Chapter 44 - Act of war (2) (1/2)
In the Empire's central colosseum normally meant for gladiators to entertain the masses, or fighting tournaments of varying professionalism a group of young knight initiates were gathered for special training. The Empire knight core were a semi elite gathering of soldiers meant to command regular forces and were therefore mostly made up of young nobles and skilled youths.
”What the f.u.c.k is that?...”
”Looks to be our new temporary instructor.”
”No I mean what the f.u.c.k is that behind him?”
”Yeah what the f.u.c.k is that?”
I looked like a some sort of foreign armored knight, on steroids, Its limbs larger than any normal human or even a beastkin. With its irregular and strange armor plating, it stood a bit over 3 meters high and the armor was completely black with a dull shine that completely enclosed the wearer, if there was any. With its only armament being a large dull silver metal case with reinforcing.
REX Heavy Industries MK V Heavy variable frame type exoskeleton
The mark 5 frame was originally developed for exploration and heavy industry as it was one of the first fully sealed full body exoskeletons. After a small retrofit it seamlessly integrated with ICI type weapon systems, with the earliest proof of concept being a stripped down frame with a heavy machine gun wielded to one of the arms. With minimal modifications a combat type frame was ready, and immediately used for orbital insertion of special forces were hostiles were crushed in a massacre so extreme it could only be described as giants running rampant on a playground filled with toddlers.
Their new instructor looked to be a large demonkin male, his black guild tag clearly hang by his neck and displayed his authority. Between him and the strange suit of armor was a young woman about the age of the knightlings, she wore light black clothing like the demonkin and looked just as bored.
”Okay gather up on me, I'm your new temporary instructor.”
The demonkin lazely sat down in the dirt as he called on the knightlings to gather around as his companions backed off. Most of the 50-ish knightlings ignored him however, and only a single knightling came before him. She was about 20 years old, and wore light clothing ment for training with her light blue eyes showing slight nervousness as she twirled her shoulder length pure black hair.
”Just 1 huh… What's your name miss knightling?”
”It's Paige.”
”Okay let's start training then.”
”Huh!? What about the others?”
”They can join us if they feel like it, for now get a practise weapon”
”O-okay..”
”Please tell me what the f.u.c.k I'm doing here”
While the knightling was getting a practise weapon from a rack at the edge of the area Terra took no time to start complaining.
”Have patience my young grasshopper.”
”I'm leaving”
”Wait a second, if you stay I'll make you a meal in the evening~”
”Personally?”
”Yep, I'll even throw in some of my special made smoked bacon.”
”Really?”
”If you help me out with this yeah.”
Even though Terra hated her teacher like none other she could hardly deny that he had spent most of his free time over the last 800 years of his life perfecting his culinary skills, and the food he made was amazing.
”I'm ready now… What is happening here?”
As Paige returned with a wooden spear she came upon her new teacher grining full face at a drooling woman he brought along.
”Perfect. Paige meet Terra, she's a former ranger from Black Hollow. Terra can you tell her about monster combat?”
”...”
”While we wait for your reward.”
”...”
”I'll cook your meals for 3 days.”
”5 days”
”3 days, with 3 meals a day.”
”..”
”Take it or leave it.”
”Fiiinne. Your name was Paige right? Let's start at the basics, what do you know about monsters?”
”Umm, monsters are animals that have been-”
”Monsters are a treat, no more or less than that. Now there are two primary types of monsters, those that want to eat you and those that want to kill you.”
”But that seems to kind of the same?”
”There is a slight difference. But that I'll get into in a bit, for now we'll go over the types of monsters that will be a likely problem for you in the future and how to deal with them. First is the-”
Going into full instruktor mode like she had returned to her ranger days, Terra slowly drew the other knightlings and within a few minutes she had their full and undivided attention.
”Why would you piss a troll off?”
”For the basic satisfaction, and a pissed off troll is a stupid troll that bleeds out faster.”
”I see..”
”Hey Terra poke me when you get to combat training, I'll be gone for a bit.”
”Now that is not the same with a cyclops- I'll be sure to kick you in the face. Where were I? Ah yeah cyclpos'. They are more-”
As Terra continued her anti monster lecture Dax started meditating.
(ICI connect me to the specter network.)
(CONFIRMED, BIOSIGNATURE LOGIN APPROVED. CONNECTING TO 150 TIMES GUARDIAN SPECTOR, 5 TIMES REX VULTURE, 1 TIMES GUARDIAN ELECTRONIC WARFARE DRONE TYPE 144 'ALBATROSS'…. CONNECTION ESTABLISHED, RAW DATA FEED AT 30 MS RELAY DELAY)
(Okay then… Request data replay from Albatross and show me the last hour of footage centered around me in a 2 click radius.)
(ORDER CONFIRMED, DOWNLOADING COMPRESSED DATA PACKAGE…. COMPLETE, REPLAYING FOOTAGE.)
Immediately as Dax's artificial eye lit up, his scenery changed to a birds eye view of the city Kingsted.
(Okay let's start with the obvious suspects, any blacklisted contacts within range?)
(NONE DETECTED.)
(Hmmm…. Are we sure they're tracking us at the moment?)
(AFFIRMATIVE. MOVEMENT IN THE SUSPECTED CHAIN OF COMMAND DETECTED, 4 CURRIERS ACTIVE IN GRID.)
(Then it must be some sort of magic… Replay mana particle irregularities detected by the Vultures and overlay it on the tac map.)
(SWITCHING SIMULATION TO TACTICAL INTERFACE, STANDBY..)
As ICI once more worked its magic Dax's scenery changed once more. First all the colours and structures disappeared from view, until only white lines appeared in a grid formation on a void background. Then came the details, gray lines traced the architecture of Kingsted and after a few seconds a city of gray lines had appeared.
(NOW OVERLAYING MANA PARTICLE DATAFLOW FORM VULTURE CUSTOM SENSOR PODS.)
Then colour returned, a purple and and red dust suddenly spread throughout the city with intense movement.
(Filter out ambient mana and up the resolution in a 2 click area around me.)
(LOADING PRECISE DATA FROM GUARDIAN ALBATROSS..)
Suddenly most of the dust disappeared from the map, leaving human-like figures of dust of all kinds of different colours.
(Now we're getting somewhere.. Filter out confirmed civilian contacts.)
(AFFIRMATIVE.)
(Let's see… Huh?)
Against Dax's expectations the map turned completely colourless once more.
(Is this the highest resolution data?)
(AFFIRMATIVE.)
(Well shit. Give me a frame of reference, plot me on the map and start the replay from when we left the church's area of influence.)
In response to his new command Dax's view tightened in on a single blue dot and a few blocks around it.
(Start the replay.)
Then the dot started moving, or more like the simulated buildings around it did, watching the replay for about 5 minutes Dax was about to give up when he saw it.
(No luck huh.. WAIT stop the replay and bring up kvadrant at relative grid R3-5-2-9!)