Chapter 1-5
When we think today of the near apocalypse that followed the arrival of the System, it is common to focus on the Wasted War. While that was certainly the coda of the conflict, in another light it was simply the extension of years of hostility that preceded it. It is difficult in the present to reconstruct the detailed natures and timelines of the various regional conflicts that took place, but it is undisputed that they did occur.
The best records we have are of our own forefathers, the United States of America, ‘peacefully’ annexing their immediate neighbors under threat of arms. The USA then proceeded to march troops south, their advance reaching as far as the Straits of Panama. In other regions, we have fragmented but incomplete reports of wars in far-flung nations across the world. South Korea fell to North Korea, which was in turn crushed by Chinese forces.
Unfortunately, over the years troves of irreplaceable pre-System records have been destroyed or lost in various calamities, starting with the Undying War of ‘66 and continuing through the Water Riots of the early 100s and beyond.
- Rufus Veres, Level 37 Verbose Historian, A Brief History of the System
I sat on the floor for a few minutes, breathing hard. Wasted hells, three goblins at once, and one of them armed and had a barrier too? That could be the final fight for a Standard Tutorial! Angels, how many more monsters am I going to have to fight?
“Hey System, how many monsters are left in the Tutorial?” I asked hopefully.
[THERE ARE FOUR FEWER MONSTERS THAN WHEN YOU STARTED!]
“Jerk.”
[INPUT NOT RECOGNIZED! PLEASE REPHRASE YOUR QUESTION, GUNNER!]
The System ignored my muttered curses as I climbed slowly back to my feet and started looking around for my spent shotshells. I managed to find the un-fired one I’d thrown, and I was relieved to see that when I dusted it off and placed it back in my bandolier it didn’t consume any mana. Several minutes of searching turned up only three of the five shells I had fired, each one consuming two points of mana when I slipped it back into the loops of my bandolier.
All right, let me see if I can figure out how to get this to make me two more new shells… I think I can ‘push’ my mana into it like it’s a spellform. Thankfully, it proved to be as easy as I’d imagined, and a few seconds later I had a full load of five shells ready to go. I sighed, feeling a bit of mental strain, and checked my resources.
