November 3rd, 2035

North Gate, Osiris

The leader of Squad A6, Gambler, was sleeping on the job. He was sitting on a wooden chair with his feet up on a table and his chair leaning backwards. The brim of Gambler’s cowboy hat was pulled low over his eyes in order to block the afternoon sun. He wore blue jeans, a tucked-in shirt, and a rancher’s jacket. Gambler’s belt held about thirty heavy caliber pistol rounds, and the holster at his belt held a single-action revolver.

Under other circumstances, Gambler’s superiors wouldn’t want anything to do with this cowboy cosplayer. As it was, his skill with a revolver made the governing powers of Osiris much more amenable to his eccentricities.

Five men dressed in various forms of medieval armor and wielding firearms from the early 20th century approached Gambler from the direction of the city. One of the men had long black hair, wore a thick fur-lined coat over his chainmail, and carried with him a palpable aura of potential violence.

“Gambler!” shouted the man who more closely resembled a barbarian at the fall of Rome than a soldier in a modern military. The man’s shout also caught the attention of the four other men who were standing watch at the northern gatehouse. None of them had been paying attention, and they had to spend a few seconds to wake themselves up.

Gambler jerked in his chair as he was awoken from his nap. With one gloved hand, he lifted the brim of his hat as his other hand subtly inched closer to his revolver. For the briefest instant, Gambler looked at the newcomer with the steely eyes of a viper ready to strike. This instant passed, and a smile formed on Gambler’s face as his hand moved away from the revolver.

“Ashcroft,” Gambler said as he stood up from his seat and stretched. “Is my watch over already?”

“Yeah,” Ashcroft said with a look of annoyance. “You remember that you’re actually supposed to be watching the Gate, right?”

“I was,” Gambler said without an ounce of contrition. “I was out here for eight hours, and nothing happened, same as yesterday. After the sixth hour… well… I figured my boys could handle watching a gate that nobody uses.”

“Have you considered that sleeping on the job puts you in danger?” Ashcroft pointed a gloved finger at Gambler. “Any Goblin could walk up and shoot you in the head while you’re sleeping, then we’d be down one of our best soldiers because you decided that napping was more important than security.”

Gambler opened his mouth to offer a retort, but he was cut off by the sound of a trumpet emanating loudly from behind Ashcroft.

The ten Revenants at the North Gate turned to look as three knights and a squire stepped into the gatehouse. The squire carried a trumpet in one hand and a large piece of paper in the other.

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“I come bearing duel requests from Sirs Balthazar, Cedric, and Lothar. These three honorable knights wish to challenge Captain Ashcroft of the North Gate to a duel. The terms of the duel and any potential champions shall be…”

Gambler stopped listening and turned to Ashcroft. He said, “I thought you said these guys were going to stop showing up.”

“It’s my fault, really,” Ashcroft said while pinching the bridge of his nose. “I’ve already crippled or killed eight of these bastards in ‘honorable duels.’ I should never have engaged with them. I think a different strategy will be necessary. Gambler, how about you deal with them?”

“Okay,” Gambler said, shrugging his shoulders.

Gambler turned toward the group of NPCs that had just arrived, and he squared his shoulders. The Revenants standing near the four Imperials took a few steps back and made sure to get out of the way. The squire was still talking in a grating voice about the legal specifications of dueling. They had no idea what was about to happen.

“Sir Balthazar, who has mastered the twin arts of Battle Aura and Weapon Enhancement, shall naturally go last…”

A shining silver revolver jumped out of Gambler’s holster and into his hand. In the space of half a second, Gambler drew his gun and dispensed a seven-gram package of death into the first knight’s skull.

The second knight had just enough time to widen his eyes in fear and grit his teeth in rage before a second bullet had shattered his orbital bone.

The third knight had just started unsheathing his sword when Gambler’s third bullet struck him in the eye.

As they fell to the ground, the three knights stumbled to the ground like men who had been drinking since noon. When they fell to the ground, however, they would never rise again.

“No!” The squire shouted in denial of the brutally efficient violence which had just transpired in front of him. Guns did not exist within the Imperial’s cultural consciousness. They had never experienced the ease with which a trained gunman could dispatch multiple targets.

Gambler flourished his revolver in his hand, turning it over multiple times. He regained the grip on his gun and pointed his revolver at the squire’s head. The squire screamed in fear as Gambler pulled the hammer of his gun back with eyes full of killing intent.

“Stop,” Ashcroft said clearly. Gambler raised the barrel of his gun away from the squire and looked over at Ashcroft.

“Hmm?” Gambler asked wordlessly.

“We’re trying to send a message. There’s no point in killing them unless we leave someone alive to tell the others,” Ashcroft said as the squire fell to the ground in fear.

The squire turned away from the Revenants and fled on hands and knees.

“Anyway, what were we talking about?” Ashcroft said as blood and splattered brains seeped into the stone ground of the northern gatehouse.

“You were talking about how I’m one of ‘our best soldiers,’” Gambler responded as he returned his smoking revolver to its holster.

“Oh yeah,” Ashcroft said. “I was just about to list all of the reasons why sleeping on the job is terrible. Number one…”

The Revenants of Ashcroft’s battle-company, the Knights of Ashes, never bothered cleaning up the corpses of the three dead magic knights. The families of the deceased would eventually come to retrieve the corpses, and none of the Revenants present would ever face punishment for this incident.