"Dax? Are you okay?""... Ah, yeah I"m good."
Taking way longer than he normally used to form a response, the arc angel Solaris wasn"t really that convinced.
"Really? You"ve been kinda out of it for the last hour."
"Ah, that"s because some bugs have shown themselves and I"ve been thinking about how to crush them."
"Bugs?"
"From the east, you know the ones that stole a lot of my stuff."
"I see, why not just "nuke them" as you usually do?"
Hearing a expression he did not expect from a magical creature Dax was slightly put off and looked at Solaris" expression for a second before answering.
"Yeah I can"t really just nuke them just because they keep shooting my drones out of the sky so it"s not really a outright declaration of war….. Or not, time to nuke the entire continent."
"Dax!?"
Having switched tone drastically mid sentence as a cold smile filled with bloodl.u.s.t formed on Dax"s face he started putting together a war plan with the help of ICI in his head while he explained to Solaris.
"I just received a report, they just attacked my cute second in command and the rest of her convoy under orders to capture or kill all of them."
Find authorized novels in Webnovel，faster updates, better experience，Please click for visiting.
Now knowing the situation Solaris put on a serious expression as she asked Dax frankly.
"Do you need to postpone my request and deal with that immediately then?"
"Nah I feel like the events are connected somehow so we"ll be moving up the schedule while I will be keeping some of my attention on the children."
As Dax showed a child like smile Solaris slightly winced when she asked a question she knew she would regret.
"M-moving up? In what way?"
"Directly to practical, more hands on training~"
---
Having cleared up the mess they had made around town Terra and Lux were doing final preparations to leave, but this time they looked quite differently when they entered the city. Instead of casual clothing or leather armor they were fully outfitted for combat, most eye catching was the hexagonal grid of the state of the art armored vest that covered the entire chest area and with thinner, more elastical plating of the same kind covering their necks, arm and legs under the dense and robust pants that were also in turn covered by some kind of flexible reactive polymer type gray armor. The same type of armor/fabric was also used for the s.h.i.+rt, and in both cases had been rolled up to the elbows were dense elbow protectors were strapped in. Most eye catching for the monster hunters of the city was their helmets however, with the pitch black armored mask the h.e.l.lwalkers were known for as a base, their entire heads was covered by gray and black armor protection, with the only thing that were visible being their arms from the elbows down. Said arms were in Lux"s case carrying a customized Rex-Alpha 357 hybrid rifle with a permanently attached bayonet that could heat up to pierce armor, and a slightly extended barrel that fitted way denser capacitors than even the military themselves had access to. Surrounding Lux and Terra were a entire squadron of drones outfitted with loaded weapons that had already almost killed about 10 hunters that had gotten to close to the formation.
"We are sure attracting a lot of attention… Those drones are in combat ready condition red, are you sure they won"t kill some hunters?"
"I don"t really care to be honest."
"Lux!"
"Yeah yeah, crist you have no humor.. I"m manually controlling the drones and overwriting their AI when needed, worst thing that can happen is that some of the "firce" monster hunter might p.i.s.s themselves, so really just a net neutral on their overall hygiene. I am so glad my armor has NBCN protection."
"NBCN?"
"Nuclear, biological, chemical and nanomachine protection. Basically I can"t smell anything of the outside in here."
"Wait that"s an option!? How do I turn that on?"
Surprised by learning of a feature that could save her from the towns special smell Terra quickly inquired about how to turn in on in her armor.
"There is none, not in yours at least."
"What!?"
"Protection against NBCN treats are for staff officers only~"
"Permission to speak freely lieutenant general?"
"Denied~ Game face on, let"s make sure that kid stays safe while we do what we need to do."
"Yes, yes ma"am. Just don"t kill any civs please."
After a few more minutes of waking Terra and Lux reached what could be called the mayor"s office of the monster hunters. The mayor of the town was a older beastkin woman called Urla, belonging to the bearkin race she had been blessed with a enduring body that still was in perfect condition after countless years. Having been made a contracted hunter by the monster hunters guild near the end of her active carrier she was then offered the long term a.s.signment of making sure that the newly formed outpost in the Eglax territory, the home of monsters. She had spend over 10 years managing a town in the middle of a gigantic monster filled wasteland, she had seen a lot, riots, murders, ma.s.s murders, monster attacks and so on.. But the strangest thing since she had started governing the outpost, even when in her entire career had happened just a few days ago. 32 people had been killed before noon, that by itself was not completely out of the ordinary, but it turned out to have been just 3 women that had killed all of them, and it had even happened in self defence after they had been ambushed. After that she had been rudely interrupted when some elver had kicked in her door and handed her some kid before promesing that she would personally burn the town to the ground if she didn"t protect the kid with her life, and now 2 women(?) in strange clothing came to talk with her.
"So what the f.u.c.k do you people want?"
Speaking to the 2 completely covered people sitting in front of her wielding what she recognized as some kind of deadly weapon that shoots lead at very high speeds and the 3 strange and glowing metal golems behind them with similar weapons, Urla didn"t show a speck of fear, as she had learned not to do in those situations.
"We want you to guarantee the safety of the child, simple as that."
"No way in h.e.l.l. Does this look like a d.a.m.ned kindergarten to you people? We get attacked by monster swans about twice a week that we barely survive, and you f.u.c.kheads just wiped out 32 fighters, chances are that this outpost will fall to the next attack."
"Well that"s too bad, but this is not a request miss Urla."
"... Is that a treat?"
"Only if you believe that to be the case miss Urla. Of course that treat would extend to your grandchildren as well, if you believe it is one."
While leading the conversation Lux took of the mask part of her helmet to reveal her bright red orange eyes that showed she meant every word she said, in response Urla"s smile disappeared completely as she rung a small bell. In response to the sound of the bell a large door behind her opened and multiple burly men stepped in, and one of them carried the child Lilly had found.
"It is time for you to leave, I don"t deal with people that do not respect their elders."
Barely containing her bloodl.u.s.t as she spoke Urla started quietly circulating mana inside her body, in response Lux formed a warm smile on her face as she briefly looked at the child before answering Urla.
"I don"t respect my elders? Of course I do. You turn 78 years next month correct?"
"What the h.e.l.l does that have to do with anything!?"
"I remember when I turned 78, that"s way back when I joined the marine academy. I was so young and naive back then, I couldn"t even destroy a single drone battalion by myself back then."
"What, really? That"s only 512 drones outfitted with a.s.sault weapons right? I thought you would have done that way earlier, I plan to make my first attempt at that in a few years time."
"Well you are picking up the Dax"s training faster than anyone I"ve ever seen, but please take a bit more time than that, after all the drones shoot to kill. Besides it"s going to be about 200 years before we leave this world."
Stepping off into their own world even as Urla and her veteran bodyguards released bloodl.u.s.t Urla realized that they didn"t really think of them as treats, not even in the slightest.
"I will repeat my prior statement, take the child and leave, this is not a kindergarten."
"Yeah it is, I just said so, and so it is."
"Upsetting me means upsetting the entire monster hunters guild."
"Oh just the hunters guild? That"s no issue then."
"What!?"
Urla was a person truly of the world of swords and magic, in that world guilds like the hunter"s guild and merchants was arguably more powerful than most countries, and as such the idea of opposing such ent.i.ties was extremely outrageous.
"We have already forced the merchants guild out of the central kingdom and wiped out 20% of their total a.s.sets with about 23.5% more to follow in the next 5 years due to lost revenue and planed hostile takeovers where we plan to size 7 of their major monopolies. Eliminating hostile ent.i.ties is a speciality of mine, the monster hunters guild will be no different if they chose to oppose us."
Leaving Urla entirely speechless at what Lux had just uttered without a hint of sarcasm on her face, she was about to raise the white flag when the door behind Lux and Terra was torn open and a small elver stormed in, making the demihuman child that so far had been scared s.h.i.+tless react.
"Older sister Lilly!"
"There he is~ I"ve come to take you with me."
"No you don"t Lilly! We talked about this, stand down!"
"f.u.c.k you!"
As confusion inside the small office peaked, no one noticed that one of the Reaper drones in the background started acting up.