Butcher of Bleeding Faithful 1
Authors Note:
I've been planning this story for a long time...
Authors Note:
I've been planning this story for a long time...
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Butcher of Bleeding Faithful (Halo/Danmachi)
- Thread starter CMDR Dantae
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CMDR Dantae
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Butcher of Bleeding Faithful 1
Authors Note:
I've been planning this story for a long time. I initially tried to write it years ago, but the words didn't go onto paper as I imagined it, and I ended up changing things. Unfortunately I was unsatisfied with the quality, so I dropped it, hoping to return later. I'm not sure if this will meet my expectations, but I'm not going to wait any longer. Chapters should come out fast for the first few days, before slowing down.
He picked up a magazine, it's Titanium-A housing as black as a dark night.
He tested the springs with a thumb. Only 29 bullets.
He added three, then packed it in his vest.
He checked his HUD.
It had been hours since he'd seen another man.
He was starting to lose hope. He'd known it was a longshot. Survival that is. Everyone was dead, well maybe Jun was still kicking, but either way... they were all that remained of Noble Team.
A red dot pinged on his HUD, and the Category-2 Spartan III sprung into action. His body moved light a fish in water. Like a bird in the air. Fluid, sharp, efficient, deadly.
He drew his MA37, turning round and somersaulting on the ground at 50kmph.
As he leapt back to his feet, his rifle shot up, pointing right at the alien before his eyes.
An Elite Major. It was one of the more deadly members of the Covenant, a Sangheili. They were an honourable species of warriors. From ONI intel, their planet was a deadly place, with surface gravity double that of Earth, and wildlife that made even Reach's look tame. A deathworld, that had a forged a people in death and war.
He was a Spartan, one of the deadliest weapons in the UNSCs disposal. In the last three weeks alone, he had counted himself killing no less than 27,712 Elites, Grunts, Brutes, Jackals, Buggers, Hunters and Engineers on his own.
If he were to include those that he hadn't confirmed dead, or that had been on the ships he had personally helped to destroy, that number might surge to 100,000 or more.
Yet even so, even in spite of the wrath he embodied. The vengeance of the UNSC, that is, a cornered rat, a badger with no way to escape biting back at it's oppressor.
Even still, they chased after him. Believing wholeheartedly that they would join the Great Journey whether they lived or died, as long they served their cursed gods faithfully.
It truly gnawed at his heart.
Because afterall, where was humanities gods?
A fraction of a millisecond later, and his index finger on his left hand pulled the electronic trigger ever so slightly.
A burst of 16 7.62 by 51 millimetre bullets fabricated of pure Titanium-A. Molecularly enhanced metal, that exceeded the strength of the workhorses of the 21st century, tool steels by kilometres and then some. Each built in multiple layers designed for their purpose.
These 16 by some stroke of luck were all armour piercing rounds. Designed to pierce Covenant armour and Energy shields by shattering entirely instead of deforming. Each as brittle and strong as the UNSC could afford.
Every single one hit the aspiring martyr in the face, shattering the frighteningly advanced forcefield, and then his skull in quick succession.
The sound of course drew attention, but unit B312 had already finished restocking.
He moved to his next target with stealth borne of long practice, and longer experience.
Plasma bolts flew over his head as a Banshee screeched through the air, right behind the warriors that had tracked him.
He dodged with contemptuous ease, but unseen to the pilot, his adrenaline surged as he responded to the very serious danger. It's fusion cannon preparing to give him enough radiation to kill him and any of his descendants.
With several grunts firing at him from the other side, he was cornered. In a situation any marine would see as certain death, he didn't flinch or bat an eye.
A plan decided on, he grabbed a grenade and thumbed the ignition, then turned and rushed beneath the nimble craft.
In response, it banked and returned for another run.
Then at the very moment it came with throwing distance, B312 launched his arm in a picture perfect throw. He had always made sure to practise his grenade throws back in Beta Company, but never had he imagined he'd be using them an Anti-air weaponry.
The grenade flung through the air, the pilot failing the register the threat as several plasma bolts struck Noble Six's shields, depleting by a serious amount.
Several grunts and elites drawn by the commotion chose that moment to open fire, their eyes locked onto the Demon with tunnel vision borne of sheer fanaticism.
So all of them were surprised when suddenly the Banshee exploded.
A broken wing struck Six in the arm, his attempt to dodge failing and the impact breaking his shield fully. He turned, and took his last three grenades, activating and throwing them all at once.
The squad of Covenant soldiers all dover for cover, making them but easy pickings for the hardened soldier.
The Elites shield saved it, but by the time it was returning fire, his shield was already back up.
Enemies dead, he looted their equipment, and continued on.
He reached another UNSC outpost. A larger one, littered with the bodies of Spartans. From the looks of it they were IIs. He gave a silent prayer to the dead, hoping they would find peace. Reach was their home, their second home, and now it too was being taken from them.
The Covenant would leave them nothing, not even a meter of land, a handful of sea, a cup of air.
So he would make them pay in enough blood to fill it.
Heartened by equal parts rage and sorrow, he dashed around the encampment. Grabbing weapons and supplies. He took off his helmet and guzzled several water cans and energy bars, before shoving it back on.
His motion sensor detected an aircraft inbound. The Sniper Rifle in his palms swivelled, and he lowered himself down to his belly on the rooftop.
A Phantom dropship. It approached to a safe distance of 3km, then dropped off several Elites, Jackals and Grunts. They were armed to the teeth with plasma rifles, needle rifles and a few Plasma Cannons. They were prepared to fight a small army.
They weren't prepared for a Spartan.
The massive rifle rang out, singing in his hands. Each 14.5x114mm dart moving at hypersonic speeds, only staying on target thanks it's absurd weight of 600 grams.
A Sangheili Ultra fell, the penetrator breaking his protecting energy shield to reach his soft brain matter without a moment of warning. Then he died.
At the explosive of purple fluid, his companions, his warriors, his loyal comrades froze. Terror gripped hold of their souls.
Another bullet sent a CRACK through the desert, and another Elite joined the Ultra on the Great Journey. One of the soldiers, a Major with dark gold armour roared and the entire Warrior Crèche leapt for cover, yet another spraying them with his lifeblood before they could do so.
Trapped behind cover, they could do nothing but wait for the Phantom to return.
Six would have loved to continue picking off the fools, but behind him another two Phantoms approached, with commanders less foolish and inexperienced.
However, he wasn't out of tricks.
As he dropped the SRS99 Sniper Rifle and switched to his DMR, several explosions rang out. He had left mines on the best landing sites, and they had not been detected.
As he leapt from the roof however, he realised that he was the one to have been tricked. No Covenant Commander would think so little of a Demon.
Had his eye sight been even a fraction less keen, he would have missed the blur through the air following him as he fell, the silhouette of a Spec-Ops Elite.
He spun mid-air and blocked the energy sword with his rifle. It launched it's fist, an energy danger extended to cut his throat.
He twisted, his head moving out of the way just as his hips launched his legs at the assassins torso, smashing it back into the wall they had just cleared.
But he failed to completely avoid the blade, it's edge draining his shields.
His arm flashed up, and several pistol shots rang out.
However, to the horror of the Elite that had planned this event down to the wind speed and temperature, it was not an M6G Magnum.
Instead, he fired a suppressed M6C/SOCOM, it's beautiful black finish highlighted by glowing green iron sights.
He had scavenged it from a dead Spartan. Perhaps a personal weapon? Kurt had always told them that the dead would prefer to stayed alive, and not to worry about pilfering their weapons. He wasn't sure he agreed, but it wasn't like he had a choice.
The Extra Terrestrial reached with it's left hand for it's own sidearm, and froze in shock when it grasped air.
Six raised his own left arm, and fired the Plasma Rifle in sync with his pistol.
It died quickly.
From there, the battle grew more frantic. After yet another stratagem of their Ship Master failed, the Covenant Armada resorted to throwing more and more numbers at him.
Wraith tanks were dropped off by Spirit dropships, grunts and jackals were fielded in the hundreds, all the while highly trained Elites took their turn at killing the Demon.
He dispatched each with deadly efficiency, punishing them with death for their hubris.
As a grenade he had flung ripped through a squad of Jackals with deadly shrapnel, Six heard a familiar sound.
He twisted and jumped, barely dodging the green streak of plasma, and landing in the sand. He raised his Assault Rifle and let loose a carefully placed burst of bullets, letting out a signature staccato.
As the Mgalekgolo Hunters raised their shields to protect their bodies, he launched himself upwards, and rushed behind the nearby building. However, his attempt to gain a measure of respite was doomed to failure as a dozen Elites rushed forth in footstep from the other side.
Without hesitation he rushed at them. Lifting a pilfered Concussion rifle to scatter them across the encampment. Several that were hit dead on being sent flying. He dropped the spent exotic weapon then leapt and landed on the nearest aliens head, crushing it's skull before using it as springboard to slam the next with his MA37, braining it in one.
He was out of grenades, so had no choice but to eliminated the rest in a mix of bullet fire and close quarters combat, but the Hunters were approaching now, his eyes tracking the blips on his HUD, their weapons firing.
So instead, he threw a dark coloured rock.
Several Elites took cover, not noticing that it was a trick. In that time, he reached for the dead body by his feat and picked up two plasma grenades, then ducked as Fuel Rod Guns reached for his life.
Moments later it was just him and the Hunters. He fired his rifle in short bursts, waiting patiently.
Then as the Hunter on his left stepped a little too close, too recklessly, he fired a single bullet at the grenade beneath it's feet.
It's Battle Brother roared in anger and mourning at it's death. He rushed forth, not afraid of the massive furious beast charging at him in frenzy to attain vengeance. With a simply manoeuvre, he leaped over it's head and grabbed it's shoulder before slamming his armoured greaves into its lower back.
Then he raised his right arm and quite literally dismantled the colony. It was barely in time as his shields starting eating fire before he was finished.
He rushed off, dashing further into the western part of the encampment and picking up a shotgun.
He used the urban environment to his advantage, picking off each enemy one by one.
Then Wraiths starting blasting the place apart.
Plans changed, he rushed into the Armada.
Wraiths, Ghosts, Revenants, Troops all fired at him as one.
Utilising the MJOLNIR Dropshield, he made himself some mobile cover, then stepped back and unleashed a hail of grenades.
Smoke covering their vision, he circled around and flanked the entire Warrior Crèche. Wraiths fired plasma artillery at him, only to miss and hit their comrades instead. He ripped metal and flesh apart, destroying the two Wraiths at the rear and the Jackal squad in seconds.
Elites rushed for him, but touched only bullet and plasma. Their shields and bodies dismantled with ruthless efficiency. A Grunt screamed for mercy, but it's neck was broken all the same. A Jackal maddened by the chaos leap for his face, biting at his raised arm with manic fury and fear.
He ignored it's ineffective assault, shoving his fist into an Elites face, before using it's corpse as cover from it's very comrades.
Finally his shields broke, and with it his actions grew more rapid, more careful as he pushed himself to the limit.
A sequence of shots from a needle rifle glanced off his helmet, cracking his faceplate and marring the heads up display.
He returned fire quickly, still able to read his motion sensor but the damage was done.
The Demon visibly wounded, the zealots of this wretched Covenant grew emboldened.
Several Ultra's approached, he wasn't sure when they'd shown up, but it mattered little at this junction.
His dispatched them one after the other, finally firing both his rifle and pistol at once.
But there was one behind him.
He waited, then at the last moment leaned back and slammed his shoulder into it's neck, breaking the shield and stunning it.
His weapons hit the floor as his knife hit it's skull.
Then another leapt for him, energy daggers raised.
A kick to the stomach left its energy shield broken and it's body reeling.
Then another, an energy sword raised.
He kicked again, but this was Zealot, it's shields stronger and body more armoured, it dropped it's weapon, but recovered slowly.
He spun trying to escape, but a second from his left shoved a 3000 degree blade through his shoulder.
The pain hit hard. He was a Spartan, but burns like this weren't something you could simply ignore.
Gritting his teeth so hard he felt them crack, he grabbed it's head with his left arm and pulled it over his head, smashing it into the energy sword the first Zealot had picked back up.
Then he swung his arm, strength fuelled by desperation smashing into it's skull.
He breathed heavily. He was seriously wounded, biofoam was ejected from his armour, and a cocktail of drugs followed, but he couldn't exactly take a moment to recover. He sluggishly reached out, and picked up the energy sword, drawing it from the corpse of the enemy that had wounded him so.
Holding it in his off hand while his right arm swung uselessly by his side, he raised his eyes.
His weapons had run out of bullets, his shields were down, his armour was damaged, he was wounded and his body was spent.
This was it. He had fleetingly hoped to reach another surviving regiment of the UNSC, perhaps even find a way off this planet, but no such luck. He would die here, breathing his last breath as he gave his all.
Before him however, his enemies weren't firing. Instead, before them stood a lone Zealot. It's armour white... a Ship Master?
"Impressive... Demon." It's mouth spoke tentatively, as if tasting the English language.
He responded emotionlessly, "I'm ready, are you?" The spirit of a dead friend comforting his tired mind.
The towering alien guffawed, the gazed at him with knowing eyes.
Instead of spitting on his bravado however, it's gaze was one of respect. Curious that.
They'll kill him, kill every last man, women and child on every planet they can get their filthy claws on, destroy everything of human origin within their grasp. Grant mercy to no-one, without exception.
But before they kill him, they'll give him respect.
He could make do with that.
He charged.
Weapons made of a quantum phenomena mankind could barely understand clashed as one, with electricity leaking through the air and damaging their bodies.
Electricity leapt from the clashing blades, damaging the Elites shields and leaving electric burns on Six's broken body.
Yet even so, he fought on, with just one arm, and no hope of survival.
Fighting for that last victory.
Finally he saw it. Victory held within the grasp of opportunity.
His blade lowered down, and flicked up, sending shards of molten rock into the Zealots face, then his blade pirouetted for it's neck.
It was blocked like nothing. Within that moment, Noble Six, no... Tom-B312 realised, this Ship Master was just playing with him. The Sangheili before him was a genius, as skilled in swordsmanship as any Spartan. Unlike him however, it was unwounded, well rested, and prepared.
There was no chance of winning this fight if he played by the rules.
So he didn't.
See, the interesting thing about MJOLNIR armour, is that it ran on piezoelectrics. Now, a piezoelectric material converts electricity into kinetic energy or vice versa. However, it was stated in all the handbooks that MJOLNIR doesn't act as simple synthetic musculature, but instead runs electricity constantly and somehow enhances every force applied on it.
But, that wasn't to say it couldn't act as synthetic musculature.
Then, with a few quick thoughts, his energy shield function was altered, all of it's recharge strength focused on his left palm, the focusing parameters set to max, leaving it floating several centimetres above his lowered hand.
He circled once more, several Grunts and Jackals reacting to the odd light. At this the seasoned Veterans eyes lit up, but it was too late to react, he had no plan for the unknown. No contingency that could conquer the unexpected.
The blade feinted to his left, then drew back instead of clashing with his own blade and instead, Six's left arm caught the blade on his left hand. Agony shot through his veins, as his very bones were melted, his blood boiling.
The Elite tried to twist it's blade out of the grasp, but even without his iron grip, the blade was stuck tight to the energy shield emitters slowly melting on his palm.
He decapitated the murderer, the monster that had seen him hunted down, not like an animal, but like a criminal, like a Demon.
It's eyes seemed to smile even as it's head flew from its shoulders.
Then, without warning, his vision sank.
He looked down, and saw black.
He was falling?
Acting quickly, he holstered the energy sword and grabbed the one melting his hand, before deactivating it.
Then light appeared once more.
He was falling.
In the last seconds before impact, he reset his shields and turned up his armour gel to max.
It was a good thing he did, or he might not have woken up.
Authors Note:
I've been planning this story for a long time. I initially tried to write it years ago, but the words didn't go onto paper as I imagined it, and I ended up changing things. Unfortunately I was unsatisfied with the quality, so I dropped it, hoping to return later. I'm not sure if this will meet my expectations, but I'm not going to wait any longer. Chapters should come out fast for the first few days, before slowing down.
[ I ]
He picked up a magazine, it's Titanium-A housing as black as a dark night.
He tested the springs with a thumb. Only 29 bullets.
He added three, then packed it in his vest.
He checked his HUD.
It had been hours since he'd seen another man.
He was starting to lose hope. He'd known it was a longshot. Survival that is. Everyone was dead, well maybe Jun was still kicking, but either way... they were all that remained of Noble Team.
A red dot pinged on his HUD, and the Category-2 Spartan III sprung into action. His body moved light a fish in water. Like a bird in the air. Fluid, sharp, efficient, deadly.
He drew his MA37, turning round and somersaulting on the ground at 50kmph.
As he leapt back to his feet, his rifle shot up, pointing right at the alien before his eyes.
An Elite Major. It was one of the more deadly members of the Covenant, a Sangheili. They were an honourable species of warriors. From ONI intel, their planet was a deadly place, with surface gravity double that of Earth, and wildlife that made even Reach's look tame. A deathworld, that had a forged a people in death and war.
He was a Spartan, one of the deadliest weapons in the UNSCs disposal. In the last three weeks alone, he had counted himself killing no less than 27,712 Elites, Grunts, Brutes, Jackals, Buggers, Hunters and Engineers on his own.
If he were to include those that he hadn't confirmed dead, or that had been on the ships he had personally helped to destroy, that number might surge to 100,000 or more.
Yet even so, even in spite of the wrath he embodied. The vengeance of the UNSC, that is, a cornered rat, a badger with no way to escape biting back at it's oppressor.
Even still, they chased after him. Believing wholeheartedly that they would join the Great Journey whether they lived or died, as long they served their cursed gods faithfully.
It truly gnawed at his heart.
Because afterall, where was humanities gods?
A fraction of a millisecond later, and his index finger on his left hand pulled the electronic trigger ever so slightly.
A burst of 16 7.62 by 51 millimetre bullets fabricated of pure Titanium-A. Molecularly enhanced metal, that exceeded the strength of the workhorses of the 21st century, tool steels by kilometres and then some. Each built in multiple layers designed for their purpose.
These 16 by some stroke of luck were all armour piercing rounds. Designed to pierce Covenant armour and Energy shields by shattering entirely instead of deforming. Each as brittle and strong as the UNSC could afford.
Every single one hit the aspiring martyr in the face, shattering the frighteningly advanced forcefield, and then his skull in quick succession.
The sound of course drew attention, but unit B312 had already finished restocking.
He moved to his next target with stealth borne of long practice, and longer experience.
Plasma bolts flew over his head as a Banshee screeched through the air, right behind the warriors that had tracked him.
He dodged with contemptuous ease, but unseen to the pilot, his adrenaline surged as he responded to the very serious danger. It's fusion cannon preparing to give him enough radiation to kill him and any of his descendants.
With several grunts firing at him from the other side, he was cornered. In a situation any marine would see as certain death, he didn't flinch or bat an eye.
A plan decided on, he grabbed a grenade and thumbed the ignition, then turned and rushed beneath the nimble craft.
In response, it banked and returned for another run.
Then at the very moment it came with throwing distance, B312 launched his arm in a picture perfect throw. He had always made sure to practise his grenade throws back in Beta Company, but never had he imagined he'd be using them an Anti-air weaponry.
The grenade flung through the air, the pilot failing the register the threat as several plasma bolts struck Noble Six's shields, depleting by a serious amount.
Several grunts and elites drawn by the commotion chose that moment to open fire, their eyes locked onto the Demon with tunnel vision borne of sheer fanaticism.
So all of them were surprised when suddenly the Banshee exploded.
A broken wing struck Six in the arm, his attempt to dodge failing and the impact breaking his shield fully. He turned, and took his last three grenades, activating and throwing them all at once.
The squad of Covenant soldiers all dover for cover, making them but easy pickings for the hardened soldier.
The Elites shield saved it, but by the time it was returning fire, his shield was already back up.
Enemies dead, he looted their equipment, and continued on.
He reached another UNSC outpost. A larger one, littered with the bodies of Spartans. From the looks of it they were IIs. He gave a silent prayer to the dead, hoping they would find peace. Reach was their home, their second home, and now it too was being taken from them.
The Covenant would leave them nothing, not even a meter of land, a handful of sea, a cup of air.
So he would make them pay in enough blood to fill it.
Heartened by equal parts rage and sorrow, he dashed around the encampment. Grabbing weapons and supplies. He took off his helmet and guzzled several water cans and energy bars, before shoving it back on.
His motion sensor detected an aircraft inbound. The Sniper Rifle in his palms swivelled, and he lowered himself down to his belly on the rooftop.
A Phantom dropship. It approached to a safe distance of 3km, then dropped off several Elites, Jackals and Grunts. They were armed to the teeth with plasma rifles, needle rifles and a few Plasma Cannons. They were prepared to fight a small army.
They weren't prepared for a Spartan.
The massive rifle rang out, singing in his hands. Each 14.5x114mm dart moving at hypersonic speeds, only staying on target thanks it's absurd weight of 600 grams.
A Sangheili Ultra fell, the penetrator breaking his protecting energy shield to reach his soft brain matter without a moment of warning. Then he died.
At the explosive of purple fluid, his companions, his warriors, his loyal comrades froze. Terror gripped hold of their souls.
Another bullet sent a CRACK through the desert, and another Elite joined the Ultra on the Great Journey. One of the soldiers, a Major with dark gold armour roared and the entire Warrior Crèche leapt for cover, yet another spraying them with his lifeblood before they could do so.
Trapped behind cover, they could do nothing but wait for the Phantom to return.
Six would have loved to continue picking off the fools, but behind him another two Phantoms approached, with commanders less foolish and inexperienced.
However, he wasn't out of tricks.
As he dropped the SRS99 Sniper Rifle and switched to his DMR, several explosions rang out. He had left mines on the best landing sites, and they had not been detected.
As he leapt from the roof however, he realised that he was the one to have been tricked. No Covenant Commander would think so little of a Demon.
Had his eye sight been even a fraction less keen, he would have missed the blur through the air following him as he fell, the silhouette of a Spec-Ops Elite.
He spun mid-air and blocked the energy sword with his rifle. It launched it's fist, an energy danger extended to cut his throat.
He twisted, his head moving out of the way just as his hips launched his legs at the assassins torso, smashing it back into the wall they had just cleared.
But he failed to completely avoid the blade, it's edge draining his shields.
His arm flashed up, and several pistol shots rang out.
However, to the horror of the Elite that had planned this event down to the wind speed and temperature, it was not an M6G Magnum.
Instead, he fired a suppressed M6C/SOCOM, it's beautiful black finish highlighted by glowing green iron sights.
He had scavenged it from a dead Spartan. Perhaps a personal weapon? Kurt had always told them that the dead would prefer to stayed alive, and not to worry about pilfering their weapons. He wasn't sure he agreed, but it wasn't like he had a choice.
The Extra Terrestrial reached with it's left hand for it's own sidearm, and froze in shock when it grasped air.
Six raised his own left arm, and fired the Plasma Rifle in sync with his pistol.
It died quickly.
From there, the battle grew more frantic. After yet another stratagem of their Ship Master failed, the Covenant Armada resorted to throwing more and more numbers at him.
Wraith tanks were dropped off by Spirit dropships, grunts and jackals were fielded in the hundreds, all the while highly trained Elites took their turn at killing the Demon.
He dispatched each with deadly efficiency, punishing them with death for their hubris.
As a grenade he had flung ripped through a squad of Jackals with deadly shrapnel, Six heard a familiar sound.
He twisted and jumped, barely dodging the green streak of plasma, and landing in the sand. He raised his Assault Rifle and let loose a carefully placed burst of bullets, letting out a signature staccato.
As the Mgalekgolo Hunters raised their shields to protect their bodies, he launched himself upwards, and rushed behind the nearby building. However, his attempt to gain a measure of respite was doomed to failure as a dozen Elites rushed forth in footstep from the other side.
Without hesitation he rushed at them. Lifting a pilfered Concussion rifle to scatter them across the encampment. Several that were hit dead on being sent flying. He dropped the spent exotic weapon then leapt and landed on the nearest aliens head, crushing it's skull before using it as springboard to slam the next with his MA37, braining it in one.
He was out of grenades, so had no choice but to eliminated the rest in a mix of bullet fire and close quarters combat, but the Hunters were approaching now, his eyes tracking the blips on his HUD, their weapons firing.
So instead, he threw a dark coloured rock.
Several Elites took cover, not noticing that it was a trick. In that time, he reached for the dead body by his feat and picked up two plasma grenades, then ducked as Fuel Rod Guns reached for his life.
Moments later it was just him and the Hunters. He fired his rifle in short bursts, waiting patiently.
Then as the Hunter on his left stepped a little too close, too recklessly, he fired a single bullet at the grenade beneath it's feet.
It's Battle Brother roared in anger and mourning at it's death. He rushed forth, not afraid of the massive furious beast charging at him in frenzy to attain vengeance. With a simply manoeuvre, he leaped over it's head and grabbed it's shoulder before slamming his armoured greaves into its lower back.
Then he raised his right arm and quite literally dismantled the colony. It was barely in time as his shields starting eating fire before he was finished.
He rushed off, dashing further into the western part of the encampment and picking up a shotgun.
He used the urban environment to his advantage, picking off each enemy one by one.
Then Wraiths starting blasting the place apart.
Plans changed, he rushed into the Armada.
Wraiths, Ghosts, Revenants, Troops all fired at him as one.
Utilising the MJOLNIR Dropshield, he made himself some mobile cover, then stepped back and unleashed a hail of grenades.
Smoke covering their vision, he circled around and flanked the entire Warrior Crèche. Wraiths fired plasma artillery at him, only to miss and hit their comrades instead. He ripped metal and flesh apart, destroying the two Wraiths at the rear and the Jackal squad in seconds.
Elites rushed for him, but touched only bullet and plasma. Their shields and bodies dismantled with ruthless efficiency. A Grunt screamed for mercy, but it's neck was broken all the same. A Jackal maddened by the chaos leap for his face, biting at his raised arm with manic fury and fear.
He ignored it's ineffective assault, shoving his fist into an Elites face, before using it's corpse as cover from it's very comrades.
Finally his shields broke, and with it his actions grew more rapid, more careful as he pushed himself to the limit.
A sequence of shots from a needle rifle glanced off his helmet, cracking his faceplate and marring the heads up display.
He returned fire quickly, still able to read his motion sensor but the damage was done.
The Demon visibly wounded, the zealots of this wretched Covenant grew emboldened.
Several Ultra's approached, he wasn't sure when they'd shown up, but it mattered little at this junction.
His dispatched them one after the other, finally firing both his rifle and pistol at once.
But there was one behind him.
He waited, then at the last moment leaned back and slammed his shoulder into it's neck, breaking the shield and stunning it.
His weapons hit the floor as his knife hit it's skull.
Then another leapt for him, energy daggers raised.
A kick to the stomach left its energy shield broken and it's body reeling.
Then another, an energy sword raised.
He kicked again, but this was Zealot, it's shields stronger and body more armoured, it dropped it's weapon, but recovered slowly.
He spun trying to escape, but a second from his left shoved a 3000 degree blade through his shoulder.
The pain hit hard. He was a Spartan, but burns like this weren't something you could simply ignore.
Gritting his teeth so hard he felt them crack, he grabbed it's head with his left arm and pulled it over his head, smashing it into the energy sword the first Zealot had picked back up.
Then he swung his arm, strength fuelled by desperation smashing into it's skull.
He breathed heavily. He was seriously wounded, biofoam was ejected from his armour, and a cocktail of drugs followed, but he couldn't exactly take a moment to recover. He sluggishly reached out, and picked up the energy sword, drawing it from the corpse of the enemy that had wounded him so.
Holding it in his off hand while his right arm swung uselessly by his side, he raised his eyes.
His weapons had run out of bullets, his shields were down, his armour was damaged, he was wounded and his body was spent.
This was it. He had fleetingly hoped to reach another surviving regiment of the UNSC, perhaps even find a way off this planet, but no such luck. He would die here, breathing his last breath as he gave his all.
Before him however, his enemies weren't firing. Instead, before them stood a lone Zealot. It's armour white... a Ship Master?
"Impressive... Demon." It's mouth spoke tentatively, as if tasting the English language.
He responded emotionlessly, "I'm ready, are you?" The spirit of a dead friend comforting his tired mind.
The towering alien guffawed, the gazed at him with knowing eyes.
Instead of spitting on his bravado however, it's gaze was one of respect. Curious that.
They'll kill him, kill every last man, women and child on every planet they can get their filthy claws on, destroy everything of human origin within their grasp. Grant mercy to no-one, without exception.
But before they kill him, they'll give him respect.
He could make do with that.
He charged.
Weapons made of a quantum phenomena mankind could barely understand clashed as one, with electricity leaking through the air and damaging their bodies.
Electricity leapt from the clashing blades, damaging the Elites shields and leaving electric burns on Six's broken body.
Yet even so, he fought on, with just one arm, and no hope of survival.
Fighting for that last victory.
Finally he saw it. Victory held within the grasp of opportunity.
His blade lowered down, and flicked up, sending shards of molten rock into the Zealots face, then his blade pirouetted for it's neck.
It was blocked like nothing. Within that moment, Noble Six, no... Tom-B312 realised, this Ship Master was just playing with him. The Sangheili before him was a genius, as skilled in swordsmanship as any Spartan. Unlike him however, it was unwounded, well rested, and prepared.
There was no chance of winning this fight if he played by the rules.
So he didn't.
See, the interesting thing about MJOLNIR armour, is that it ran on piezoelectrics. Now, a piezoelectric material converts electricity into kinetic energy or vice versa. However, it was stated in all the handbooks that MJOLNIR doesn't act as simple synthetic musculature, but instead runs electricity constantly and somehow enhances every force applied on it.
But, that wasn't to say it couldn't act as synthetic musculature.
Then, with a few quick thoughts, his energy shield function was altered, all of it's recharge strength focused on his left palm, the focusing parameters set to max, leaving it floating several centimetres above his lowered hand.
He circled once more, several Grunts and Jackals reacting to the odd light. At this the seasoned Veterans eyes lit up, but it was too late to react, he had no plan for the unknown. No contingency that could conquer the unexpected.
The blade feinted to his left, then drew back instead of clashing with his own blade and instead, Six's left arm caught the blade on his left hand. Agony shot through his veins, as his very bones were melted, his blood boiling.
The Elite tried to twist it's blade out of the grasp, but even without his iron grip, the blade was stuck tight to the energy shield emitters slowly melting on his palm.
He decapitated the murderer, the monster that had seen him hunted down, not like an animal, but like a criminal, like a Demon.
It's eyes seemed to smile even as it's head flew from its shoulders.
Then, without warning, his vision sank.
He looked down, and saw black.
He was falling?
Acting quickly, he holstered the energy sword and grabbed the one melting his hand, before deactivating it.
Then light appeared once more.
He was falling.
In the last seconds before impact, he reset his shields and turned up his armour gel to max.
It was a good thing he did, or he might not have woken up.
[ I ]
CMDR Dantae
The Scribe
- Joined
- May 31, 2020
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Butcher of Bleeding Faithful 2
There was nothing.
Stars flew, lights dash, and blood flew.
A face, alien as it was vile. It's lower mandibles spat out a few short words.
"You Demon will meet your end, at my hand or the hand of one of my brothers, and the filthy vermin that is your species shall follow shortly after. Suffer, and know your damnation is certain."
Purple blood marred the beasts face, its amber eyes glaring as the slit pupils narrowed in sheer venom.
Then the knife dropped to its neck and the stars were back again.
Worlds, alien and familiar. Gas giants, rocky worlds, water worlds and more.
Then his vision began shaking. Slowly it accelerated, the tremors growing more powerful until it felt as if the very world was shaking...
…
He woke up.
Immediately the sensation of pain shot through his entire body. Aches and pains borne of long hours of battle and many neglected wounds.
He forced himself to ignore it, then assessed his situation.
His surroundings were... alien. A cave, unlike any he had ever seen before. It's walls covered in an odd glowing moss, providing barely enough light for him see. Even Spartans didn't have perfect nightvision, although his augmentations had brought him close. The cave was shaped bizarrely, a long straight hallway marred by rough sections of rock, as if it was both artificial and natural at the same time.
It was almost like someone had grown a cave into the shape of hallway.
His eyes flicked to his cracked visor, readouts lining his HUD.
A contact had been detected by his motion sensor, it had passed by parallel to the hallway.
Perhaps a large vehicle? If it was making tremors... no that was just a dream... There's no way the UNSC have any forces left on... on...
Where was he exactly? What had happened? Had he somehow fallen through, a Slipspace portal? Trains of thought rushed through his head, and panic started to set in, before his training took over. He took several deep breaths, and considered the situation.
He had MJOLNIR, the most advanced piece of equipment in the UNSCs arsenal. Was he still on Reach? Well, he could find that out easily enough. Several interactions with his neural lace later, and he was looking at a readout display showing the suits sensors for various scientific data. Local gravity, atmosphere, gyroscopes, electromagnetic spectrum, a quantum clock and a few things he was unfamiliar with.
The readings for gravity were slightly different from Reach's norm, but it was within the bounds of error, especially if he was underground. The readings for atmosphere however... Oxygen was at 28% instead of 21%, and several anomalous elements were showing up on the spectrometer. They had neutron-proton counts that simply made no sense...
He was definitely not on Reach anymore, but these readings, was he even still in UNSC Space?
It didn't matter at this point. He had to get moving. He was low on food and water, injured and alone. He glanced around and saw the corpse of the Ship Master he had just killed... Looking at his combat footage, 7hrs and 24minutes ago.
There were two energy swords, one plasma rifle, and a couple of plasma grenades. He looked over the white armoured corpse for a few seconds, then quickly looted the weapons and grabbed a small harness on the aliens back.
Popping it open, and a stash of emergency food and water was revealed. He couldn't eat the food but the water would do him good.
Then he heard a tremor. The caves started shaking, the walls almost vibrating. It slowly grew in intensity, then a blip appeared on his HUD, fragmented by spiderweb cracks on his faceplate.
Then another appeared, and another and another.
They were approaching fast. At least 300kmph, if not faster. Yet, the motion sensor was reading them as... Infantry?
Were they using jetpacks maybe? But then why was the cave shaking.
They turned suddenly, and his head shot up.
Their bodies were red. Naked red skin covered a body like a man. The legs were human, the arms were human, even the torso was closer to a normal man than any of the aliens within the Covenant Legions, but...
Their heads, were not those of humans, but those of bulls. With massive horns and glowing red eyes they emanated an unnatural, unnerving atmosphere.
They were all moving fast, right towards him.
His adrenaline kicked into gear barely in time, smashing into his confusion like a train into a car as his Spartan Time slowed down his perception to a snails pace.
They were moving fast yes, as fast as a cheap racing car, but he was a Spartan. He could dodge bullets if was sufficiently prepared first.
He moved into a stance, and drew the first energy sword from his hip. Then his eyes glanced over the area, tracking everything. The Sangheili corpse, the cracks and indents in the walls and floor. The parts of the stone that looked just a little bit more fragile than others.
A plan started forming in his head. In the meanwhile, he activated every sensor in his helmet to figure out just what he was dealing with.
IR lasers showed something intriguing. Their bodies possessed a large crystal shaped object in their chests, all in the exact same spot. Their bodies gave off too much heat to tell if it was a different temperature, but for some reason it was giving off emissions in the Ultra-Violet spectrum. Each creature was precisely 6 foot tall, and their bones seemed rather large and bulky.
He set off several other scans, but he was out of time. He minimised his readouts, and prepared for a fight.
When the first alien reached a certain distance, he leapt into action. He rushed forth, timing it so that the dead Elite was between them.
Instead of changing directions or continuing on, the Bull-headed beast lowered it's body and sprung, it's legs leaving cracks in the stone floor.
Just as predicted.
Whatever these were, they weren't particularly smart. It landed on the corpse, and tripped from the unexpected hazard, then before it could recover, Six was in it's face. It didn't even have time to scream before the energy sword had started burning through it's neck.
Decapitating this creature was an odd experience, it's flesh and bone felt far more solid than they should. He was barely able to free his blade in time. But then, well it was clearly no normal animal, was it perhaps actually a machine of some kind?
Immediately, he leapt back, dodging the tackles of two more.
A thought flashed. Should he use the plasma grenades? No, too risky. He didn't know what else he might have to deal with.
His feinted at one, then rushed to the second.
It's telegraphed strike was easily dodged by a hairs breadth even as it sent dust into the air from sheer air pressure, and he slammed its torso with his left shoulder, his energy shield shimmering slightly from the impact.
Yet instead of being sent flying by the half ton Spartan wrecking ball, it was only flung off it's feet.
They were heavy. Very heavy.
He dashed forth, blade splitting it's skull before he turned to catch the next attacker on the sword.
Then he ducked as newcomer struck from his left, and he twisted, strike out with his leg.
Again, the impact did far less than it should have, but it mattered little as his blade found it's neck anyway.
Then there was two.
Just him, and one last Bull.
He flicked his readouts back on, and decided to see what would happen if he damaged the crystal.
He circled the creature, it's hesitation clear even as it seemed to stare in mild fear mixed with pure wrath.
Yet hatred seemed to win out, as it raised its arms overhead and howled, the sound shaking the cavern.
Then it charged.
He stepped forth and jumped, leaping off it's face.
The Beast was sent sprawling back by the impact, yet it was unharmed.
The full weight of a Spartan III on it's face didn't even leave a cut?
His feet then finally reached the ceiling.
He changed the settings on his energy shields and activated a very expensive piece of equipment.
Designed to improve the effectiveness of energy shields by using a heavily modified Grav-plate, several capacitors activated and shoved large amounts of energy into several devices that did a total of two things.
They increased the power and effectiveness of his energy shields by an order of magnitude, and then they increased the effects of gravity on his body by several dozen times.
He fell onto the Bull headed anomaly, energy sword held straight in front of him, and pierced through it's centre.
Then, instead of simply dying as was polite...
It dissolved into ash before his very eyes.
Well... that was unique. What did he just get himself into?
Spartan Tom-B312 stood there in a bit of a daze as he collected himself, trying desperately to work out what he was in for.
He eventually removed his helmet to have a drink and eat some food. The UNSC high energy snack bars were filled with all the necessary nutrition and plenty of calories. Spartans tended to have pretty efficient digestive systems, but there was only so much you could compensate for, especially in high stress battles like this. MJOLNIR tended to cut down on that since he didn't need to use as much force to move, but when he was on alone like this...
He shook his head, and sighed, then picked his helmet back up.
Right before he put it back on, he heard a faint whistling sound.
He hesitated for just a moment, and then to his shock, saw two young girls, humans at that, round the corner the bizarre animals had originated from. At supersonic speeds.
He debated putting his helmet back on, then thought better of it, tucking it under his shoulder.
With a couple of seconds, they had approached to a few metres away, stopping on a dime with seemingly no discomfort.
They had very similar appearances. Both were about Five and a half feet tall. Their skin was well tanned, and their eyes were dark green.
Both had black hair, but while the one to his left had it loose reaching down to her back, the one on the right had it tied up above her shoulders.
There was no mistaking it. They were human. There was no mistaking it, no human alive, Spartan or not could move like that.
Which was it?
"Hey there big guy! Nice kills you pulled off here, I wish you waited for us to see."
The short haired girl spoke first, voice high pitched and seemingly excited. An elaborate golden necklace adorned with blue crystal gems hung from her neck, and she wore a simple wide band of white cloth wrapped around her chest with a sand yellow and brown loincloth around her waist. There was a star symbol her belt.
He stood up slightly straighter, lessons learned from many dead soldiers helping him choose the best action.
As Jorge had always said, Spartans were more than weapons, they were a symbol. But they were most certainly still weapons.
He gave his best smile, and spoke slowly.
"Excuse me Ma'am, I appear to have gotten myself rather lost. I don't suppose you could tell me where I am?"
"Huh? The Dungeon of course?" She appeared thrown off by that simple question.
Then the other young women, presumably a sister, or cousin maybe? She grabbed the girl by the cheek, glaring at her.
"You idiot, we're supposed to apologise!" She then turned to look at him. Her loincloth was shorter, and lacked the brown underlayer. Instead she had a red bikini? With tights? Instead of a necklace she had an utterly massive white pearl connected to her neck and chest by the red bikini.
Oh, and they both had swords. The one in red had a white gladius, and the one in white had a very odd looking double ended greatsword with a rounded end and a brass centre.
"I apologise sir for the trouble. I'm Tione Hiryute of Loki familia and this idiot is Tiona Hiryute my younger sister. These Minotaurs are here because of our mess up, so I apologise for the trouble. Thank you for cleaning up before someone else had to."
"Mouuu, what's the big deal, he seems fine?" The now named 'Tiona' whined petulantly, it was rather adorable. It reminded him of... Kat. Now that was a painful memory.
The older sisters gaze and fingers tightened, "The big deal is that someone could have gotten killed because of us, so we owe this man a favour."
He raised a finger drawing their eyes.
"So could I cash that favour in then?"
Now the older girls eyes grew suspicious, while the younger sister instead looked pensive, almost curious.
"Sure."
"Can you tell me what a Dungeon is?"
The two shared glances.
Then looked at him.
Then shared more glances.
Then looked at him.
Then shared more glances.
Tiona spoke up finally. "I don't get it."
Tione seemed to have a moment of 'Eureka' and hit a palm with an upturned fist.
"Did you hit your head?"
"No." He intoned with finality.
The girl seemed crestfallen, more disappointed at being wrong than not having an answer.
Tiona spoke up again. "So... um mister? How did you end up here if you don't know what The Dungeon is?"
"I fell." He pointed at the ceiling. This was rather amusing, but he imagined that perhaps he had let this go a bit far.
At the frustrated looks the two girls were giving him, he decided to be merciful.
"Let me give you the long version, it seems that we have much to talk about."
Tione shook her head. "It's a bad idea to spend to much time in the Dungeon, how about you follow us to meet the others and we'll explain somewhere safe."
He thought for a few seconds, deliberately raising his hand to his chin to make him seem more relatable.
Perhaps if he had been slightly more observant, he would have spotted the stars in Tiona's eyes.
He raised his head. "Very well, I accept. Ah, I apologise, I forgot to introduce myself. I am Warrant Officer Tom-B312, and I'm the last member of Noble Team. It's a pleasure to meet you."
He hung his helmet off his belt and raised an arm, at the distinct action, both the foreign women finally noticed that Toms left arm was hanging limp. A slight wince was drawn out of Tiona.
Tione grabbed his hand firmly, and they shook. "The pleasures all mine, she admitted with a smile."
Then raised his arm to Tiona as well, and she floundered, thrown off balance. "Um.. ah, oh sorry, nice to meet you too!" She shook his hand very enthusiastically, as if trying to tear his arm off...
His grin faltered slightly.
Well, this would be a trip.
They walked through the cavernous maw of 'The Dungeon, chatting idly'.
Tiona was a rather excitable girl. "So we were fighting this massive horde of Barbarians, so many of them filled in, they were trampling one another underfoot to get us!"
"Wouldn't they have killed each other doing that?" He replied.
Tione was much more silent. "No, they're Level 3 Monsters."
"Okay? What doe that mean?" He was starting to think that they had some way of measuring peoples ability based on Levels. It was a bit odd, but it seemed intuitive.
Tiona answered happily. "Technically they are estimated to be between Level 3 and Level 4. Barbarians have massive physical strength and durability. They can survive having boulders dropped on them! I would know, I've tried it out a few times!"
Her hobby was dropping massive boulders... on inhuman monsters? Well he wasn't one to judge, he'd heard stranger.
"Anyway, they were filling the cavern like fish in a barrel. Then, they broke our Vanguard, and several rushed in to get at our soft mages. So the high level adventurers, that's us by the way! Jumped in and started slaughtering them like so much meat. One of them was going for my friend Lefiya, and out of nowhere the Sword Princess just flashes over there and cuts it into a thousand pieces without breaking a sweat!" She appeared to be enjoying telling this story.
That said, even assuming these Barbarians were weaker than Minotaurs, cutting them into a thousand pieces seemed rather absurd. Then there was the absurd speeds they had showed on their first meeting.
He was slowly starting to figure out this puzzle.
Tione finally spoke up, "Yeah she did, and then she dove into the horde like a maniac."
"Oh don't say that sis, you know how it is. She's not the only one trying to Level up." She responded good naturedly.
"So, what's a Level up?" This was starting to feel like that time he and the rest of Noble Team had been stuck in a bunker full of Marines in preparation for an assault, and some of them had asked him to play some videogames with them.
"How to put it... The Falna gives you 5 Basic Abilities. Strength, Endurance, Dexterity, Agility and finally Magic. Now-"
"Did you just say Magic?" He couldn't exactly ignore that one. He stared intently at her.
"Um, yes? Do you like Magic?" Tiona raised an eyebrow.
"Magic you say, is it real?" He had to confirm this.
"Well, of course right? You really didn't know people could use magic? I mean Tione here has magic too so." The girl in question was very pointedly looking at him now.
"I think we should leave this for later... Back to that story?" He concluded.
Tiona perked up a bit at that. "Anyway, after Sword Princess jumped in the herd and we cut through the break-ins like a scythe through wheat, Riveria-sama finally finished her signature spell, then Ais backflipped over the battlefield as the Magic circle formed, and everything burnt to a cinders by a sea of fire! It was awesome!" She explained delightedly.
"That does sound like quite a sight." He admitted.
"See! I told you sis, I'm great at telling stories." Her sister huffed in response, seeming to have caught a headache.
Something caught his eye.
"Contact." He put his helmet back on and grabbed the- his energy sword.
It was a small figure, with mottled green skin, a humanoid shape and a ugly vile looking face. Large ears hung off it's head, framing it's glowing, red, eyes.
"Oh, that's just a goblin." He raised his head at that.
"It is as strong as a Minotaur?" Tiona cocked her head oddly, seeming somehow more confused than before.
"No...."
"Then I'll take care of it." He nodded at them, and stepped forth putting the energy sword back on his magnetic holster.
The creature seemed wary, but approached him all the same. He merely walked up to it. It let loose a piercing scream and charged at him, arms held to it's side with sharp claws.
It swung at him, and he grabbed the wrist, then snapped it in a fluid movement of his thumb, it swung its other arm without missing a beat. He backhanded the arm snapping it like a twig. Then he grabbed the neck and gave it a harsh twist, breaking it without hesitation.
It's body hung loosely in his hand, dead.
"Well that was hardly a fight." Tiona voiced disappointed.
"Was testing durability." He replied.
"Why?"
"To improve efficiency. Wasted movement is wasted energy. Wasted energy is wasted resources. Wasted resources is wasted lives. Lives are important." There was a dull melancholy to his words.
She didn't ask him to explain further.
They settled into a comfortable silence.
Eventually they started passing other people as they journeyed up the Dungeon. Some of them had similar clothing to the two members of Loki Familia.
Many had steel weapons and armour, like out of a history book. Some had absurd looking weapons and armour that seemed impractical. Some carried strange staffs and sticks, wearing flowing robes over their bodies instead of protection.
There was another oddity. Maybe had distinctly... inhuman traits. Long and sharp ears or in some cases, the ears and tail of an animal, often resembling a dog, or a cat or something else.
A small few were short, almost child sized, but were very obviously adults from the gaze in their eyes and the way they carried themselves.
It was a strange experience.
Finally, they reached the entrance to the Dungeon. A giant round hallway, surrounded by a spiralling staircase that reached several dozen meters to the surface. Above them was a ceiling of stone, with a small doorway being the exit.
In front of him was a large group of people. They had large carriages that were... being pulled by people? Odd.
Near the centre was one of those shorter people he had seen before giving out orders. He appeared to be charge. He'd normally think the boy had dwarfism, but there were differences in his appearance to those had the condition. He remembered hearing somewhere that in the long past, many subspecies of humans had existed, some were shorter with the stature of a child, while others had denser bones and stronger muscles such as the Neanderthal.
Surrounding the blonde haired commander was a pointy eared lady with green hair and a bearded man in very heavy armour.
Walking with Tiona and Tione he approached the leadership, his helmet held under arm.
"Hey Captain!" Tione appeared to almost change into a different person at the sight of who was presumably Loki.
The bearded man to the Captains left eyed him curiously, while the women was talking with another girl with pointed ears.
Eventually, Loki managed to untangle himself from the suddenly excitable older sister, and looked at him a stern gaze.
"So who is this, Tione?" He asked. Yet there was a subtle pressure beneath his words.
"Oh, this idiots Tom bee something or other? Anyway, it's probably best if we discuss him somewhere more private..."
Loki seemed perturbed by that. "Was there a casualty?"
"No nothing like that, just... well questions. A lot of questions." She explained without explaining.
Eventually, the blue eyed blonde seemed to accept her answer, and raised his hand.
"Finn Deime, Captain of Loki Familia. You seem to have caught Tione's interest?" He had made a false assumption, this was not Loki after all.
He grasped the hand, shaking it firmly. "Warrant Officer Tom-B312, just call me Six. It's a pleasure to meet you."
"Likewise, for now stay with us. If we need to talk in private, Twilight Manor should be more than private enough."
He nodded back.
[ I ]
There was nothing.
Stars flew, lights dash, and blood flew.
A face, alien as it was vile. It's lower mandibles spat out a few short words.
"You Demon will meet your end, at my hand or the hand of one of my brothers, and the filthy vermin that is your species shall follow shortly after. Suffer, and know your damnation is certain."
Purple blood marred the beasts face, its amber eyes glaring as the slit pupils narrowed in sheer venom.
Then the knife dropped to its neck and the stars were back again.
Worlds, alien and familiar. Gas giants, rocky worlds, water worlds and more.
Then his vision began shaking. Slowly it accelerated, the tremors growing more powerful until it felt as if the very world was shaking...
…
He woke up.
Immediately the sensation of pain shot through his entire body. Aches and pains borne of long hours of battle and many neglected wounds.
He forced himself to ignore it, then assessed his situation.
His surroundings were... alien. A cave, unlike any he had ever seen before. It's walls covered in an odd glowing moss, providing barely enough light for him see. Even Spartans didn't have perfect nightvision, although his augmentations had brought him close. The cave was shaped bizarrely, a long straight hallway marred by rough sections of rock, as if it was both artificial and natural at the same time.
It was almost like someone had grown a cave into the shape of hallway.
His eyes flicked to his cracked visor, readouts lining his HUD.
A contact had been detected by his motion sensor, it had passed by parallel to the hallway.
Perhaps a large vehicle? If it was making tremors... no that was just a dream... There's no way the UNSC have any forces left on... on...
Where was he exactly? What had happened? Had he somehow fallen through, a Slipspace portal? Trains of thought rushed through his head, and panic started to set in, before his training took over. He took several deep breaths, and considered the situation.
He had MJOLNIR, the most advanced piece of equipment in the UNSCs arsenal. Was he still on Reach? Well, he could find that out easily enough. Several interactions with his neural lace later, and he was looking at a readout display showing the suits sensors for various scientific data. Local gravity, atmosphere, gyroscopes, electromagnetic spectrum, a quantum clock and a few things he was unfamiliar with.
The readings for gravity were slightly different from Reach's norm, but it was within the bounds of error, especially if he was underground. The readings for atmosphere however... Oxygen was at 28% instead of 21%, and several anomalous elements were showing up on the spectrometer. They had neutron-proton counts that simply made no sense...
He was definitely not on Reach anymore, but these readings, was he even still in UNSC Space?
It didn't matter at this point. He had to get moving. He was low on food and water, injured and alone. He glanced around and saw the corpse of the Ship Master he had just killed... Looking at his combat footage, 7hrs and 24minutes ago.
There were two energy swords, one plasma rifle, and a couple of plasma grenades. He looked over the white armoured corpse for a few seconds, then quickly looted the weapons and grabbed a small harness on the aliens back.
Popping it open, and a stash of emergency food and water was revealed. He couldn't eat the food but the water would do him good.
Then he heard a tremor. The caves started shaking, the walls almost vibrating. It slowly grew in intensity, then a blip appeared on his HUD, fragmented by spiderweb cracks on his faceplate.
Then another appeared, and another and another.
They were approaching fast. At least 300kmph, if not faster. Yet, the motion sensor was reading them as... Infantry?
Were they using jetpacks maybe? But then why was the cave shaking.
They turned suddenly, and his head shot up.
Their bodies were red. Naked red skin covered a body like a man. The legs were human, the arms were human, even the torso was closer to a normal man than any of the aliens within the Covenant Legions, but...
Their heads, were not those of humans, but those of bulls. With massive horns and glowing red eyes they emanated an unnatural, unnerving atmosphere.
They were all moving fast, right towards him.
His adrenaline kicked into gear barely in time, smashing into his confusion like a train into a car as his Spartan Time slowed down his perception to a snails pace.
They were moving fast yes, as fast as a cheap racing car, but he was a Spartan. He could dodge bullets if was sufficiently prepared first.
He moved into a stance, and drew the first energy sword from his hip. Then his eyes glanced over the area, tracking everything. The Sangheili corpse, the cracks and indents in the walls and floor. The parts of the stone that looked just a little bit more fragile than others.
A plan started forming in his head. In the meanwhile, he activated every sensor in his helmet to figure out just what he was dealing with.
IR lasers showed something intriguing. Their bodies possessed a large crystal shaped object in their chests, all in the exact same spot. Their bodies gave off too much heat to tell if it was a different temperature, but for some reason it was giving off emissions in the Ultra-Violet spectrum. Each creature was precisely 6 foot tall, and their bones seemed rather large and bulky.
He set off several other scans, but he was out of time. He minimised his readouts, and prepared for a fight.
When the first alien reached a certain distance, he leapt into action. He rushed forth, timing it so that the dead Elite was between them.
Instead of changing directions or continuing on, the Bull-headed beast lowered it's body and sprung, it's legs leaving cracks in the stone floor.
Just as predicted.
Whatever these were, they weren't particularly smart. It landed on the corpse, and tripped from the unexpected hazard, then before it could recover, Six was in it's face. It didn't even have time to scream before the energy sword had started burning through it's neck.
Decapitating this creature was an odd experience, it's flesh and bone felt far more solid than they should. He was barely able to free his blade in time. But then, well it was clearly no normal animal, was it perhaps actually a machine of some kind?
Immediately, he leapt back, dodging the tackles of two more.
A thought flashed. Should he use the plasma grenades? No, too risky. He didn't know what else he might have to deal with.
His feinted at one, then rushed to the second.
It's telegraphed strike was easily dodged by a hairs breadth even as it sent dust into the air from sheer air pressure, and he slammed its torso with his left shoulder, his energy shield shimmering slightly from the impact.
Yet instead of being sent flying by the half ton Spartan wrecking ball, it was only flung off it's feet.
They were heavy. Very heavy.
He dashed forth, blade splitting it's skull before he turned to catch the next attacker on the sword.
Then he ducked as newcomer struck from his left, and he twisted, strike out with his leg.
Again, the impact did far less than it should have, but it mattered little as his blade found it's neck anyway.
Then there was two.
Just him, and one last Bull.
He flicked his readouts back on, and decided to see what would happen if he damaged the crystal.
He circled the creature, it's hesitation clear even as it seemed to stare in mild fear mixed with pure wrath.
Yet hatred seemed to win out, as it raised its arms overhead and howled, the sound shaking the cavern.
Then it charged.
He stepped forth and jumped, leaping off it's face.
The Beast was sent sprawling back by the impact, yet it was unharmed.
The full weight of a Spartan III on it's face didn't even leave a cut?
His feet then finally reached the ceiling.
He changed the settings on his energy shields and activated a very expensive piece of equipment.
Designed to improve the effectiveness of energy shields by using a heavily modified Grav-plate, several capacitors activated and shoved large amounts of energy into several devices that did a total of two things.
They increased the power and effectiveness of his energy shields by an order of magnitude, and then they increased the effects of gravity on his body by several dozen times.
He fell onto the Bull headed anomaly, energy sword held straight in front of him, and pierced through it's centre.
Then, instead of simply dying as was polite...
It dissolved into ash before his very eyes.
Well... that was unique. What did he just get himself into?
Spartan Tom-B312 stood there in a bit of a daze as he collected himself, trying desperately to work out what he was in for.
[ I ]
He eventually removed his helmet to have a drink and eat some food. The UNSC high energy snack bars were filled with all the necessary nutrition and plenty of calories. Spartans tended to have pretty efficient digestive systems, but there was only so much you could compensate for, especially in high stress battles like this. MJOLNIR tended to cut down on that since he didn't need to use as much force to move, but when he was on alone like this...
He shook his head, and sighed, then picked his helmet back up.
Right before he put it back on, he heard a faint whistling sound.
He hesitated for just a moment, and then to his shock, saw two young girls, humans at that, round the corner the bizarre animals had originated from. At supersonic speeds.
He debated putting his helmet back on, then thought better of it, tucking it under his shoulder.
With a couple of seconds, they had approached to a few metres away, stopping on a dime with seemingly no discomfort.
They had very similar appearances. Both were about Five and a half feet tall. Their skin was well tanned, and their eyes were dark green.
Both had black hair, but while the one to his left had it loose reaching down to her back, the one on the right had it tied up above her shoulders.
There was no mistaking it. They were human. There was no mistaking it, no human alive, Spartan or not could move like that.
Which was it?
"Hey there big guy! Nice kills you pulled off here, I wish you waited for us to see."
The short haired girl spoke first, voice high pitched and seemingly excited. An elaborate golden necklace adorned with blue crystal gems hung from her neck, and she wore a simple wide band of white cloth wrapped around her chest with a sand yellow and brown loincloth around her waist. There was a star symbol her belt.
He stood up slightly straighter, lessons learned from many dead soldiers helping him choose the best action.
As Jorge had always said, Spartans were more than weapons, they were a symbol. But they were most certainly still weapons.
He gave his best smile, and spoke slowly.
"Excuse me Ma'am, I appear to have gotten myself rather lost. I don't suppose you could tell me where I am?"
"Huh? The Dungeon of course?" She appeared thrown off by that simple question.
Then the other young women, presumably a sister, or cousin maybe? She grabbed the girl by the cheek, glaring at her.
"You idiot, we're supposed to apologise!" She then turned to look at him. Her loincloth was shorter, and lacked the brown underlayer. Instead she had a red bikini? With tights? Instead of a necklace she had an utterly massive white pearl connected to her neck and chest by the red bikini.
Oh, and they both had swords. The one in red had a white gladius, and the one in white had a very odd looking double ended greatsword with a rounded end and a brass centre.
"I apologise sir for the trouble. I'm Tione Hiryute of Loki familia and this idiot is Tiona Hiryute my younger sister. These Minotaurs are here because of our mess up, so I apologise for the trouble. Thank you for cleaning up before someone else had to."
"Mouuu, what's the big deal, he seems fine?" The now named 'Tiona' whined petulantly, it was rather adorable. It reminded him of... Kat. Now that was a painful memory.
The older sisters gaze and fingers tightened, "The big deal is that someone could have gotten killed because of us, so we owe this man a favour."
He raised a finger drawing their eyes.
"So could I cash that favour in then?"
Now the older girls eyes grew suspicious, while the younger sister instead looked pensive, almost curious.
"Sure."
"Can you tell me what a Dungeon is?"
The two shared glances.
Then looked at him.
Then shared more glances.
Then looked at him.
Then shared more glances.
Tiona spoke up finally. "I don't get it."
Tione seemed to have a moment of 'Eureka' and hit a palm with an upturned fist.
"Did you hit your head?"
"No." He intoned with finality.
The girl seemed crestfallen, more disappointed at being wrong than not having an answer.
Tiona spoke up again. "So... um mister? How did you end up here if you don't know what The Dungeon is?"
"I fell." He pointed at the ceiling. This was rather amusing, but he imagined that perhaps he had let this go a bit far.
At the frustrated looks the two girls were giving him, he decided to be merciful.
"Let me give you the long version, it seems that we have much to talk about."
Tione shook her head. "It's a bad idea to spend to much time in the Dungeon, how about you follow us to meet the others and we'll explain somewhere safe."
He thought for a few seconds, deliberately raising his hand to his chin to make him seem more relatable.
Perhaps if he had been slightly more observant, he would have spotted the stars in Tiona's eyes.
He raised his head. "Very well, I accept. Ah, I apologise, I forgot to introduce myself. I am Warrant Officer Tom-B312, and I'm the last member of Noble Team. It's a pleasure to meet you."
He hung his helmet off his belt and raised an arm, at the distinct action, both the foreign women finally noticed that Toms left arm was hanging limp. A slight wince was drawn out of Tiona.
Tione grabbed his hand firmly, and they shook. "The pleasures all mine, she admitted with a smile."
Then raised his arm to Tiona as well, and she floundered, thrown off balance. "Um.. ah, oh sorry, nice to meet you too!" She shook his hand very enthusiastically, as if trying to tear his arm off...
His grin faltered slightly.
Well, this would be a trip.
[ I ]
They walked through the cavernous maw of 'The Dungeon, chatting idly'.
Tiona was a rather excitable girl. "So we were fighting this massive horde of Barbarians, so many of them filled in, they were trampling one another underfoot to get us!"
"Wouldn't they have killed each other doing that?" He replied.
Tione was much more silent. "No, they're Level 3 Monsters."
"Okay? What doe that mean?" He was starting to think that they had some way of measuring peoples ability based on Levels. It was a bit odd, but it seemed intuitive.
Tiona answered happily. "Technically they are estimated to be between Level 3 and Level 4. Barbarians have massive physical strength and durability. They can survive having boulders dropped on them! I would know, I've tried it out a few times!"
Her hobby was dropping massive boulders... on inhuman monsters? Well he wasn't one to judge, he'd heard stranger.
"Anyway, they were filling the cavern like fish in a barrel. Then, they broke our Vanguard, and several rushed in to get at our soft mages. So the high level adventurers, that's us by the way! Jumped in and started slaughtering them like so much meat. One of them was going for my friend Lefiya, and out of nowhere the Sword Princess just flashes over there and cuts it into a thousand pieces without breaking a sweat!" She appeared to be enjoying telling this story.
That said, even assuming these Barbarians were weaker than Minotaurs, cutting them into a thousand pieces seemed rather absurd. Then there was the absurd speeds they had showed on their first meeting.
He was slowly starting to figure out this puzzle.
Tione finally spoke up, "Yeah she did, and then she dove into the horde like a maniac."
"Oh don't say that sis, you know how it is. She's not the only one trying to Level up." She responded good naturedly.
"So, what's a Level up?" This was starting to feel like that time he and the rest of Noble Team had been stuck in a bunker full of Marines in preparation for an assault, and some of them had asked him to play some videogames with them.
"How to put it... The Falna gives you 5 Basic Abilities. Strength, Endurance, Dexterity, Agility and finally Magic. Now-"
"Did you just say Magic?" He couldn't exactly ignore that one. He stared intently at her.
"Um, yes? Do you like Magic?" Tiona raised an eyebrow.
"Magic you say, is it real?" He had to confirm this.
"Well, of course right? You really didn't know people could use magic? I mean Tione here has magic too so." The girl in question was very pointedly looking at him now.
"I think we should leave this for later... Back to that story?" He concluded.
Tiona perked up a bit at that. "Anyway, after Sword Princess jumped in the herd and we cut through the break-ins like a scythe through wheat, Riveria-sama finally finished her signature spell, then Ais backflipped over the battlefield as the Magic circle formed, and everything burnt to a cinders by a sea of fire! It was awesome!" She explained delightedly.
"That does sound like quite a sight." He admitted.
"See! I told you sis, I'm great at telling stories." Her sister huffed in response, seeming to have caught a headache.
Something caught his eye.
"Contact." He put his helmet back on and grabbed the- his energy sword.
It was a small figure, with mottled green skin, a humanoid shape and a ugly vile looking face. Large ears hung off it's head, framing it's glowing, red, eyes.
"Oh, that's just a goblin." He raised his head at that.
"It is as strong as a Minotaur?" Tiona cocked her head oddly, seeming somehow more confused than before.
"No...."
"Then I'll take care of it." He nodded at them, and stepped forth putting the energy sword back on his magnetic holster.
The creature seemed wary, but approached him all the same. He merely walked up to it. It let loose a piercing scream and charged at him, arms held to it's side with sharp claws.
It swung at him, and he grabbed the wrist, then snapped it in a fluid movement of his thumb, it swung its other arm without missing a beat. He backhanded the arm snapping it like a twig. Then he grabbed the neck and gave it a harsh twist, breaking it without hesitation.
It's body hung loosely in his hand, dead.
"Well that was hardly a fight." Tiona voiced disappointed.
"Was testing durability." He replied.
"Why?"
"To improve efficiency. Wasted movement is wasted energy. Wasted energy is wasted resources. Wasted resources is wasted lives. Lives are important." There was a dull melancholy to his words.
She didn't ask him to explain further.
They settled into a comfortable silence.
Eventually they started passing other people as they journeyed up the Dungeon. Some of them had similar clothing to the two members of Loki Familia.
Many had steel weapons and armour, like out of a history book. Some had absurd looking weapons and armour that seemed impractical. Some carried strange staffs and sticks, wearing flowing robes over their bodies instead of protection.
There was another oddity. Maybe had distinctly... inhuman traits. Long and sharp ears or in some cases, the ears and tail of an animal, often resembling a dog, or a cat or something else.
A small few were short, almost child sized, but were very obviously adults from the gaze in their eyes and the way they carried themselves.
It was a strange experience.
Finally, they reached the entrance to the Dungeon. A giant round hallway, surrounded by a spiralling staircase that reached several dozen meters to the surface. Above them was a ceiling of stone, with a small doorway being the exit.
In front of him was a large group of people. They had large carriages that were... being pulled by people? Odd.
Near the centre was one of those shorter people he had seen before giving out orders. He appeared to be charge. He'd normally think the boy had dwarfism, but there were differences in his appearance to those had the condition. He remembered hearing somewhere that in the long past, many subspecies of humans had existed, some were shorter with the stature of a child, while others had denser bones and stronger muscles such as the Neanderthal.
Surrounding the blonde haired commander was a pointy eared lady with green hair and a bearded man in very heavy armour.
Walking with Tiona and Tione he approached the leadership, his helmet held under arm.
"Hey Captain!" Tione appeared to almost change into a different person at the sight of who was presumably Loki.
The bearded man to the Captains left eyed him curiously, while the women was talking with another girl with pointed ears.
Eventually, Loki managed to untangle himself from the suddenly excitable older sister, and looked at him a stern gaze.
"So who is this, Tione?" He asked. Yet there was a subtle pressure beneath his words.
"Oh, this idiots Tom bee something or other? Anyway, it's probably best if we discuss him somewhere more private..."
Loki seemed perturbed by that. "Was there a casualty?"
"No nothing like that, just... well questions. A lot of questions." She explained without explaining.
Eventually, the blue eyed blonde seemed to accept her answer, and raised his hand.
"Finn Deime, Captain of Loki Familia. You seem to have caught Tione's interest?" He had made a false assumption, this was not Loki after all.
He grasped the hand, shaking it firmly. "Warrant Officer Tom-B312, just call me Six. It's a pleasure to meet you."
"Likewise, for now stay with us. If we need to talk in private, Twilight Manor should be more than private enough."
He nodded back.
[ I ]
CMDR Dantae
The Scribe
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Butcher of Bleeding Faithful 3
"HHMMMMMFFFHH!" A muffled voice was heard from behind him.
He turned slowly, cautious not to make sudden movements. Could never be too careful when dealing with unknowns.
"You okay Lefiya? Oh right, I forgot." He heard the distinct sound of Tiona having her cheeks pulled by her older sister.
It was the two he'd noted early, each with pointed ears. The one covering her mouth and looking at him a pale face had exotic looking orange hair and dark blue eyes. She was maybe 5 feet tall, and wore a white and pink blouse and skirt with a white buttoned shirt and purple ribbon beneath an odd looking red cloak that stopped at her upper arms, not reaching her elbows.
To the right of her was a taller women, with jade green eyes that matched her hair. Her attire was more practical, being a green overcoat under a white yellow cloak and brown long boots. It also looked rather well made compared to the other clothes he'd seen, or more accurately more aesthetic. As if it had been made to look more professional.
Tiona scratched her head, "Ah sorry Captain, we forgot to mention he was injured."
The bearded man spoke sarcastically, "Well that certainly doesn't look like a wound from a Minotaur Tom-san. What the hell did you fight? Some kind of irregular?"
Six cringed at the name, as he turned to look at the short and portly, but well built man. "Just call me Six please."
"Why? You not like the name or something?" He responded gruffly.
The older Spartan Commando matched his gaze, there was a sense of pride in those eyes, and loss too.
"I'm not gonna lie to you Lieutenant, you're stepping into some shoes the rest of the squad would rather leave unfilled."
He nodded, he had read the files after all, seen the footage. Thom-A293 would be remembered, one way or the other.
"It's not that I don't like it, so much as what it means. Think of it as a gesture of respect to the fallen." He spoke softly, the words struggling to come out of his mouth.
Recognition lit up in the short mans eyes. "I understand." He raised a gloved hand. "Gareth Landrock, nice to meet you Six."
They shook. He had a surprisingly firm grip.
"You mind telling me the story of that later?" Tiona asked, looking at him, almost nervously?
"I'd be proud to."
"So you're Six right?" The jade haired women asked. He nodded once.
"That wound looks bad, normally I wouldn't act on charity like this, but if you don't take something you'll lose that arm." She offered a vial of orange fluid.
He looked at it suspiciously. "No offense, but I'm new here. I'm not entirely sure what's normal for you, but I've been taught not to accept unknown substances from strangers."
Suddenly many gazes, especially among the wagons being loaded onto cables went sharp. It was an odd feeling, a sort of pressure he had felt before, but never like this. It reminded him of how ODSTs used to look at him.
"You sure you'll be fine as you are? No point in explaining what happened later if you die from shock before that." The now named Finn asked. There was an odd sense of professionalism in his demeanour, it reminded him of Carter. He liked that.
"I'll be fine, Spartans are tough. I've known people that took worse and kept fighting."
The sight before him was an odd one. A young looking man that didn't even hit 4 feet in a purple, yellow and black patterned ensemble that looked like an artists take on military camouflage. Yet somehow, he exerted a pressure and sense of leadership that matched many of the most experienced veterans he had met. To add to it, instead of questioning him, the man went right back to issuing orders to the 'adventurers' surrounding them.
"Orba, I want whatever's left of those weapons recovered stat. Have the scraps sold if you have to. Lox, don't waste any of the empty vials, no point spending more on glass. Glass that can survive High-class adventurers being nearby doesn't come cheap. Arcs, that wagon isn't secured properly, move it."
He was more certain now. Finn Deime, and the other short people he'd seen were part of some ethnicity or race that didn't grow as tall as the average human. Perhaps Lefiya and the green haired women were also a different race?
Tione and Tiona approached him. The older sister spoke first. "Six, are you sure you'll be fine like that, I don't mean to be rude but your left shoulder looks like charcoal. Riveria's being pretty generous too, elixirs don't come cheap."
His forehead creased and his eyes narrowed in consternation. "Left shoulder?" He looked, and it was true. He remembered his right shoulder being pierced through. He was trained to be ambidextrous even if he preferred his right side, Kurt had made sure they were prepared for everything, so it made little difference in his combat effectiveness, but how could such a thing even happen?
"Is something wrong?" Tione asked.
"Nevermind for now, we'll discuss it later." He concluded. They seemed to think it was better to keep his situation private for now. He'd trust that, they'd show him courtesy so far and he'd repay that much.
"Why are you so damn paranoid anyway?" Tiona whined.
He considered it for a moment.
"I'll drink it on one condition." The now named Riveria raised an eyebrow at that.
"I'll scan the contents first. Even if I trust you not to poison me, it's quite clear you people have a... shall we say unique physiology?" That drew some confused glances.
"You want to just look at it?" He simply nodded.
He picked up his helmet off his waist, then put it back on, sealing it tight with a sound of gas being released. His HUD lit up, and behind his cracked visor was an array of curious and confused faces.
Perhaps they didn't have strong transparent materials here? It was moments like this he wished he'd been taught the same history lessons the Spartan IIs had. Jorge's expanded education came in handy, particularly when dealing with non-Spartans.
He reached out for the stoppered glass vial, and Riveria handed it over tentatively.
Then he ran every scan he could think of. IR lasers confirmed the molecular structure. He ran a few simulations, but it just seemed like a normal concoction of herbs to promote healing. Nothing special. The herbs were quite interesting though. The molecules they had produced didn't match anything in his database.
Safe to drink then. He put the vial which was shaped a bit like a test tube in one of his open pockets, then removed his helmet.
He nodded at the group before him. Then he bit off the cork, and swallowed it whole. Warmth flooded his body, and his arm went hot.
Suddenly he had feeling in his left arm again. There was no pain, no delay. Just a drink and it instantly healed him.
Even though by all laws of physics, it should have at the very least needed to pass through his digestive system before having any effect.
He raised his once broken limb, looking in awe and a slight dose of disbelief as he flexed his fingers with ease. Not noticing the confused stares from the bewildered adventurers.
It was absurd. First the Minotaurs, then Tiona and Tione's incredible speed. Their claim of magic being real. The bizarre features on the people everywhere in this underground Dungeon.
Now this. It was all a bit too much to explain. Overwhelmed, the supersoldier finally let his confusion show, and Tiona laughed saying she'd "told him there was nothing to be afraid of". But he wasn't listening.
Memories, old memories were starting to reach his mind, uncovered after over a decade of neglect.
All of this, it sounded like something out of a fantasy book.
What did that mean for him?
Eventually, once all the wagons had been attached to the cables and elevated to the surface, a couple more people joined them.
Two more adventurers, and from the speed at which they moved, presumably strong ones. They were even faster than Tiona and Tione, if not by a huge amount.
The first individual was moving slightly faster, though they slowed down rapidly as they approached.
From the blurred figure he could make out the details of long golden hair, and steel armour covering their upper body, with blue garments on their legs of some sort.
Behind them, a grey and black figure with shorter hair followed.
They stopped in front of the small army of adventurers and their appearance shot into focus just like that.
A golden haired, golden eyed women, adorned in apparently decorative steel armour that was mostly covering her arms and chest. Two pair of plates also protecting the sides of her waist and her knees. Along with a steel headband.
Beneath the armour was a white blouse, and a pair of turquoise blue boots reached up to the tops of thighs.
The grey figure was an odd looking man. Short grey hair and amber eyes with a blue lightning tattoo on his left cheek, but atop his head were what appeared to be the ears of grey wolf, while a grey furred tail hung from behind him. It was a disconcerting oddity, but it matched the previous examples he'd seen among adventurers, so he dismissed it.
He was shirtless with a grey jacket and black undercoat both wide open and revealing his muscled figure. White gauntlets and greaves were worn on his arms and legs, his leg armaments possessing a spherical red gem inlaid in each.
The male youth was seemingly chuckling about something, while the young women held a blank stare.
Finn nodded at both.
Tiona leaped at the girl, arms outstretched. "Ais what took so long?"
The girl turned her head to the side, cheeks flushing slightly and the boy laughed even harder.
"Eh? Did something happen Bete?"
They finally climbed to the surface, scaling the spiralling staircase leisurely.
When they surfaced, Six saw a whole new world.
A large field surrounded the entrance, with it's edges surrounded by trees and bushes and plants he didn't recognise.
Adventurers everywhere, carrying their supplies and weapons. Some civilians enjoying the sunlight. The place was beautiful, with stone buildings stretching out as far as he could see.
As they left for the exit, wagons following behind them, many cheered at the sight.
Chanting 'Loki-Familia is back' or 'The strongest adventurers have returned!'. It was fascinating to see.
Eventually, they reached the main pavement. The roads were neat and tidy. With building lining the streets in an ordered manner akin to those he was used to back home. It seemed a bit advanced... to advanced almost, at least for people that seemed lack any sign of advanced technology. They didn't act primitive at least.
Then he glanced behind him, to get one last look at the Dungeon entrance.
A white pearl tower of radiant stone spiralled high into the sky, touching the clouds and beyond.
It was awe-inspiring to look at. He had seen space elevators before, and skyscrapers that stretched kilometres high, but nothing quite like this.
"That.. is that a Space Elevator!?"
Finn shook his head. "No, that's Babel Tower. Its highest floors are above the clouds, but it doesn't reach the Heavens."
"Eh really? I always thought it did?" A brown haired man he had heard Finn call Raul marvelled.
Finn gestured. "Before Freya Familia bought the top floors, Zeus and Hera Familia used to allow other gods to visit them for a price. Loki has actually been there a few times. I think at least one Denatus was even held on the highest floor."
"How was such a thing built?" Six inquired.
"The gods." Was Finns non-answer.
"The gods?"
"When they descended, they created it just like that."
"You're saying gods descended, from the heavens?" He wasn't sure he could believe what his ears were hearing.
It would be another thing if the man was lying, but Six had been trained in body language and war by the very best the UNSC had to offer. If someone could lie to him, that was one thing, but not a single of the several dozen people surrounding them even flinched at the words.
As if they were obvious, a mere fact of life.
Either these people were crazy, he was crazy, or maybe... just maybe... something else was going on entirely.
They finally reached Twilight Manor. It was an impressive looking place. Very old fashioned, almost ancient in style.
Steel gates surrounded the exterior, while a building that resembled a castle was fashioned out of white stone. It was a simple structure with a convex roof covered in rust red tiles. Each corner had a spire covered in a similar red tiles.
Several guards were before the gates, and small number of adventurers could be seen waiting within. Preparing to greet the returning expedition.
They opened the gates, and Finn was back to giving out orders. Not for long though.
"So you have a story to tell?" The blonde asked seriously.
They were in a large room with a long table taking up most of its space, accompanying them was a few of the more important looking people he noted earlier.
Tiona and Tione shared glances. "You're not going to believe this one Captain."
He raised an eyebrow as if taunting them.
"Six doesn't have the Blessing." Tiona blurted out.
Several gasps rang out in sequence.
The blue eyed blonde's expression shifted, from shocked to pensive, to accepting, to shocked again.
"Yeah, fair enough that's pretty hard to believe." He finally nodded.
The wolf-eared man, apparently curious at the unfamiliar figure with his companions, interjected.
"Why was some kid without a Familia in the dungeon again?"
Finn raised a finger. "I think that ones easy to answer Bete, if you can kill a Minotaur without the blessing, I can see why would you brave the upper floors of the dungeon, even if just briefly."
The man's face seemed to freeze at the explanation.
Tiona's smile wavered, and Tione behind seemed even more exasperated that before.
"Yeah, unfortunately that's not the case Captain. He said he fell through a hole." That seemed to draw even more attention. Eyes being drawn to him like plasma fire.
"A hole in a the Dungeon?" Finn looked at him questioningly.
"Yes and no. I wasn't on this planet before I fell through it, nevermind the Dungeon." He explained simply.
"Planet? Do you mean... you weren't on Gekai?" Gareth breathed out, disbelievingly.
He looked to Riveria, a silent question on his lips.
"It's possible. The gods descended from Tenkai after all, and we know they had searched for entertainment in other worlds."
"Reach wasn't the only planet the UNSC has explored. Rather it's the very first colony, and one of six in the Epsilon Eridanus system." This much was fine to tell civilians he was certain. Or rather, what was the point of OPSEC if he didn't even know if they were still in the Milky Way galaxy? Operation security didn't really matter once you died of all old age in his opinion.
"Your people have explored different worlds?" Finn asked inquisitively.
He nodded. "We've travelled to many stars using Slipspace. The portal I fell through, it matched some descriptions of Slipspace portals. There may be a connection."
"Hold on a minute! This is crazy! Are we really going to believe some no-name, I mean even if he killed a Minotaur without the Falna..."
"Actually it was 5 Minotaurs, and something else with white armour." Tione remarked.
Ais, seemed to show interest at the statement. Her head tilted in thought as she studied him with an intense gaze.
"Yeah, but still-"
He cut off the argument with a raised hand.
Then placed his helmet on the table, and pulled out a UNSC datapad from his suits storage compartment.
After showing them the footage from the tail end of his fight with the Sangheili Shipmaster, then skipping through the 7 hours he spent asleep in the Dungeon right to the battle with the Minotaur.
"You fight very smart." Finn praised.
"Yeah, not bad for a human." Gareth nodded.
Bete fingered his chin, seemingly deep in thought. Behind him, his tail drooped, and his ears laid flat atop his head. "What does this all mean? That definitely wasn't Orario, and the skies..."
Riveria spoke up, "We have to tell Loki this, other worlds dumping random people into the Dungeon. That could cause issues with our next expedition. No, this could pose a threat to all of Orario."
Silence took hold of the room for several moments.
"Hey Six?" A concerned voice rang out, breaking him out of his funk.
"Yes?"
"I think you forgot to remove the magic stones from those Minotaurs."
Tione's face paled.
Finn sighed. "You fools, if a Monster eats those we could get an irregular."
"An irregular?" Six's voice lights up in curiosity.
"Monsters stronger than others of their species. Often smarter and more cunning too. Very dangerous."
Six nods. "I'll destroy all Magic stones in the future then."
Tiona waves her hands in alarm - "What but you're supposed to sell them! I mean, I we don't since small ones like from a Minotaur don't sell for much, but you should be... wait you killed a Minotaur, so would you start at Level 1 or Level 2?" She started counting off her fingers, deep in thought.
Gareth laughed. "I guess we'll find out if the kid joins the Familia." He looked at Six meaningfully. "So how about it then? You're certainly stronger than a Dwarf if you killed a damn Minotaur. No Level One has done that before, and you don't even have the blessing."
Six shook his head. "It's a function of my armour." He tapped his shoulder plate.
They all turned to him at that, listening to his every word.
"Piezoelectric layer charged with massive amounts of electricity amplifies all force using a newly discovered quantum phenomena that manipulates momentum. It's a little beyond my paygrade, but the simple answer is that it increases my strength by a factor of 40 times or so. A special gel underlayer absorbs physical force, and the armour is the strongest composite the UNSC can yet make. Without it all, I probably would have died."
"Impressive." Gareth gave in approval, thumbing his chin.
Finn nodded in agreement. "Can anyone use this armour?"
Six considered it. "That's classified information." Was his non-answer.
"Classified to you? Or to us?" The Captain pointed out observantly.
"Lets just say I probably already told you far more than I should." That seemed to mollify him.
"Wait a minute?" Tiona pointed at him, from the contorted expression she had remembered something.
"Where's your sword? Those Minotaurs were all decapitated, apart from the one you dusted." She accused.
He reached down to the purple hilt on his waste, pulled it from the magnetic holster, and with a flick.
"BRRRSSSSSTTTTTT"
A glowing translucent blade of aquamarine blue 'cracked' into existence, emanating a faint hum and a noticeable amount of heat.
"I used this." He explained curtly, hiding a smile at their expressions.
"That's awesome!" Tiona breathed in delight.
"Is this classified too?" Finn asked exasperatedly.
"No actually, it's Covenant technology. We barely have a clue how it works."
The door was flung open. Behind it emerged a women with narrowed eyes, red hair in a ponytail and a blue and black hoodie. "What's this I heard about you guys finding a lovely new recruit for me!"
She smiled, but it was not a thing of joy. Instead he got the sense of greed and desire from that pristine face.
Yet, he barely noticed any of that.
Too busy was he dealing with something new.
His mind screamed at him.
GOD! GOD! GOD!
GOD! GOD! GOD!
dIvINe! DiVInE! dIVinE!
It screamed through his mind like plasma searing through his flesh.
He stamped down on it with all the force of his will that he could bring to bare.
It didn't stop, but it's volume receded, pushed to the very depths of his mind. He breathed out, taking in air hungrily.
Before him, everyone was staring. Startled.
Loki was frozen, mid-wrestle with Ais?
"I've never seen a mortal react to the Divine like that? You okay kid?"
He nodded. "I'm fine, just need a breather." He glanced at Finn meaningfully.
"I think I need some fresh air. I'll just take a quick walk around the place, you mind looking after my weapons? I wouldn't want to get in trouble carrying weapons brazenly around."
The red haired goddess's eyebrow raised at that, but Finn just smiled. "Yeah sure, just don't be gone too long, we have a celebration later on this evening. Feel free to ask around, you may not have realised it but Loki Familia is the best in all of Orario."
Somehow, that was a relief. He nodded, then left the room. Leaving his helmet and weapons behind.
Leaving Loki Familia to explain the mystery they'd uncovered to their confused goddess.
He explored Orario.
Outside the central streets, things were less neat and tidy.
Less organised. Houses sprawled almost randomly. Alleyways were covered with dirt, and several distinct areas were straight out filled with the wreckage of abandoned and collapsed buildings.
Markets were filled with people selling goods.
Residential areas filled with children playing.
At one point he even found what appeared to be a red-light district of some sort. The strong smells and perfumes warding him away with some distaste.
He eventually found himself climbing one of the walls, and looking at the views from the top.
It was beautiful. Grass fields stretched miles out, and the backdrop of vast mountains and rivers on horizon only accented it with an air of familiarity.
It was just like Reach. The realisation stung. He turned around, looking over Orario. An odd street caught his gaze. He'd heard some mother warn her kids not to stray near Daedalus street or they might get lost.
He decided to explore it. He faintly remembered something he'd heard from Commander Kurt. The story of the Minotaur. The Minotaur trapped within Daedalus's labyrinth. He smiled at the odd coincidence.
"So you really don't know anything, huh kid?"
Six scanned the mans expression once again. There was a familiar tiredness, an exhaustion he could to relate to after so many years of being ground down, spat on, broken and crushed by life.
He was covered in dirt, his torn, cheap- no, no person in the UNSC had clothes so poorly made. They looked more like a couple of sacks than anything that could be called 'protection from elements'.
They'd met in the labyrinthian structure of Daedalus street. The homeless man had happily given him a font of information about Orario while he scrambled for a plan of action.
He still remembered those days back on Alfheimr, the frozen planet orbiting Trappist, a star a mere 40 light years from Earth.
He was but 4 years old, and the Covenant had finally broken through the Outer Colonies, and had laid siege on the far away system of Gliese 667 Cc.
He had barely comprehended it all back then. That at any moment, he could lose everything.
Then he did, and he'd had no choice but to.
They came in the night. It was after a long day spent playing with his family. Him, his big brother, his sisters and his parents.
Screams from that night still haunted him. His father, a former Marine, had grabbed him and his siblings and shoved them in the car with their mother.
Then was the crash. Afterwards... what to this day he could only described as monsters had descended on the vehicle and the crippled and dead bodies within...
To this very day, he held an irrational hatred, a soul born loathing for Brutes, for the Jiralhanae.
At the darkening of his expression, Jacob Lee raised a hand to the 20 year old soldiers shoulder and gave him a light shake.
It was a futile attempt, being that the same shoulder was clad in 600 kilograms of composite armour, but it released the young man from his memories nonetheless. "Thanks." He nodded.
"You okay there fella? You look like you've seen hell?" The concern on his face was clear to see.
He nodded. "I'm fine, just old memories. You were saying? The Blessing?"
Jacob frowned. Then sighed. "Yeah, you need the Blessing if you want to make it in Orario, but if you don't have the Blessing how are wearing this armour? It bloody weighs like a boulder?"
"That's classified information, UNSC technology."
"Well whatever, but if this you-enaseee isn't a god, then you can get yourself a Falna. The Blessing improves everything, even your lifespan."
He thought about that. It explained what he'd seen. "...and the catch?"
Jacob laughed a that, right from his gut. "Haha, yeah you're smart kid, I like ya. The catch, is you have to listen to a god, they can be quite the pain, trust me. It's worth it though."
He'd have to put his trust in someone, that wasn't quite human. It reminded him of Smart AIs in a way. They could do amazing things, but they could just as easily do horrible things.
"So, I just ask them for a Blessing in return for doing what they ask?"
"Not quite, you can probably make a contract since you seem pretty tough. They'd do a lot for a talented adventurer. Negotiate well and you could even retire. However, everyone starts at Level 1. It doesn't matter who you are or what you've done. You start there. However...."
Level 1? So a baseline then. "However?"
He continued. "Some people, if they are particularly talented, or even determined, or just hardworking. They can start with a skill. Skills are the bread and butter of High class adventurers, they can mean more than Levels sometimes. Level 1 will make you stronger than the strongest mortals in the world. It can make even a child able to lift small boulders, and outrun a marathon runner. But... the monsters in the Dungeon are just as strong, and they get stronger the deeper you go."
That made sense with what he'd seen. "So how do I Level up?"
"Hahaha, kid you don't beat around the bush do ya?"
He shook his head.
"Well... let me put it like this. You have to go on an adventure, do something genuinely amazing, something even the gods can't deny." He paused for a few seconds, then turned and spoke with emphasis.
"Like something right out of a story, right out of books of Myth and Legend." Jacobs eyes closed.
He mulled over that for a moment. It sounded, intriguing?
"Sounds doable."
The man doubletaked at that. "Kid, adventurers die every day. It doesn't matter how strong you are, to qualify for a Level up, at least from a fight, you have to genuinely be at risk of death."
He shook his head in response, and picked up his helmet, getting up. Then he turned his eye, staring straight into the older mans dark brown eyes with a gaze of purest steel.
Behind his gaze, the lifetime of training, the unending loss of his two most beloved families, the recent and yet unhealed wound of losing all of Noble Team, it all burned in a fire that together fuelled his spirit to further heights.
"For a Spartan, cheating death is just another Tuesday." He spoke without emotion or volume, as if it were a statement of the obvious.
He took in a deep breath, puffing his chest up.
"Afterall, Spartans Never Die, we're just Missing In Action." There was a force behind these words.
In the end, wasn't he too missing in action now? He'd survived the Fall of Reach hadn't he? Even if nobody else had. Or rather, especially because no-one else had.
What was one more adventure? One more impossible task, so that he could eventually claw his way back home, and then once again, to finally stop the Covenant in it's tracks, and turn the whole war on it's head.
He'd do it. For those who were fallen, and for those who were not.
"I accept."
The red haired goddess seemed taken aback.
"Just like that?" She frowned, as if put off by his eagerness.
"Problem?"
"You aren't going to give me any terms or conditions? Afterall that build about you killing 5 Minotaurs at once?" She seemed disappointed at the lack of a negotiation.
"Are you saying you have any?" He smirked.
"Of course I do." She smiled back, without missing a beat.
It didn't throw her off as he'd expected, but he'd planned for that too.
"That's going to be a problem for me. I'm still a member of the UNSC afterall. Warrant Officer Spartan Tom-B312 at your service." He gave a dashing smile, and a very small bow of his head. Just enough to be polite.
"UNSC? Isn't this UNSC stuck on a galaxy a long way away?" Odd choice of words that?
"Wouldn't know. Haven't had a chance to take a scan of the night sky yet. We could be next door, or in another dimension entirely... I'm not putting my money on the first one though." She nodded at that.
Behind her were sitting Finn, Riveria and Gareth. The 'big three' it seemed, of Loki Familia.
"So then, you fine with helping me get back?" He questioned casually.
"Of course, but in turn I do expect you to help my Familia. My darling kids have their problems you know?"
"That's fair. What sort of problems?"
Finn scratched his head.
"You're already tough and skilled enough to take on multiple Minotaurs. Combined with the Blessing, you should be comparable to any Level 2, if not most Level 3s. We lost a lot of money in the last expedition. See, we found new monsters, with acid for blood." He explained candidly. There was clearly a routine here, and an angle they'd planned.
"Acid blood?" He inquired, mind racing.
"Yeah, they ruined most of our weapons and even destroyed the spares. We had to cancel the expedition." Finn explained.
Finn looked down at his armour meaningfully.
"You have weapons and armour completely different to ours, can you produce more?"
He thought on it. Nevermind classified intel, helping them reverse engineer Covenant technology wasn't technically against regulation, but only technically. It was probably possible. Orario already had basic industry, using magic stones from the Dungeon. Apparently Hephaestus, interestingly enough was the goddess of the Familia with the city's best smiths. Wasn't Hephaestus a god of smithing in Greek mythology?
Even then, from what Jacob had said about gods, they were hardly a trustworthy lot. If they somehow attained Nuclear weapons, it probably wouldn't be pretty.
He finally shook his head. "I can't help you there, but I can offer something else. My suit has a radio and state of the art scanners. It should allow both direct communication with the surface, recording of events seen through my helmet, and finally a real time map of the Dungeon. I remember it detecting as much as 20 floors down when I was checking my location earlier." 20 floors doesn't sound like much, but his suit's gravity and motion sensors have a range of 10 kilometres. Those were not small floors. This Dungeon was truly vast.
Riveria's eye sparkled. "That would be very useful, but..." She glared a glance with the others and Finn continued her unfinished sentence. "...will you be able to run your suit off of magic stones?"
"No problem. It uses deuterium."
"Say again?" Loki mouthed. Clearly not one of them understood.
"It runs off of the same processes as the sun. It just needs water. As long as I can maintain it, and I still have a few tools on me, then it should last years."
"That solves one issue, but the fact remains that you won't be starting off very strong as an adventurer. You have experience, so Leveling up should be feasible with a couple of years, maybe five years at most. You'll be starting off as a supporter. That means you'll be helping carry supplies, and getting experience with the higher floors while our elites go deeper. Is that fine with you?" Finn explained, seemingly trying not to upset him.
It didn't sound too different from what he was used to. Carrying supplies? What soldier didn't? Not being good enough to go deep with their best?
Well sure, he was one of the best Spartans left. But, Spartans were deadliest in teams, and he was alone. That was hardly new either. Especially after a few weeks of being Noble Teams rookie. He felt a pang of pain at their memory. He ignored it. He wanted them to be remembered fondly, as something he was proud of, not hurt by.
"That's acceptable." He finally answered.
Finn eyed him with a searching gaze. "My thumb says good things about you. I know you won't disappoint." He nodded at Loki, who was rubbing her hands together with a gaze of excitement.
"I like this kid. I want him." She raised her fist with a gleam in her eye.
Finn smiled, then turned back to him. "Well there you have it. Welcome to Loki Familia Six, we look forward to working with you." He held out a hand and they shook. "Likewise." He responded.
Gareth laughed. "Well this is certainly the oddest recruitment I can remember! What you say Riveria?"
She folded her arms. "I don't know, Lefiya certainly raised the bar for that one, didn't she?"
Finn noticed his confused gaze. "Lefiya Viridis is one of our mages, she was recruited after she managed to Level up in Orario's school district."
She managed to level up from... School?
"Enough of that!" Loki demanded. "Now it's time to see what we've got to work with. Come on RNGesus, give me a nice juicy skill..." She was outright salivating now, and who exactly was arenjesus?
Half a hour later, after both Gareth and Finn had lost their patience with watching him remove his armour, and helped out, he was lying on a bed with his back naked.
Behind him, Loki was dead silent. He hadn't learned much about her, but from what little he had picked up, this was out of character.
Riveria too was silent.
"Is something wrong?" Finn asked.
"What's up with the lot of you? You look like ya seen a ghost Loki?" Gareth demanded, sounding concerned.
Eventually, Loki sighed and pressed a sheet of paper to his back.
Then, she pulled him up and shoved it in his hands.
He looked over it. The letters were unfamiliar, but distinctly based on English, just like all the other writings he'd seen. He'd been told their language was Koine, and he wasn't the only one perturbed by its similarity to English.
But, as he read through it, he couldn't help but be confused.
He'd been told to expect maybe one skill if he got lucky. Maybe even magic if he was really lucky.
This was not 'just one skill'.
"What is all of... this?" B312 inquired inquisitively.
He looked up at Loki, a bewildered expression marking his face.
"These kid, are your skills." She intoned, smirking. Yet there was something hidden beneath that expression.
The Category-2 Spartan III cocked his head and raised his right eyebrow slightly at the red haired women.
"But I don't see fishing anywhere?"
The androgynous women's face lost it's smug countenance.
"Fishing? Why would you have fishing!?" She chastised angrily.
"Jorge taught me. He said it was important for a Spartan to be able to live off the land, never got to use it though." The mans appearance turned wistful and solemn.
A blood vessel popped on Loki's forehead. "You imbecile. These aren't mundane Skills! Do you even understand what any of this means?"
"Not a clue to be honest."
The goddess sighed in combined exasperation and frustration.
"Let me enlighten you Mr. I killed a few Minotaurs. You have 12 Skills. Not 12 mundane skills, but 12 Skills granted by the Falna. Skills granted by the Falna all must come from excelia, your experiences. Maybe the strongest person in my Familia, our Captain Finn, has only five Skills, and started with just 2. Nobody ever forgets the event that gave them a Skill, because they are literally etched into your soul. Do you understand?" She breathed out, exhaling heavily and eyes almost bloodshot.
Noble Six thought for a moment on what this must mean. Countless trains of thought rushed through his head. Threat assessments, debates on the rationality of what was happening, plans for the future and finally a philosophical argument on what it meant for entire parts of his life to be written out like a book.
He summarised this internal monologue succinctly.
"But I don't remember getting any of these?"
The goddess literally groaned, then to top it all off, she pouted at him. He had to fight not to smile at the sight.
"Well look, even if you don't know which came from what, I do since I got a look at each. So let me explain.
She pointed at the document on the table before them. "Demon <Butcher of The Bleeding Faithful>, is the weirdest skill I've ever seen. It comes from you killing thousands of people, who you knew with certainty believed that killing you is the right thing to do, and let me not ignore how absurd that it. Usually 'normal' people try to rationalise people they kill as evil or something. But no you accepted them all as people, even good people somehow!"
He could see the frustration growing in every word, he felt a slight chill down his spine. From the moment he first saw her, his instincts claimed incessantly "God". It was unnerving, as if she was somehow reaching into his very head. He was still uncertain if this was all just a dream, but maybe he shouldn't upset the being that appeared to be something 'inhuman'.
"It's even structured differently to normal skills and there's this weird poem at the start. It increases the number of enemy combatants? How does that even work? It inflicts fear on enemies and raises parameters? What does it mean by parameters? I've seen Skills that raise all abilities by a large amount or something similar, but this terminology is bizarre!"
Her voice grew curious, slowly overshadowing the frustration with a layer of subdued excitement.
"It also reduces the chance of frightened enemies running away. Considering what just happened this last expedition, I'm sure you can see how that would be useful."
Noble Six nodded at that, afterall, he'd dealt with fleeing enemies many times before. Sometimes, the results were messy.
"Then there's a weird symbol I've never seen before, and the next four are all... I think based on your childhood. Spirit of Vengeance and Survivor of Dying Worlds are from watching... w..wa..watching your..." Her voice trailed off, stuttering.
"Watching your home die..." Her gaze stared off into the distance.
Finn, the ever reliable leader, reached out for her arm.
"Are you okay Loki?" His eyes showed concern.
Across from him, Gareth and Riveria shared a look, before meeting his own gaze. The look in their eyes hurt to see.
He averted his gaze.
To this very day, those scars stung like anti-septic on an open wound.
Loki breathed out a gasp, then breathed again deeply. "I'm fine, just a bit... I've never seen something like that. Never expected to see anything like that."
Finns face showed confusion.
"What do you mean, haven't the gods seen countless countries fall, from before you descended?" He questioned.
Noble Six truly realised then, that the pity they showed lacked understanding. They knew not what he had gone through. He had only been four years of age, barely having learnt to walk.
"No, this wasn't just a country. Or even a continent. His whole world, the entire planet. Millions of innocents, all gone in an instant. Turned to glass..."
She looked at him, and the sheer pain in her gaze shattered his heart.
She hadn't just seen what had happened. She had experienced everything. The pain of a child losing his treasured loved ones, his family, his friends, his teachers, his people, his nation, his home, his entire world all gone in but a single day.
"I... How did you deal with it? How did you keep fighting after all of that? I.. I have to know." Her gaze grew strong, piercing almost through him.
It felt like she was staring into his soul, and if they were telling the truth about the Falna, then she actually had.
He didn't notice the looks of sheer horror colouring the faces of Loki Familias three leaders beside them.
He was too captured, too trapped by his own memories. Memories he would never, ever forget.
"It's because of something my grandpa told me."
She nodded.
"If we don't do it, if we don't solve problems while we still can, then someone else will have to. If I didn't become a Spartan and stop the Covenant then and there... more worlds would be glassed, more children would end up like me. It would continue, until nothing was left."
"Until... all of humanity... was extinguished."
[ I ]
"HHMMMMMFFFHH!" A muffled voice was heard from behind him.
He turned slowly, cautious not to make sudden movements. Could never be too careful when dealing with unknowns.
"You okay Lefiya? Oh right, I forgot." He heard the distinct sound of Tiona having her cheeks pulled by her older sister.
It was the two he'd noted early, each with pointed ears. The one covering her mouth and looking at him a pale face had exotic looking orange hair and dark blue eyes. She was maybe 5 feet tall, and wore a white and pink blouse and skirt with a white buttoned shirt and purple ribbon beneath an odd looking red cloak that stopped at her upper arms, not reaching her elbows.
To the right of her was a taller women, with jade green eyes that matched her hair. Her attire was more practical, being a green overcoat under a white yellow cloak and brown long boots. It also looked rather well made compared to the other clothes he'd seen, or more accurately more aesthetic. As if it had been made to look more professional.
Tiona scratched her head, "Ah sorry Captain, we forgot to mention he was injured."
The bearded man spoke sarcastically, "Well that certainly doesn't look like a wound from a Minotaur Tom-san. What the hell did you fight? Some kind of irregular?"
Six cringed at the name, as he turned to look at the short and portly, but well built man. "Just call me Six please."
"Why? You not like the name or something?" He responded gruffly.
[ I ]
The older Spartan Commando matched his gaze, there was a sense of pride in those eyes, and loss too.
"I'm not gonna lie to you Lieutenant, you're stepping into some shoes the rest of the squad would rather leave unfilled."
He nodded, he had read the files after all, seen the footage. Thom-A293 would be remembered, one way or the other.
[ I ]
"It's not that I don't like it, so much as what it means. Think of it as a gesture of respect to the fallen." He spoke softly, the words struggling to come out of his mouth.
Recognition lit up in the short mans eyes. "I understand." He raised a gloved hand. "Gareth Landrock, nice to meet you Six."
They shook. He had a surprisingly firm grip.
"You mind telling me the story of that later?" Tiona asked, looking at him, almost nervously?
"I'd be proud to."
"So you're Six right?" The jade haired women asked. He nodded once.
"That wound looks bad, normally I wouldn't act on charity like this, but if you don't take something you'll lose that arm." She offered a vial of orange fluid.
He looked at it suspiciously. "No offense, but I'm new here. I'm not entirely sure what's normal for you, but I've been taught not to accept unknown substances from strangers."
Suddenly many gazes, especially among the wagons being loaded onto cables went sharp. It was an odd feeling, a sort of pressure he had felt before, but never like this. It reminded him of how ODSTs used to look at him.
"You sure you'll be fine as you are? No point in explaining what happened later if you die from shock before that." The now named Finn asked. There was an odd sense of professionalism in his demeanour, it reminded him of Carter. He liked that.
"I'll be fine, Spartans are tough. I've known people that took worse and kept fighting."
The sight before him was an odd one. A young looking man that didn't even hit 4 feet in a purple, yellow and black patterned ensemble that looked like an artists take on military camouflage. Yet somehow, he exerted a pressure and sense of leadership that matched many of the most experienced veterans he had met. To add to it, instead of questioning him, the man went right back to issuing orders to the 'adventurers' surrounding them.
"Orba, I want whatever's left of those weapons recovered stat. Have the scraps sold if you have to. Lox, don't waste any of the empty vials, no point spending more on glass. Glass that can survive High-class adventurers being nearby doesn't come cheap. Arcs, that wagon isn't secured properly, move it."
He was more certain now. Finn Deime, and the other short people he'd seen were part of some ethnicity or race that didn't grow as tall as the average human. Perhaps Lefiya and the green haired women were also a different race?
Tione and Tiona approached him. The older sister spoke first. "Six, are you sure you'll be fine like that, I don't mean to be rude but your left shoulder looks like charcoal. Riveria's being pretty generous too, elixirs don't come cheap."
His forehead creased and his eyes narrowed in consternation. "Left shoulder?" He looked, and it was true. He remembered his right shoulder being pierced through. He was trained to be ambidextrous even if he preferred his right side, Kurt had made sure they were prepared for everything, so it made little difference in his combat effectiveness, but how could such a thing even happen?
"Is something wrong?" Tione asked.
"Nevermind for now, we'll discuss it later." He concluded. They seemed to think it was better to keep his situation private for now. He'd trust that, they'd show him courtesy so far and he'd repay that much.
"Why are you so damn paranoid anyway?" Tiona whined.
He considered it for a moment.
"I'll drink it on one condition." The now named Riveria raised an eyebrow at that.
"I'll scan the contents first. Even if I trust you not to poison me, it's quite clear you people have a... shall we say unique physiology?" That drew some confused glances.
"You want to just look at it?" He simply nodded.
He picked up his helmet off his waist, then put it back on, sealing it tight with a sound of gas being released. His HUD lit up, and behind his cracked visor was an array of curious and confused faces.
Perhaps they didn't have strong transparent materials here? It was moments like this he wished he'd been taught the same history lessons the Spartan IIs had. Jorge's expanded education came in handy, particularly when dealing with non-Spartans.
He reached out for the stoppered glass vial, and Riveria handed it over tentatively.
Then he ran every scan he could think of. IR lasers confirmed the molecular structure. He ran a few simulations, but it just seemed like a normal concoction of herbs to promote healing. Nothing special. The herbs were quite interesting though. The molecules they had produced didn't match anything in his database.
Safe to drink then. He put the vial which was shaped a bit like a test tube in one of his open pockets, then removed his helmet.
He nodded at the group before him. Then he bit off the cork, and swallowed it whole. Warmth flooded his body, and his arm went hot.
Suddenly he had feeling in his left arm again. There was no pain, no delay. Just a drink and it instantly healed him.
Even though by all laws of physics, it should have at the very least needed to pass through his digestive system before having any effect.
He raised his once broken limb, looking in awe and a slight dose of disbelief as he flexed his fingers with ease. Not noticing the confused stares from the bewildered adventurers.
It was absurd. First the Minotaurs, then Tiona and Tione's incredible speed. Their claim of magic being real. The bizarre features on the people everywhere in this underground Dungeon.
Now this. It was all a bit too much to explain. Overwhelmed, the supersoldier finally let his confusion show, and Tiona laughed saying she'd "told him there was nothing to be afraid of". But he wasn't listening.
Memories, old memories were starting to reach his mind, uncovered after over a decade of neglect.
All of this, it sounded like something out of a fantasy book.
What did that mean for him?
[ I ]
Eventually, once all the wagons had been attached to the cables and elevated to the surface, a couple more people joined them.
Two more adventurers, and from the speed at which they moved, presumably strong ones. They were even faster than Tiona and Tione, if not by a huge amount.
The first individual was moving slightly faster, though they slowed down rapidly as they approached.
From the blurred figure he could make out the details of long golden hair, and steel armour covering their upper body, with blue garments on their legs of some sort.
Behind them, a grey and black figure with shorter hair followed.
They stopped in front of the small army of adventurers and their appearance shot into focus just like that.
A golden haired, golden eyed women, adorned in apparently decorative steel armour that was mostly covering her arms and chest. Two pair of plates also protecting the sides of her waist and her knees. Along with a steel headband.
Beneath the armour was a white blouse, and a pair of turquoise blue boots reached up to the tops of thighs.
The grey figure was an odd looking man. Short grey hair and amber eyes with a blue lightning tattoo on his left cheek, but atop his head were what appeared to be the ears of grey wolf, while a grey furred tail hung from behind him. It was a disconcerting oddity, but it matched the previous examples he'd seen among adventurers, so he dismissed it.
He was shirtless with a grey jacket and black undercoat both wide open and revealing his muscled figure. White gauntlets and greaves were worn on his arms and legs, his leg armaments possessing a spherical red gem inlaid in each.
The male youth was seemingly chuckling about something, while the young women held a blank stare.
Finn nodded at both.
Tiona leaped at the girl, arms outstretched. "Ais what took so long?"
The girl turned her head to the side, cheeks flushing slightly and the boy laughed even harder.
"Eh? Did something happen Bete?"
[ I ]
They finally climbed to the surface, scaling the spiralling staircase leisurely.
When they surfaced, Six saw a whole new world.
A large field surrounded the entrance, with it's edges surrounded by trees and bushes and plants he didn't recognise.
Adventurers everywhere, carrying their supplies and weapons. Some civilians enjoying the sunlight. The place was beautiful, with stone buildings stretching out as far as he could see.
As they left for the exit, wagons following behind them, many cheered at the sight.
Chanting 'Loki-Familia is back' or 'The strongest adventurers have returned!'. It was fascinating to see.
Eventually, they reached the main pavement. The roads were neat and tidy. With building lining the streets in an ordered manner akin to those he was used to back home. It seemed a bit advanced... to advanced almost, at least for people that seemed lack any sign of advanced technology. They didn't act primitive at least.
Then he glanced behind him, to get one last look at the Dungeon entrance.
A white pearl tower of radiant stone spiralled high into the sky, touching the clouds and beyond.
It was awe-inspiring to look at. He had seen space elevators before, and skyscrapers that stretched kilometres high, but nothing quite like this.
"That.. is that a Space Elevator!?"
Finn shook his head. "No, that's Babel Tower. Its highest floors are above the clouds, but it doesn't reach the Heavens."
"Eh really? I always thought it did?" A brown haired man he had heard Finn call Raul marvelled.
Finn gestured. "Before Freya Familia bought the top floors, Zeus and Hera Familia used to allow other gods to visit them for a price. Loki has actually been there a few times. I think at least one Denatus was even held on the highest floor."
"How was such a thing built?" Six inquired.
"The gods." Was Finns non-answer.
"The gods?"
"When they descended, they created it just like that."
"You're saying gods descended, from the heavens?" He wasn't sure he could believe what his ears were hearing.
It would be another thing if the man was lying, but Six had been trained in body language and war by the very best the UNSC had to offer. If someone could lie to him, that was one thing, but not a single of the several dozen people surrounding them even flinched at the words.
As if they were obvious, a mere fact of life.
Either these people were crazy, he was crazy, or maybe... just maybe... something else was going on entirely.
[ I ]
They finally reached Twilight Manor. It was an impressive looking place. Very old fashioned, almost ancient in style.
Steel gates surrounded the exterior, while a building that resembled a castle was fashioned out of white stone. It was a simple structure with a convex roof covered in rust red tiles. Each corner had a spire covered in a similar red tiles.
Several guards were before the gates, and small number of adventurers could be seen waiting within. Preparing to greet the returning expedition.
They opened the gates, and Finn was back to giving out orders. Not for long though.
"So you have a story to tell?" The blonde asked seriously.
They were in a large room with a long table taking up most of its space, accompanying them was a few of the more important looking people he noted earlier.
Tiona and Tione shared glances. "You're not going to believe this one Captain."
He raised an eyebrow as if taunting them.
"Six doesn't have the Blessing." Tiona blurted out.
Several gasps rang out in sequence.
The blue eyed blonde's expression shifted, from shocked to pensive, to accepting, to shocked again.
"Yeah, fair enough that's pretty hard to believe." He finally nodded.
The wolf-eared man, apparently curious at the unfamiliar figure with his companions, interjected.
"Why was some kid without a Familia in the dungeon again?"
Finn raised a finger. "I think that ones easy to answer Bete, if you can kill a Minotaur without the blessing, I can see why would you brave the upper floors of the dungeon, even if just briefly."
The man's face seemed to freeze at the explanation.
Tiona's smile wavered, and Tione behind seemed even more exasperated that before.
"Yeah, unfortunately that's not the case Captain. He said he fell through a hole." That seemed to draw even more attention. Eyes being drawn to him like plasma fire.
"A hole in a the Dungeon?" Finn looked at him questioningly.
"Yes and no. I wasn't on this planet before I fell through it, nevermind the Dungeon." He explained simply.
"Planet? Do you mean... you weren't on Gekai?" Gareth breathed out, disbelievingly.
He looked to Riveria, a silent question on his lips.
"It's possible. The gods descended from Tenkai after all, and we know they had searched for entertainment in other worlds."
"Reach wasn't the only planet the UNSC has explored. Rather it's the very first colony, and one of six in the Epsilon Eridanus system." This much was fine to tell civilians he was certain. Or rather, what was the point of OPSEC if he didn't even know if they were still in the Milky Way galaxy? Operation security didn't really matter once you died of all old age in his opinion.
"Your people have explored different worlds?" Finn asked inquisitively.
He nodded. "We've travelled to many stars using Slipspace. The portal I fell through, it matched some descriptions of Slipspace portals. There may be a connection."
"Hold on a minute! This is crazy! Are we really going to believe some no-name, I mean even if he killed a Minotaur without the Falna..."
"Actually it was 5 Minotaurs, and something else with white armour." Tione remarked.
Ais, seemed to show interest at the statement. Her head tilted in thought as she studied him with an intense gaze.
"Yeah, but still-"
He cut off the argument with a raised hand.
Then placed his helmet on the table, and pulled out a UNSC datapad from his suits storage compartment.
[ I ]
After showing them the footage from the tail end of his fight with the Sangheili Shipmaster, then skipping through the 7 hours he spent asleep in the Dungeon right to the battle with the Minotaur.
"You fight very smart." Finn praised.
"Yeah, not bad for a human." Gareth nodded.
Bete fingered his chin, seemingly deep in thought. Behind him, his tail drooped, and his ears laid flat atop his head. "What does this all mean? That definitely wasn't Orario, and the skies..."
Riveria spoke up, "We have to tell Loki this, other worlds dumping random people into the Dungeon. That could cause issues with our next expedition. No, this could pose a threat to all of Orario."
Silence took hold of the room for several moments.
"Hey Six?" A concerned voice rang out, breaking him out of his funk.
"Yes?"
"I think you forgot to remove the magic stones from those Minotaurs."
Tione's face paled.
Finn sighed. "You fools, if a Monster eats those we could get an irregular."
"An irregular?" Six's voice lights up in curiosity.
"Monsters stronger than others of their species. Often smarter and more cunning too. Very dangerous."
Six nods. "I'll destroy all Magic stones in the future then."
Tiona waves her hands in alarm - "What but you're supposed to sell them! I mean, I we don't since small ones like from a Minotaur don't sell for much, but you should be... wait you killed a Minotaur, so would you start at Level 1 or Level 2?" She started counting off her fingers, deep in thought.
Gareth laughed. "I guess we'll find out if the kid joins the Familia." He looked at Six meaningfully. "So how about it then? You're certainly stronger than a Dwarf if you killed a damn Minotaur. No Level One has done that before, and you don't even have the blessing."
Six shook his head. "It's a function of my armour." He tapped his shoulder plate.
They all turned to him at that, listening to his every word.
"Piezoelectric layer charged with massive amounts of electricity amplifies all force using a newly discovered quantum phenomena that manipulates momentum. It's a little beyond my paygrade, but the simple answer is that it increases my strength by a factor of 40 times or so. A special gel underlayer absorbs physical force, and the armour is the strongest composite the UNSC can yet make. Without it all, I probably would have died."
"Impressive." Gareth gave in approval, thumbing his chin.
Finn nodded in agreement. "Can anyone use this armour?"
Six considered it. "That's classified information." Was his non-answer.
"Classified to you? Or to us?" The Captain pointed out observantly.
"Lets just say I probably already told you far more than I should." That seemed to mollify him.
"Wait a minute?" Tiona pointed at him, from the contorted expression she had remembered something.
"Where's your sword? Those Minotaurs were all decapitated, apart from the one you dusted." She accused.
He reached down to the purple hilt on his waste, pulled it from the magnetic holster, and with a flick.
"BRRRSSSSSTTTTTT"
A glowing translucent blade of aquamarine blue 'cracked' into existence, emanating a faint hum and a noticeable amount of heat.
"I used this." He explained curtly, hiding a smile at their expressions.
"That's awesome!" Tiona breathed in delight.
"Is this classified too?" Finn asked exasperatedly.
"No actually, it's Covenant technology. We barely have a clue how it works."
The door was flung open. Behind it emerged a women with narrowed eyes, red hair in a ponytail and a blue and black hoodie. "What's this I heard about you guys finding a lovely new recruit for me!"
She smiled, but it was not a thing of joy. Instead he got the sense of greed and desire from that pristine face.
Yet, he barely noticed any of that.
Too busy was he dealing with something new.
His mind screamed at him.
GOD! GOD! GOD!
GOD! GOD! GOD!
dIvINe! DiVInE! dIVinE!
It screamed through his mind like plasma searing through his flesh.
He stamped down on it with all the force of his will that he could bring to bare.
It didn't stop, but it's volume receded, pushed to the very depths of his mind. He breathed out, taking in air hungrily.
Before him, everyone was staring. Startled.
Loki was frozen, mid-wrestle with Ais?
"I've never seen a mortal react to the Divine like that? You okay kid?"
He nodded. "I'm fine, just need a breather." He glanced at Finn meaningfully.
"I think I need some fresh air. I'll just take a quick walk around the place, you mind looking after my weapons? I wouldn't want to get in trouble carrying weapons brazenly around."
The red haired goddess's eyebrow raised at that, but Finn just smiled. "Yeah sure, just don't be gone too long, we have a celebration later on this evening. Feel free to ask around, you may not have realised it but Loki Familia is the best in all of Orario."
Somehow, that was a relief. He nodded, then left the room. Leaving his helmet and weapons behind.
Leaving Loki Familia to explain the mystery they'd uncovered to their confused goddess.
[ I ]
He explored Orario.
Outside the central streets, things were less neat and tidy.
Less organised. Houses sprawled almost randomly. Alleyways were covered with dirt, and several distinct areas were straight out filled with the wreckage of abandoned and collapsed buildings.
Markets were filled with people selling goods.
Residential areas filled with children playing.
At one point he even found what appeared to be a red-light district of some sort. The strong smells and perfumes warding him away with some distaste.
He eventually found himself climbing one of the walls, and looking at the views from the top.
It was beautiful. Grass fields stretched miles out, and the backdrop of vast mountains and rivers on horizon only accented it with an air of familiarity.
It was just like Reach. The realisation stung. He turned around, looking over Orario. An odd street caught his gaze. He'd heard some mother warn her kids not to stray near Daedalus street or they might get lost.
He decided to explore it. He faintly remembered something he'd heard from Commander Kurt. The story of the Minotaur. The Minotaur trapped within Daedalus's labyrinth. He smiled at the odd coincidence.
[ I ]
"So you really don't know anything, huh kid?"
Six scanned the mans expression once again. There was a familiar tiredness, an exhaustion he could to relate to after so many years of being ground down, spat on, broken and crushed by life.
He was covered in dirt, his torn, cheap- no, no person in the UNSC had clothes so poorly made. They looked more like a couple of sacks than anything that could be called 'protection from elements'.
They'd met in the labyrinthian structure of Daedalus street. The homeless man had happily given him a font of information about Orario while he scrambled for a plan of action.
He still remembered those days back on Alfheimr, the frozen planet orbiting Trappist, a star a mere 40 light years from Earth.
He was but 4 years old, and the Covenant had finally broken through the Outer Colonies, and had laid siege on the far away system of Gliese 667 Cc.
He had barely comprehended it all back then. That at any moment, he could lose everything.
Then he did, and he'd had no choice but to.
They came in the night. It was after a long day spent playing with his family. Him, his big brother, his sisters and his parents.
Screams from that night still haunted him. His father, a former Marine, had grabbed him and his siblings and shoved them in the car with their mother.
Then was the crash. Afterwards... what to this day he could only described as monsters had descended on the vehicle and the crippled and dead bodies within...
To this very day, he held an irrational hatred, a soul born loathing for Brutes, for the Jiralhanae.
At the darkening of his expression, Jacob Lee raised a hand to the 20 year old soldiers shoulder and gave him a light shake.
It was a futile attempt, being that the same shoulder was clad in 600 kilograms of composite armour, but it released the young man from his memories nonetheless. "Thanks." He nodded.
"You okay there fella? You look like you've seen hell?" The concern on his face was clear to see.
He nodded. "I'm fine, just old memories. You were saying? The Blessing?"
Jacob frowned. Then sighed. "Yeah, you need the Blessing if you want to make it in Orario, but if you don't have the Blessing how are wearing this armour? It bloody weighs like a boulder?"
"That's classified information, UNSC technology."
"Well whatever, but if this you-enaseee isn't a god, then you can get yourself a Falna. The Blessing improves everything, even your lifespan."
He thought about that. It explained what he'd seen. "...and the catch?"
Jacob laughed a that, right from his gut. "Haha, yeah you're smart kid, I like ya. The catch, is you have to listen to a god, they can be quite the pain, trust me. It's worth it though."
He'd have to put his trust in someone, that wasn't quite human. It reminded him of Smart AIs in a way. They could do amazing things, but they could just as easily do horrible things.
"So, I just ask them for a Blessing in return for doing what they ask?"
"Not quite, you can probably make a contract since you seem pretty tough. They'd do a lot for a talented adventurer. Negotiate well and you could even retire. However, everyone starts at Level 1. It doesn't matter who you are or what you've done. You start there. However...."
Level 1? So a baseline then. "However?"
He continued. "Some people, if they are particularly talented, or even determined, or just hardworking. They can start with a skill. Skills are the bread and butter of High class adventurers, they can mean more than Levels sometimes. Level 1 will make you stronger than the strongest mortals in the world. It can make even a child able to lift small boulders, and outrun a marathon runner. But... the monsters in the Dungeon are just as strong, and they get stronger the deeper you go."
That made sense with what he'd seen. "So how do I Level up?"
"Hahaha, kid you don't beat around the bush do ya?"
He shook his head.
"Well... let me put it like this. You have to go on an adventure, do something genuinely amazing, something even the gods can't deny." He paused for a few seconds, then turned and spoke with emphasis.
"Like something right out of a story, right out of books of Myth and Legend." Jacobs eyes closed.
He mulled over that for a moment. It sounded, intriguing?
"Sounds doable."
The man doubletaked at that. "Kid, adventurers die every day. It doesn't matter how strong you are, to qualify for a Level up, at least from a fight, you have to genuinely be at risk of death."
He shook his head in response, and picked up his helmet, getting up. Then he turned his eye, staring straight into the older mans dark brown eyes with a gaze of purest steel.
Behind his gaze, the lifetime of training, the unending loss of his two most beloved families, the recent and yet unhealed wound of losing all of Noble Team, it all burned in a fire that together fuelled his spirit to further heights.
"For a Spartan, cheating death is just another Tuesday." He spoke without emotion or volume, as if it were a statement of the obvious.
He took in a deep breath, puffing his chest up.
"Afterall, Spartans Never Die, we're just Missing In Action." There was a force behind these words.
In the end, wasn't he too missing in action now? He'd survived the Fall of Reach hadn't he? Even if nobody else had. Or rather, especially because no-one else had.
What was one more adventure? One more impossible task, so that he could eventually claw his way back home, and then once again, to finally stop the Covenant in it's tracks, and turn the whole war on it's head.
He'd do it. For those who were fallen, and for those who were not.
[ I ]
"I accept."
The red haired goddess seemed taken aback.
"Just like that?" She frowned, as if put off by his eagerness.
"Problem?"
"You aren't going to give me any terms or conditions? Afterall that build about you killing 5 Minotaurs at once?" She seemed disappointed at the lack of a negotiation.
"Are you saying you have any?" He smirked.
"Of course I do." She smiled back, without missing a beat.
It didn't throw her off as he'd expected, but he'd planned for that too.
"That's going to be a problem for me. I'm still a member of the UNSC afterall. Warrant Officer Spartan Tom-B312 at your service." He gave a dashing smile, and a very small bow of his head. Just enough to be polite.
"UNSC? Isn't this UNSC stuck on a galaxy a long way away?" Odd choice of words that?
"Wouldn't know. Haven't had a chance to take a scan of the night sky yet. We could be next door, or in another dimension entirely... I'm not putting my money on the first one though." She nodded at that.
Behind her were sitting Finn, Riveria and Gareth. The 'big three' it seemed, of Loki Familia.
"So then, you fine with helping me get back?" He questioned casually.
"Of course, but in turn I do expect you to help my Familia. My darling kids have their problems you know?"
"That's fair. What sort of problems?"
Finn scratched his head.
"You're already tough and skilled enough to take on multiple Minotaurs. Combined with the Blessing, you should be comparable to any Level 2, if not most Level 3s. We lost a lot of money in the last expedition. See, we found new monsters, with acid for blood." He explained candidly. There was clearly a routine here, and an angle they'd planned.
"Acid blood?" He inquired, mind racing.
"Yeah, they ruined most of our weapons and even destroyed the spares. We had to cancel the expedition." Finn explained.
Finn looked down at his armour meaningfully.
"You have weapons and armour completely different to ours, can you produce more?"
He thought on it. Nevermind classified intel, helping them reverse engineer Covenant technology wasn't technically against regulation, but only technically. It was probably possible. Orario already had basic industry, using magic stones from the Dungeon. Apparently Hephaestus, interestingly enough was the goddess of the Familia with the city's best smiths. Wasn't Hephaestus a god of smithing in Greek mythology?
Even then, from what Jacob had said about gods, they were hardly a trustworthy lot. If they somehow attained Nuclear weapons, it probably wouldn't be pretty.
He finally shook his head. "I can't help you there, but I can offer something else. My suit has a radio and state of the art scanners. It should allow both direct communication with the surface, recording of events seen through my helmet, and finally a real time map of the Dungeon. I remember it detecting as much as 20 floors down when I was checking my location earlier." 20 floors doesn't sound like much, but his suit's gravity and motion sensors have a range of 10 kilometres. Those were not small floors. This Dungeon was truly vast.
Riveria's eye sparkled. "That would be very useful, but..." She glared a glance with the others and Finn continued her unfinished sentence. "...will you be able to run your suit off of magic stones?"
"No problem. It uses deuterium."
"Say again?" Loki mouthed. Clearly not one of them understood.
"It runs off of the same processes as the sun. It just needs water. As long as I can maintain it, and I still have a few tools on me, then it should last years."
"That solves one issue, but the fact remains that you won't be starting off very strong as an adventurer. You have experience, so Leveling up should be feasible with a couple of years, maybe five years at most. You'll be starting off as a supporter. That means you'll be helping carry supplies, and getting experience with the higher floors while our elites go deeper. Is that fine with you?" Finn explained, seemingly trying not to upset him.
It didn't sound too different from what he was used to. Carrying supplies? What soldier didn't? Not being good enough to go deep with their best?
Well sure, he was one of the best Spartans left. But, Spartans were deadliest in teams, and he was alone. That was hardly new either. Especially after a few weeks of being Noble Teams rookie. He felt a pang of pain at their memory. He ignored it. He wanted them to be remembered fondly, as something he was proud of, not hurt by.
"That's acceptable." He finally answered.
Finn eyed him with a searching gaze. "My thumb says good things about you. I know you won't disappoint." He nodded at Loki, who was rubbing her hands together with a gaze of excitement.
"I like this kid. I want him." She raised her fist with a gleam in her eye.
Finn smiled, then turned back to him. "Well there you have it. Welcome to Loki Familia Six, we look forward to working with you." He held out a hand and they shook. "Likewise." He responded.
Gareth laughed. "Well this is certainly the oddest recruitment I can remember! What you say Riveria?"
She folded her arms. "I don't know, Lefiya certainly raised the bar for that one, didn't she?"
Finn noticed his confused gaze. "Lefiya Viridis is one of our mages, she was recruited after she managed to Level up in Orario's school district."
She managed to level up from... School?
"Enough of that!" Loki demanded. "Now it's time to see what we've got to work with. Come on RNGesus, give me a nice juicy skill..." She was outright salivating now, and who exactly was arenjesus?
Half a hour later, after both Gareth and Finn had lost their patience with watching him remove his armour, and helped out, he was lying on a bed with his back naked.
Behind him, Loki was dead silent. He hadn't learned much about her, but from what little he had picked up, this was out of character.
Riveria too was silent.
"Is something wrong?" Finn asked.
"What's up with the lot of you? You look like ya seen a ghost Loki?" Gareth demanded, sounding concerned.
Eventually, Loki sighed and pressed a sheet of paper to his back.
Then, she pulled him up and shoved it in his hands.
He looked over it. The letters were unfamiliar, but distinctly based on English, just like all the other writings he'd seen. He'd been told their language was Koine, and he wasn't the only one perturbed by its similarity to English.
But, as he read through it, he couldn't help but be confused.
He'd been told to expect maybe one skill if he got lucky. Maybe even magic if he was really lucky.
This was not 'just one skill'.
"What is all of... this?" B312 inquired inquisitively.
He looked up at Loki, a bewildered expression marking his face.
"These kid, are your skills." She intoned, smirking. Yet there was something hidden beneath that expression.
The Category-2 Spartan III cocked his head and raised his right eyebrow slightly at the red haired women.
"But I don't see fishing anywhere?"
The androgynous women's face lost it's smug countenance.
"Fishing? Why would you have fishing!?" She chastised angrily.
"Jorge taught me. He said it was important for a Spartan to be able to live off the land, never got to use it though." The mans appearance turned wistful and solemn.
A blood vessel popped on Loki's forehead. "You imbecile. These aren't mundane Skills! Do you even understand what any of this means?"
"Not a clue to be honest."
The goddess sighed in combined exasperation and frustration.
"Let me enlighten you Mr. I killed a few Minotaurs. You have 12 Skills. Not 12 mundane skills, but 12 Skills granted by the Falna. Skills granted by the Falna all must come from excelia, your experiences. Maybe the strongest person in my Familia, our Captain Finn, has only five Skills, and started with just 2. Nobody ever forgets the event that gave them a Skill, because they are literally etched into your soul. Do you understand?" She breathed out, exhaling heavily and eyes almost bloodshot.
Noble Six thought for a moment on what this must mean. Countless trains of thought rushed through his head. Threat assessments, debates on the rationality of what was happening, plans for the future and finally a philosophical argument on what it meant for entire parts of his life to be written out like a book.
He summarised this internal monologue succinctly.
"But I don't remember getting any of these?"
The goddess literally groaned, then to top it all off, she pouted at him. He had to fight not to smile at the sight.
"Well look, even if you don't know which came from what, I do since I got a look at each. So let me explain.
She pointed at the document on the table before them. "Demon <Butcher of The Bleeding Faithful>, is the weirdest skill I've ever seen. It comes from you killing thousands of people, who you knew with certainty believed that killing you is the right thing to do, and let me not ignore how absurd that it. Usually 'normal' people try to rationalise people they kill as evil or something. But no you accepted them all as people, even good people somehow!"
He could see the frustration growing in every word, he felt a slight chill down his spine. From the moment he first saw her, his instincts claimed incessantly "God". It was unnerving, as if she was somehow reaching into his very head. He was still uncertain if this was all just a dream, but maybe he shouldn't upset the being that appeared to be something 'inhuman'.
"It's even structured differently to normal skills and there's this weird poem at the start. It increases the number of enemy combatants? How does that even work? It inflicts fear on enemies and raises parameters? What does it mean by parameters? I've seen Skills that raise all abilities by a large amount or something similar, but this terminology is bizarre!"
Her voice grew curious, slowly overshadowing the frustration with a layer of subdued excitement.
"It also reduces the chance of frightened enemies running away. Considering what just happened this last expedition, I'm sure you can see how that would be useful."
Noble Six nodded at that, afterall, he'd dealt with fleeing enemies many times before. Sometimes, the results were messy.
"Then there's a weird symbol I've never seen before, and the next four are all... I think based on your childhood. Spirit of Vengeance and Survivor of Dying Worlds are from watching... w..wa..watching your..." Her voice trailed off, stuttering.
"Watching your home die..." Her gaze stared off into the distance.
Finn, the ever reliable leader, reached out for her arm.
"Are you okay Loki?" His eyes showed concern.
Across from him, Gareth and Riveria shared a look, before meeting his own gaze. The look in their eyes hurt to see.
He averted his gaze.
To this very day, those scars stung like anti-septic on an open wound.
Loki breathed out a gasp, then breathed again deeply. "I'm fine, just a bit... I've never seen something like that. Never expected to see anything like that."
Finns face showed confusion.
"What do you mean, haven't the gods seen countless countries fall, from before you descended?" He questioned.
Noble Six truly realised then, that the pity they showed lacked understanding. They knew not what he had gone through. He had only been four years of age, barely having learnt to walk.
"No, this wasn't just a country. Or even a continent. His whole world, the entire planet. Millions of innocents, all gone in an instant. Turned to glass..."
She looked at him, and the sheer pain in her gaze shattered his heart.
She hadn't just seen what had happened. She had experienced everything. The pain of a child losing his treasured loved ones, his family, his friends, his teachers, his people, his nation, his home, his entire world all gone in but a single day.
"I... How did you deal with it? How did you keep fighting after all of that? I.. I have to know." Her gaze grew strong, piercing almost through him.
It felt like she was staring into his soul, and if they were telling the truth about the Falna, then she actually had.
He didn't notice the looks of sheer horror colouring the faces of Loki Familias three leaders beside them.
He was too captured, too trapped by his own memories. Memories he would never, ever forget.
"It's because of something my grandpa told me."
She nodded.
"If we don't do it, if we don't solve problems while we still can, then someone else will have to. If I didn't become a Spartan and stop the Covenant then and there... more worlds would be glassed, more children would end up like me. It would continue, until nothing was left."
"Until... all of humanity... was extinguished."
[ I ]
CMDR Dantae
The Scribe
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Butcher of Bleeding Faithful 4
Authors Note:
This story has received a lot of attention, more than I expected. I ended up scrapping the first draft over quality concerns, but I didn't want to take too long rewriting it.
I did have another Danmachi fanfic that I hadn't yet posted publicly, but with my focus on this, it'll be on Hiatus. I'll also now be uploading this story to a few other sites, such as FFN, SV, QQ and AO3. I hope you all enjoy this one.
Six tapped his fingers on the UNSC Datapad in his hands, as he sat on the edge of a bed.
It was a specialised configuration, built specifically to meet the needs of Spartans in the field. It could connect directly to both his MJOLNIR and the Spartan Neural Interface chip embedded in his skull. The computing power wasn't anything to brag about, but with the crystal computer hardware underlining the gel layer in his suit of Mark V(B), he had enough power to run an AI.
In fact he did have an AI. A fragment of Auntie Dot was in his suits memory.
Dumb AIs were not quite as efficient as Smart AIs. While a Smart AI could conceivably operate at near full efficiency using the resources of the latest MJOLNIR variant, Dumb AIs just required too much calculation power.
Which limited his options greatly. He couldn't just ask Dot for a plan of action, it was barely operable in its current condition. So instead he cut off the unnecessary functions, ease of use, verbal communication, psychological analysis.
It was a kit bashed solution, and he just knew if Kat had ever seen it she'd have outright spat in disgust, but unfortunately he didn't have many options...
He looked to his left.
An energy dagger puncture, 27 plasma impacts, 12 needle punctures, and radiation exposure from plasma grenades and fuel rod explosions.
His suit of MJOLNIR was in tatters. Even if his body had now been fixed up by processes he couldn't yet comprehend, it didn't change that he was limited in options now.
He was a pretty good engineer, especially considering it wasn't his speciality, but without the tools and equipment...
Parts of his armour plating were outrighted half melted, the absorbent paint coating was scratched and worn away. Multiple components either barely functioning, damaged beyond repair or outright missing.
Worst of all. His eyes trailed over the left shoulder, it didn't match the footage or his memories, jarring him with a sense of cognitive dissonance. Yet the hole piercing right through the armour plating, nanoweave undersuit, gel layer, and finally the Polymerized lithium niobocene that made up the suits most important function. The physical enhancement.
The suits self-repair capabilities were good, but not this good. The armours Drop Shield capability did have some restorative functions for reasons that were yet to be understood, but they seemed to primarily affect biology not machinery.
He wished for just a moment, that the UNSC had been able to reverse engineer the Covenants nanomachine capabilities. For all that the UNSC had a mastery of fabrication and mass production, the Covenant had them beat in terms of self-sufficiency and ease of use.
It wasn't like cutting edge technology was just going to drop into his lap unfortunately.
A thought hit him then, striking with the ferocity of lightning.
'The Ship Master!'
In the Dungeon, 4 floors down, it's corpse still laid. He thought on it, mulling over the possibilities. He doubted this magic could easily unlock the Covenants secrets, but he knew now they hadn't been lying.
He looked at his hand, a wrench between his fingers.
He deftly tossed it in the air.
As it rose, time halted to a stop.
It moved glacially, slower than a snails pace.
For the first time, he could control 'Spartan Time' at will.
Time sped back up and he caught lightly.
He was curious about the full effects. He'd tested his augmentations heavily, sparring with comrades and performing all manner of exercises a long, long ten years prior.
Now he had another. The Falna.
If he wanted to secure the dead Sangheili's amour, he'd need a bag to hide it in. Carrying it openly would no doubt attract attention.
If he was going to the Dungeon however...
He moved to the gear laid out on the floor. Trained eyes scanned over his equipment with skill borne of over a decade of experience.
2 Plasma grenades, an Energy Sword and a Plasma Rifle.
His new MJOLNIR rated WD M11 combat knife, a few tools such as a wrench and a screwdriver.
A Covenant water container with 500milliletres, his own meagre supplies of food and water, a Utility pouch, an armoured backpack and finally his Datapad.
He couldn't openly use the Plasma weapons, from what Jacob had told him, attracting attention would be dangerous, and he couldn't recharge or replace them. He'd have to save them for emergencies.
His M11 knife, a new weapon built with Titanium B to match the needs of Spartan Operators, could easily handle anything up to the 4th floor. He wasn't certain, but he'd dismantled the Goblin on his way down with ease. That was in MJOLNIR, but the creature hadn't been an issue.
He strapped the M11 to his waist and grabbed the bag, then set off.
Behind the door, several of his fellow Familia members passed by. Two younger men, both in casual gear.
"....red, I genuinely thought that was it for us, those Irregulars gave me a real shock." A blonde haired man spoke to his junior, a younger man with dark hair.
"Ah, it's the new guy. Hello there, I'm Kevin, this is Morrel. Pleasure to meet ya."
Six nodded back. "Likewise."
The man eyed his bag and knife, "Going somewhere? The celebration is in a couple hours."
He'd tried to wave off Finns offer to join them, but the man had pointed out it was a great chance for him to get to know his new comrades. "I forgot something in the Dungeon, I'm retrieving it."
"Ah? Is that so? Well, you'd best hurry up. We won't keep ya." The man nodded back, and turned away, continuing his chat.
Six quickly made his way to Twilight Manors entrance, and the guards let him through. Though on the way out, he couldn't help but notice a number of eyes, some curious, some less kind.
After promptly making his way through Orario and descending into the Dungeon entrance, he found himself on the first floor once again.
It was quiet no, barely any adventurers left inside.
His mind went over the skills his Falna now granted.
'Demon <Butcher of The Bleeding Faithful>'
It was apparently odd even by the local standards, it increased the number of enemies when in combat. He'd have to watch out for that. However, it didn't just do that. It also made him more powerful when outnumbered, and when facing a certain number of enemies, would hasten their terror.
He moved quickly, having memorised his route up with Tiona and Tione.
Then he heard a loud cracking sound.
He turned, drawing his knife and lowering his stance, all in one swift motion.
Prepared, he watched as the Monster was born from the Dungeon walls.
Jacob had told him that some said the Dungeon wanted them dead, that it wasn't just alive, but thinking too.
He wasn't certain if it was true, but at this point, it was hardly the strangest thing he'd seen.
The Monster wasn't a goblin this time. It's body was instead furred, and its head that of a wolf.
He didn't know what these were called, but it hardly mattered. It's red eyes were just the same. They narrowed in a fierce glare as it growled.
Then it charged at him.
Time slowed.
It still moved surprisingly fast. Going by an estimate, it was moving faster than the average Spartan could, despite being on the first floor.
That said, just like the Goblin from before.
He leaned forward and sprung, his knife swung from his right hand, cutting straight through it's throat.
It didn't react in time, perhaps it didn't even see his movement.
His knife didn't stop however, instead going right through the neckbone, decapitating it entirely.
He was certain he had moved faster than ever before, even faster than he could in MJOLNIR. Perhaps the Falna's affect on his speed was greater because he didn't have the added mass of his armour 600 kilogram bulk?
He shook off the distraction as cracks sounded off down the hallway.
He'd need to focus. Instead of standing still again, he instead dashed down the hall.
One of his skills, [Lone Wolf], helped him deal with pain and fatigue.
The monsters chased after him as he dashed round the corner.
He kept going.
A Goblin appeared to his left, and it's skull was split by a front kick.
Several more of the wolf headed creatures blocked his way.
He quickly stabbed one, rushed past the second and tripped the last, before picking it up by the leg and throwing it behind him.
Finally, he reached the stairways to the 2nd floor.
He surveyed it quickly, then positioned himself around the corner. The large staircase wasn't a great chokepoint, being wide enough for carriages. The cover was still useful though.
Then the horde came.
He leaped into the fray.
Normally, he wouldn't have been so reckless. But against Monsters he'd already found to be no challenge?
Well, he had skills that improved his capabilities when outnumbered, so he'd surely be fine.
He moved quickly, finding his speed and strength had improved from before. The effects of his Skill no doubt.
He stayed on the move, cutting a path through them, using their terror and confusion to his advantage.
Once he was in the middle of the horde, Goblins and wolf-heads trampling each other underfoot to get at him, he jumped and leaped off the walls, bouncing to the top of the stairs.
Then he turned.
Now with the benefit of the high ground, taking them apart would be easy.
However, it was not to be. He heard a cracking noise from behind.
'Even more Monsters?'
He changed plans, rushing down and cutting apart the Monsters as fast as he could. If he was pinned, he'd take far too long to finish them all off. He couldn't be late for the celebrations planned later.
Quickly he made his way to Floor 2. But as he stepped onto the floor he heard a sound from behind.
He twisted out of the way of the large mass of brown scales.
It was a large brown lizard. Easily 90 kilos, perhaps more.
He jumped onto it's back, grabbed it's skull with an iron fist, and cut its throat open.
Then the horde was upon him.
He'd expected a challenge, but this Skill was proving to be more of a hurdle than predicted.
He made his way through floor 2, where the number of Monsters increased dramatically, more lizards appeared and he had to take care not to be ambushed by them again.
He was tempted to use one of his Skills to make passing through easier, but decided better of it.
Trump cards were meant as a last resort. If the Dungeon really could think, and wanted him dead, better not to let it know what he could do.
He reached the stairs quicker this time, aided by the effects of his Skill. Floor 3 however was much larger, and he spent a good 20 minutes fighting his way through.
It also felt like the Monsters were slightly tougher. Not by much, but enough to notice. Even still, the difference between him was too much for them to surpass. It was similar to fighting the Covenants lesser races, Jackals and Grunts in close quarter combat.
They were no match for a Spartan.
Eventually, he reached the stairs.
Finally, he was on floor 4, and not even an hour had passed.
He retraced his steps quickly, careful to not let the Monsters assault distract him, before he reached the spot where the Minotaur corpses... had been?
Nearly all of them were gone.
All that was left was the one he had tricked into tripping over the alien corpse, it's red body hung over it like a sack.
And above that body was... a Minotaur.
Interesting. He'd be teen told that Minotaurs didn't usually come down this far. Loki familia had even apologised to him about it.
Yet something... was off.
The Minotaur wasn't looking... wasn't glaring at him, like every other monster he'd encountered.
Instead, it was holding the dead Minotaur up and looking at the headless Elite.
How intriguing. A Monster with a mind behind it.
Dangerous.
He activated his skill then.
This Skill, [The Unseen Assailant] was a simple one. It granted him perfect invisibility.
He'd tested it before, and it had fooled even Finns eyes. Apparently 'Pallums' had better vision than other races?
It did have a few drawbacks though. It cost his stamina to use, and heightened his fear and excitement. Things that could be a complication for any soldier.
He felt his emotions shift, and within the Dungeon, the effect was far greater than before. It was an unnerving sensation, but he resisted with willpower forged in battle.
The Minotaur finally looked up, as a horde of Goblins, Brown Lizards and Wolf-headed men all attacked, roaring at the Minotaur as if it was another adventurer.
This was getting stranger by the second.
The Minotaur picked up a short spear with a long blade coloured red, just like his skin.
Then it howled, the sound chilling even him.
It charged, swinging it's weapon like a club.
It was unskilled, but its strength...
He'd been able to tell the Minotaurs were unnaturally strong before, but this helped him picture it.
With a single swing, the Minotaur sent a dozen Monsters flying, their bodies breaking as they impacted the walls.
It was ferocious. For all that it showed intelligence before, the way it fought was like a wild animal.
With him not fighting, his skill 'Demon <Butcher of The Bleeding Faithful>' stopped drawing in more enemies, and eventually the horde was reduced to none.
He was tempted to deactivate [The Unseen Assailant] and open a dialogue. On one hand, nobody had mentioned anything like intelligent monsters. It would have seemed like an important thing to mention.
That said, he wasn't actually supposed to be in the Dungeon right now. Finn had asked him to register at the guild with his deputy, Raul Nord. So it wasn't impossible this was a common thing.
Then the Minotaur did something else that surprised him.
It torn open one of the corpses, and ate the magic stone inside.
Hadn't Finn warned them leaving magic stones uncollected would result in Irregulars?
He deactivated his skill.
Then he cleared his throat.
The great beast was larger than the other Minotaurs he'd fought. It was just an inch shorter than his own height of 6 foot 9 inches.
It's mouth opened, and then another surprise came.
"You're... not going to attack?" It's voice was gravelly and deep, and laced with confusion and apprehension.
It could speak as well? This day really was full of surprises.
"Are you?" He answered with his own question.
When the Minotaur shook its head, now looking at him curiously he started wondering if adventurers didn't know of intelligent monsters after all.
"I wasn't aware there were Monsters with a mind. Are there others like you?"
The alien creature looked down, humming in thought.
"I have not met any, but the other Monsters started attacking me when I first awoke. Perhaps they are simply dead."
Awoke? Not born?
"Were you asleep before that?" He asked.
The Minotaur chuckled, its laugh deep and cheery.
"In a sense. But no, my memories before I gained this light are dull. I have died in this Dungeon many times. It is only now I have this gift. Or perhaps it is a curse? Hated by adventurers and monsters both, is it not amusing?"
He felt a bit of sympathy hearing that. The ferocious monster from before was gone, and instead was a dejected creature.
"I'm Six, do you have a name?"
The Minotaur shook it's head.
"Then how does Turuk sound?" It was the name of a character from a book he'd read.
The Minotaur raised his head, his mouth moving silently as if tasting the name.
"Turuk... Turuk, I think I like it." He bowed his head slightly.
"Thank you Six, this one shall treasure his name."
It was odd in a way. Meeting an inhuman creature like this, not as enemies. He'd fought the Covenant for so long, and many among his allies hated them with blood driven furore. This was a novel experience, but then wasn't everything he'd seen today new?
"Why are you up this high? I heard that Minotaurs appear much further down, on the 15th floor."
Turuk simply raised a hand, and pointed at a bloodstained spot on the ground.
"That, was where I last died."
His voice was solemn.
"Of my memories before, only that fight is so vivid. I faced an adventurer, unlike any before. He was slow, yet skilled beyond measure, and strong. I was with five of my siblings, yet none of us landed so much as glancing blow. I fear him, but I was too curious. Perhaps too curious for my own good."
Six nodded. Was this what Finn had meant by Irregular then? But he'd told him afterwards that Irregulars were monsters that could eat magic stones to grow stronger? Although that wasn't actually mutually exclusive.
Bizarre.
Perhaps he should tell Turuk that it was him? Then again, there was no need. He was running out of time as is.
"I have to go, I'm taking that."
He pointed at the Sangheili's body.
Turuk followed his finger, then blinked at him.
"Do you know what it is?"
"It's an alien warrior. One from a place far away from here."
"I've remember dying so many times, fighting so many people. Yet... not once have I seen this. How far do you speak of Six?"
That was... more than he'd expected. How long had adventurers explored the Dungeon?
"Beyond the skies." Was his terse reply.
Turuk nodded. "Very well, then take it. I have no use for it. The armour wouldn't fit anyway."
He moved over to the corpse quickly, shoving the Minotaur away.
Normally, when a Covenant warrior died, their armour and weapons self-destructed to prevent the UNSC getting their hands on it.
However, as the UNSC had gotten their hands on Covenant technology later in the war, this seemingly fell out of practice, perhaps to allow their armies to scavenge weapons and equipment from the dead. It was still used by most of the Covenant, but on such a high ranking Elite, the countermeasure would serve little purpose.
If their armour was destroyed, then they wouldn't ever be able to uncover what threat had killed such a valuable warrior. They would lose valuable information for little gain. Even the Covenant only had so many commanders.
He pressed a few buttons on the back of the combat harness, near the Pinch Fusion Reactor, and a few lights lit up over the white nanolaminate.
Fortunately he was able to deactivate the armour. With that done, he stripped it from the cold corpse efficiently, and packed it all into the bag. It wasn't as heavy as he'd expected, feeling light in his hands. As he had thought, the Falna was an amazing gift.
Finished, he nodded to the Minotaur, and left down the hallway.
Even encumbered, getting back to the 1st floor wasn't difficult, just time consuming.
By the time he returned to Twilight Manor, only an hour and a half had passed.
The guards didn't pay any mind, but several adventurers had looked oddly at the bloodstains in his clothes.
He placed his things in his room, then cleaned up. Wiping off the sweat and blood with a wet cloth, he changed his clothes for the upcoming social event.
Then he went to his Datapad and started recording what he'd learned in a secure file.
The Dungeon, gods, adventurers and monsters now.
All of it was an enigma. He still hadn't yet seen the magic Tiona had spoken of before.
Jacob Lees info had been immensely valuable, he'd not expected sharing his food to grant such a boon, but it was welcome all the same.
And finally of course, was his Falna, and incredible abilities it had provided him, many of which he had yet to understand.
Authors Note:
This story has received a lot of attention, more than I expected. I ended up scrapping the first draft over quality concerns, but I didn't want to take too long rewriting it.
I did have another Danmachi fanfic that I hadn't yet posted publicly, but with my focus on this, it'll be on Hiatus. I'll also now be uploading this story to a few other sites, such as FFN, SV, QQ and AO3. I hope you all enjoy this one.
[ I ]
Six tapped his fingers on the UNSC Datapad in his hands, as he sat on the edge of a bed.
It was a specialised configuration, built specifically to meet the needs of Spartans in the field. It could connect directly to both his MJOLNIR and the Spartan Neural Interface chip embedded in his skull. The computing power wasn't anything to brag about, but with the crystal computer hardware underlining the gel layer in his suit of Mark V(B), he had enough power to run an AI.
In fact he did have an AI. A fragment of Auntie Dot was in his suits memory.
Dumb AIs were not quite as efficient as Smart AIs. While a Smart AI could conceivably operate at near full efficiency using the resources of the latest MJOLNIR variant, Dumb AIs just required too much calculation power.
Which limited his options greatly. He couldn't just ask Dot for a plan of action, it was barely operable in its current condition. So instead he cut off the unnecessary functions, ease of use, verbal communication, psychological analysis.
It was a kit bashed solution, and he just knew if Kat had ever seen it she'd have outright spat in disgust, but unfortunately he didn't have many options...
He looked to his left.
An energy dagger puncture, 27 plasma impacts, 12 needle punctures, and radiation exposure from plasma grenades and fuel rod explosions.
His suit of MJOLNIR was in tatters. Even if his body had now been fixed up by processes he couldn't yet comprehend, it didn't change that he was limited in options now.
He was a pretty good engineer, especially considering it wasn't his speciality, but without the tools and equipment...
Parts of his armour plating were outrighted half melted, the absorbent paint coating was scratched and worn away. Multiple components either barely functioning, damaged beyond repair or outright missing.
Worst of all. His eyes trailed over the left shoulder, it didn't match the footage or his memories, jarring him with a sense of cognitive dissonance. Yet the hole piercing right through the armour plating, nanoweave undersuit, gel layer, and finally the Polymerized lithium niobocene that made up the suits most important function. The physical enhancement.
The suits self-repair capabilities were good, but not this good. The armours Drop Shield capability did have some restorative functions for reasons that were yet to be understood, but they seemed to primarily affect biology not machinery.
He wished for just a moment, that the UNSC had been able to reverse engineer the Covenants nanomachine capabilities. For all that the UNSC had a mastery of fabrication and mass production, the Covenant had them beat in terms of self-sufficiency and ease of use.
It wasn't like cutting edge technology was just going to drop into his lap unfortunately.
A thought hit him then, striking with the ferocity of lightning.
'The Ship Master!'
In the Dungeon, 4 floors down, it's corpse still laid. He thought on it, mulling over the possibilities. He doubted this magic could easily unlock the Covenants secrets, but he knew now they hadn't been lying.
He looked at his hand, a wrench between his fingers.
He deftly tossed it in the air.
As it rose, time halted to a stop.
It moved glacially, slower than a snails pace.
For the first time, he could control 'Spartan Time' at will.
Time sped back up and he caught lightly.
He was curious about the full effects. He'd tested his augmentations heavily, sparring with comrades and performing all manner of exercises a long, long ten years prior.
Now he had another. The Falna.
If he wanted to secure the dead Sangheili's amour, he'd need a bag to hide it in. Carrying it openly would no doubt attract attention.
If he was going to the Dungeon however...
He moved to the gear laid out on the floor. Trained eyes scanned over his equipment with skill borne of over a decade of experience.
2 Plasma grenades, an Energy Sword and a Plasma Rifle.
His new MJOLNIR rated WD M11 combat knife, a few tools such as a wrench and a screwdriver.
A Covenant water container with 500milliletres, his own meagre supplies of food and water, a Utility pouch, an armoured backpack and finally his Datapad.
He couldn't openly use the Plasma weapons, from what Jacob had told him, attracting attention would be dangerous, and he couldn't recharge or replace them. He'd have to save them for emergencies.
His M11 knife, a new weapon built with Titanium B to match the needs of Spartan Operators, could easily handle anything up to the 4th floor. He wasn't certain, but he'd dismantled the Goblin on his way down with ease. That was in MJOLNIR, but the creature hadn't been an issue.
He strapped the M11 to his waist and grabbed the bag, then set off.
Behind the door, several of his fellow Familia members passed by. Two younger men, both in casual gear.
"....red, I genuinely thought that was it for us, those Irregulars gave me a real shock." A blonde haired man spoke to his junior, a younger man with dark hair.
"Ah, it's the new guy. Hello there, I'm Kevin, this is Morrel. Pleasure to meet ya."
Six nodded back. "Likewise."
The man eyed his bag and knife, "Going somewhere? The celebration is in a couple hours."
He'd tried to wave off Finns offer to join them, but the man had pointed out it was a great chance for him to get to know his new comrades. "I forgot something in the Dungeon, I'm retrieving it."
"Ah? Is that so? Well, you'd best hurry up. We won't keep ya." The man nodded back, and turned away, continuing his chat.
Six quickly made his way to Twilight Manors entrance, and the guards let him through. Though on the way out, he couldn't help but notice a number of eyes, some curious, some less kind.
[ I ]
After promptly making his way through Orario and descending into the Dungeon entrance, he found himself on the first floor once again.
It was quiet no, barely any adventurers left inside.
His mind went over the skills his Falna now granted.
'Demon <Butcher of The Bleeding Faithful>'
It was apparently odd even by the local standards, it increased the number of enemies when in combat. He'd have to watch out for that. However, it didn't just do that. It also made him more powerful when outnumbered, and when facing a certain number of enemies, would hasten their terror.
He moved quickly, having memorised his route up with Tiona and Tione.
Then he heard a loud cracking sound.
He turned, drawing his knife and lowering his stance, all in one swift motion.
Prepared, he watched as the Monster was born from the Dungeon walls.
Jacob had told him that some said the Dungeon wanted them dead, that it wasn't just alive, but thinking too.
He wasn't certain if it was true, but at this point, it was hardly the strangest thing he'd seen.
The Monster wasn't a goblin this time. It's body was instead furred, and its head that of a wolf.
He didn't know what these were called, but it hardly mattered. It's red eyes were just the same. They narrowed in a fierce glare as it growled.
Then it charged at him.
Time slowed.
It still moved surprisingly fast. Going by an estimate, it was moving faster than the average Spartan could, despite being on the first floor.
That said, just like the Goblin from before.
He leaned forward and sprung, his knife swung from his right hand, cutting straight through it's throat.
It didn't react in time, perhaps it didn't even see his movement.
His knife didn't stop however, instead going right through the neckbone, decapitating it entirely.
He was certain he had moved faster than ever before, even faster than he could in MJOLNIR. Perhaps the Falna's affect on his speed was greater because he didn't have the added mass of his armour 600 kilogram bulk?
He shook off the distraction as cracks sounded off down the hallway.
He'd need to focus. Instead of standing still again, he instead dashed down the hall.
One of his skills, [Lone Wolf], helped him deal with pain and fatigue.
The monsters chased after him as he dashed round the corner.
He kept going.
A Goblin appeared to his left, and it's skull was split by a front kick.
Several more of the wolf headed creatures blocked his way.
He quickly stabbed one, rushed past the second and tripped the last, before picking it up by the leg and throwing it behind him.
Finally, he reached the stairways to the 2nd floor.
He surveyed it quickly, then positioned himself around the corner. The large staircase wasn't a great chokepoint, being wide enough for carriages. The cover was still useful though.
Then the horde came.
He leaped into the fray.
Normally, he wouldn't have been so reckless. But against Monsters he'd already found to be no challenge?
Well, he had skills that improved his capabilities when outnumbered, so he'd surely be fine.
He moved quickly, finding his speed and strength had improved from before. The effects of his Skill no doubt.
He stayed on the move, cutting a path through them, using their terror and confusion to his advantage.
Once he was in the middle of the horde, Goblins and wolf-heads trampling each other underfoot to get at him, he jumped and leaped off the walls, bouncing to the top of the stairs.
Then he turned.
Now with the benefit of the high ground, taking them apart would be easy.
However, it was not to be. He heard a cracking noise from behind.
'Even more Monsters?'
He changed plans, rushing down and cutting apart the Monsters as fast as he could. If he was pinned, he'd take far too long to finish them all off. He couldn't be late for the celebrations planned later.
Quickly he made his way to Floor 2. But as he stepped onto the floor he heard a sound from behind.
He twisted out of the way of the large mass of brown scales.
It was a large brown lizard. Easily 90 kilos, perhaps more.
He jumped onto it's back, grabbed it's skull with an iron fist, and cut its throat open.
Then the horde was upon him.
He'd expected a challenge, but this Skill was proving to be more of a hurdle than predicted.
He made his way through floor 2, where the number of Monsters increased dramatically, more lizards appeared and he had to take care not to be ambushed by them again.
He was tempted to use one of his Skills to make passing through easier, but decided better of it.
Trump cards were meant as a last resort. If the Dungeon really could think, and wanted him dead, better not to let it know what he could do.
He reached the stairs quicker this time, aided by the effects of his Skill. Floor 3 however was much larger, and he spent a good 20 minutes fighting his way through.
It also felt like the Monsters were slightly tougher. Not by much, but enough to notice. Even still, the difference between him was too much for them to surpass. It was similar to fighting the Covenants lesser races, Jackals and Grunts in close quarter combat.
They were no match for a Spartan.
Eventually, he reached the stairs.
Finally, he was on floor 4, and not even an hour had passed.
He retraced his steps quickly, careful to not let the Monsters assault distract him, before he reached the spot where the Minotaur corpses... had been?
Nearly all of them were gone.
All that was left was the one he had tricked into tripping over the alien corpse, it's red body hung over it like a sack.
And above that body was... a Minotaur.
[ I ]
Interesting. He'd be teen told that Minotaurs didn't usually come down this far. Loki familia had even apologised to him about it.
Yet something... was off.
The Minotaur wasn't looking... wasn't glaring at him, like every other monster he'd encountered.
Instead, it was holding the dead Minotaur up and looking at the headless Elite.
How intriguing. A Monster with a mind behind it.
Dangerous.
He activated his skill then.
This Skill, [The Unseen Assailant] was a simple one. It granted him perfect invisibility.
He'd tested it before, and it had fooled even Finns eyes. Apparently 'Pallums' had better vision than other races?
It did have a few drawbacks though. It cost his stamina to use, and heightened his fear and excitement. Things that could be a complication for any soldier.
He felt his emotions shift, and within the Dungeon, the effect was far greater than before. It was an unnerving sensation, but he resisted with willpower forged in battle.
The Minotaur finally looked up, as a horde of Goblins, Brown Lizards and Wolf-headed men all attacked, roaring at the Minotaur as if it was another adventurer.
This was getting stranger by the second.
The Minotaur picked up a short spear with a long blade coloured red, just like his skin.
Then it howled, the sound chilling even him.
It charged, swinging it's weapon like a club.
It was unskilled, but its strength...
He'd been able to tell the Minotaurs were unnaturally strong before, but this helped him picture it.
With a single swing, the Minotaur sent a dozen Monsters flying, their bodies breaking as they impacted the walls.
It was ferocious. For all that it showed intelligence before, the way it fought was like a wild animal.
With him not fighting, his skill 'Demon <Butcher of The Bleeding Faithful>' stopped drawing in more enemies, and eventually the horde was reduced to none.
He was tempted to deactivate [The Unseen Assailant] and open a dialogue. On one hand, nobody had mentioned anything like intelligent monsters. It would have seemed like an important thing to mention.
That said, he wasn't actually supposed to be in the Dungeon right now. Finn had asked him to register at the guild with his deputy, Raul Nord. So it wasn't impossible this was a common thing.
Then the Minotaur did something else that surprised him.
It torn open one of the corpses, and ate the magic stone inside.
Hadn't Finn warned them leaving magic stones uncollected would result in Irregulars?
He deactivated his skill.
Then he cleared his throat.
The great beast was larger than the other Minotaurs he'd fought. It was just an inch shorter than his own height of 6 foot 9 inches.
It's mouth opened, and then another surprise came.
"You're... not going to attack?" It's voice was gravelly and deep, and laced with confusion and apprehension.
It could speak as well? This day really was full of surprises.
"Are you?" He answered with his own question.
When the Minotaur shook its head, now looking at him curiously he started wondering if adventurers didn't know of intelligent monsters after all.
"I wasn't aware there were Monsters with a mind. Are there others like you?"
The alien creature looked down, humming in thought.
"I have not met any, but the other Monsters started attacking me when I first awoke. Perhaps they are simply dead."
Awoke? Not born?
"Were you asleep before that?" He asked.
The Minotaur chuckled, its laugh deep and cheery.
"In a sense. But no, my memories before I gained this light are dull. I have died in this Dungeon many times. It is only now I have this gift. Or perhaps it is a curse? Hated by adventurers and monsters both, is it not amusing?"
He felt a bit of sympathy hearing that. The ferocious monster from before was gone, and instead was a dejected creature.
"I'm Six, do you have a name?"
The Minotaur shook it's head.
"Then how does Turuk sound?" It was the name of a character from a book he'd read.
The Minotaur raised his head, his mouth moving silently as if tasting the name.
"Turuk... Turuk, I think I like it." He bowed his head slightly.
"Thank you Six, this one shall treasure his name."
It was odd in a way. Meeting an inhuman creature like this, not as enemies. He'd fought the Covenant for so long, and many among his allies hated them with blood driven furore. This was a novel experience, but then wasn't everything he'd seen today new?
"Why are you up this high? I heard that Minotaurs appear much further down, on the 15th floor."
Turuk simply raised a hand, and pointed at a bloodstained spot on the ground.
"That, was where I last died."
His voice was solemn.
"Of my memories before, only that fight is so vivid. I faced an adventurer, unlike any before. He was slow, yet skilled beyond measure, and strong. I was with five of my siblings, yet none of us landed so much as glancing blow. I fear him, but I was too curious. Perhaps too curious for my own good."
Six nodded. Was this what Finn had meant by Irregular then? But he'd told him afterwards that Irregulars were monsters that could eat magic stones to grow stronger? Although that wasn't actually mutually exclusive.
Bizarre.
Perhaps he should tell Turuk that it was him? Then again, there was no need. He was running out of time as is.
"I have to go, I'm taking that."
He pointed at the Sangheili's body.
Turuk followed his finger, then blinked at him.
"Do you know what it is?"
"It's an alien warrior. One from a place far away from here."
"I've remember dying so many times, fighting so many people. Yet... not once have I seen this. How far do you speak of Six?"
That was... more than he'd expected. How long had adventurers explored the Dungeon?
"Beyond the skies." Was his terse reply.
Turuk nodded. "Very well, then take it. I have no use for it. The armour wouldn't fit anyway."
He moved over to the corpse quickly, shoving the Minotaur away.
Normally, when a Covenant warrior died, their armour and weapons self-destructed to prevent the UNSC getting their hands on it.
However, as the UNSC had gotten their hands on Covenant technology later in the war, this seemingly fell out of practice, perhaps to allow their armies to scavenge weapons and equipment from the dead. It was still used by most of the Covenant, but on such a high ranking Elite, the countermeasure would serve little purpose.
If their armour was destroyed, then they wouldn't ever be able to uncover what threat had killed such a valuable warrior. They would lose valuable information for little gain. Even the Covenant only had so many commanders.
He pressed a few buttons on the back of the combat harness, near the Pinch Fusion Reactor, and a few lights lit up over the white nanolaminate.
Fortunately he was able to deactivate the armour. With that done, he stripped it from the cold corpse efficiently, and packed it all into the bag. It wasn't as heavy as he'd expected, feeling light in his hands. As he had thought, the Falna was an amazing gift.
Finished, he nodded to the Minotaur, and left down the hallway.
[ I ]
Even encumbered, getting back to the 1st floor wasn't difficult, just time consuming.
By the time he returned to Twilight Manor, only an hour and a half had passed.
The guards didn't pay any mind, but several adventurers had looked oddly at the bloodstains in his clothes.
He placed his things in his room, then cleaned up. Wiping off the sweat and blood with a wet cloth, he changed his clothes for the upcoming social event.
Then he went to his Datapad and started recording what he'd learned in a secure file.
The Dungeon, gods, adventurers and monsters now.
All of it was an enigma. He still hadn't yet seen the magic Tiona had spoken of before.
Jacob Lees info had been immensely valuable, he'd not expected sharing his food to grant such a boon, but it was welcome all the same.
And finally of course, was his Falna, and incredible abilities it had provided him, many of which he had yet to understand.
[ I ]
Lv. 1
Strength: I0
Endurance: I0
Dexterity: I0
Agility: I0
Magic: I0
<Magic>
[?]
<Skills>
Demon <Butcher of The Bleeding Faithful>
- They called you Demon on a hundred battlefields, so you slaughtered them to the last on a hundred battlefields.
- Increases the number of enemy combatants relative to recent kills. Reduces chance of frightened enemies running away. If combating a group larger than 100, automatically inflicts fear on all enemies and raises all parameters.
Δ
[Spirit of Vengeance]
- When activated, increases attack power against any enemy recognised by Spartans as an enemy of humanity.
[Survivor of Dying Worlds]
- When in enemy territory, reduces all needs such as rest, food, water and breathing.
[Spartans Never Die]
- Provides the Developmental Abilities: [Healing Power] and [Abnormal Resistance].
- Effect improves according to Level.
[One Man Army]
- Increases Growth when fighting a numerically or qualitatively superior foe.
Δ
[Paragon Nova]
- When in a dangerous situation can temporarily become invulnerable and gain a boost to all parameters, causes excessive fatigue and pain after use.
[Noble Constellation]
- Increases Attack Power of allies when fighting as part of a Unit.
[Lone Wolf]
- Nullifies penalties from pain or fatigue.
- Provides the Developmental Abilities: [Luck] and [Hunter].
- Hunter's effects are expanded to any targets of [Spirit of Vengeance].
- Effect improves according to Level.
[Hyper Lethal]
- Increases damage from all wounds inflicted on enemies, inflicted wounds are slower to heal.
Δ
[The Unseen Assailant]
- Allows perfect invisibility, disabled when dealing or taking damage.
- Uses up stamina when active, and increases feelings of fear and excitement.
[Grim Reaper]
- Improves all stealth abilities and skills to a supernatural level. Improves parameters when fear is inflicted on enemies.
Dominion <Record of the Ancients>
- Effects unknown.
Strength: I0
Endurance: I0
Dexterity: I0
Agility: I0
Magic: I0
<Magic>
[?]
<Skills>
Demon <Butcher of The Bleeding Faithful>
- They called you Demon on a hundred battlefields, so you slaughtered them to the last on a hundred battlefields.
- Increases the number of enemy combatants relative to recent kills. Reduces chance of frightened enemies running away. If combating a group larger than 100, automatically inflicts fear on all enemies and raises all parameters.
Δ
[Spirit of Vengeance]
- When activated, increases attack power against any enemy recognised by Spartans as an enemy of humanity.
[Survivor of Dying Worlds]
- When in enemy territory, reduces all needs such as rest, food, water and breathing.
[Spartans Never Die]
- Provides the Developmental Abilities: [Healing Power] and [Abnormal Resistance].
- Effect improves according to Level.
[One Man Army]
- Increases Growth when fighting a numerically or qualitatively superior foe.
Δ
[Paragon Nova]
- When in a dangerous situation can temporarily become invulnerable and gain a boost to all parameters, causes excessive fatigue and pain after use.
[Noble Constellation]
- Increases Attack Power of allies when fighting as part of a Unit.
[Lone Wolf]
- Nullifies penalties from pain or fatigue.
- Provides the Developmental Abilities: [Luck] and [Hunter].
- Hunter's effects are expanded to any targets of [Spirit of Vengeance].
- Effect improves according to Level.
[Hyper Lethal]
- Increases damage from all wounds inflicted on enemies, inflicted wounds are slower to heal.
Δ
[The Unseen Assailant]
- Allows perfect invisibility, disabled when dealing or taking damage.
- Uses up stamina when active, and increases feelings of fear and excitement.
[Grim Reaper]
- Improves all stealth abilities and skills to a supernatural level. Improves parameters when fear is inflicted on enemies.
Dominion <Record of the Ancients>
- Effects unknown.
[ I ]
Last edited:
CMDR Dantae
The Scribe
- Joined
- May 31, 2020
- Messages
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Butcher of Bleeding Faithful 5
Authors Note:
This chapter took a lot out of me, I've been very busy the last week so it's not quite as long as I was aiming for. The story is now on Royal Road. For those wondering, I posted on SB first. I hope you all enjoy the chapter.
[ I ]
As the sun began to set on Orario, many adventurers congregated towards pubs and bars, looking to relax after another hard and treacherous day in the Dungeon. Near the city centre, on a small plot of land laid the home of Loki Familia.
Twilight Manor was filled with the sounds of adventurers chatting together, packing away equipment and preparing for the celebrations.
Many of the adventurers who had gone on the expedition were happily telling stories of what challenges they had faced to those who had stayed behind.
In a small room near the back of the massive Familia home was a strange sight. A man with dark hair highlighted by seemingly unnatural streaks of silver sat on a simple bed, wearing clothes not unlike his fellows. His dark eyes however reflected a sight not seen anywhere else on the entire planet.
A seamless handle made of dark black metal held up a panel of a transparent glass like material. Upon that simple pane, blue lights flickered showing images and text. The man's thumb swiped down, and the text and imagery moved in response, as if it was a physical object, and not merely light emitted by the object.
Six was spending the last few minutes before the celebrations going through some files on his datapad.
When he had scavenged for supplies in the UNSC outpost before ending up in the world of Gekai, he had downloaded some files from the fallen Spartans to his suit.
Reading through the messages and data they had been transmitting told a sad and painful tale.
The Spartans had been trying to regroup, with plans of boarding a Covenant ship to escape Reach. Instead their transmissions had been intercepted by the Covenant, and they had been slowly ground down by endless waves of Covenant warriors until they were too exhausted to fight.
They had died knowing nobody would come to save them, with no hope for escape or survival.
His hand reached into his pocket and pulled out several dog tags as he placed the datapad aside, and picked up his canteen for a gulp of water. He swallowed, studying the names and numbers on the slips of metal. He normally wouldn't let himself waste time reminiscing, but he needed a least a bit of time to process... well pretty much everything that had happened.
Reach had been an ordeal, even for him.
First they had lost Jorge. The oldest and most experienced among them. The man was a gentle giant and a social genius, able to reassure even the most panicked of civilians with ease. He had died thinking he had saved Reach by sacrificing himself.
In a way, Six envied him. While Six had escaped Reach, he had no way of returning, no way of doing anything to help.
Then they had lost Kat. Their technician, and someone he had known since he was five years old. A fellow member of Beta Company... Most of their number had died in Operation Tornado, and now he wasn't sure if anyone was left.
The memory drove a pang of pain through his heart. In a way, Beta Company had been his family, and now he might be the only one left. Perhaps even the only Spartan, Commander Kurt had almost certainly returned to the field by this point.
It sunk in then that he was truly alone, on an alien world.
Gekai, Orario... It was so different from anything he had ever seen before. The people were strange, the culture was bizarre, and the technology was basic and very different from what he was familiar with.
Loki Familia was friendly, and surprisingly professional, but they weren't Spartans. They weren't fellow members of the UNSC.
How could he possibly relate to them?
He sighed, ruffling his hair a bit. Then he looked at the dog tags once more.
Jun... might be still alive. He was good at getting out of dangerous situations, but Reach was a deathtrap at this point. He hoped the man would find a way somehow. They needed more people like Doctor Halsey to win this war. With Reach gone, there was nothing but tepid resistance between the Covenant and Earth.
Carter, he'd gone down like any Captain, down with the ship. He was a good man and a great leader. He was a tactical genius, even for a Spartan, and had taught Six a lot in the last three weeks.
Emile... He flicked the dead man's dog tags slightly. Emile was the scariest man he'd ever known. He had reflexes and skills in close combat that easily rivalled, if not surpassed, his own. He was a genuine master of psychological warfare, and could send even Elites backing up in fear. Yet, he got the sense there was more to the man than that.
After New Alexandria, he just hadn't been the same. Both him and Jun had cracked less jokes and been more serious than before.
He knew that every Spartan coped with war differently. Spartans were trained damn well, but they weren't invincible and they could still break. Maybe for the man it was just his way of coping. His way of becoming a weapon that could strike fear into even the Covenant.
Noble Team had been some of the best Spartans alive.
And now, there was just one member left.
It was bitterly ironic in a way, that Noble Team had lost their last Six, and now he had lost all of them.
As the room darkened with the setting sun, enjoyed the peaceful view of the clear sky for a few moments.
Then he laid back on the bed and dangled Kats dog tag above him.
Memories from boot camp surged to his mind. Their struggles in the early years, how several trainees had thrived and succeeded to such a degree they'd been put on the CATEGORY 2 Spartan III program, including himself and Kat.
A pleasant tingle suddenly ran down his spine. It was unfamiliar, yet for some reason it brought a sense of comfort. Then unbidden, an odd memory of the past rose to his mind. A training mission, where he, Kat, Adam, Sev, as well as Lucy and Tom had been camping overnight after hours of trekking through a forest.
The trainees huddled for warmth together in their sleeping bags.
They'd make a fire, but as part of the training, they were to avoid detection. The smoke would see them fail, and none of them wanted to be chewed out by Mendez for such a basic mistake.
The stars above glittered like jewels, untouched by light pollution, the view was breath taking.
Lucy spoke up, "Do you think that the Covenant are invading one of those worlds up there right now?"
Tom-B292 spoke up from her side. "Of course, that's why we're training right now isn't it? To stop them."
"There's no way we'll stop them, at best we'll slow them down." Sev countered, the normally silent teen speaking up for once.
"Don't say that, if we don't stop them, who will? We're going to be Spartans."
Sev laughed, bitterly. "The UNSC had Spartans from the start of the war, what difference will we make. At best, we can get for revenge for those they've taken, and I plan to do that at least."
Tom-B312 felt obliged to speak up. "Don't talk like that Sev. Like Kurt told us, every battle is about Morale. If we give up, we've already lost. Besides, Spartans Never Die."
Sev looked at him oddly. "You know that's just propaganda right?"
B312 shook his head. "Every lie has a kernel of truth to it. That's what my grandpa always told me."
The mention of family silenced the trainees, all of them were orphans, and the wounds of that loss, even years later were still painful.
After a few moments, B312 spoke up again. "If it's a lie, then that's fine right? We just have to make it the truth, or at least close enough. Spartans do the impossible, and we're the best of the best."
Sev was silent at that. "I don't agree, but I can respect that Tom. I already know how I am going to die."
None of them batted an eye as a mere 9 year old, someone who should have had his whole life ahead of him, proclaiming his certainty of his demise. After all, they all knew they were facing impossible odds.
"That said..." The blonde haired teen paused... "Promise me you guys, promise that when I die, when any of us die, you'll remember me. If all of us remember those who have fallen, we'll never truly be gone, as long as even one remains."
His eyes pierced B312 like a laser, and he met them resolutely. "Of course." He responded.
"Right." Lucy added, B-292 nodding silently next to her.
Adam raised a thumbs up, then crossed two forefingers over his face in the Spartan salute.
Kat however, facing away from the group, grumbled and then turned over. "Yes, now shut up you lot, we have to be up by 0500 sharp or we'll fail."
The others grimaced at the idea, and they quickly shuffled back into comfortable positions.
As Tom-B312 slowly drifted off, he wondered. "Hey Catherine, do you think we'll survive?"
Kat glared at him, then her gaze softened and she relented. "Our job isn't to survive, our job is to give the UNSC time. But.. I hope all of us make it anyway." She turned over again.
Tom hoped they would all make it too. Beta Company was his family.
His eyes flicked open with a jolt.
He breathed heavily, taking in the fresh evening air.
They were gone.
They were all dead.
He sighed, staring straight at the ceiling.
He idly noted that the vision had been oddly vivid, too vivid even for a dream, and he was wide awake.
The realisation barely registered under the mountain of pain shattering his soul.
He was, for the first time since he had lost his family on that horrible night...
Truly, utterly, alone.
…
Memories filtered through his head. He couldn't let himself mope like this. He had to keep going, just like he had after his family died. After Operation Tornado killed nearly all of his second family.
He had to. The UNSC was losing, he needed to find a way back, then a way to stop the war.
But... he just wanted, to rest for a moment.
To get his breath back.
The phrase jarred something in his memory, and he remembered something Jorge had told him several weeks prior.
'Spartans are more than weapons.'
He and Emile had disagreed heavily on that one, but in a moment alone together, Jorge had mentioned more.
'Spartans are meant to be symbols. We are meant to inspire, to give new strength, to burn the fires of the phoenix that is the UNSC.'
'We are those who Deliver Hope.'
He calmed slightly, and closed his eyes for a bit of rest and recovery.
He came to with a start, hearing the sound of some rapping their knuckles at the door.
He cleared his throat, tired after a very long day, but no less professional.
"Come in." He invited.
The door opened, and light from the hallways filtered in.
Authors Note:
This chapter took a lot out of me, I've been very busy the last week so it's not quite as long as I was aiming for. The story is now on Royal Road. For those wondering, I posted on SB first. I hope you all enjoy the chapter.
[ I ]
As the sun began to set on Orario, many adventurers congregated towards pubs and bars, looking to relax after another hard and treacherous day in the Dungeon. Near the city centre, on a small plot of land laid the home of Loki Familia.
Twilight Manor was filled with the sounds of adventurers chatting together, packing away equipment and preparing for the celebrations.
Many of the adventurers who had gone on the expedition were happily telling stories of what challenges they had faced to those who had stayed behind.
In a small room near the back of the massive Familia home was a strange sight. A man with dark hair highlighted by seemingly unnatural streaks of silver sat on a simple bed, wearing clothes not unlike his fellows. His dark eyes however reflected a sight not seen anywhere else on the entire planet.
A seamless handle made of dark black metal held up a panel of a transparent glass like material. Upon that simple pane, blue lights flickered showing images and text. The man's thumb swiped down, and the text and imagery moved in response, as if it was a physical object, and not merely light emitted by the object.
Six was spending the last few minutes before the celebrations going through some files on his datapad.
When he had scavenged for supplies in the UNSC outpost before ending up in the world of Gekai, he had downloaded some files from the fallen Spartans to his suit.
Reading through the messages and data they had been transmitting told a sad and painful tale.
The Spartans had been trying to regroup, with plans of boarding a Covenant ship to escape Reach. Instead their transmissions had been intercepted by the Covenant, and they had been slowly ground down by endless waves of Covenant warriors until they were too exhausted to fight.
They had died knowing nobody would come to save them, with no hope for escape or survival.
His hand reached into his pocket and pulled out several dog tags as he placed the datapad aside, and picked up his canteen for a gulp of water. He swallowed, studying the names and numbers on the slips of metal. He normally wouldn't let himself waste time reminiscing, but he needed a least a bit of time to process... well pretty much everything that had happened.
Reach had been an ordeal, even for him.
First they had lost Jorge. The oldest and most experienced among them. The man was a gentle giant and a social genius, able to reassure even the most panicked of civilians with ease. He had died thinking he had saved Reach by sacrificing himself.
In a way, Six envied him. While Six had escaped Reach, he had no way of returning, no way of doing anything to help.
Then they had lost Kat. Their technician, and someone he had known since he was five years old. A fellow member of Beta Company... Most of their number had died in Operation Tornado, and now he wasn't sure if anyone was left.
The memory drove a pang of pain through his heart. In a way, Beta Company had been his family, and now he might be the only one left. Perhaps even the only Spartan, Commander Kurt had almost certainly returned to the field by this point.
It sunk in then that he was truly alone, on an alien world.
Gekai, Orario... It was so different from anything he had ever seen before. The people were strange, the culture was bizarre, and the technology was basic and very different from what he was familiar with.
Loki Familia was friendly, and surprisingly professional, but they weren't Spartans. They weren't fellow members of the UNSC.
How could he possibly relate to them?
He sighed, ruffling his hair a bit. Then he looked at the dog tags once more.
Jun... might be still alive. He was good at getting out of dangerous situations, but Reach was a deathtrap at this point. He hoped the man would find a way somehow. They needed more people like Doctor Halsey to win this war. With Reach gone, there was nothing but tepid resistance between the Covenant and Earth.
Carter, he'd gone down like any Captain, down with the ship. He was a good man and a great leader. He was a tactical genius, even for a Spartan, and had taught Six a lot in the last three weeks.
Emile... He flicked the dead man's dog tags slightly. Emile was the scariest man he'd ever known. He had reflexes and skills in close combat that easily rivalled, if not surpassed, his own. He was a genuine master of psychological warfare, and could send even Elites backing up in fear. Yet, he got the sense there was more to the man than that.
After New Alexandria, he just hadn't been the same. Both him and Jun had cracked less jokes and been more serious than before.
He knew that every Spartan coped with war differently. Spartans were trained damn well, but they weren't invincible and they could still break. Maybe for the man it was just his way of coping. His way of becoming a weapon that could strike fear into even the Covenant.
Noble Team had been some of the best Spartans alive.
And now, there was just one member left.
It was bitterly ironic in a way, that Noble Team had lost their last Six, and now he had lost all of them.
As the room darkened with the setting sun, enjoyed the peaceful view of the clear sky for a few moments.
Then he laid back on the bed and dangled Kats dog tag above him.
Memories from boot camp surged to his mind. Their struggles in the early years, how several trainees had thrived and succeeded to such a degree they'd been put on the CATEGORY 2 Spartan III program, including himself and Kat.
A pleasant tingle suddenly ran down his spine. It was unfamiliar, yet for some reason it brought a sense of comfort. Then unbidden, an odd memory of the past rose to his mind. A training mission, where he, Kat, Adam, Sev, as well as Lucy and Tom had been camping overnight after hours of trekking through a forest.
[ I ]
The trainees huddled for warmth together in their sleeping bags.
They'd make a fire, but as part of the training, they were to avoid detection. The smoke would see them fail, and none of them wanted to be chewed out by Mendez for such a basic mistake.
The stars above glittered like jewels, untouched by light pollution, the view was breath taking.
Lucy spoke up, "Do you think that the Covenant are invading one of those worlds up there right now?"
Tom-B292 spoke up from her side. "Of course, that's why we're training right now isn't it? To stop them."
"There's no way we'll stop them, at best we'll slow them down." Sev countered, the normally silent teen speaking up for once.
"Don't say that, if we don't stop them, who will? We're going to be Spartans."
Sev laughed, bitterly. "The UNSC had Spartans from the start of the war, what difference will we make. At best, we can get for revenge for those they've taken, and I plan to do that at least."
Tom-B312 felt obliged to speak up. "Don't talk like that Sev. Like Kurt told us, every battle is about Morale. If we give up, we've already lost. Besides, Spartans Never Die."
Sev looked at him oddly. "You know that's just propaganda right?"
B312 shook his head. "Every lie has a kernel of truth to it. That's what my grandpa always told me."
The mention of family silenced the trainees, all of them were orphans, and the wounds of that loss, even years later were still painful.
After a few moments, B312 spoke up again. "If it's a lie, then that's fine right? We just have to make it the truth, or at least close enough. Spartans do the impossible, and we're the best of the best."
Sev was silent at that. "I don't agree, but I can respect that Tom. I already know how I am going to die."
None of them batted an eye as a mere 9 year old, someone who should have had his whole life ahead of him, proclaiming his certainty of his demise. After all, they all knew they were facing impossible odds.
"That said..." The blonde haired teen paused... "Promise me you guys, promise that when I die, when any of us die, you'll remember me. If all of us remember those who have fallen, we'll never truly be gone, as long as even one remains."
His eyes pierced B312 like a laser, and he met them resolutely. "Of course." He responded.
"Right." Lucy added, B-292 nodding silently next to her.
Adam raised a thumbs up, then crossed two forefingers over his face in the Spartan salute.
Kat however, facing away from the group, grumbled and then turned over. "Yes, now shut up you lot, we have to be up by 0500 sharp or we'll fail."
The others grimaced at the idea, and they quickly shuffled back into comfortable positions.
As Tom-B312 slowly drifted off, he wondered. "Hey Catherine, do you think we'll survive?"
Kat glared at him, then her gaze softened and she relented. "Our job isn't to survive, our job is to give the UNSC time. But.. I hope all of us make it anyway." She turned over again.
Tom hoped they would all make it too. Beta Company was his family.
[ I ]
His eyes flicked open with a jolt.
He breathed heavily, taking in the fresh evening air.
They were gone.
They were all dead.
He sighed, staring straight at the ceiling.
He idly noted that the vision had been oddly vivid, too vivid even for a dream, and he was wide awake.
The realisation barely registered under the mountain of pain shattering his soul.
He was, for the first time since he had lost his family on that horrible night...
Truly, utterly, alone.
…
Memories filtered through his head. He couldn't let himself mope like this. He had to keep going, just like he had after his family died. After Operation Tornado killed nearly all of his second family.
He had to. The UNSC was losing, he needed to find a way back, then a way to stop the war.
But... he just wanted, to rest for a moment.
To get his breath back.
The phrase jarred something in his memory, and he remembered something Jorge had told him several weeks prior.
'Spartans are more than weapons.'
He and Emile had disagreed heavily on that one, but in a moment alone together, Jorge had mentioned more.
'Spartans are meant to be symbols. We are meant to inspire, to give new strength, to burn the fires of the phoenix that is the UNSC.'
'We are those who Deliver Hope.'
He calmed slightly, and closed his eyes for a bit of rest and recovery.
[ I ]
He came to with a start, hearing the sound of some rapping their knuckles at the door.
He cleared his throat, tired after a very long day, but no less professional.
"Come in." He invited.
The door opened, and light from the hallways filtered in.
[ I ]