The scenery has changed from a sea of golden sand to a lush jungle haven, had it not been close to nighttime, it could have been a better experience for Samuel and co. Right now, all of Samuel's brain is used to weighing between a single revival and a tent, a single tent only costs 15 credits to own, but this tiny amount of funds will effectively make him unable to buy one more extra life in case he needs it. But he couldn't imagine sleeping in the wild without a tent, all those mosquitoes… it sends shivers through his spine.
"Commander."
Victoria who was on the lookout with Hans called to him.
"This is just a suggestion… but couldn't you just use your car if you don't want to spend any creds on a tent? We don't need to fire up the engine, only leaving a single gap in the window is enough not to run out of oxygen. Also, only you and maybe Miss Rosemarie need full rest. Me and Hans could take turns guarding the perimeter."
"…that's smart, I didn't even think of using my car. But, are you… Alright, I'll leave the division of the shift between you and Hans, if anything happens immediately wake me up, even more so if it turns out to be an indigenous people. If we could talk it up with them, it might solve our shelter problem."
He initially wanted them to also take a rest since they had been walking for the past few hours, but leaving the car unattended without someone to take guard was also unwise. So he leaves it to them, the combat experts of the group, to decide what is better for the current situation. His body was fine and dandy with the help of Rosemarie's restore skill but mentally he was exhausted, midway he told her to stop applying her skill and let him tire himself out.
Truthfully, he was nervous about continuing, he needed time to truly think and resting was his most preferred time to exercise his brain.
He had said about a chance to meet the indigenous people, but he was afraid that there would be a wall preventing him and them from seeing eye to eye. One, he highly doubted he could speak their language, it could be that the four of them were the only ones who could speak languages from Earth in this world. Two, whether they're accepting of a foreigner intruding into their space, the chance is they'll attack on sight and he wanted to avoid human beings to be his system's first nourishment if possible. Three, he couldn't speak their language, definitely can't. This language problem was mentioned twice because at first, he thought of using hand signs in case of a language barrier but who knows, if his sign of being harmless is equivalent to announcing hostility in this land? Had he accidentally insulted their whole bloodline, even a peaceful tribe would have turned hostile at once.
After he materialized his car from his inventory, he invited Rosemarie to also take a rest. She rejected him at first, on the premise that her still infected from the sickness from this afternoon, and she didn't want him to also get infected by it. The SBR was nowhere near being comfortable to wear, if she wanted to sleep, she had to take it off or she could tough it out and sleep like the dead, uncaring of their own comfort. Fortunately, Samuel was NOT in the mood to let someone sleep in a way unbefitting of a human nor interested in bickering his way to mutual understanding, so he commanded her to take her mask off and sleep in the third row of the seat in his Jeep. He used his cloak as a temporary makeshift barrier by clamping both ends on the window spreading it apart across the second seat, separating the front and the back.
For dinner, the group made do with crackers and tea boiled with the campfire, Samuel forgot to buy any ingredients for the more sophisticated meal such as meat and spices when he was stockpiling, instead, he had a lot of long-lasting food and basic condiments such as sugar and salt, nothing else. His idea of long-lasting food was dry crackers, hardtacks, and anything cured with salt or smoke, he completely forgot the third option at the time. At least he didn't forget to also stock on water so they don't have to bother themselves with procuring safe water, most sickness could be healed by Rosie's skill but nobody wanted to even experience it in the first place.
By midnight, looking at the night sky of another world, Samuel felt something wrong or off about it, but he couldn't point out why… so he decided to write it off as only his hunch and went to sleep in his Jeep. It seems that Hans and Victoria decided to stay up late til morning by receiving the 'restore' skill of Rosemarie that refreshen them up, enabling them to start their nightguard shift on their tiptop condition.
0o0o0
Sometime past the midnight…
"Hans, what do you think about our situation?"
Victoria started off a conversation with Hans who was on his third cup of coffee and making some carving on the wooden part of his rifle.
"Nothing much, as far as I know, as crazy sounded as it is, we are some kind of game-like character summoned to fulfil our purpose to fight. But I have a 'background' and I'm sure you and Rosie also have it. My memory of my background ended when I signed my new contract as a hired soldier after the war in my homeland. Honestly, I don't know how much of this memory of mind is true or something fabricated as a convenience, but as the commander says…"
"…As of now, what you remember is as real as mine…"
"Exactly, I have friends back home but my family died during the war, in some way, I see this situation as a way to move on from my grieving. While I would've preferred to have a chance to say farewell to my friends and have the last drinking party, it is what it is, I also doubt there is any chance for us to go back to our original world written in our background."
As he finished his speech, he also finished his carving, it was a date of something surrounded by some kind of artistic pattern.
[12-12-2424]
He showed it to Victoria, the smile on his face showed that he thought highly of his craft and wanted to share it with her.
"What do you think? A good number isn't it? Coincidence or not, this was the date when my memory ended. It's far ahead in the future compared to the time when our commander came from. It wasn't written in the bio of my background, that thing only records the general look of our life. All other small details are up to us to preserve in our mind or any other form of our choice."
Victoria gave him two thumbs up, one for his words that gave her a lot more angle to look from, the other one in appreciation of his artistry. But Hans didn't know about it, in his mind his art got full approval and appreciation from her looking at her double thumbs up, it made him feel elated, enough for him to move on to his next project on the front wooden part of his bolt-action rifle.
Both of them stay silent for a while with only the crackling of the bonfire and the occasional scratching sound of Hans carving his rifle wooden body with his bayonet, filling the empty silence with noises pleasant to the ear.
Victoria was deep in thought until she decided that thinking to herself would not provide much answer she needed.
"I was a city girl."
"Hm?"
Hans stopped his activity when he heard the redhead's words.
"My time was not very far into the future, I grew up in a relatively peaceful time, that is until ASEAN suddenly announced the start of the space-faring era."
"Space-faring?"
"Yes, space-faring. It was very sudden and unexpected for the rest of the world. A lot of things happened, I didn't really care at the time but who would expect that it would turn into an all-out war? I thought it would become the start of some space adventure or frontier or something. I even excitedly started to read a lot of things regarding space and articles that talk about living up there. Haa…"
She let up a sigh of vexation and disappointment.
"But the whole world split into two and an extra third party. One who wanted to cooperate and join in the space program, they have even demonstrated the spaceship taking off the ground to space like some kind of sci-fi movie! But some weren't too happy with them going to space for whatever reason. The third one was those who didn't really have a problem with it but had a beef with one of the members on either side, so they joined the opposing side of their enemy. I… really don't understand. I am not even aware of who my country has a beef with, none of the people I know back then was unsupportive of the idea of going to space. It was like someday the world was at war again, everything I wouldn't ever imagine happened to Britain happened, rockets, missiles, any kind of ordinance rained my home city, and in a matter of days, everything was reduced to a wasteland. It happened everywhere, no holds barred, for whatever reason no one was sparred, and there was no invasion only the intention to destroy with thousands of long-range attacks, it was a rain of explosive steel. I was lucky to live unscathed, my friends and family? None was as lucky as I am."
Hans can only listen with concern as Victoria tells him her story before she is called here. Her jolly and full of curiosity face he saw this afternoon was filled with frowns with her eyebrows scrunched as she gazes at the flickering bonfire, all the while telling her story.
"In the end, my country joined those who opposed the space program. I joined the army out of spite and grieve for my dead family and friends, but along the way, I kind of regretted it, for years I lived in fear of whether my base coordinate was found or not and I was only a few hours away of being bombarded to heaven. Hans, I was weak, no matter how much I trained or exercised, I could never compare to those who have been in the army for years. This power I have now…"
She picked up a stone near her feet and crushed it with ease only with her thumb and index finger.
"…if only I have this kind of strength back then. I could've done more, but in retrospect, I alone still won't be able to do much even if I have super strength. It was some five years later, as suddenly as it was started the wars ended. Even now, I don't know why it was started in the first place or why it was ended after that long. Every news source tells a different story, my superior tells a different story, and my colleague in the army tells a different story. I bet none of us actually know why exactly it was started. Not my superior, not any of those news outlets. After the war ended… I didn't think I could go living the way I was before so I signed up for some random PMC gig available at the time, well, I was not actually signed up for anything per se, I just kind of posted up my resume online for somebody to see and hire me… hehe. Well, being hired to work in a different world and probably some existential crisis was not something I thought of at the time. But, as you say, I could see this as an opportunity to start a new leaf, maybe I could request the Commander to buy a notebook for me so I could keep a diary. Some kind of a start of a new story, get it?"
She wasn't looking at the bonfire anymore nor she was looking at her nightguard partner. She was looking at the sky. Her face was more relaxed than it was when she recounted her past which goes unwritten in Samuel's system.
"I see you have a lot on your plate, but I get you. This situation sounds exactly like the start of some kind of story, isn't it? Well, I'm just glad that you took this situation in a stride like I am. Tea or Coffee?"
"Nah thanks, I still have mine."
She finished her cold tea in one go and busied herself looking around the premise of the campfire. Meanwhile, Hans continued his work on carving the rifle, he was close to done with one of the sides.
"Still though… this is some century-old tech we are using now, back in my place some of the squad I know already started to use optical weaponry, Laser gun, Laser rifle, Laser canon. No recoil, no noise, and no ejected empty shell cases, it wasn't perfect but it was the best for close to midrange battle."
"Optic weapon? Sounds cool, I wonder if Commander's shop has those items available in the future."
"They're cool if you're a sci-fi fan like me, a bit bulky but it operates just the way I like. We only have things up until the First World War for now, apparently upgrading the shop costs a lot of credits, or upgrading anything in his system. There is also a lot of function locked behind the paywall, his system sounds like something made by a money-grubbing company. Heh."
"He designed it himself though."
Both of them chuckled when suddenly the Jeep's driver door opened, Samuel briskly walked towards them after he got down from his vehicle.
"Hans, Victoria."
He addressed the two soldiers who had already stood at attention when he exited the car.
"I have some news… about our situation and some other thing."
As the two soldiers looked at him in interest, Samuel pulled out a tablet with a sizeable screen, on it was a picture of space with markers upon markers and a straight line stretching from one end of the screen to another. Samuel pointed with a pen to one end of the line…
"We are here, and this is earth… supposedly."
He pointed to the other end. Not receiving any questions from Hans or Victoria he continued by tapping the screen twice, revealing a UI with a long string of numbers.
"One trillion six hundred seventy-four billion light years, that is the distance between this place and Earth. The good news is that we are not in some kind of another world or dimension, the bad news is realistically, it is too far away. And apparently, I had travelled THAT far without knowing."
"Pardon?"
"You can't see it, Victoria… But here, in front of me, is a screen, a holographic screen showing my age. Word for word, I'm one trillion six hundred seventy-four billion years old with an extra 25 years old including my life on earth. God, how is that possible? I don't remember anything about that! I mean, I found myself here in the same exact position the last time I sat in my jeep going to work. I just feel like blinking and then I'm here. Honestly, I don't know how else I would react after this. Sigh…"
After his small outburst, he sat near the bonfire and threw some dry sticks into it while contemplating something.
"Why are you guys still standing? Come sit. Haa, good thing I didn't receive Miss Rose's energising skill before seeing this, now, I'm too tired to go crazy."
He rummaged through a bag filled with tea and coffee, a pity he didn't have milk because a warm milk tea would surely feel heavenly for this occasion. While Samuel was busy preparing his tea, Hans and Victoria were silent, digesting the news they just had heard was proven to be quite difficult. This situation would've continued for far longer if Hans hadn't detected an approaching figure hiding in the darkness far away.
"Commander, on your six, I see something."
Getting up from his seat, he positioned himself between the unknown figure and Samuel. Victoria also already positioned herself with her Lewis gun, one of the early light machine guns that existed during the First World War, she pointed the end of her gun muzzle into the general direction of the foe pointed by Hans. Both have already taken their minds off the previous discussion and now focusing on the next command of how to engage the unknown variable hidden in the shadow in front of them.
"You can see them? How do they look like?"
Samuel with his M1911 gun in his hand stood beside Hans, trying to discern the hidden things but to no avail.
"They're agile, but the vision is limited due to lack of light. Be careful Commander, they seem to be trying to encircle us. How do we approach this? Should we open fire? Strike them first?"
Hans was already in the form to shoot, his index finger already started to squeeze the trigger of his Rifle. His weapon was a standard issue of the Germans at the time of the First World War, a Gewehr 98 bolt-action rifle.
"Wait, maybe we could tal- never mind, how screwed are we if we let them encircle us?"
"Pretty bad, even if we-"
With a flick, Hans suddenly fired his rifle, followed by a snapping sound or cracking. Not long after a wrecked head of a crude spear landed near his foot. Hans has just intercepted a spear thrown by the now apparent enemy.
"Yeah, we are done if they succeed surrounding us… Hans, Victoria, open fire!"
Immediately after his command, several projectiles made of lead pierced the air at a speed faster than sound, producing a loud cracking noise painful to the ear of those unused to it. Victoria's gun especially produced a reliable steady almost rhythmic amount of those sounds as it mowed down the figures moving among the trees.
Samuel held his hands over his ringing ears to prevent any more of the loud sound of violence being generously dished out to the enemy from entering his ear.
He ran back to his car, looking for his headphones to cover his ear. When he opened the door, he saw Rosemarie without her mask already climbed to the middle seat.
"Commander! Who attacked us?!"
"I don't know! I didn't see them, but they're encircling us!"
He found his headphones inside the dashboard, he promptly put on the headphones and prepared to go back outside to join Hans and Victoria in engaging the enemy.
After the headphones muffled most of the noise, he noticed a faint beeping sound. He tried to look around but he noticed something at the corner of his sight. A bright red, flickering banner with the all-capitalized word 'BATTLE!' written on top of it.
Mentally opening it, he was greeted with a similar map he saw when he inspected the system a few hours ago. The difference was the overall look of the panel was switched from neon blue to bright red and the before empty map was now filled with various symbols and pointers moving about the surface of the map.
There was no explanation for each symbol but the meaning delivered was obvious enough for him to not need one. There was his car, he and his friends were marked blue markers, and the foes were marked red markers. As Hans said, the foes were trying to encircle them with a not-very-peaceful intention, evident with the first spear being thrown at them. Surprisingly… or not very surprisingly, both Hans and Victoria made quick work of the enemies neutralizing them one by one as the number of red markers keep reduced at a fast rate.
That is bad.
Samuel didn't want to kill them all. He needed at least a few of them alive. Apart from his morality, he also needed the information the foe might hold about this world.
When he got outside to remind Hans and Victoria to not completely decimate the enemy, he saw Hans already stopped his shooting and was fixing his bayonet on his rifle. Victoria on the other hand had just emptied the magazine attached to her gun, she then took out a shovel, and by the look of it the scratched paint on the edges, she had tried sharpening the edges with rock or something.
Confused by the situation, Samuel checked the map again, there he saw the movement of the enemy who had given up on their encircling effort and now are quickly storming the camp en masse, which it was it meant that the number of enemy fighters increased, the small dwindling number he saw before to easily triples the number of red markers. It seems their friends decided to join the fight and thus were considered enemy combatants by the system.
From behind his holographic panel, he could hear the sound of a scream muffled by his headphones. Taking the headphones off and setting the screen off to the side, he was just in time for the first sight of the enemy entering the visible vicinity of the camp, illuminated by the light of the campfire.
The almost the same bipedal body as a normal human, but with some scales and the head of a crocodile, the other looks like some kind of a reptile. They have the same intimidating savage looks as the hungry crocodile he saw back on Earth.
The first of the crocodile people who showed up was dispatched by Hans who rushed it down with a bayonet to its heart and when he saw the foe still putting up a fight he pulled out his sidearm, the same M1911 as Samuel's, and shot it in the head twice.
Likely being a warring tribe, the other enemy who saw their fellow raider being killed didn't even bat an eye or flinch as Samuel does, the enemy saw it as an opportunity to attack Hans who was occupied. Unfortunately for him, a gun doesn't need a recovery phase like a melee weapon does, in exchange, it needs to reload and M1911 doesn't need to be reloaded after only two shots. The enemy was gunned down with two well-placed shots to the head, along with the other enemy behind him who also thought of attacking Hans.
Another enemy warrior who has just exited the thickets feels hesitant after seeing three of his fellow tribesmen get dispatched in a close-quarter combat, something they are clearly proud of from their display and confidence when attacking. His moment of doubt ended up becoming his downfall as he became the victim of Samuel's inexperienced shots, his body was filled with all eight rounds from Samuel's gun.
Samuel emptied his magazine for his first blood, it was an attempt to compensate for his lack of skills with a firearm.
As Samuel clumsily reloaded his sidearm, he saw Victoria subduing two enemy fighters with her shovel. She barely uses any of her skills as she brute-forced smacking them with the broadside of her shovel, rendering them unconscious. Before another shows up, she hoists the two unconscious bodies and throws them near the Jeep.
"Commander, we could interrogate them later, is two enough?"
Samuel could only nod as he absent-mindedly stared at the two anthropomorphic crocodile people.
0o0o0
The fight draws out for another ten minutes, it was the time needed for Samuel and Rosemarie to fumble about figuring out how to use the Colt Browning M1895 Machinegun, another amazing piece of weaponry coming from before the First World War. After they figured it out, it was time for Hans and Victoria to pull back the frontline closer to the car where Samuel and Rosemarie installed the machine gun beside it.
After the first one, installing the second machine gun becomes far easier and quicker than the first one. Two machine guns were a lot of firepower even if used by amateurs, as long as they didn't jam.
The battle ended with zero casualties on Samuel's side, but his car suffered some thrown spear puncture to its tyre, window, and some of the body. Meanwhile, the enemy camp suffered a lot but was annihilated, after a solid minute of seeing that none of them managed to get past the tree line, the rest of the hostiles decided to retreat and gave up on attacking the camp.
With a lacklustre notification, lacking any kind of fanfare, the system sends him a battle report. It keeps track of how many enemies they defeated, how long the battle lasted, the names of those on his side who participated in the fight, how many bullets they used, and many more, at the very end was the most important part for him, the counting of how much he gained from this battle.
Each defeated fighter, whether he was killed or simply made unable to continue the fight, has a worth ranging from 100 credits to 323 credits the highest. During the whole battle, Samuel's team defeated a total amount of 67 enemy fighters with a total worth of 17444 credits, a sizeable amount of funds considering a box of 100 ammo for the machine gun was only 10 credit points.
The battle itself was categorized as a 'Great Victory', a victory with overall small losses on the friendly side, this one… was his car. This victory spoils count included the size of the conflict in the count, it ended with a hefty amount of 35000 credits.
Pretty happy with the result, he decided to continue resting on his partly wrecked car until morning. He will have a lot of things he wants to do when the sun goes up, that Is having a conversation with the native he secured and researching a bit more about his system.
Now he will sleep, meanwhile, the rest of his team was awake cleaning the aftermath of the battle.
0o0o0
A/N : Man, I need to watch Stargate again to refresh some good memories again... Welp, there goes their funding problem, that was quick, hehe
