*BOOM*

The last Ranger fell upon his knees and slumped down, clutching his chest under the mid-day sun. Soon he would join his comrades (and my former comrades) and depart the mortal plane. After I slung the Garand over my shoulder, I cautiously approached the 4 fallen Rangers. As messed up as it is to loot them, my growing militia has equipment needs and military-grade body armor doesn’t grow on trees.

As I turned one of the bodies over to strip it of the leather armor, the not-dead-yet Ranger grabbed my hand with what little strength he had left. Fun Fact: Unlike what you see in the movies and books, people usually don’t immediately die after getting shot. The blood loss and systemic shock takes a bit of time.

“It’ll be your day soon, traitor!” He croaked with all the malice and bitterness he could still muster.

“Until then, mind if I borrow your stuff?” I nonchalantly brushed aside his arm and continued looting. My former comrade gradually lost his consciousness as he bled out. By the time I was done looting him, he had expired.

I’ve wondered if the me that died all these years ago would’ve been horrified at the callous man he’d become, casually looting the bodies of men he’d murdered in cold blood. Would I be ashamed to look that man in the eye if we were to ever meet?

Not that I have any way to confirm, but my theory is that at this point, the Ronnie Lee that tragically died all those years ago died again when I became Rummy of Carnwennan. My memory of that life faded bit by bit over the years, and the modern morality I once prized so much had fully eroded. Hell, I had snuffed out so many lives with these hands in service to my dream harem.

As far as I was concerned, we were two different men who happened to share some life history and technical expertise. Let’s… just leave it at that.

Musings aside, I have a multitude of issues. One, I’m deep in Elf territory. I traveled here as a decoy to throw off the pursuit squad off the caravan. And that squad had probably sent off 1 man to report back when they were ambushed by me. Another Fun fact: Elves are not known to be gracious hosts. Two, if we were not on the 626th’s radar before, we definitely are now. Veteran squads who wouldn’t be caught dead in Elf territory were determined enough to chase me here, so they were serious about trying to find Pridwen. And lastly, when they eventually do find Pridwen, I’d need to mount a defense intimidating enough to dissuade them from testing it and have a few aces left in my sleeves when things go south. As of now, I still need to find that ace in the hole. Sigh…

Why the trip to the danger zone? Well, I took the risk to lead them here because I wanted to paralyze the Legion leadership. After all, the top brass knew damn well that sending a loud, lumbering army through Elf territory is basically suicide with extra steps. Even if they assume Pridwen is not in Elf territory, they have to be wary of the fact that even sending a Legion expedition adjacent to Elf territory would invite a hostile response. If the political factions in the leadership were still as fractious as it was when I was a Ranger, this debate would inevitably get politicized and deadlocked between the factions and result in total inaction (just like what happened when the power struggle between the surviving noble brats took place).

In simpler terms, as long as the leadership was fractured and paralyzed with the Elf debate, no serious expedition to Pridwen could ever launch.

After I finished looting things into my ring, I scanned for a place in the dense forest for me to hide. Why hide instead of run? I’ve only had a few interactions with Elves in my time in this world. But I knew this: it is quite impossible to run away from a race of people who are that adept at tracking and hunting. Their massive advantages in vision and mobility would make any attempts to outrun them a losing bet. No, the only way to avoid them is to not let them know you were here in the first place (like the Witches when they slaughtered the village to the last).

I took off my shoes and tried my best sanitizing the scene. I had to hurry- even with a suppressor, gunshots are loud and Elves aren’t deaf. Sadly, I couldn’t see any surefire winners in the vicinity. Damn, so much for the luck of the protagonist. Well, if I couldn't get by with the luck of the protagonist, then I'd just have to make my own luck.

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

I pulled out my trusty pistol Aurelia and pointed it to my temple.

“Holy assholes.” I quietly whisper. “Gonna need some divine inspiration here. I suggest you help. If I die here, there goes your only hope of saving your shitty empire!”

After an awkward moment of silence, I began to hear faint murmurs and hushed whispers, but they were unintelligible, as if somebody muffled the source of the voices. After taking a deep breath, I closed off my mind to outside distractions and hyper-focused on one such voice.

“YOU WILL CEASE THIS INSOLENCE AND OBEY!” A familiar gravel-like voice erupted in my mind..

Nope, wrong voice. Let’s try another one. Literally any voice but that one~

“Rummy, I implore you to see reason. I’m sure we can negotiate…” A calmer, subdued voice said.

No dice. Next!

After going through half a dozen useless voices, I finally found a winner. “16 paces to the west, then 12 paces north. <> under the hill.” A more feminine (?) voice helpfully suggested.

“Thanks! Was that so hard?” I ceased the concentration and the “connection” tapered off.

I carefully measured my steps while taking care to minimize chances of them getting picked up by a tracker. After following the directions, I looked down to my right and saw a low hill with mostly loose soil at the base of it. At first glance, I didn’t see anything particularly special about this place.

No time to waste pondering if I just got pranked. I crouched down and quietly intoned, “<>” to make my own little burrow. The entrance to the burrow was now barely big enough for me to crawl through. After struggling my way through, I enlarged the headspace of the burrow while sealing the entrance with another application of <>.

I closed my eyes and waited. After a couple of minutes, I heard some talking.

“Gibberish*... find… gibberish*.”

“No, gibberish*... too much… gibberish*... from…gibberish*... crystal.”

“The gibberish*. It’s here?”

“Yes, I… gibberish*... it.”

“I see. Gibberish*...sure…”

All of a sudden, a spear stabbed towards my face. Before I could activate <>, the spear stopped right as it punched through the wall of the burrow. After 2 more stabs, the Elves seemed to give up on the hill I was hiding under to try their luck elsewhere. Fuck, that was almost unlucky.

“Gibberish* humans. Gibberish* in my ears even after gibberish*.” One of them seemed to be frustrated enough to call it a day.

“Let’s go.” Another one said. Good, go back to your villages and take a load off, fellas. I’ll show myself out. And after a good quarter-hour of silence, I finally relaxed and sighed in relief. The gambit paid off, in more ways than one..

One of the Pantheon gods sure picked a hell of a hiding spot. Apparently mana crystals could interfere with an Elf’s ability to super-sense. This would imply that their ability is at least magic-related in some way? I swear, this world gets weirder and weirder. Well, time to loot and scoot. I could ponder the massive implications of this adventure while hauling ass.

I cast <> on a bundle of tree branches to provide some lighting. Then I continuously cast <> to make the burrow expand. I saw a navy blue crystal chunk sticking out of the freshly dug earth. Score! Time element mana crystal!

With adrenaline coursing through my veins, I continue to <> around the crystal to free it. After 5 minutes, I was horrified as I discovered that the mana crystal was actually the size of a fucking building! I didn’t even know what tier of spell you can do with a crystal that size! There was no fucking way that monster could fit into my storage rings even if I chucked out all the very-necessary iron I had stored there.

This hurts. To discover the loot of a lifetime and be forced to leave it here. The Pantheon giveth and taketh, it would appear. Well, at the very least, I found an ace card that I could play if shit ever hits the fan.

I dug myself out of the hill and carefully concealed it. After a big sigh, I began my trip back home.