Azure: Gunner

‘War. War never changes.’

This ancient saying pre-dates the System. While the sentiment rings true, the reality is that the last large-scale sapient-against-sapient conflict was the Wasted War. In the intervening centuries, historians, politicians, and journalists have applied the label on multiple occasions, with varying justifications and degrees of accuracy.

The most famous example is the Undying War, which began in the year 66 and ultimately resulted in the destruction of the original Lost Angels. On other occasions, a number of campaigns conducted on the fringes of the Wastes, or in defence of Fort Alpha and Fort Delta, have received the moniker.

In all of them, however, I would argue that ‘war’ is an inaccurate label. Historically, wars are fought between distinct political entities. It is disingenuous at best to claim that the undead of the QZ qualify as such, and strictly false in the case of the monsters of the Wastes.

In this author’s humble opinion, the definition of ‘war’ has not changed merely due to a lack of organized polities with the strength to challenge Lost Angels. Note that this argument is rooted in the cause of semantic precision, and is in no way intended to demean the sacrifices made by our brave soldiers and civilians in any of these struggles.

- Rufus Veres, Level 37 Verbose Historian, A Brief History of the System

<War?!>

I was stunned. I only knew the term from history classes, as far as wars between people went. The Wasted War of course came to mind. I knew there had been many wars before then, but I could never really bring myself to care too much about ancient history.

Mason nodded soberly.

<Lost Angels law states that every stable dungeon is the property of the Lost Angels government. They lease the rights to run the dungeon, almost always to one of the Families, who farm it for resources and money. Dungeons are not the only thing keeping LA running, but they form one of the city’s economic pillars and the basis of much of the Families’ wealth and prestige. Since LA does not recognize Zion as an independent state, the Families are insisting the dungeon belongs to LA.

<The leaders of Zion have no interest in turning their dungeon over to be exploited by the people that discriminate against the very same races that live in Zion. The Families see this as a challenge to their power and wealth, and are pushing for the Army to move in and force Zion to surrender – or to burn it down and seize the dungeon by force.

<The Army has no desire to get involved in this fight, but ultimately they are under the Governor’s authority. They are pushing back, as gathering a force powerful enough to suppress Zion would require stripping the QZ and Fort Delta bare.

<Now the Guildmaster has stepped into this mess, offering a different solution. Originally, the plan was to establish a second Academy for students to move to after completing their first year of study here, but that will be amended to instead relocate the Academy to Zion and bring their dungeon under Guild management.>

<And the Guildmaster wants us involved, specifically?> G’hala asked rhetorically. <I assume because of the, ah, composition of our team?> she added, gesturing around.

<Exactly,> Mason agreed. <I am leading a small team of Tier 4s to negotiate with Zion. You will accompany us, as proof that the Guild welcomes all, regardless of race, and provides them with the same opportunities as it does to humans. Once I’ve secured permission, you’ll be the first Guild team into the Zion dungeon, as an example of the effectiveness of our teaching methods.>

I exchanged worried glances with my team. I was the only one who had hit Tier 1 so far, though I was sure the others were getting close. How bad would a Level 12 dungeon be? Honestly, I wasn’t sure I was ready to jump back into a dungeon anytime soon…

My mind went to the memories of the void I’d glimpsed. To my body, still uncomfortable and off balance. I’d felt ready to start training this morning. That was a long shot away from being ready to fight for my life again.

<Thompson planned this, didn’t she?> Raylan said bitterly. <She knew the dungeon was going to collapse, and that’s why she pushed into it again over and over, trying to get our Levels up so we could go play the heroes in this Level 12 dungeon…>

He trailed off, and I found myself nodding in agreement. Mason sighed, looking tired for a moment.

<She certainly placed her bet on your team being a representative of the ‘best’ of the Guild to the people of Zion,> he said slowly. <Whether or not she knew the dungeon might collapse with you in it, I can’t say. I can assure you that everything that’s happened here since the matriarch’s attack happened without my knowledge, nor would I have kept silent if I knew.

This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

<On this point, however, she has already won. You are the best team I can think of to go on this mission, regardless of how you got to this point. You’ll need more training and Levels, of course, and there will be plenty of chances for both along the way.>

<What do you mean by that?> I asked nervously.

I believed in Mason’s training methods – Raylan, Zaire, and I were living proof that they worked – but that didn’t mean I enjoyed them.

OK Az, that’s a lie and you know it. You do enjoy them. Mostly. And you’re nervous. Both things can be true.

My concerns were not eased as Mason shot the team one of his rare unguarded smiles, sharp teeth shining.

<We’ll be traveling in secret, to avoid… complications. That means staying off roads and out of towns as much as possible. And I’m sure you can guess what that means,> he told us.

<Monsters. Lots of monsters,> I said, not sure how to feel about it.

<Exactly! We’ll take the rest of the day to prepare, and leave in the morning. Let’s get going!>

By the time we’d left the classroom, Arlo and Squad Excel were gone, back to LA or off to somewhere else, I wasn’t sure. Mason had said they were going to LA, but I wasn’t sure what to trust anymore. I wanted to trust Mason, but I certainly didn’t trust Thompson to have told Mason the truth. If this mission was secret, why would she let them go back to LA and gossip with the other students?

I got no answers, only a trip to the shooting range to test out my ‘new’ shotgun. Which was weird. I mean, it worked just fine, and the accuracy didn’t seem to suffer much, if at all, from the shorter barrel. It was just so different from the gun I’d been using many times a day for months and months. I had to adjust to how quickly it traversed between targets due to the combination of its reduced length and my increased Strength and Dexterity.

And despite my practice that morning, reloading it was a real pain in the ass. At least my reloading hand was my left hand, which hadn’t inexplicably grown on me. My ‘new’ arm wasn’t too much of a hindrance when shooting, fortunately. The good news was that the ability to switch between two different types of ammunition on the fly was awesome!

What was not awesome was trying to use my cutlass. My new corruption threw off everything when it came to swordplay, and I felt sloppy and uncoordinated in ways I couldn’t remember ever struggling with before. I was grateful that Mason remained patient with me, never getting frustrated as he personally ran me through a series of drills to help me adjust to my altered body.

I barely got a chance to try out my new Skills. Well, Wetwork was passive, so it was always doing something, but it wasn’t obvious when training. I got to try Always Ready a few times, enough to confirm that it worked fine with my cutlass, but I could tell it was going to take quite a bit of practice to master.

For one thing, the position of my right hand when shooting was not the same as when holding my sword, so the moment the switch happened was awkward. I realized the pistol-style vertical grip on my shotgun was a better match for the Skill than my old angled stock had been. That was something in its favor at least.

Then there was the time I forgot I’d been using Always Ready, and tried to put my gun away normally only to drop my cutlass when it suddenly appeared in my hand. There was no chance I was going to repeat that mistake in the future though. Out of the question.

It was fascinating watching Tara practice using Brace. A common Defender’s Skill, it negated part of an attack’s force and distributed the rest of it across her entire body. Apparently that felt extremely strange, but it was Wasted effective. The massive H’ruk shoulder-charging her and driving his shoulder into her shield would have knocked her flat on her shapely ass before.

With the Skill active, he stopped like he’d run into a wall, his barrier flaring. Tara’s feet slid backwards slightly, since Brace didn’t anchor her to the ground. The other weakness of the Skill was that it only stayed active for five seconds, so if her opponent could trick her into activating it they could wait out the effect. Fortunately it only triggered on a strong blow, so at least you couldn’t cheat it just by tapping her shield.

I didn’t last as nearly as long as normal in training that afternoon. Despite Lydia’s efforts, I was still not back to 100%. I ended up heading back to my room, where I changed my armor components out for my new Level 10 scout armor. It looked and felt badass, and I definitely didn’t spend several minutes in the bathroom posing in front of the mirror. My Level 5 armor was great in terms of quality, but the purple-and-silver was not my style, and neither were the designs on it.

I wasn’t sure which armor mod to remove in order to equip dash. I finally settled on the basic camouflage mod, and happily discovered that the process of removing it was much less dizziness-inducing than before my Tier up. It actually took less than half my mana to remove the mod this time, and I stored it away in my Inventory in case I changed my mind later.

Then I went outside to try my new mod. It felt extremely weird when I equipped the dash mod – like I was walking through sand. OK, it didn’t slow me down nearly that much, but it was noticeable. Maybe a better explanation was to say that it felt like walking on deep sand instead of normal ground.

The slowness lasted for around a minute. Then I started jogging and activated the mod. I was almost thrown forward by the sudden burst of power – like my legs were pushing the ground much harder than before.

It lasted for the promised five seconds, followed by me crashing down on the ground as my legs went from enhanced to restrained in a moment. I definitely didn’t skid on the dirt for several feet. It was fine, no one was around to notice, right? I cleaned up my armor with a bit of mana, then went to meet the team for dinner at the dining hall.

It was weird without Arlo there. I missed the Pistoleer already.

Despite my misgivings about what was to come, I passed out the moment I crawled into bed that night. The long day had exhausted my recovering body. I even slept in the next morning, until Raylan knocked on my door and woke me up.

Shortly after breakfast, we were heading out of the Academy gate. I’d taken everything of interest with me, including the copies of the Bestiary, Delver's Handbook, and Magical Basics – I might actually want to study those more. A Brief History of the System stayed behind, and I was not-so-secretly grateful that no one was going to expect me to read any more of that dry nonsense.