The Allbright System - A Sci-Fi Progression LitRPG Story

“It’s not that melee weapons came back. They were never really gone…

It’s more that the galaxy finally became strong enough to be able to use them again.”

For a Galactic War supposedly ruled by long-range precision and ammo produced from System Printers faster than you can blink, it may seem baffling to outsiders why Chainswords, Vibroblades, and Resonance Hammers remain staple gear in the modern UHF Marine’s kit.

But the truth is far simpler than most think: The resurgence of melee isn’t a return to tradition or a vain attempt at making things personal—it’s a natural response to the very shape of war.

Inside a ship, every shot fired is a risk.

Bulkheads, reactors, pressurized corridors—each one a catastrophic failure point just waiting for the wrong round. Even with SmartAmmo that carefully tracks its targets and hull-safe dispersal-charged tips, both defenders and attackers learned early in the war that precision was never going to be enough.

As accident-losses mounted, more resources were poured into developing ammo and firearms that would minimize internal damage during shipboard engagements. Specialized rounds were created, engineered to break apart on impact or disperse energy rather than pierce through walls and hit fragile systems.

But while those improvements made the ships safer for a short time, the Allbright System was busy rewriting the rules of combat entirely.

With Marines abruptly several times stronger, faster, and more durable than any human had a right to be, it became possible to strap thick, reinforced armor onto even the most mobile soldiers and marines. And once System Materials entered the picture, you had combat suits capable of shrugging off hits that would’ve once torn holes through light vehicles.

Armour that could stand toe-to-toe with a ship’s own bulkhead—sometimes quite literally.

That left both sides in a bind.

You had weapons designed to be safe for the ship, but now they couldn’t actually punch through the armor worn by the people inside it.

So once again, the tactics had to evolve.

Boarding teams shifted back toward the fundamentals—blades, bludgeons, and blunt-force trauma. Simple Chainswords, Hammerheads, modified Lifter-Gauntlets.

Anything that let you smash your way forward without lighting up a reactor core or venting half a hallway into space.

And as it turned out, the very same advancements the Allbright System had introduced—stronger bodies, higher Attributes, heavier armor—worked just as well for melee combat.

Maybe even better.

When you’re swinging something five times heavier than any soldier from the Old Era could’ve ever possibly imagined being able to lift, at speeds that would’ve once torn muscle from bone? Basic physics does the rest.

That kind of weight and velocity doesn’t just hit—it obliterates.

Naturally, as attackers brought out hammers, cleavers, and high-frequency blades, defenders followed suit.

What do you do when a threat appears that your doctrine can’t answer? You steal it.

If it works against you, chances are it can also work for you.

And it did.

Once both sides started fielding melee weaponry again, the equation shifted; drastically.

It wasn’t just about having the best gear anymore—it was about who could use it.

Suddenly, techniques that had long been dismissed as obsolete or ceremonial—parries, ripostes, stances, disarms—were back in full force.

Swordplay schools that had desperately clung to last shreds of relevancy for centuries on the Core Worlds were now suddenly flooded with contracts from military instructors.

What used to be a noble’s pastime became essential battlefield training.

And now? It’s baked into doctrine.

Every Major Faction’s boarding kit includes melee equipment—custom-fitted to the user's size, strength, and combat role. Every Major Faction’s training curriculum includes melee combat classes.

‘Now, boarding actions are one thing,’ I hear you saying. ‘But what about real Battlefields? Planet-side? Why would they have melee weapons there?’

Here’s what outsiders forget: Marines aren’t just people with guns anymore.

They’re walking tanks.

The Allbright System takes every inch of training and multiplies it by raw, unfiltered power.

A Marine with 25 Strength and a movement-type Ability doesn’t just run—they accelerate like a damn missile. Who needs a firearm if you, yourself, are the bullet?

And when something that fast and that heavy closes 40-50 meters in less than a second?

You’re not aiming. You’re praying.

Firearms do still dominate the Battlefields at range; no question.

It is unlikely to ever change either.

But in engagements where terrain, supply, or squad composition collapse those distances? Where ammo can’t be wasted, as printers are out of reach, or you’re facing a Super-Heavy, or Emperor-forbid, bona-fide Ultra-Heavy armour?

Unless you just so happen to be packing anti-armour specific weaponry, have it readily at hand and are ready to fire the moment they come into view?

You draw your blade. You hunker down.

And you meet the paintrain head-on.

The modern battlefield is diverse, nuanced and technologically advanced beyond comprehension of your average grunt on the ground.

But even now, at the edge of advancement and doctrine, there is one universal truth:

Blades don’t jam.

Hammers don’t require reloads.

And the ones who forget that, don’t get to forget it twice.

—Excerpt from The Practical Doctrine of Close-Quarters Supremacy, Vol. 7, by Commander Halish Cole (Ret.)