Earth. June. 2022. CE.
Even after almost two decades, humanity had barely scratched the surface of what mana and, by extension, magic was capable of. Their slow progress was not entirely their fault, as a certain Eldritch God had done much to both help and hinder humanity's advancement. Even then, Earth had made decent efforts into the world of magic—specifically, magitech, which combined mana, magic, and technology.
Though minute, this progress in magitech was commendable as magitech was an uncommon prospect in the rest of the universe, mainly due to the inhabitants of a pnet often discovering mana early on. The discovery of mana would then lead to the discovery of magic, which would be quickly spread across the world. As such, most pnets used simple technology and advanced it to incredible extremes by applying mana and magic. Then, the things that couldn’t be done with simple technology were often wholly repced by other magical means.
So, the decision not to share knowledge was where Earth had taken a different path than the rest of the universe.
Earth and, by extension, humanity's magic users had willingly held back their magical knowledge. As such, Earth had first gone down a much more technological line of evolution. This line was not necessarily bad. In fact, some of the most prosperous pnets in the universe that held whole Astral Empires could do so because of magitech.
Due to Earth’s low ambient mana, the usual use of magitech was extended even further as Earth sought to use the mana more efficiently.
These new gadgets were then easily manufactured and spread across the pnet, leading to great strides in various fields such as power creation, water treatment, and transportation.
However, out of all the industries, the two rgest ones affected by magitech were those dealing with military and household machinery.
Even though humanity's weapons could inflict some damage against magical defenses through sheer raw power, the damage inflicted using these mundane weapons could be made ineffective with enough magical power. As such, new creations were needed.
The best of the new creations was The Shifter Tiger - Four Two Zero.
The new magical firearm would work simirly to how souls functioned. They would pull mana from their surroundings, compress and refine it, and then eject it. Unlike souls, however, the firearms could pull, refine, and release mana without worrying about hurting a creature's body by channeling purer mana than the body could handle.
The Shifter Tiger was an incredibly advanced firearm capable of changing into multiple forms, allowing for ease of use in several combat styles. The firearm consisted of a small dark steel blue cube that could be transformed into four states, with some states having slight variations.
Out of the four states, the Shifter Tiger’s fourth form was also its second strongest and took the shape of a long-barreled sniper rifle. The structure itself did not grant the gun any advantages and was only there to provide a sense of simirity for the wielder.
What made the fourth form so powerful were the runes which came assimited with it. Humanity had learned that with specific runes, mana could be given a concept or intent that would massively increase the power of magical effects that were also simir to this concept.
For example, imbuing magical projectiles with the concept of piercing and stability, even to a minuscule degree, could bring a projectile's power to new heights.
The concept of stability granted magical projectiles much more solidity, allowing them to travel greater distances without slowly fading into the ambient mana. Meanwhile, piercing allowed projectiles to penetrate through magical shields more easily and without diluting themselves before striking their intended target.
These small breakthroughs for humanity were only small examples of what mana could accomplish and were only the surface of what the rest of the universe had long gained access to. So, it went without saying that the concepts and intent could have taken humanity's weaponry to untold heights of power.
Sadly, humanity was not in control of its own fate, and the Eldritch God promptly shut down the entire operation. The god did not want humanity to get to a point where they could actually pose a threat.
However, it was already too te; the damage had already been done, and thanks to the god's hubris, the sniper rifle form had been used to eliminate countless aberrations across Earth.
Even now, in the st days of humanity, aberrations, much like the one currently in the crosshairs of Tesilim’s scope, were being eliminated by the Shifter Tiger - Four Two Zero.
After spending the night in the abandoned house, Tesilim had set off into the world. He had spent around two days leisurely enjoying life, hoping the Earth would finally be destroyed.
Unluckily, it wasn’t, and he had once again begun running short on supplies.
Then, after coming across a few empty houses, he got desperate and searched for any physical maps in the st pce he looted.
Luckily, the pce had once belonged to some older folks who had left behind an Ats from before the war. Using the Ats, Tesilim had quickly made his way to a small nearby town in the hopes of resupplying.
However, after making it to the outer edge of the town, Tesilim had heard the low buzz of magical bullets being discharged. He had known it was dangerous to enter the town, but curiosity had gotten the best of him, and if it had been humans under attack, he couldn’t just abandon them. At the very least, Tesilim had decided to scout the area and figure out what was happening.
Fast forward 30 minutes ter, and Tesilim found himself on the roof of a two-story building with his Shifter Tiger set to sniper form.
It turned out that humans had been under attack, and a full brawl had broken out at the center of town.
From what Tesilim gathered from his long-range scouting, the humans were a mix of armed civilians and a couple of warlock soldiers, if their uniform were to be believed. The humans were under attack by what had to be a whole aberration hunting party.
Much like other hunting parties Tesilim had seen, this one was led by a humanoid aberration that was apparently called an Octopien. These aberrations had a head that highly resembled an octopus without eyes and contained tentacles where a human's chin area would be. Their head then connected to a humanoid torso, which led to two arms that, much like their head, contained a multitude of tentacles that repced their hands. Their legs also split into three rger tentacles where the knees would typically be for humans. The body was also smooth and did not have any of the body parts or features humans had. Tesilim noted that this particur octopien had dark purple and pinkish skin, which was a new color combination as far as the aberrations he had seen went.
Watching the fight, Tesilim could tell the battle was going poorly for the humans as the octopien freely floated above the battlefield, easily giving commands to the rest of the aberrations on the ground. Luckily, the thing was distracted and had yet to detect Tesilim.
The issue, however, was that Tesilim's sniper rifle was not enough to break through the octopien's shield. As such, Tesilim hoped that the warlocks had yet to unleash their full powers, which would undoubtedly cause the octopien some strain and allow Tesilim to take it out of the pying field.
Just as he finished the thought, Tesilim was delighted to be surprised by a pulse of deep crimson energy erupting from the town center.
The crimson pulse was then followed by two other pulses, one light blue and the other bright pink.
Then, as Tesilim watched, a figure with bck spectral horns and deep crimson wings shot upwards, smming into the octopien. The two figures were then engulfed in crimson energy.
Following the crimson bst, Tesilim’s attention shifted back down towards the town center. There, he could see the remnants of pink and blue energy bsts as they dispersed above the buildings. Then, only a few seconds ter, he felt the faint sensations of heat and coldness carried outward in a wave of sparkling dust.
