Ulrike and Dejan believe in team building. That includes fraternizing with military support when possible. Thus I have been strongly encouraged to not spend the evening online in my little screened off cubicle in the attic of the school partially seized to house our forces. Yes, the locals love us for that. My team mates are strangely affected by that. I do not care. I lost my faith in the common man about a decade ago.

Our base has welcomed a military detachment. You may have the wrong impression about the size of our base. We have two dozen police, a radio operator and a car/firearms technician, a supply guy from some new federal office, whom I also get my supplies from, and us three wizards the convoy has dropped off here. My colleagues are not my cup of tea. The first, coral – can conjure a dozen translucent tentacles in shape of a ring around his head, which earned him the obvious nick name Count Tentacula – is an accountant. He is, well, the kind of man you would buy a used car from or give your keys to if you want your plants watered while you are on vacation, but like a conversationalist he does not seem. The other – stag, he can run as you expect from that – believes that the government has hidden aliens in Area 51 and the monsters are now coming to rescue their brothers. Yes, exactly like you are thinking now. The picture in your head is bound to be flattering.

Sourcing your people from among nerds obsessive enough to learn lore from the appendix of the documentation of an online strategy game has drawbacks.

To have a drink in a classroom increases the charm of beer in a plastic beaker. Have I mentioned that most environmental concerns are losing importance when monsters who want to eat you are out there? The radio plays 90s pop. Upbeat music on the radio is a sign of our times. Bleak times call for happy music. I drink cola like a pilot with a flight scheduled.

People seem to be avoiding me. That is, my teammates notice; I expect to be. I don’t know these people. I am neither police nor military. Why would soldiers I have never met want to talk to me?

Dejan is in a conversation with their commander.

C: Your wizard seems a quiet guy.

D: Two weeks ago he was still a programmer in a cubicle

C: He is new? Not network?

Dejan waves me in. That is turning interesting and creates a need to set the record straight. I was not in a cubicle. Dejan introduces me.

P: Leutnant Müller, nice to meet you.

LM(C): It is an unexpected type of encounter

P: Am I your first wizard, or – to be precise – ritualist?

LM: No, no, I joined the dimensional incursion troops almost a year ago. We just haven’t gotten the new caps.

P: I am not sure I am following. Caps? Dimensional Incursion?

LM: O sorry, I keep forgetting you are new to this. Our branch of the ground forces has been assigned its own cap color. New caps are just not that much of a priority right now

D: Dimensional Incursion?

LM: This classification makes no sense any longer. We supported the network fighters going through the dimensional doorways to fight the dimensional entities before the intrusions break through.

U: Dimensional entities.

LM: Monsters. Sorry we are still on the prerelevation terminology. Yes, we have been fighting monsters. To be honest we mostly shelter the ritualists, but in the worst cases we fought.

Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

He has increased his charm level. Dejan in a demonstration of how things are puts his arm around Ulrike, his hand coming to rest on her hip. The man shows excellent control of his facial features.

LM: That really cost us a lot of special ammunition.

P: Special ammunition.

LM: O yes. Haven’t you gotten the memo? We are going to upgrade, upgun and equip this post with some special ammunition tomorrow. I guess international routes make even a minor base important.

D: That is good news

LM: Sure this is our unit’s first conventional monster sweep, but we can spare one vehicle to escort you.

U: Can you tell us why our encounter also involved a newt? Most stories you hear on the base involve those animals.

P: My first was not a headless horseman, but a headless horse with a trunk and a circular toothy maw where the neck should have been. If you are swimming you really can’t turn to the side. You can turn back, but if you are a lazy monster you just drift downstream.

D: So the flowing water gives them a boost. That makes sense. And even more so given today’s heat. I’d stay in the water.

LM: Yes. In addition walkers and flyers move far more slowly because they have a free choice of direction at all times. The ground does not pull you along like water does. Our new software now corrects for that.

D: Figures. At least the weather should become cooler tomorrow. Thunderstorms on forecast.

P: This is just Great. did you notice that my usual ritual circles are made out of salt? Switching to sand won’t help in a downpour. Can you requisition spray paint and solvent?

U: That is a great point. I’ll put in the request right now. The base commander is quite sharp but this stuff is pretty new.

P: I am still concerned about delays. Correcting sprayed stuff takes longer and if I compensate with more coins we’ll get in trouble.

U: If worst comes to worst we can stay overnight at the border. I’ll advise our boss of the possibility.

LM: Absolutely. We are not equipped or train to operate at night.

--

Getting upgrades and departing at dawn means getting out of bed at a monstrous, sorry, ungodly hour. Anyway I am now equipped with an impressive magic knife and our vehicle has three G3 rifles and a full clip of special ammunition for each plus quite some conventional ammunition. My team mates are not ecstatic about the third of each and thinking of my fellow wizards I kind of get it, but I don’t care.

U: Are we also getting special ammunition for the M2?

LM: Sorry, too expensive. But I can offer you a new battle pad with the new software suite. Photographic entity recognition and tactical modelling with the newest wind and water updates?

D: Only one. Sorry. But at least you’ll get the newest software now. You still need to trigger updates manually. You really don’t want these things to upgrade while you are in the field. But you get them as soon as the regular military forces get them.

U: The solvent took some work. It should be here in half an hour. We’ll also get a fire extinguisher. The stuff is flammable.

LM: We can live with a small delay.

Those military guys have a grenade launcher on their vehicle. How cool would it be if I could conjure such a thing? Alas, no. We head out. I even detect an incipient intrusion at extreme range away from the highway in the direction of our excursion. They tell us to ignore it. The soldiers really, really like getting good food when we use our cards exempting us from rationing on the other side of the border. We are really careful to display a lot of NATO signs, though. No need to cause an international incident.

On the return leg also nothing. What did you think? If you take special preparations nothing will happen.

We are to head out again on the next day on our own.