Azure: Gunner

A few DMZs are persistently outright toxic to most forms of life, but this is surprisingly rare. At least after some time has passed. No known DMZ extends far enough to actually reshape the region’s weather, nor does a DMZ create a magical shield to preserve its changes.

If somehow a desert dungeon were to go unnoticed and merge in the middle of the LA River, dumping a square mile of sand and dirt in its path, the river would quickly carve its way through. Conversely, a patch of jungle dropped into an arid plain would wither and die in months, perhaps a few years at most.

On the other hand, a merge could create an entirely new cave system under what was once solid rock. Those caves might well collapse immediately, or stand strong for thousands of years. A new hill, even a small mountain, might be deposited on a rolling plain, remaining there until erosion has its way.

- Bonnie, Level 41 Beastmaster, Bonnie’s Bestiary

Arlo reached Level 5 from the lavasaur fight, and we waited tensely as he Leveled. He took Variable Load as his Level 5 Skill, wanting more options for his own conjured ammunition. I couldn’t blame Jayce for what they’d done – their Spell had been crucial, disorienting the wounded monster long enough for Arlo to put his shots into its eye. I just wished we could retreat into the relative safety of the underground room to rest and recover.

Out here, in what seemed to be a winding ravine, we were far more exposed. The effects of Balance seemed to be manageable for the rest of my team, though when I moved I still felt spikes of agony lance through me. G’hala explained that there were probably still rock fragments inside my body, and that I’d have to bear the pain until we could escape the dungeon. Then Lydia could remove them, allowing my body to properly heal.

We tried to rest and recover, but within a few minutes we all noticed the heat from the ground had increased significantly. It was getting uncomfortable to sit on, and I took that as a sign to get going. Visibility was shit here, but we could go either right or left from the door. Either direction would take us down what looked like a canyon between dark cliffs. Naturally, I picked left.

With Jayce unable to walk, and their stretcher left behind in the cave, we needed to make them another one or come up with an alternative. A stretcher would tie up two of us in the case of a fight, so it was far from ideal. G’hala offered to carry the cyborg instead, so we rigged up a simple harness and tied Jayce to the Shaman’s powerful back. It certainly didn’t look comfortable, but the Sound Mage suffered through it stoically, and we were on the move before the temperature became unbearable.

I had switched off my quiet steps mod to recover my mana more quickly, but now I had to activate thermal regulation instead. As we made our way over the near-black rocky ground we had to pay close attention to where we stepped, lest we twist an ankle or worse. Barriers didn’t protect against everything. With everyone else’s eyes on the ground, it was Jayce that spotted the next threat.

<Above us! Flyers!> they screamed into the Comms, and I jerked my eyes up.

The monsters were nearly on us, a swarm of bird-like winged beasts the size of large dogs with similar rocky flesh as the lavasaur. They hurtled down out of the dark, billowing clouds, mouths open and eyes glowing.

<Get down!> I yelled, throwing myself flat on the hot ground, biting down a scream as my torn insides flared with pain. I felt an impact on my back hammer me down into the hard rock, and my barrier flared as it deflected the attack. Shouts and grunts from my teammates mixed with the beat of heavy wings as the monsters hurled themselves back up into the sky.

<Back in formation! Shoulder to shoulder, G’hala in the center!> I called, and scrambled to follow my own orders.

We’d been moving in a loose circle around the Shaman and her passenger, and now we pulled back into a much tighter one. I found myself flanked by H’ruk and Raylan as we executed one of the defenses we’d been taught to use against groups of flyers. One of the disadvantages of winged monsters was that those wings needed room – usually a lot of it – so unless they were tiny it was difficult for them to attack a tight formation one-on-one.

I had my gun in my hands as my eyes tracked the monsters for a moment before they disappeared into a swirling cloud. Shots rang out from behind me, and I fought the instinct to turn and look. I had to watch my side of the formation, or we’d get taken by surprise again. I infused Force as I waited tensely, ignoring the sounds around me.

It seemed like an eternity later that I finally spotted a group of the creatures burst out of a dark cloud and dive towards us. I lined up a shot, leading the first flyer slightly, and pulled the trigger. The kick of my gun’s recoil was oddly comforting, and at least some of my pellets impacted my target.

It staggered in the air, the shove from Force forcefully slowing it down, and I discovered something that the Spell truly excelled at. It turned out that when a group is hurtling towards you in tight formation, even a small disruption to their momentum can trigger a chain reaction. Another flyer rammed into the first from behind, and another swerved abruptly, colliding with yet another as it tried to avoid the first pair.

I grinned savagely as only two monsters emerged unscathed, both of which were quickly gunned down by me and my friends. The others slammed into the ground a few dozen yards away, and at least one didn’t get up again. Those that did didn’t last long either. The whole encounter had lasted maybe two minutes at most.

We probably spent longer sitting there waiting to make sure no more attacks were coming than the fight itself had taken. After the second attack, it became evident that time was turning into our greatest foe. I could feel the heat through the thick rubber soles of my boots and most of us were drenched in sweat. Even the orcs were starting to feel the heat, and we didn’t all have thermal regulation mods – not that mine was keeping me cool.

A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

I could feel pieces of rock inside me, slowly tearing my flesh as we accelerated to a jog. I was ‘only’ down a dozen health, but I resisted the urge to take another healing potion since the fragments would just start cutting me again the moment I healed. The terrain was flattening out, the footing becoming more stable, as the walls of the canyon narrowed around us.

When the third group of flyers attacked, I ordered the group to keep moving while we fought. It slowed our pace to a crawl, but that was better than a complete stop. They weren’t that dangerous, as long as we saw them coming. The creatures’ size was an unfortunate – for them – middle ground where they were large enough to make good targets without being big enough to punch straight through our barriers and armor with a single attack.

As long as we each avoided getting hit multiple times in quick succession, we weren’t in too much danger. And as our bird-like foes circled between attacks, they seemed to pick their targets randomly instead of concentrating on one of us and wearing them down. It seemed like their job was just to slow us down while we roasted alive.

If I’m right, then these fuckers are too Wasted good at their role…

Wolf would have freely admitted that the atmosphere in the observation chamber had been tense from the start. As soon as his students had vanished into the portal, the instructors had hurried through a side door to a spiral ramp leading down. The observation room was a single floor underground, directly below the portal chamber.

It had been accessed by a staircase before the Dungeoneer had grown old enough to require the use of a wheelchair. The new ramp was too steep for him to traverse on his own, but it was possible for someone to carefully guide his chair down it. The dimensions of the chamber roughly matched those of the room above, and it was equally comfortable – in theory.

Wolf had not agreed when he discovered the Head Instructor had ordered the dungeon configured to a split-start. The ability of Dungeoneer Thompson to exert so much control over the dungeon’s configuration was a closely-guarded secret among the instructors. It was one thing to push a talented group of students, another to make them face their first dungeon alone.

Thompson’s ability was supposed to be used to ensure teams got exposure to different types of dungeons during training, without giving them any clues in advance. The training needed to be realistic, after all, if they were to survive after leaving the Academy. Even the ancient Dungeoneer’s Skills had limits, however, and his foreknowledge of exactly how the dungeon would manifest was far from perfect.

Wolf felt both relieved and guilty that the observation room only allowed a single point of view, which followed the Squad leader. He did not regret missing the sight of Jayce battling desperately for their life, their most powerful Spells calling down ever more monsters upon them while their only other magic was snatched away by the supernatural darkness of the dungeon.

It wasn’t hard for him to conclude that the cyborg had only survived through the strength granted by the mechanical half of their body, smashing the horrors apart with their scepter by brute force. The idea of an eighteen year old being forced to sit alone, back against a cold, hard wall, in the near-dark, while desperately winding a tourniquet around their own leg…

For all that he understood the necessity of the training that happened at the Academy, he thought this was a step too far. Much like the training Az had endured at the fangs of Trite.

He’d been forced to confront his own uneasiness around the cyborg Mage as he considered their bravery and composure in the face of the pain they undoubtedly felt. Wolf had always been unsettled by their very nature, never more so than in the past week. With both of his legs replaced by prosthesis, he feared he was losing his own humanity. Seeing Jayce displaying all-too-human courage, he had to wonder if his own fears were misplaced.

Now he was watching the team struggle through a hellscape of a canyon. It was all too apparent that the temperature was rising – even the orcs were sweating freely, and they were famously lovers of heat. He tore his gaze away from the projection and back to the old man in the chair. Thompson was drenched in sweat himself as he fought to exert control over his dungeon. The man’s breathing was ragged and uneven.

Lydia was watching him like a hawk, but there was little even a Tier 3 Healer could do against the ravages of time itself. Thompson was old, probably the oldest man Wolf had ever met, and he looked like the grim reaper might claim him at any minute. If he died now, Squad Hard Limit was likely doomed. The orcs alone might survive long enough to find the exit – if they were lucky.

“You can do it, old man,” the Healer said in a soft, encouraging voice as she tenderly wiped sweat from his face with a damp towel. Wolf wondered what his students would think if they saw the softer side of the black-leather wearing woman.

“She’s in a right mood today, all right,” the Dungeoneer cackled as a vein bulged on his bald head. “She’s getting old and ornery, just like me!” Then he broke into another coughing fit.

“Less talking, more fixing!” Wolf growled as yet another flight of monsters swooped down on Az and her team.

“Shut up!” Lydia hissed, looking over at him with a scowl before returning her attention to Thompson. He glared back at his longtime teammate and off-and-on lover as she stared at the old man, monitoring his health intently, for all the good it would do. Zenia’s cool fingers gripped his shoulder and squeezed reassuringly.

“He’s done this a thousand times before, you know that Elias,” she said softly.

Wolf’s hands clenched and he forced himself to take slow, deep, breaths. For all the things he enjoyed about his work at the Academy, this was the part he hated most. He hated feeling powerless more than anything, hated watching the students he’d worked so closely with for months hovering on the brink of death, knowing there was nothing he could do.

He forced himself to look back at the projection. Tara had actually stored her armor and he watched as the manaborn poured water directly from a waterskin onto her head and neck, trying to cool her off. The rest of the team looked equally miserable as the Earth Mage made the rounds with the waterskin before pouring the last of it on himself and tossing it aside.

Wolf could see the way the dark ground dried almost instantly where the water hit it, the heat evaporating it in moments. He doubted the team could last long at this rate. G’hala was still carrying Jayce on her back, and he knew she had to be burning through mana Strengthening herself. Her brother was the only one that looked remotely OK as the team fought to keep moving forward.

“Fuck this!” Wolf barked, and turned towards the ramp. He needed to punch something, preferably something that would fight back. Too bad JJ was still in LA – Wolf could always count on the Berzerker for a good scrap. The Ranger was halfway up the ramp when his acute hearing picked up a soft exclamation from below.

“That’s it, my love, just one more fight for the children!" the old man cackled, and Wolf turned back to the projection to see whether his students would live or die.