I ran to the wall and found Olivia standing in the middle of the projected area where they would first come into range. “You trying to break their charge too?” she asked. I noticed that the rest of her team were spread out among the soldiers every ten meters to give them magical support.
“That was the plan. I can lay down suppressing fire quite quickly if I need to.” She nodded.
A few seconds later a sound of something crashing through the trees entered the camp and everyone readied their weapons. A few seconds after that, hundreds of creatures, mostly quadrupedal, broke through the treeline and ran at the wall as fast as they could. I opened fire with rapid fire mana bullets, and the soldiers did the same with their automatic rifles. Olivia and her people held their fire until the creatures got within fifty meters of the wall, then began raining fireballs upon them. About forty meters from the wall a wall of fire erupted, stopping some in their tracks, and exploding or burning many others. I and the soldiers had mowed down at least five hundred feline, canine, ursine, or reptilian creatures large enough to ride on when the wall of Grilk came into view.
By the time they made it past the wall of fire, all but a few of the beasts were lying dead on the ground, with the ones that still breathed most trying to run away. Stray rounds from the thousands of bullets being fired into their sapient comrades finished most of those off.
When they reached the walls, the Grilk started climbing. They had some sort of gloves on that let them climb surfaces that weren’t perfectly smooth. My guess was that they were basically gecko gloves from that popular RPG system. Olivia called out to her people and they all ran over to the wall above one of the groups of climbers and reached over the top. “Grease” they all called out, and the Grilk started losing their hold on the wall. A few of them managed to make it to the top, only to take a rifle butt or bullet to the face. Right, Olivia was obsessed with RPGs. Of course she made sure they had all of the best spells from those.
No longer able to climb the walls, the Grilk knelt behind the bodies of the fallen animals and some sort of pistol appeared in their hands. I didn’t notice them firing until after several of the men on the wall were already shot, with several of them either collapsing or falling from the walkway. We ducked down, but from the sounds outside I could tell that their pistols were doing significant damage to the wall. Their damage was comparable to a half-mana mana bullet, but they could fire them far faster than I could, and were chipping away at the wall.
“Grenade” yelled one of the men, hurling something over the top of the wall, and several of the other soldiers pulled out something the size of a fist and threw it as well. A series of explosions and bright blasts sounded on the other side of the wall and the soldiers popped back up and fired at the wounded and disoriented Grilk below.
Once that wave was dealt with, another quickly appeared. The soldiers on the wall were running out of bullets, and the support crew were running more to them as quickly as possible. The shortages of ammo, however, allowed a few Grilk to get close enough to set up another firing line fifty meters away, outside the throwing range of our troops. There was a shootout and half of our men went down before we managed to break their assault with a few RPGs the gunsmith had made on a whim mixed with exploding fireballs.
With most of their men down, something else crashed through the trees. Two four meter and one five meter tall humanoids lifted something red and hurled it into our camp. The three objects landed and I noticed that it looked like a two meter tall dog covered in quills. The System identified it as a Sagqua. Some of the men jumped down from the walls and engaged them and I returned to fighting the giant humanoids.
I sent a picture to Silan and told him how tall they were. ‘Jotun.’ he responded. ‘Primitive Alfinoids. They are incredibly strong and durable, but not very good at strategy or improvization. Try outmaneuvering them.”
‘Jotun? What’s next, are you going to tell me Asgard is real?’
‘Of course it is, but don’t worry. I doubt there are more than a hundred Vanir slaves in the entire GCA. They won’t risk one on a minor conflict on a minor planet.’
I shrugged. Well, at least I won’t have to fight a god. The Jotun seemed to have run out of Sagqua to throw at us, and were charging the wall. As they were taller than the wall, they were able to swing their weapons over the top of it. I ran at one of them, firing rifle strength mana bullets at its face, but only angered it. It swung its ax downward and I jumped out of the way, but it was too fast for me to dodge completely. Noticing that I could no longer feel my arm, I looked to where I had dodged and saw it laying on the ground, cleanly severed just above the elbow. A gray web had already started forming over the stump where my arm used to be as I saw the arm disappear, no doubt gathered by Bob for future reattachment. “Focus on the other two!” I yelled, then ran at the five meter tall brute.
With one of his arms grabbing the top of the wall in an attempt to tear it down, I jumped on top of the arm then ran to his shoulders, where I wrapped my legs around his throat. I squeezed will all I had as he struggled to pull me off. I could tell he had broken several of my ribs with his grip, but kept squeezing anyway as I charged up a two mana bullet. I placed my one remaining palm at the base of his skull and fired upwards. The explosion of bone and brain blew me off of him, dislocating my right leg from my hip due to having my legs locked together, and I fell to the ground. A few seconds later, the corpse fell on top of me and I passed out.
When I opened my eyes I noticed that I was in an unfamiliar bed. From the cramped layout of the room I could tell that I was in an RV, but I didn’t know whose. My arm had been reattached, however, and my leg and ribs were healed, so I must be missing some time. Looking beside myself I saw Di laying there. This seemed familiar. I looked under the sheets to see that we were both completely naked. She was quite well toned, and it took me a few second to stop staring. ‘Uh, Vera? Did we?’
‘Have sex. Yes. Twice.’
‘So, why don’t I remember?’
‘After the battle was over and Tim healed you, you realized that you had personally killed over a hundred sapient beings and became traumatized. You asked me to block the memories so that you could cope with it, but I didn’t block them completely, as your mental pain resistance was greatly improving from the trauma and I knew you valued improving your resistance skills. Di came by to council you, to help you through the rest of the trauma, and some kind of human interaction occurred that I don’t understand. She kissed you and shortly afterwards you followed her back here where the two of you engaged in intercourse. Not sure how that helped your trauma, but it seemed to work.’
‘I guess that’s one of the shortcomings of not having a physical body or hormones.’
‘I actually consider behaving logically to be a strength.’
The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.
Di awoke, turned over, and looked at me. “Good Morning.” she said, and the simple phrase seemed like music.
“Good Morning.” I said, trying to return to my senses. “Sleep well?”
“All thanks to you.” she said, then kissed me before getting out of bed. Once again I had to force myself to look away. She was at least a seven out of ten, if not an eight. “You don’t have to look away if you don’t want to. You certainly saw plenty last night.”
I laughed slightly. “So, does that mean we’re joining seventy percent of the population as a couple?”
“If you want. I certainly wouldn’t mind.”
I smiled. “In that case, how about you meet me at the teleporter at noon. We can have lunch in Paris.”
She leaned over and kissed me. “It’s a date, then.” She hit the button to equip her clothes, this time a pant suit, and left.
I laid there for the next few minutes thinking about the previous day. I had killed people. Not just one, but dozens, hundreds. Even if it was in self defense, I’m not sure I’m okay with that. That’s probably why I had Vera block the memories.
I got out of bed and checked my skills. My Physical and Mental pain resistance had both increased, as had my Regeneration. My Nanite Manipulation had also risen, probably as a result of firing thousands of mana bullets. Interestingly, my stats had also increased. Apparently losing an arm but continuing fighting was great for both Endurance and Willpower.
I got up and equipped my clothes, the same bluejeans and shirt I had wore to the battle. Vera had cleaned them with my Clean Surface spell while they were in my inventory, so I didn’t look like a horror movie extra from all of the blood on them. Still, they weren’t in the best condition so I would need to get something new to wear. I checked what clothes the stores in town had listed, but didn’t see anything I really wanted. Still, I needed to get some new clothes. I checked the System and, while their clothes all looked like the kind of high-tech stuff you would see in a sci-fi or superhero show, they did have a type of under-armor listed. It was a skin-tight suit that was highly cut, stab, and abrasion resistant, self cleaning, self repairing, and automatically regulated the temperature of the wearer, the whole thing being powered off a small orb in the collar and a small battery. They cost two hundred and fifty zerka each. I ordered one for myself and one for Di, as they were specially tailored to the individual user, but didn’t know when I would give it to her. I would probably keep it for a special occasion, after I had the tailor make her something nice out of some of the special materials and fabrics the System could provide. Maybe they could make her a suit out some of that programmable fabric that could change color on demand. If I remembered correctly, it was also bullet resistant and could store nanites to be programmed with extra functions. Maybe I could work in a shield of some sort, tied to a Detection Field.
I sent mine and Di’s measurements to the tailor’s and asked for a suit for each of us of a style they had listed in the market. I also asked if they could use that material to make the suits, and also make me a tie and dress shirt of the same material. Now that the battle was over, most businesses were diversifying into civilian markets because the military market was dying down. Other cities were still buying through the Market, but this town had pretty much bought all that it needs and stopped the special purchasing agreement for military hardware with everyone but the armor makers, the emergency/military food vendor, and the gunsmith, as those were the only goods that the military still needed to buy. While the Tailor did make the plate carriers for the military, that only took up a fraction of their time.
After I was done shopping, I checked my messages. Two of them seemed important. The first was from the Sanctuary Outpost Core, informing me that my “Teleportation platform (small)” was complete. The second was from Paul, informing me that he and Silan needed to meet with me for a debriefing about the battle. I sent a message to the Outpost Core, ordering it to get the Builder to set up the teleporter in the teleportation room I had already had carved out, then inform me when it was complete. The teleporter would be locked with a special code that prevented teleporting to it or using it to go to another teleporter without the code. Only me and the main city teleporter had that code. I would be giving it to my council members and Jacob, Silan, and Lord Tarn eventually, in case they needed to evacuate Fort Solinan or the town’s outposts, but I wanted to make sure everything in Sanctuary was ready for refugees first. I then sent a message to Paul asking when he wanted to meet. It only took him a few seconds to respond that he was meeting with Silan now and could meet with me immediately.
I travelled over there immediately and joined their meeting. To sum things up, they had recovered the bodies of every animal and sapient being, and given them to Bob as raw material. Bob had extracted the DNA from all of them, in case we needed him to clone the animals later. All implants, including their Cores in their brains, and all equipment was taken into military custody, with the exception of the defensive turrets and other gear they left at their forward base a kilometer away. As we didn’t own them, the System wouldn’t let us pick them up automatically by expanding the Outpost’s field, and because they would shoot anyone that approached, we couldn’t get close enough to claim them as battle salvage. They wouldn’t attack anyone in their camp, regardless of race or faction, but as they had evacuated the camp in order to attack, and all of them had died during the assault, including some who committed suicide rather than be captured, we had no way to enter the camp.
I did have one idea though. “Hey, Paul. How far do you think you could throw a teleportation orb?”
“No idea. How heavy is it?” I bought one for ten thousand with my own money and had it appear in my hand, then tossed it to him. He tested the weight by tossing it in the air a few times. “Maybe three to four kilos. Probably a hundred and forty to a hundred and sixty meters. Why?”
“Can you get close enough to the turrets to throw that into their camp?”
Paul smiled. “Yeah, I think I can. One of the scouts got about forty meters from one of them before he was detected. I’m sure I can get close enough.”
Silan laughed. “I never would have thought about that way to exploit the way the System works. My people have tried that with telekinesis, but the turrets detected it as an attack and shot at the orb. If you are simply throwing a System Device that can’t deal any damage and uses no Magic, the turrets shouldn’t see it as an attack. We’ll just need to find someone to teleport us in, and we can claim the camp.”
“I can do that, but as long as we link it to the teleporter here and charge it first, we can have people on standby for when he informs us that he got it within the camp.”
With such good news, we ended the meeting and Paul got a tech team to standby and await his orders. I linked the teleportation orb to the mine’s teleportation platform and had it completely charge the device. It could only hold enough charge to move one hundred or so people, but the enemy camp would likely have a generator we could claim to recharge it.
An hour later, Paul sent the message. As he agreed to let me teleport him instead of taking the platform, I grabbed Silan’s shoulder and teleported us to the device. When we appeared Silan gritted his teeth and collapsed on the ground in pain. “Shit. I forgot that you didn’t have regeneration or pain resistance.” I called over one of the technicians who had a basic healing spell and he started working on Silan.
“It’s fine.” said Silan through his teeth. “I really should have those if I’m going to be a military advisor. I’ll download them now.” A few seconds later he looked like he was doing much better, so I knew that at least the Physical Pain Resistance had started working.
“Still, I should apologize.” I sent him a thousand zerka, and his eyes widened in surprise.
“This is too much, even if you intended to harm me. The damage is not that severe, just painful.”
“In that case, consider the excess a bonus for all of the help you have given us. I hope we can work together in the future.”
He nodded and I left to help search the camp for hidden devices that we could claim. An hour later, Vera sent me a notification that it was time to leave for my date. I found Paul, who was inventorying the items we had collected with Silan. “I’ve got to go, it’s 11:50 and I’ve got a lunch date.”
“Yeah, I saw you leaving with Di last night. It’s about time you two got together. I’ve known she was into you since you first brought her to the kitchen.”
“So did I. I just didn’t know if I was into her.”
“I’m guessing you also didn’t want to admit that you were into older women, but now that she looks younger you’re cool with it.”
“Well, that and the fact that she was a bit too forward for my taste. Anyway, I’ll talk to you later. I’ll be in Paris if you need me.”
“We’ll get the inventory done and send it to you so we can figure out what to do with all of the gear. Still, Paris? High roller today, huh? Going to bankrupt yourself trying to impress her.” Silan nodded in agreement, but I ignored them and teleported myself back to the mine before taking the teleporter to town.
Still, I was confused by what he meant about being a high roller. I gave the teleporter mine and Di’s information and asked for an estimation of the cost of going to Paris. I gasped. No wonder he thought I’d bankrupt myself. The teleporter told me that at current rates, the trip would cost me over twelve thousand zerka. Sure, I could afford it, but I doubt most people in town would be able to go once in their lives. What did Paris charge to return? The teleporter estimated only one hundred and twenty three zerka. Ok, that was manageable for even the basic workers if they saved up for a while. Apparently, the teleporter in Paris was set to cost only one hundredth of a zerka per kilometer per hundred kilograms. I checked several other teleporters around the world and they were all half that to five times that. I had severely overestimated how much it should cost to travel.
I reset the cost at all of the town’s teleporters to match Paris’s, and posted a bulletin about it so that the people in town would be know about it. I had assumed that we weren’t getting visitors from other towns and cities because we were going to be invaded, but at the cost I had set for using the teleporter it was no surprise that people avoided us.
A minute later Di arrived and we left for Paris.