+++ Lieutenant Hans Hoffman +++

  Ygeian Countryside

  November 6, 1538 CE

  “I picked ‘UPG: Wrath Against Sinners II’ as my new upgrade. I liked the idea of reducing my maintenance costs but, eh. I figured I’d need more specialized ammunition types going forward…”

  The response from Adelyn made sense to Hans’ perspective. After all, last time around, her special ammunition did decide the fate of the engagement, so he had no protests. It was Hans who had a problem choosing between the two options available to him, simply because…

  Well because they both sounded appetizing to Hans’ eyes.

  “So what about you?” Adelyn asked. “What did you choose?”

  “Uhh…”

  On one hand, having an organic defense system is salivating. That would reduce the chances of me dying to something bullshit.

  Hans overthought his choice.

  But then, the machine gun rounds option is nice. I’d be able to somewhat actually use my secondaries to deal credible damage to demons. Sure, it won’t be as strong as Adelyn’s weapons, but still…

  He’d be able to do so much with it. He’d be able to hurt and suppress a demon by spraying his machine guns at them. Which was extremely useful during high-speed, high-risk maneuvers. Maneuvers where he’d rarely fire his main gun, but usually only his machine guns.

  In those kinds of CQC encounters, Hans’ experience was that his machine guns kept the demons off of him better than his main gun. Except of course if the demon was some far-away long-range threat. In which case the first option would be a better one. But in the case of someone like the Calamity of Desire…

  I hate making decisions. They both look so damned tasty. Why can’t I have both? This is cruelty. Injustice even!

  “I choose ‘UPG: Trace the Dots’,” Hans “calmly” replied. “Screw that shield bullshit. Four hours cooldown? I bet it’s only going to be useful at a few more tiers. I’d have considered it utilizable if only the cooldown was sane and I don’t know…somewhere around, ten minutes or five minutes. I mean come on, if I got slashed by a demon once, I’m already dead anyway at the next slash!”

  “Oh…”

  “So whatever, I choose ‘UPG: Trace the Dots’, so now I can fight demons well like do, somewhat, so hah! I can keep up with you now. That’s cool. Also, more utilizable and usable. So it’s a natural option. Case closed!”

  “You really are a bit grumpy sometimes,” Adelyn giggled. “You sound like you’ve been denied a cooler toy.”

  “I wanted the first option so I can parry a demon one-to-one but the system is cruel to me, so yes, Captain, I am a tad bit grumpy today. I worked hard for this crap last night.”

  “Trust me, soon-ish, you’ll get there. We just need to keep working harder. Now that you have your own way to dispense good damage against demons, you can choose ‘UPG: Smooth Response’ next time and upgrade it as you please.”

  “I think I’d like to max it out,” Hans said. “Maybe at some point, it’ll be so good it can block like four or six catastrophic attacks of any kind, but with a cooldown timer of around three minutes or lower. It’d be glorious!”

  “And then the AP cost would be at two hundred…”

  Adelyn innocently whistled on the other line, as Hans groaned.

  “Don’t remind me of that, Captain.”

  “I’m just saying. Now that I’ve upgraded ‘UPG: Wrath of the Law’, my rounds would deal better damage, and I’d have two new special rounds for my MPAT and sabot, but still…it seems that the AP cost has risen…”

  “I suppose that’s the case for most upgrades outside of the logistical ones…” Hans sighed. “Maybe increasing the tier of our autofabricator will help with that later?”

  “It already does, but the reduction percentage for meeting it as a prerequisite for my ‘Wrath of the Law’ upgrade is still unchanged at Tier II…”

  The author's content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

  “Maybe at the next tier?”

  “Most likely, mhm…” Adelyn sighed. “Well, we can’t do anything about it. Our classes as ‘Mech Pilots’ are unique. We really wouldn’t be able to look up any written account about what we’d expect from the system. I still haven’t met anyone who even has something as ‘Upgrades’ connected to them.”

  “It does make you wonder,” Hans said. “Do you think our mechs are connected to our bodies? Maybe our souls?”

  “Heh, dwelling now into the supernatural, huh?”

  “I’m just saying,” Hans said. “When we appeared here, we didn’t just appear with our bodies alone. We came here with our mechs. As if…as if it’s something integral to us.”

  Adelyn fell silent.

  Then, she yawned.

  “Alright, alright, nice theorizing, Lieutenant,” Adelyn breathed out softly. “I’ll wake Alizée up and get her breakfast. This wubbly little girl looks so innocent…and hungry. I think she’s hungry…ahh, she’s so cute!”

  Hans just shut off his comms with Adelyn as he relaxed in his seat. He smiled a bit as he looked at his displays.

  These two damned angels. Hans shook his head. I guess I’ll let them relax as always. We did defeat that demon smoothly last night. Must be quite nice for them both.

  +++

  Villers–Dupont

  Hans and Captain Weibel exited the mayor’s residence. They had just finished reporting to him about the liquidation of the nearby demon. Naturally, the town’s mayor and its small council took the news in great jubilation. By the time Hans and Captain Weibel exited, runners had already begun announcing that the demon was killed.

  Civilians, who were rushing already to pack up their goods and belongings into their wagons, stopped or returned home. Hans looked at them and smiled a bit.

  “We nipped the bastard in the bud quite quickly,” Hans said. “It’s nice that there’s fewer casualties for once. Kinda gets tiring when we mess up and so many people die.”

  Captain Weibel on the other hand just continued preparing his tobacco pipe, lighting it up before puffing out smoke. Hans sighed as he looked at Captain Weibel.

  “You know, you’re like the King of Vices,” Hans commented. “I mean, I take cigars sometimes…but, thrice a day? And with an actual pipe?”

  “A man’s gotta have his fix, Sir Hoffman,” Captain Weibel cheekily replied as he briefly removed his pipe. “Besides, they were offering good tobacco that they wanted to clear quickly over there. I had to take the opportunity.”

  “Classic…” Hans sniffed the smoke a bit. “What’s next, you’re going to buy up their stock of alcohol?”

  “Too late. They’re already going back to business as usual,” Captain Weibel then groaned as he was reminded of that. “You know, damn it. Maybe we shouldn’t have informed them yet. Should have bought up their stocks while they were desperate to sell off then only after should we have informed the city mayor. Can’t believe I haven’t thought of that quickly. I’m getting rusty.”

  “Your skills really are a great bang for our buck,” Hans just walked away. Captain Weibel on the other hand followed him with a grin.

  “I pride myself on my cunning strategies, Sir Hoffman. You know, perhaps if I showed my great ideas to your Captain, she’ll raise my pay.”

  “Yeah, right. More like she’ll give you a pay cut for being immoral.”

  “Huh, what?! You ‘Lotharingians’ truly are a weird bunch. It’s a good skill to let us make more money. A positive skill!” He shook his head. “Then again, she is just way too serious about everything. You know, don’t you think, being such a nice hero, that she’d be interested in at least banking out of that goodwill to extract nice things?”

  “Eh, that’s just not in her style,” Hans frowned. “Not in my style too. You know, you’re just a money grubber.”

  “You wound me.”

  “Yeah, yeah, well, it’s what you are. Not that there’s anything wrong with it. Just that, people will see you as an asshole with that. You know, if you were back in my country, you’d fit in many good places.”

  “Many good places?”

  “Oh, yes. You can be one of our lovely politicians.”

  “I think I can be like that here,” Captain Weibel said. “You’ve seen those damned nobles. They’re living the good life. Sometimes they don’t even have money, yet they live nicely! It boggles the mind. All because they have a fancy title on their name.”

  “You wager you can trick them into giving you gold instead of tricking commoner businesses?”

  “Hmm, perhaps. They’re a bit trickier though.”

  “Yeah, because your limit is an illiterate farmer,” Hans laughed. “You know, I can kinda respect that. You really are a man driven to make yourself survive and make it big at all costs.”

  Hans finally pulled out his canteen which he had filled with alcohol that he bought from a local store. But as he opened it and prepared to drink it, they suddenly came face-to-face with Adelyn. She was standing in front of the two, arms crossed.

  “Well, well…you two just disappeared out of nowhere. And immediately, one of you is smoking, while the other one is about to drink something that smells strong.”

  “Victory celebrations, Miss!” Captain Weibel replied with a grin. “Ain’t no way to celebrate winning than drinking hard liquor. Ain’t that right, ole Hoffman?”

  He shoved Hans’ shoulder, and Hans just stammered.

  “I-it seemed like it would taste nice,” Hans replied. “I think. It’s just for once. I mean, it seemed like they had something close to brandy, so I got interested. It tastes like shit though.”

  “And you bought it anyway?”

  “I am just as confused as to why I decided to buy it, but here I am,” Hans answered with a straight face. “Can’t throw it either. I wasted a good sum on it.”

  Adelyn’s hands remained crossed. Hans decided to try handing it to her.

  “Wanna try?”

  “You are a bit audacious at times.”

  “Okay,” Hans took it back and drank it. He was immediately hit by a strong flavor that burned his insides. He winced a bit and closed it anyway. “My alcohol tolerance is so childish. Damn it, it’s gonna take me years to build it.”

  “You’re going to get there—” Captain Weibel was immediately cut off by Adelyn.

  “Don’t encourage him,” she warned. “Okay, let’s just go. I don’t want to give my comments about this, but I’ll just say, I am a bit concerned. You don’t normally partake in these kinds of stuff after all.”

  Adelyn’s eyes softened a bit.

  “So yeah…if something is going on, please don’t resort to this, okay? You don’t even like the taste. But you bought it anyway.”

  I guess she does have a good reason to be concerned in that case.

  “Err…”

  “Well, anyway, we have to move out now,” Adelyn said. “Let’s go now. Nomos is waiting for us, after all.”

  The two immediately followed her, as they exited Villers–Dupont.

  They were going back on the road, again.

  Discord server here!