Chapter 1: A Soldier's Flag

Out in the middle of nowhere sat a man writing in his journal. His name was Sylvester Flores. A 20-year-old Lance Corporal in the United States Marines.

It was the year 2021. It may not seem like it, but the world has entered a state of war. North Korea finally decided to try its hand at reinvading South Korea.

What was supposed to be a small conflict spiraled out of control once China joined in, with several other smaller nations joining, along with America only joining once their way of life was threatened. Flores was forced to the front lines and landed right into the thick of it.

"Guess the dyslexic Mayan calendar meme was right. If someone gets antsy and fires a nuke, then we're going to have Fallout 5 much sooner than we expected." Flores chuckled as he wrote his thoughts down in his journal.

"You really need to improve your handwriting. If that ends up becoming the final log of the previous world, no one will be able to read it."

The person insulting him right now is Tim. The leader of Flores's squad and one of his best friends. The one that survived, at least.

He and the rest of the squad were tasked with receiving and escorting an artillery convoy. But when they finally got to the drop location, the helicopter ended up getting delayed by a couple of hours.

"And what about you? Your handwriting isn't any better."

"Bruh, what do you mean? I have the neatest handwriting in the squad!"

"What good is neat handwriting when you need the highest-grade microscope to see it?"

The two looked at each other before bursting into laughter.

"Tim, we've been waiting for 6 hours now. How long until the artillery arrives?"

"I'm not sure. Radar has picked up a lot of enemy jet activity for the past hour."

"Ughh." Flores groaned. "At this point, we're never going to leave." Taking out a cigarette from his pack, Flores used a lighter and put it in his mouth.

"Want one?"

"You snuck weed on a deployment? You have a problem."

"I'm not using weed, just the normal cig. And it's only a problem once I run out."

"You said that and still don't see the issue!"

"More for me then." Putting the pack back into his bag, Flores also put his journal away so he could talk.

"So Tim, what do you plan on doing after th-"

"Come on, man. You know everybody dies when someone asks that question." A voice interrupted.

Sitting up from the backseat was Dale. Second in command and the one person who makes Flores wonder how he's still overweight in this field of work.

Usually, a commander was the one who sat around all day, but he's constantly active in the field, doing all the same missions Tim and Flores did with zero effort.

"Is that really fat or just muscle? At this point, I can't tell."

"You've been watching too many movies. That never happens."

"Karma is a real bitch, man. You don't want to be messing with her. Especially in a warzone."

"If it were real, then that means stepping on a crack would break our mother's back. Which it doesn't."

"I'm warning ya, man." Dale laid back down in the seat, leaving them alone.

"I have a feeling he's a flat-earther." Flores said.

"I'm 90% sure he is. As for what I'll do, I'll go home and propose to Jemma."

"Oh, right, that was supposed to happen. Sorry about that."

"It's not your fault. When the call of duty... well called. It's either you answer it or you'll be thrown in prison for deserting. Either way, you're fucked. At least it'll be in the metaphorical sense on the battlefield." Tim chuckled.

"So what about you? If you're going into journalism, I suggest using a computer."

"I'm not becoming a journalist. If you look at the average game journalist today, I'll be too overqualified for the job." Flores joked.

"Preaching to the church with that statement."

"Thank you. But as for what I'll do-"

Boom

An explosion went off as a shell impacted a nearby vehicle, blowing it to pieces. Grabbing his gun, Flores got away from the truck just in time to avoid another shell. Dale, however, wasn't so lucky and got caught in the explosion before he could figure out what was going on.

"Enemy mortar! It's an ambush!"

Flores ran toward the remaining groups, but Tim pulled him to the side and directed him to the forest.

"Everyone to the forest. Go, go, go!"

Under his order, he quickly ran into the forest at full speed. Explosion after explosion happened behind him as adrenaline fueled his stamina. He could hear the screams of his fellow comrades who were caught in the flames.

"Commander Hayner to the supply helicopter. Land immediately and prepare for pickup!"

Just as Flores thought all hope was lost, it showed up in the form of two supply helicopters. As they flew in, both copters landed far away from the mortar shelling and opened their doors.

"We're almost there; let's— agh!" A soldier by Flores suddenly fell over and was left behind. Flores stopped running and went back to pick him up, but a hole in his leg made him realize what had happened.

"Sniper, get down!" Flores shouted, returning fire as he started dragging the guy to safety. His message got across, as those who had already made it started to return fire as well. This gave Flores enough time to wrap the soldier's wounds and start dragging him to safety.

Soon enough, the mortar strike also stopped. But Flores knew that they only stopped so they could recalculate their shot.

Knowing the worst was coming soon, he crawled faster, with the guy he saved lagging behind.

Tim and the others had already gotten there and were waiting for Flores to board. The explosions of the mortar, however, restarted and were much closer than before.

"Flores, hurry!"

"I'm trying, Tim!"

His order. No, his plea for Flores to get to the helicopter was an impossible task. Between the sniper, mortar shells, and carrying this dude, his chances of survival had dropped to 1%. A 1% chance that he was willing to take.

Getting up, Flores picked up the injured soldier and made a dash toward the helicopter. Explosions and shrapnel went off by his side as they narrowly missed the two. Even the sniper's aim seemed to have been messed up by the shockwaves produced by the mortars.

For a moment, he was confident that he could survive. That thought, however, took a tragic end as a blast blew off his leg and caused a huge cut throughout his left arm.

Needless to say, he fell. He tried his best to crawl away with the last bits of his adrenaline running low. But just as the copter started to fly, Tim jumped out of the chopper and ran towards Flores.

Picking him up. He tossed Flores inside, getting on himself with the help of two others.

"Flores, speak to me!"

"I guess… Dale was right." Flores replied, gasping for air between breaths.

"It's bad. His leg was blown off with a major laceration to his left arm. I can deal with the arm. But the massive hemorrhage from the leg is too much without the proper equipment."

"So he's going to—"

"Hey. Don't worry about it, T-t-tim. M-mind giving me a f-final light?"

Funnily enough, Flores did sneak weed into this deployment. He handed over the pack he had premade to Tim, the latter of whom was balling his eyes out. "You really are an idiot, aren't you?" Tim replied, shedding several tears.

"Yeah, you know it." Getting his final blunt. His eyes slowly closed for the final time.

/~/

Sometime later, he woke up. To him, it felt like hours. But he knew that it couldn't have been more than a few seconds. The last thing he remembered was getting on the helicopter.

"Holy shit I died!"

Flores frantically inspected his body. His arm, which was pretty much all but blown off, was fully healed. Even the leg that actually got blown off seemed to have regenerated with no sign of prior injury.

"Oh, finally. If this one failed, I would have assumed the weapon had rejected us."

"Who was that!?" Flores asked. Looking up, he noticed that he was surrounded by a group of people in blue robes. The one who startled Flores earlier was standing in a white cloak. He floated on a platform that oversaw the whole circle.

As he continued to look around, he noticed a black flag with a blade lying at the end. That's when the emotions he tried to hide finally burst out.

"What the! Why do I have this? Where is Tim? Did I die? Did I get cap-"

"He's annoying me, so before I get violent, grab his voice and make him silent. [Star Mute]"

Flores' voice was cut off when a circle appeared in his mouth. No matter how hard he tried, he wasn't able to speak. Feeling that this was a trap, he tried to run. His foot, however, was grabbed by the grandmaster's platform, which shifted into a rope.

"Grandmaster Paper, how dar-"

"Annoying voice. Allow me to rejoice." A circle appeared on the cultist's mouth as well. "Anyone else have any comments?"

"No ma'am."

"Good, now shut up. He seemed to have gone through a lot before his summoning."

The grandmaster waved their hand, and the platform released Flores from its clutches.

"Okay, Flores, Microbots, or something. You've seen similar technology in that movie about the fat robot. Do we even have that technology?"

"Follow me, and I'll explain everything." The grandmaster said, taking off their hoods to reveal a girl with brown hair.

"You're gonna drag me with... this again if I don't?" Flores asked. Gesturing to the platform.

"Absolutely."

"Alright alright. I surrender." Seeing as he had no other options, Flores stepped on the platform. As he stepped on, he noticed that it wasn't nanobots, but a lot of paper folded in on each other. He knelt down and touched it, noting that it was as hard as steel but still flexible enough to fold when needed.

"Please don't do that. It's hard trying to keep my concentration if you do that.

"Oh sorry. That probably messed up the stability a bit." Flores chuckled, trying his best to keep calm.

"It's not that. I'm just not used to having people touch my body like that." The girl blushed a bit.

"Huh?" Flores asked. He, however, never got an answer to what the grandmaster meant.

/~/

Reaching the top of the lab, Flores walked off of the girl's body. Taking a quick look around, he got startled by an animal trying to tackle him through its cage. While stepping back, he almost fell off, but the grandmaster's platform caught him just in time.

"Don't fall, please. Mihare already got on my ass for this place being 'unsafe'."

"What the fuck! She was being serious! How!? Why!? Where the hell am I? Keep calm, Flores. keep calm. Just think of other things. Wait, where exactly did I touch?"

"Sorry, it's just that I got startled. Hold on, is that a fucking unicorn?" Flores looked inside the cage and confirmed that it was indeed a unicorn. "Impossible; these don't exist. At least I think they don't."

"Ahh, yes, the normal reaction." Pulling out a set of keys, the girl unlocked a door that led to what seemed to be a private study or bedroom. Books and other alchemical notes were spread across the floor without a care. She even had a bed in the corner of the room that had a mountain of notes lying on it.

"How does she even sleep at night? Does she even sleep? Questions for later."

"Now that we're in a more private section of the lab, I'm ready to answer your barrage of questions." The platform that she was just floating on flew over and refolded itself into a chair.

"...Okay, so who are you? What the hell are you? Where am I? Why do I have a flag stuck to me? And finally, clean your damn room! This place is filthy!"

"Hey, just because I'm messy doesn't mean you can insult my lifestyle!"

"Yes, I can! And you were just speaking in a monotone and serious voice a second ago. Why did it change!?"

"Fine, I quit." The girl flipped her chair and flopped to the ground with a groan. "I owe someone so much Laura right now.

"What?"

"I was making a bet to see how long I could act as a great sage to the next hero. That's 5 Laura down the drain." The grandmaster sulked

"Why do you keep calling me that? What exactly is going on!?"

The girl sat back up. "What hero? Well, to make this easy on both of us, our world has three of these special weapons. The morale tools, the train, and the metronome."

"Wait, did you just say train?"

"Yes, don't ask me why; I'm just as confused as you on that. Anyway, 600 years ago, these weapons were used to protect the world from these waves. A phenomenon that splits a hole in our reality and dumps in monsters.

"Our previous hero, Miguel, fought his hardest to stop it. But he failed, and the world was plunged into an age of darkness. And by age, I mean, like a few hours."

The girl pulled out two maps. The first map was huge, holding several nations, cities, and farms. The second map, however, was much smaller, limiting the nation count from 12 to 5. It also heavily reduced the number of cities on the map, not to mention the special areas. A mountain that was once on the old map was now labeled as a quarry, and the forest of another was reduced to grassland.

"As I said, the hero failed, and the beast ravaged the land of Arcadia until something stopped it. After that, the waves disappeared, and we rebuilt on the remains of our former lands. Flash forward to the present, and the dragon hourglass has started once again. That's why the weapons chose to summon you here. They believe you're capable of handling this threat."

"I-"

"Oh, and if you fail, we'll all die."

"Yeah, I'm gonna need a bit more context than that."

"Also, the normal reaction." The paper girl sighed and pulled out a chalkboard. "Okay, let's start this again from the beginning."

The girl then spent the next 3 hours and 24 chalkboards giving Flores a thorough lecture. Everything from the waves to the weapons and why he was there was covered. She even added some extra excerpts. Most of them, however, were just an introduction to the status magic system, the law that governs the world, and one of the many things that Flores struggled to comprehend.

Usually. He would have usually forgotten everything the grandmaster had said up until now. But after being yelled at by his drill sergeant for forgetting formations, he decided it would be best to take notes.

The first piece of important information he wrote down was that the weapon he carried was called the Morale Tools. It was a support class on steroids, as most of its abilities were focused on buffing groups of people. Its main forms included flags and instruments like drums and trumpets.

The next thing that he noted was that the girl lecturing him right now was named Paper. She is what's known as a construct, an object that gained a human form. She is also the current wielder of the metronome and is part of the duo known as the Apostles of Morale.

"Now, who is the genius who decided to name her Paper in the first place? That scientist must have been very bad at coming up with names."

"And that's the basics of all the research I have. Now, are there any more questions?"

"Um, yes. If you're the apostle of the metronome, who's the train apostle then?"

"Riala."

"Who?"

"She's the reason why I'm like this. The person who not only killed my father but destroyed half my body in the process."

"You okay?" Flores put a hand on her shoulder. "Do paper people even have emotions? Should I ask, or would that be inconsiderate of me? Damn my curiosity."

"Yeah, I'm fine. I'm just not very fond of her." Opening a door to her balcony, Flores finally got the first fresh breath of air since he got here. Many people here were actually wearing Mexican clothing as well. Even the grandmaster was now wearing a purple and red huipil dress under her paper robe.

"The city of Ken'bitch was created by the Morale hero long ago. Although most of the information was lost to time, we do know from the stories of old that he failed to defeat the waves. Although many died, he saved as many as he could and created this city so we could prepare for another calamity."

The grandmaster pointed over to the largest building here. It was a hacienda whose size was on par with a castle. Or at least the size of a modern military base. Two flags of a nine-tailed fox flapped in the wind as hundreds of soldiers walked around the area.

"I will give you the full support of the country of Foo. Our army is 400 strong, with many... somewhat "talented" people being trained as we speak. With you leading us, I believe we will be able to do what the hero decades ago couldn't accomplish." The girl then kneeled to the ground and got into a bowing position.

"I beg of you, please save our world."