductions are out of the way,” he says in a serious tone, doing his best to pretend he wasn’t seething with rage minutes ago. “We’ll take a train to the Eastern Docks where a transport is prepared to take us and a few squads from other companies to the western edge of the front.”
Every mber of the squad but Emily reacts to the ntion of the west, with Ice Petal quietly clicking her tongue and Demo disappointedly shifting the gear bag on his back.
“Suck it up, it’s not that bad. We’re only stationed to an outpost for three months and there haven’t been any big movents from Denros recently, so we probably won’t see any enemy contact,” Crackshot explains, staring at Doomaxe and refusing to let his gaze wander towards Emily as he speaks. “For the duration of this mission we will be referred to as squad Advac. Try to rember it.”
A train slides into the station a few minutes later, and they climb into the leading carriage, joined by another group of ard rcenaries who settle down at the opposite end to their squad.
“Crackshot called you a variant earlier,” Emily says as Ice Petal lowers herself slowly into the seat beside her. “What’s that about?”
“A variant? It’s what we call soone who uses an elent other than the four common ones,” Ice Petal replies, glancing up at Emily with a look of realisation. “You’re not from here are you.”
“No, I’m not.”
“Where are you from?”
They chat quietly as the train rolls beneath the city. Emily answers several of Ice Petal’s questions about Modo in return for more information about the Liberte Mage Academy’s curriculum. Their conversation ends when the train stops under their target docks and they disembark, following Crackshot towards their ship.
The ship they climb onto is almost two tis longer than Calypso, with a massive balloon already inflated above it and without any visible weapons at all. After following a crew mber on a tour of the facilities open to them, from the ss hall to their rooms and the workshop available for them to do weapon maintenance, Crackshot dismisses them for the two-day long trip.
***
The ship lands in Bastilo, a city at the southern edge of New Denntimo’s territory, and Emily finally leaves her room to et up with her squad again.
She ets them at the exit to the ship, waiting among several other rcenaries to leave.
“Did you ditate for two days?” Ice Petal asks her. “You didn’t even leave your room to eat.”
“I was making ammo for my guns,” Emily replies, patting the Spitter at her side.
“You’re a weaponsmith as well?”
“Sothing like that.”
They finally filter to the front of the queue and step through the large ship door, descending to the floor on a set of sturdy tal steps.
“Follow
and stay close,” Crackshot calls over the noise of people moving around them as he leads them through the open-air dock towards the rest of the walled city. “We’re heading towards the company’s base here to grab a transport.”
The senior rcenary leads them through the city with practised ease, proving the worth of his experience despite his poor first impression. The Silver Moon base they arrive at is a large compound just outside the southern wall of the city, alongside several others from Black Fang, Snake Nest, and a few of their other competitors.
They enter the compound, presenting their Signatures to the D rank guards, before heading towards a lot filled with large, rugged six-wheeled transports painted in mixed brown hues for desert camouflage. A chanic in greasy overalls walks over as they approach the vehicles.
“Can I help you?” she asks the group, wiping her hands on a rag before throwing it over her shoulder.
She scans over them before her eyes co to rest on Crackshot standing in the lead.
“We’re here to collect a transport. It should be under squad Advac,” he replies, puffing out his chest.
“Got it,” the chanic says, turning towards a nearby counter and grabbing a clipboard with a stack of paper on it, flipping through it. “Yep, here it is, AF6. Follow .”
She tosses the clipboard down and turns, gesturing for the squad to follow her before she charges off into the neatly lined-up trucks. Emily looks through the rows as they move and sees a few cars raised on jacks for people to do maintenance underneath.
They arrive at a truck large enough to fit eight people, where the chanic leaves them to run off and grab the keys.
“Are you driving?” Emily asks Crackshot when she sees him trying to climb into the driver’s seat.
“Yes. Why?” he asks, pausing and looking over at her cautiously.
“How are we finding the outpost? Are you navigating as well?”
“Well, yes? Do you want to drive or sothing?” he questions defensively.
“Yes,” Emily says with a firm nod. “It will only make things easier for you.”
Crackshot grits his teeth, but he nods and tries to cover it.
“Fine. You can drive.”
Good. It looks like he won’t try to pull rank just for the sake of it.
The chanic returns with a set of keys a few minutes later to find Emily sitting behind the truck’s wheel, with Crackshot in the seat beside her, and the rest of the squad in the armoured main cabin.
“Here you go,” she says, handing Emily the keys through the window. “Good luck on your contract.”
“Thank you,” Emily says, taking the keys and sliding them into a slot below the wheel, activating the vehicle’s half-magical engine.
She floods the vehicle with machina, taking in every minute detail as her eyes scan over the controls available to her.
“You do know how to drive, right?” Crackshot asks when she doesn’t pull out imdiately.
“I can learn,” Emily mutters, barely paying him any attention.
This should be simple enough.
Emily releases the handbrake and presses on the accelerator, driving steam through the engine’s pistons as the clutch engages, kicking the vehicle into motion. They slide forward and Emily turns the wheel, guiding the truck along the empty gap between rows of other transports.
She heads towards the gate at the south of the compound, and they roll out onto the open sands before Crackshot pulls a map from his bag. He opens it in his lap as Emily revs the engine, smoothly pulling the truck over a small dune.
This is fun.
Emily turns the wheel, cresting along the dune and riding down without wasting more fuel.
“Head south-south-west for now,” Crackshot instructs her, tracing his fingers along the map to plot their path.
Emily doesn’t argue and quietly drives, enjoying the rumbling of the vehicle’s engine.
After a little over an hour of driving, Emily notices a shadow far off in the sky, slowly approaching their position.
“Sothing’s coming,” she says, pulling Crackshot’s attention away from cleaning his rifle’s cylinder.
“Where?” he asks, scrambling to reassemble his weapon with a bumbling lack of technique that makes Emily want to confiscate it from him.
“In the sky ahead,” she replies, pressing her foot down to accelerate towards the shadow, closing the distance until she’s able to make out so of the individual creatures forming it.
“It’s a massive flock of thrashers,” Emily says, narrowing her eyes and scanning the flock. “I can see four large enough to be second circle.”
“Shit!” Crackshot growls, turning to address the cabin behind them. “Prepare for combat, we have thrashers incoming.”
He turns back, looking at Emily with obvious panic on his face.
“Can you take care of the second circle birds? I don’t want to die here,” he asks.
“Sure,” Emily replies with a shrug, calmly turning towards a nearby raised dune. “Is it common to see such a large group of beasts out here?”
“Half our job is dealing with the groups that get displaced by the fighting,” Crackshot explains, pulling open his bag and pulling out several speed-loaders covered in prepared bullets. “But I didn’t think we’d hit anything on the way to the outpost. Basically, other than fliers, everything should be stopped before getting to this side of our defences.”
Emily slams on the brakes, bringing the truck to a grinding halt before slipping out.
The rest of the squad quickly scramble out as well, leaving their bags behind and setting up with their guns pointed towards the sky. Ice Petal pokes a revolver out of her cloak with one hand, and a small tal stick covered in runes with a cold-blue crystal embedded at the base with the other.
Is that a focus?
Emily watches a small, glistening icicle form at the end of the stick as Ice Petal pours mana into it, and her eyes widen.
A casting aid to let a first circle mage cast proper ranged spells. It’s like a miniature version of the weapons on the patrol ship. How fascinating.
The squad begin shooting, releasing small clouds of smoke from their guns and dropping several of the approaching birds from the sky. Ice Petal’s icicle flies up and punches through a bird, getting stuck in its chest but dropping it to the floor anyway.
It’s still quite weak.
Emily nods, glancing at the rest of the squad fighting in a boringly predictable manner, standing together without any real formation, frantically trying to shoot the birds down.
A little disappointing.
She raises her hands, pulling a haze of purple mana from her belt to reveal her newest weapon, the Stream.
The sleek black and grey rifle is covered in silver engravings, with one lightning crystal in the centre of the shoulder stock, and two lesser wind crystals on either side of the body. The gun’s barrel is shorter than the Whispers, with a similar spiralling pattern, and the magazine beneath the gun is much larger as well, holding forty large rounds.
Emily flicks the gun’s firing selector into fully-automatic and squeezes the trigger, lighting up the silver engravings with a blend of blue and green as the weapon’s full capacity is unloaded within a few seconds, flinging a storm of tal into the air that tears the flock of birds down without missing a soul as the crack of rapid gunfire makes her squad flinch and look over in shock.
The last body hits the floor, and the desert falls silent as Emily looks between the lightly smoking breach of her weapon and the pile of empty bullet casings on the floor below her.
I should find a way to collect those.
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