Chase didn’t know whether to be appalled or appreciative of how easily he got his gun license. He’d expected a months-long process of applications, interviews, online video courses, and assessments. Instead, they snapped a photo of him against a white section of wall, slapped it through a computer and handed him the card that came out the other end.
“Just like that?”
“Just like that,” Darryl confirmed. “Oh, actually, have you ever been convicted of a crime?”
“Nope.”
“Great, then you can keep it. Almost forgot that part.”
Chase put the card in his wallet and hitched up his backpack. “I gotta say, I’m surprised that was so easy. Has it always been like that?”
“Like what?” Mary asked.
“You know…informal.”
She snorted. “I s’pose when we’ve got sixteen-year-olds running around shooting fireballs from their eyes and lightning from their fingertips, things get a little lax. The GR-hey and the Embassy got bigger fish to fry.”
Chase nodded. “Fair enough. Thanks for your help — I’ll be back soon, I think. For some ammo.”
“Watcha need?”
“Nine mil. For a Luger.”
Darryl perked up, choking on his drink and nearly spurting it over the counter. “Crikey! A Luger? And it works?”
“My Gramps says so.” Chase didn’t think it was wise to tell them that he shot it three times just last week. “But he’s old, and it’s old. I’ll bring it here to be registered, you can check it out.”
“Son, that would be a treat,” Darryl said. “Grab a fifty-pack of nine mil on the way out, we can square the bill next time.”
Chase held back a laugh at the absurdity of this whole interaction. “Sure. Thanks for that.”
Mary came around the counter with a key, unlocked a glass case, then handed him a small box of bullets. It was smaller and lighter than he was expecting, almost like a bag of lollies.
He made it back to the new house half an hour later. Trains ran constantly between Two City and Three City, which made the trip a breeze. When he walked through the door into the living room, Gramps was sitting on the couch, basically right where Chase left him that morning. If the old man noticed his late arrival, he didn’t mention it.
Chase stashed his new acquisitions in his room then came back out.
“Hungry?” he asked.
“Absolutely famished,” Gramps answered. “That nurse brought me a few cookies, lovely young lass, but I fear they got the ol’ digester in a bit of a tizzie. Won’t stop rumblin’!”
Chase chuckled. “Right, well I’ll whip something up. Don’t run too far.”
Gramps harrumphed. “Not likely.”
**************
The next day, Chase was out of bed bright and early. There was a mammoth Gate in Six-Town that Majesty was set to conquer, and they’d brought in two teams to do it. As of 6 a.m. the Raid would’ve been underway for about an hour, and it would be another two hours or so until it was finished, around 8. The Haulers went in at 9, which gave him three hours to tick off some chores.
The first order of business was listing the Demon horns for sale. There had been a slight uptick in prices after the Dungeon Break, as the Ultras were the only people allowed in Dungeons for a few days. Without Haulers around to retrieve the good bits, supply crashed, and prices rose.
Chase opened the Exchange on his System and went to work.
***
Item: [Demon Horn] (Grade B) (x2)
***
Price per item: 40 Credits
***
Bulk Buy Option: 70 Credits
***
Barter? (No) | Flexible Price? (No) | Contact Seller? (No)
***
Easy. No contact, no questions, no problems.
Only a few minutes after he activated the offer, the horns sold. Someone snapped up the Bulk Buy and 70 Credits appeared in Chase’s suspense account, retrievable once he delivered the horns. He was glad to get them off his hands so quickly, but he couldn’t help wondering if there were a few more Credits to scrounge from the transaction. He had half an hour until he actually needed the Credits, and to sell them so quick could only mean…
Who cares? That’s nearly a day’s wages. Crack on, Chase. Stop sookin’.
This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.
Next up was his promised return trip to Darryl and Mary’s. Now that he was a fully licensed gun-toting individual, he needed to register the Luger before he could use it. Plus, being in debt to them didn’t feel too great.
He grabbed the Luger just as Gramps’ stairlift started to whine and turn, snaffling it into his backpack underneath today’s collection of empty beer bottles. The results of yesterday’s efforts were in a series of bags and glass containers under his bed, organized by stickiness.
Then he was off. He deposited the Demon horns at an Exchange Bank where they would be zipped around to wherever they needed to go. There were hundreds of these buildings throughout the city; the rumour was that you could drop off an item at their collection bays, and by the time you walked out the front doors it would already be safely and securely in the hands of its new owner. Chase thought that was a bit rich, but the service was quick and effective, and that’s all he needed to know.
The train to Two City was packed to the brim. Chase smushed himself against the doors with his backpack full of ballistic weaponry and glass bottles at his feet. He burst out at the station like a popped zit, heaving in the fresh air that tasted only mildly of train fuel.
When he made it to Mary and Darryl’s store, he was out of breath from dodging past all the early-morning runners in the Botanic Gardens. He seemed to be the only person on the track going counter-clockwise, and the preened-up City folk in their 300 Credit running shoes and 500 Credit smartwatches let him know it. He was pretty sure someone spat at him.
He was relieved to see the hunting store’s lights on. It was only half-past, but most stores opened early these days to account for Hunters going about their business. Darryl spread out his arms when Chase arrived in the store. “There he is, fit as a fiddle!” He called out to Mary, who was in the backroom. “I win, Mares, he showed up! And I expect my winnings in my account right this minute! Nice and proper!”
Mary hustled out, slapped Darryl on the arm, then went back to whatever she was doing. Chase brought out the Luger and placed it on the counter.
“Marvellous,” Darryl said, handling the weapon with awe. “I only ever read about them. Mass produced for fifty years or so, nearly three million of the things, but heck, not too many of them left today, are there?”
Chase let him admire the gun. “Rare enough to sell?”
Darryl looked up at him like he was speaking heresy. “You wouldn’t! Though, even if you would, I don’t think it’s quite at that level. Plus, it’s not really an ideal weapon because of…ahhh, I won’t bore ya.”
Instead of giving Chase all the specifics, Darryl got going with the registration. All he needed was the details on Chase’s hunting license and a magnifying glass to see the serial number on the Luger. Again, it was an uncomfortably quick process that had Chase back on the road to Six Town in no time. He almost forgot to transfer them 50 Credits for the ammo. One Credit per bullet. The horns came in clutch.
After another train ride (this one slightly less suffocating), he arrived at Six Town. The Dungeon wasn’t far from the station, and there were far less morning joggers clogging up the thin sidewalks. He made it in record time, had a quick powernap on a park bench, then was rousted from his slumber by the sounds of the Haulers mobilising.
The Gate was huge. Chase’s usual position of head honcho was taken from him by a tiny lady in a bright pink suit with a string of pearls around her neck. She didn’t operate a Retriever — this Gate was serious enough that she was just there to coordinate and oversee the Haulers. Chase joined the procession with his yellow hard hat on tight, a throwback to a few months ago before he became a Supervisor and earned his orange hat.
The lady’s shrill voice echoed off the apartment blocks. “Haulers!” (She pronounced it with a strong American accent, like haa-lers rather than hawl-ers). “Please be advised that this Raid is ongoing. I repeat, this Raid is still being fought. Embassy representative Muichiro Hayasaki has given us permission to send you in, though he remains on standby if you have any questions. Let’s begin!”
Chase laughed to himself.
So much for questions, he thought. She gave us about two seconds to consider it before ringing the starting bell.
No one seemed too bothered by the presence of monsters, including Chase. A Gate this big would require an S-Rank in the main attack unit or at least waiting on the sidelines as a precaution. Nothing could go wrong.
The procession of Haulers traipsed in. Chase was sandwiched between Pete and Marla. Pete looked positively green even before they went through the Gate, but once they got in he went to a dark corner and brought up his breakfast. Marla was holding herself together, though she had to look away from Pete and block her ears while he hurled.
“Had a good night after I left?” Chase asked.
Marla nodded and gave a thumbs up, but didn’t speak. Her bloodshot eyes spoke volumes, however.
“Once your Retriever is full, let me know. I can guide them both back and you can have a rest somewhere. Sound good?”
Another nod.
Just as he did yesterday, Chase let his Retriever do the hard work while he looked for substances to coat his bullets with. The pickings were slim; he got the vibe that whoever the main attacker was, their Talent involved blowing everything to smithereens and asking questions later. He found a particularly interesting scene about a kilometre into the Dungeon, where glittering, crystallised monster parts covered the walls and ceilings like an exploded disco ball.
Marla came up behind him. She’d found her voice in the half hour they’d been down there. “Nebula’s doing,” she said.
“Whose?” Chase asked.
“Neb-you-la. She’s nineteen. Just popped up one day all wrapped in a red bow with an S-Rank next to her name. People say she’s gonna be an Ultra before she turns twenty-five.”
“Certainly looks like it,” Chase said. “You reckon this is all just one attack?”
Marla laughed. “If the gossip is accurate, this is more like a flick of a finger. She’s mental.”
Chase tapped one of the crystals. It was hard, but brittle. He knocked off a few chunks and filled four bottles with the multicoloured monster-gems. Talent residue from a future Ultra was intriguing. And potentially valuable.
He returned to his Retriever, giving it instructions to follow him into the next cavern. Just as he was ready to hit Go, he noticed a perfectly preserved monster in its own huge cocoon of Nebula’s gems.
Up close, it was clearly a Berekhin. The scaled monster resembled a velociraptor, but it was larger and had raised pieces of thin cartilage all the way down its back, like a conveyor belt escalator on a production line. They also spat corrosive venom and had three rows of teeth, but if you found that out personally, it was probably too late.
Chase traced the imprisoned monster with his finger, thinking that someone should take it off the wall and preserve it in a museum. If he thought for a second that Jenny might allow him to do so, he would’ve instructed his Retriever to bring it down and throw it in the collections bin. His finger trailed along its ridged spine, its frilled neck, all the way up to its head.
Its eyelids flicked open, revealing a pair of yellow eyes. Its black pupils found him, then widened to the size of saucers.
Nebula’s prison shattered, and the Berekin was released.