Chapter 1: Taking all of the S Rank Quests

"Hello, sir, how may I help you today?" a woman asked a young man.

The young man was wearing a hooded grey zipped-up jacket, blue jeans, dark brown steel-cap boots and gloves with steel knuckles, a sniper rifle was slung over his back and two steel war axes were strapped to either side of his waist, some of his face was concealed thanks to his hood but the woman could see his unhappy expression and a glaring look from his blue eyes. He looked like a delinquent and meant trouble, but the Lastation Guild was trying to become more friendly towards people and thus the receptionist was forced to act with politeness towards the odd man.

"I want to sign up for a job at the Guild," replied the odd man.

"Very well then, sir. What type of job are you looking at taking?"

"I'll be taking quests and completing them, I have no idea what profession that is but I'll take it."

"Alright then. May I have your name and personal details please? It's for the registration form."

"Fine then. The name is Mars, age unknown, date of birth unknown, that's about all I know."

The woman looked at the young man with a confused expression plastered on her face, she had met strange people before who came in every now and again, but this guy took the cake as the most oddest of all, the only thing he knew about himself was his name. Despite her inner instincts telling her to not question about it she decided to ask him a few questions, maybe one question at least before he got angry.

"Excuse me, sir, if you don't mind me asking but are you just telling me this because you really don't know anything about yourself or are you saying it because you are refusing to give your personal information for the registration form?" she asked.

The young man stared at her in response, refusing to say a single word. She swore she could feel his eyes piercing her very soul and a tinge of blood red appeared in his eyes, she slightly backed away and tried to fix the situation at hand.

"I-It isn't because I find you suspicious or anything, I just gotta fill this form out for you!" she stammered.

Mars sighed and slouched forward, his gaze never leaving the unfortunate woman. "I honestly don't know anything personal about myself to be honest, now lets get this damn form signed and all that so I can get some quests done already."

The woman nodded quickly and began to fill in the registration form, as she did this Mars took a glance around the Lastation Guild for a better look at the place, he found it rather big and open as there weren't many people around. The walls were big with a black and grey colour, there were columns that sprouted from the floor to the ceiling and various boards were attached to them that were filled with all manner of different quests, the boards were more like large computer touch screens where small numbers of people stood by and looked through the available quests. Many people were working in groups and chatted amongst themselves in a happy manner, it made Mars have mixed feelings about it, on one hand he was glad that people could rely on each other and had someone to be happy with, but on the other hand it made him uneasy and sort of sick, he never had anyone to depend on and had no friends or happiness that he could remember.

Let them keep whatever happiness that they have. I believe it would be better for them to have happiness instead of feeling pain and misery, for they deserve it more than I do.

It had been over two years since he practically brought Project Mars to its knees and killed almost everyone who worked with it, after he buried his deceased inmates he had sworn to kill the surviving people who worked for the project and while it had taken two years to keep his promise a reality he was nearly done with his task, he had gone after the remaining scientists after careful research into them, despite their records being just about deleted, he had managed to encounter just about all of the remaining survivors and once he did find them he did the only thing he could do: kill them. One unfortunate man had his intestines ripped out of his body before Mars forced it down his throat, either the man bled to death or choked to death. Fortunately the news reporters didn't get wind of it. However there was one man who had escaped his bloody vengeance: Maximilian, the man who created the Mars that walks the plains of Gamindustri. The thought of him still being alive and out there somewhere in Gamindustri was heavy upon Mars' heart, but his thought were distracted by the voice of the receptionist.

"The form has been filled out, all it needs is your signature," she said to him.

Mars nodded and took her pen before signing the registration form, the signature read 'Mars' in bad cursive handwriting. Once done she took the form and returned her gaze at him. "Now that's done, do you want to do a quest before heading out?"

"Sure, why not," responded Mars with a shrug. He honestly wasn't sure why he wanted a job at the Guild but since he hadn't seen a single sign of Maximilian for over a year he had come to the conclusion that he needed to do something to pass the time before he picks up the trail again.

"Very well then, now, which quest would you like to do?" she asked him.

Mars took a look at the screen and looked through all the available quests, he noticed that there were a few S rank quests that were available. Mars guessed, correctly, that S rank was the highest ranking quest available to anyone in the Guild, and since he was a little bit bored he decided to do the unthinkable: accept all of the S rank quests.

"Hmm, how 'bout I take all of the S rank quests," said Mars.

The woman looked shocked at him, she couldn't believe the fact that a complete newbie to the Guild wanted to do all S rank quests that were up for completion, she feared that the young man was way over his head and would die because of it. Plus, whoever heard of someone completing more than one S rank quest in one day?

"Um, are you sure about that, sir?" she asked. "No one has ever tried to do all the S rank quests before so it might be..."

"Just give me the locations of each quest, now," Mars responded in a harsh tone.

The receptionist was quick to respond to his statement and quickly handed Mars a list of the quest locations, there were three S rank quests available and Mars just took them, it sounded crazy to do three S rank quests at the same time but he reasoned to himself that it would be a piece of cake, besides, it just meant that there would be less danger around Lastation once he had completed the quests. Mars took the list and nodded at the receptionist before walking out of the Guild and towards the first location, which was to the east in a small mountain range, apparently there were was an ancient dragon nesting ground there that needed to be wiped out before the ancient dragons could launch an attack on helpless civilians.

"Good, ancient dragons, a challenge," muttered Mars with a sadistic grin.

As he walked down the street, and ignored the obvious stares of people who were concerned about their own safety as they could not only see his weapons but could also sense the grin, the clouds were beginning to settle more densely in the midday sky, obscuring most of the Sun. Mars didn't have an opinion about Lastation, in fact he didn't have much of an opinion about Planeptune, Lowee and Leanbox either. He had spent quite some time in the other nations while hunting down the last few remaining Project Mars scientists but didn't really had a lot of time to enjoy himself, in fact he never had a happy moment in his entire life as far as he could remember, not even the deaths of the rogue scientists made him feel joyous. Why did he decide to join the Lastation Guild instead of the others? It was because of the location of the former Project Mars facility, the ruins of the facility were along the northern border in an obscure location, and since he didn't feel at home in the other nations he came to the conclusion that he should stay in Lastation for a while.

Mars took a glance at the list with the quests on it and noticed the reward he would receive once he completed them: in total the reward would be 8,000 credits, not a bad sum he summarised. He didn't really need the money but he found out over the last two years that it was always best to have money at the ready just in case.

"Well, I better get to it then, those ancient dragons are going down! Then I have to take care of another monster nesting ground to the south and what appears to be some strange attacks to the north, guess I've got my hands full for the day."

He put the list away in his pocket and continued to walk down the street and turned towards the east, a small patch of mountains could be seen on the horizon and somewhere out there was his first quest. He couldn't wait to let out some brutal killing moves upon some unsuspecting monsters for a change.


It had been quite some time since Mars had set out on his mission to complete all of the three S rank quests and now a certain CPU Candidate was making her way to the Guild, she wore a black dress with white lining, black fingerless glove sleeves, black boots with while lining and a portable device was strapped to her left waist, she had two ribbons in her hair that were tied around two twin tails, her crimson red eyes sparkled as she smiled to herself. Thus Uni, CPU Candidate of Lastation, walked down the street towards the Guild in a happy manner.

"This is it, this is the day that I can outshine Noire by completing all the S rank quests," Uni muttered to herself. "If I can do this then maybe, just maybe, I can prove that I'm more than capable at doing anything!"

The streets were a lot more livelier than they had been a while ago, more people were out shopping for goods, socialising with each other, going out on dates and goodness knows what else. People made way for Uni as a sign of respect, others said "hello" and a few waved in her direction, Uni showed her respect by waving back and replying to every hello with a "hello" "and how are you" despite getting flustered by all the attention. She was well liked by the populace and was extremely popular with gun lovers, Uni would attempt everything with all her burning passion and would not rest until she had completed any task that was given to her, despite that she had a sense of insecurity as she was at times compared to her older sister, who claimed that she could do only everything, and this had caused Uni to gain increasing levels of anxiety and she always felt that she was living under the shadow of Noire, thus she attempted to become better than her. And that wasn't an easy task, especially since her tsundere nature would get the better of her.

Uni believed that by completing all the S rank quests she would finally prove herself to Noire and get her sisters affection and the words "Good job Uni" from her, it seemed like a flawless plan but the CPU Candidate had failed to take one thing into account: what would happen if someone had already taken the quests? She was going to find out as soon as she walked into the Guild and look at the available quests.

Once Uni had entered the Guild she noticed a depressed woman standing behind a reception desk, the Candidate walked over to her and noticed that the woman was shaking her head and mumbling to herself. It sounded like she was saying "I'm such an idiot, I should have stopped him." With a bit of concern in her mind Uni approached the woman and tapped her shoulder.

"Excuse me, but you're mumbling to yourself," said Uni. "Is there anything wrong?"

The woman looked at Uni in surprise. "Huh? Oh, greetings Miss Uni, is there something that you wanted?"

"Well I'm here to do a few quests but you look like a wreak, did something happen?"

"Sort of, some new guy just signed up to become a member of the Guild and immediately took all of the S rank quests, I wasn't able to change his mind."

Uni was shocked that some newbie had just taken all of the S rank quests for himself, she was quite understandably ticked off at whoever the person was. "Who is this guy? I have to have a few 'words' with this person when I find him."

"Why is that? Oh, were you going to do an S rank quest as well?"

Uni nodded in response. "Who was this guy? Can you give me a name and whatever he looks like just tell me."

"Alright then, I fear for his safety so it would be good for a CPU Candidate to go and help him. His name is Mars and he has blue eyes, wears a grey hooded jacket, blue jeans, dark brown boots, has a sniper rifle slung over his back and two axes strapped to his waist, he seems like a delinquent and is rather harsh in tone."

"Huh, sounds like a strange individual. He must be an idiot if he believes he can survive three S rank quests all by himself. By the way, what were the quests?"

The receptionist handed Uni a list of the S rank quests that Mars was undertaking, and it surprised Uni so much that she gasped in shock. Mars was going to go up against a hoard of ancient dragons and goodness knows what from the south and north. It was clear to Uni that the young man was going to get himself killed out there, suddenly a thought occurred to the CPU Candidate.

If I went out there and saved him that would give me some publicity and raise Lastation's shares as I would have saved a citizen, perhaps that would also make Noire appreciate me more as well.

"I guess I can help him if need be," said Uni in her tsundere way. "I'll get going now, er, good luck, I guess."

The receptionist nodded in response and Uni left the Guild and walked down the street, asking people if they had seen a grey jacket wearing delinquent with a sniper rifle around the place, but it seemed that not a lot of them had seen him, those that had seen him weren't helpful as they didn't pay much attention to where he was heading.

"Urgh, this is getting frustrating," grumbled Uni. "But I can't ask for help, I have to do this on my own and prove my worth. I guess I'll just have to look around even harder and see if I can spot him anywhere."

As Uni turned down a street she thought she saw someone who fitted the description perfectly, but when she looked again the person was gone, as swift as the wind itself. With her patience starting to run thin she decided that it would be best to start looking at the quest locations, and if he wasn't there then she would clear the area and gain the reward. The closest location was the ancient dragon den to the east, that could be a good chance to bump into Mars and 'convince' the newbie to giver her the quests instead.

"Alright then, I'm heading east!"


The track up through the mountain range was largely uneventful at best, there was hardly any lifeforms running around and everything was quite, almost too quiet for the young man who was walking on the dirt path up the mountain range. The day had grown darker due to the clouds and it looked like it would rain at some point during the mid or late afternoon, but that didn't concern him at all, what did concern him was whether he would be able to kill the ancient dragons before the end sunset. All around him the light brown mountains, which were not that big at all, stood high and mighty, their shadows cast the ground in darkness. Mars wasn't sure where the ancient dragons would be, could they be in a cave or perhaps out in the open somewhere? He had no clues and his boredom was starting to rise.

This is getting ridicules, I could have past them for all I know, perhaps they're already been cleared out by someone else or something? Bah, who knows and who cares, I've got to get my skills up. Huh, there's a cave up ahead.

As he continued to walk along the path he spotted a cave and saw various burn and claw marks all around the edges of the cave, it was clear who lived down there: ancient dragons. Mars quickly turned towards the cave and entered it without a second thought or delay. The cave stretched far into the bowls of the mountain range, the path was covered in flat, curved and spiky stones, as Mars walked through the cave passage he noticed that it began to get darker and more darker until he was forced to pull out a flare and activate it, he continued to walk down the passage until he arrived in an area that was lighted by whatever sunlight could pass through the clouds, there he found what he was looking for: three sleeping ancient dragons. He was fortunate to find them asleep as he threw the flare away.

"Well, I found the bastards, now to kill them," Mars muttered to himself as he pulled out his two axes and approached the largest of the ancient dragons.


Uni had arrived in the mountain range not long after Mars had entered the cave and immediately began to look for him, she wasn't sure why the strange delinquent would want to take on three S rank quests all by himself but she knew one thing: that guy was an idiot, at least he seemed so at first glance. For the next ten minutes she searched the mountain range in her HDD form, Black Sister, which her attire consisted of a black one piece bathing suite-like uniform, long black gloves and boots, her eyes had become bright green with a power symbol, her hair was now silver and up in two drill-tails on either side of her head, one other noticeable feature was that her breasts shrunk in size. Black Sister flew through the afternoon sky, the clouds much more dense than before and signs of rain and lightning were beginning to appear, it became clear to Black Sister that she would have to hurry her search before it started to rain heavily.

Hmm, if I was an ancient dragon, where would I hide? Somewhere hidden, somewhere obscure, somewhere… underground perhaps? Possibly in a cave? Yeah, a cave, that has to be where they are!

As Black Sister flew over a stony track she spotted what appeared to be the entrance of a cave, she flew over to it and landed outside the entrance, it was dark inside but it was a good possible location for the ancient dragons as well as Mars, thus she entered the cave. To make herself more secure in safety Black Sister materialised her oversized rifle (well, more like a cannon really) and walked down the passage, listening carefully for any sounds and watched out for any signs of movement, yet there wasn't any sound to be heard or any movement to be seen. Black Sister turned on a torch to lighten the dark and continued walking. However, as soon as she turned around a corner she heard raised voices, or rather a voice and several roars, it didn't take a genius to realise what was going on.

Black Sister picked up her pace and ran around to the site of the noises and as soon as she arrived she was confronted with a young man on top of an ancient dragon's head and was slashing his axes into the monster's thick flesh, the ancient dragon that was being mutilated thrashed its head around back and forth but failed in sending the young man to crash to the ground. The other two ancient dragons attempted to take down Mars by slashing at him with their claws and tail, most of the time he would dodge the attacks but at other times the tips of the claws would strike him, ripping parts of his jeans and jacket. Black Sister couldn't describe why but she felt a sense of uneasiness whenever she looked at him, he didn't appear to notice her and the dragons didn't seem to notice either.

As she readied her massive weapon she watched in either amazement or shock as the young man started to glow red and his eyes glowed a blood red colour, in either eye a small black dot took the place of his pupils, suddenly he jumped into the air and shouted "Savage Strike!", he then continuously swung his axes swiftly at the dragon beneath him, blood red energy had engulfed his weapons and were making a mark against his opponent. Finally he held his axes together and swung them over his head and into the unfortunate dragon's skull, killing it. As it disappeared into pixels Mars fell to the ground and landed on his feet, a savage grin was on his face as he glared at the remaining two ancient dragons. They roared at him, sending dust and small rocks into the air, Mars responded by roaring back at them in an inhuman way, it almost sounded like dragon roars.

Black Sister wouldn't admit it but she was starting to get a little terrified thanks to this new development, she continued to hide behind a large rock and peer at the battle, unsure whether to help Mars or just hide. Mars, on the other hand, put his two axes by his waist, grabbed his sniper rifle and ran around the dragons whilst shooting at them. From what she could see he was a good shot, but not as talented as herself. But as she continued to watch she realised that he had gotten cornered by the two ancient dragons and was starting to get tired, perhaps too tired to get himself out of his predicament.

This is it, this is when I save a citizen of Lastation and get my sister's praise!

Black Sister came out from behind the rock, flew into the air and fired several rounds into the back of one of the dragons, causing it to turn around at the new attacker and began to pounce at her. Mars fired several more bullets into the other dragon before he noticed the silver haired girl by the large rock with an oversized gun, he wasn't impressed that someone else had turned up but he was also grateful that they had turned up as he would have been made into mincemeat; he had underestimated the ancient dragons. He was more used to fighting humans and spent little to no time fighting monsters.

"Hey, the hell are you still standing there for?!" yelled Black Sister. "Get out of here!"

"Like hell I am!" responded Mars with a shout. "These ancient dragons are mine and I ain't letting anyone else do the job for me!"

Mars moved out of the way as a spiked dragons tail smashed into the ground next to him, he jumped onto a large piece of crooked rock, aimed the sniper rifle up at the dragon and once it opened its mouth to roar at him again he locked onto his target: the dragon's throat.

"This is it, Blood Beam!" shouted Mars as he fired a blood red beam from his sniper rifle, this was one of his special attacks that he enjoyed using. The beam flew through the dragon's mouth and out the back of its neck, killing it instantly. He didn't enjoy his kill for long as the last of the ancient dragons swung his tail at Mars, smashing into him and sending him across the cave, he skidded for several feet before crashing into the cave wall, Black Sister could see skin from his face dangling down from the flesh and his jacket and jeans had become shredded.

Black Sister saw all of it happen and could only cringe at it, but when she saw skin dangling from his face and hands she became worried about him, despite her tsundere nature telling herself that she wasn't concerned. She looked back at the ancient dragon that she was fighting and knew that the fight would get ugly if something lucky didn't happen, it was then that she got an idea.

The ceiling, those rocks look loose and perhaps a few shots could dislodge them and cause the dragon to be crushed to death. It's worth a try!

"EX Multi Blaster!" Black Sister shouted. An energy beam was shot from her gun and it hit the ceiling, as the dragon was about to launch an attack at Black Sister the ceiling came crashing down upon the beast, thus slaying it.

Black Sister, who sighed with relief at the death of the last monster, turned her attention towards Mars, who was loosing consciousness. She ran up to him and noticed that his eyes had returned back to their normal state and the blood red glowing aura around his body had also disappeared, but what startled her most was when she saw his wounds heal thanks to a red mist that came out of the wounds, soon his scraped skin and flesh were back to normal and the only way one could tell that he had been in a fight was the fact that his clothes had been torn in several places.

Is this guy even human? Who is able to survive such a hit and still be able to heal themselves like that? He isn't normal, those blood red eyes of his are too creepy for him to be just a normal person.

"Uh, hey… are you alright? I'm not concerned or anything, I just need to know," asked Black Sister.

The only response she got out of him was an unintelligible groan and he then lost consciousness, the last thing Mars saw and heard was the bright green of her eyes and her attempts to get him to stay awake.


A/N: Finally got a new chapter done, I'd appreciate suggestions and ideas from any of the readers for this fanfic, don't worry I still have ideas of my own but I just like to blend things together at times.