Chapter 3.4: My Family

June 23, 2018 / Yasashii Fuyu / 3 Comments

Surprisingly enough what followed after my introduction into what apparently was the Japanese resistance, wasn’t some sort of celebration party or further information, but instead the room quickly emptied itself with most of the people respectfully bowing to me as they slid past me and away into the elevator.

After mere moments the room was empty except for my mother, the old man that had greeted me at the door, his bodyguards, and myself, and the old man soon walked towards me as well, once again looking me sternly in the eyes before saying “I’ll leave the rest to your family for now, I just want you to know that I have known your father for a very long time, and hope you’ll be able to follow in his honourable footsteps. We will let you know when things get started and we’ll have need of you…”

And with that the old man slightly bowed, nodded to his bodyguards who instantly flanked him, and left through the elevator as well, leaving me and my mother alone.

I turned around towards her and was about to burst out into a million questions, but my mother quickly rose her hand in a stopping gesture, then raised a finger to her lips , looking around the room meaningfully and then waved me to follow her.

We vanished into the elevator as well, but this time we ended up in an area with way higher security level apparently, as my mother not only had to let herself get scanned, but also enter an ID card, a password, a voice recognition sentence, and a drop of blood before the pitch black doors in front of us would open.

Behind the door lay another traditionally Japanese looking Tatami room which was completely empty except for some shrines on the walls, which I quickly realized contained pictures of dead family members of the Fuyu Clan, with even my father’s included.

My mother went into the middle of the room and then turned around towards me, looking at me with a very stern look in her eyes.

“Son, I know this is all a lot for you, and you most likely don’t understand half of what’s going on, even though you’ve always been a smart one…at least if you wanted to I guess…..anyways….”

I wanted to chuckle at the last part of my mother’s speech, remembering fully well all the troubles I had caused her in my youth and the horribly stupid things I did back then, and most likely to this day sometimes, but the look on my mother’s face told me that this wasn’t the time for laughter even though we both might have wanted it to be, and so instead I let her continue on undisturbed.

“As you know things are about to change for the Japanese citizens of Yu Jing, an Uprising is about to begin, and our family is going to be a part of this, by choice, but maybe not all the choices we would have liked them to be. I know you have always been a fan of the Yu Jing idea of a united Asia, and to be honest, so have I been and even your father to a lesser extent. But this dream is over now; Japan will rise against their oppressor and attempt to become its own nation. This will ruin the dream of a united Asia, but it’s better to stand divided on your own feet, than crawl on all fours in an oppressor’s dream world….or so your father used to say in those last few days…”

“Mother….could you please cut the Propaganda short? “ I interrupted her with a brash tone “You know I would have preferred things to end up differently, but I understand what is going on to some extent, and to be honest, I don’t think I have a choice to get back to my old reality, so you might as well give me the direct introduction to my new one….let’s just assume I am fully convinced by our glorious new agenda, it’s not like I have a choice really, and give me the details of how we are involved in this…”

My mother just sighed and turned around, moving her hand in a weird gesture as she replied “Fine, pragmatic as ever I see. I thought bolstering your pride would do you some good, it always did for your father, but I guess you come after me quite a bit as well nowadays…so let’s get straight to the point…”

With that she finished her hand gesture and all of a sudden the floor next to her in front of all the shrines opened up and a giant multi monitored console rose from the opening, taking up most of the dimply lit room and flashing it with multi coloured light as the system booted up and revealed a giant login screen.

“Our family has secretly worked towards this uprising as well, not so much for the glorified independence of Japan, we both know that unifying with Yu Jing in a better way could have achieved just as much for our people, but more so because we have a lot to gain from this. As you know we Kuge have lost a lot when Yu Jing took control of our nation, and state sanctions, taxes, horrible laws and general dislike for our people has made business and life harder for us than it ever was, and needed to be. Heck we had a glorious deal with some PanO merchants for combat Geists prepared just a few months ago, only to see it shut down by the government for “reasons of state security” even though we had already started production, leaving us with a big loss both in profit and opportunity….”

“Stop…just stop please….I know you love the business side of our family, much more so than father did, but please spare me the corporate details for now….it’s a rough day and I can do without tax return rates and whatnot for today…”

Turning around my mother seemed slightly saddened for a moment, having been stopped in what she enjoyed most, talking about the business tactics of our family which she was mostly responsible for, but she quickly returned to normal and then continued “Of course, sorry, you know I love this stuff…..I’ll give you the extreme short version then….for now at least…..”

With that she stepped aside from the terminal behind her and waved towards it in an inviting gesture.

“Getting to the point: With or without our family, the Japanese will rise up against their oppressors now, and this allows our family to gain a lot of influence as well as benefit our people and help make this uprising a success. As you well know our family is not only a warrior family, but like all Kuge families, also a corporation, and we have vastly extended our fields of expertise since you last cared for it….we no longer only produce and sell Geists to our customers, but we also expanded in Remotes of all sorts, weapons to some extent, security services, and some more minor things like consumer electronics, and even our own brand of tasty noodles, a stupid fluke of your father really, but it’s selling surprisingly well, anyways….we also intend to expand into space ship production in the future, mainly because should the uprising succeed, we’ll need to be able to develop spaceships on our own, but that’s for the near future really, and you don’t need to worry about that for now too much…”

Taking a break to catch some air and smirk at me a little she continued. “What you do need to worry about however, is that from this moment onwards, you are the head of the Fuyu Family, and even though we tried to prepare ourselves for the upcoming uprising, with your father’s death, it will fall into your hands to lead us to a better future, not only for our family but also for the Japanese people, if you allow me the Propaganda…”

No sooner had she said those words than the monitors started to change their displays and a Geist in form of a talking Mount Fuyi appeared and somehow managed to bow towards me. “Lord Yasashii Fuyu, it’s a pleasure to see you, if you’d be so kind as to create an account so I can give you full control over your company’s assets?..”

And once again, my day became rougher…..

What followed was another hours long tour into the debts of my families assets guided by my mother’s competent comments and data packages, which I’ll spare to mention the details of…

Suffice it to say that the Fuyu Clan Company has indeed acquired fast assets in different areas, most of which were somehow connected to the military however, and which even included a “household guard” which was more akin to an army really. Apparently all Kuge families had acquired similar forces over the last years under some disguise or other and these forces alongside the standing Japanese Military Ranks in the Yu Jing army would be the driving force for the Uprising if things went well.

It was precisely this reason that my mother had decided to bring me back into the family fold for and make me the head of the family…the business side she could easily have handled herself, and she would even continue to do so in the future, if maybe a little bit more from the backrow, but when it came to military strategy and actually leading our assets in the upcoming times, my talents where just what was missing now that my father was dead…..

I spent the next day or so studying and organizing my family’s assets and business plans, surprised that somehow the ISS hadn’t raided this place and murdered me and all…my….employees along the way, but apparently the sway of the ISS in Tokyo wasn’t big nowadays, and my exact whereabouts had been kept a secret even from the watchful eyes of the ISS, with the help of some Ninja Kagemushas apparently…a feat I would have been upset about was I still in charge of my ISS division…

However I barely had time to familiarize myself with what I had to work with, before the old man, whose name I now knew was “Furukoshima” sent me a message, proclaiming that “It was time”…..

Chapter 3.3: Foxes in the Temple

June 20, 2018June 23, 2018 / Yasashii Fuyu / Leave a comment

The Moment I saw my mother standing there in front of me the whole event with my father came rushing back into my active memory and I had to fight hard to avoid tearing up right then and there. Heck normally I would have done so without shame, but one look at the way my mother stood there told me that now wasn’t the time for it, and that important events were about to take place.

So instead I steadied myself , quickly brushed over the Japanese style business suite I only now fully realized I had been dressed into while I was unconscious, whipped my hand over my face just in case some remnants of my long sleep remained, quickly checked my hair in my reflection on the window, and then made the gesture for the door to open, little more than a flick of the finger with intent really.

The moment the door slit above the limousine I was hit by a harsh gust of cold air, only natural since the rooftop of the Fuyu Headquarter building was quite high up in the sky really, and steadying myself against the side of the door I pulled myself out of the car. Surprisingly the harsh wind didn’t seem to bother my mother or her hair much while mine where blowing around out of control, but then my mother always loved to have an air of authority and elegance around her when on official duty, so she most likely had fixed her hair and clothes in place somehow to prepare for it.

Since my mother was still slightly bowed I quickly bowed to her in kind as well, responding with a firm “It’s been a while Oka-san”, and with that we both rose to our full height again, my mother severely smaller than myself at no more than 1,60 meters in height. Since talking was quite hard on the rooftop and spying eyes could be everywhere my mother then instantly turned around and moved towards the rooftop access to the building, a little hut designed in the style of an old Japanese shrine. Yuki quickly came after us while the virtual Raccoon simply had vanished into thin air, and together we quickly entered the elevator that would bring us down into the more comfortable areas of the building.

The moment the elevator doors closed behind us, finally protecting us from potential spying eyes at least for a moment, I moved closer to my mother and gave her a tight hug, which she quickly returned before pulling out of it again, both of us whipping away a little tear from our eyes as we did so. “I still can’t believe it, Otou-san is dead? What happened? How are you coping? Why did no one tell me?”

Before I could rumble on my mother raised a hand in a stopping gesture “I’m sorry Ya-chan, but we couldn’t contact you about it, things are different here now, you have to understand that. Things have been set in motion, things that have been planned for a very long time in fact, and we simply couldn’t risk contacting you, you were with the ISS after all, and some even questioned your loyalty…”

Ignoring the fact that Yuki could barely contain her laughter at my mother calling me “Ya-chan”, I looked at my mother in shock and slight anger, and responded with the same tone in my voice “What do you mean? Loyalty? Were in the ISS? I still AM in the ISS in some way Ka-chan, I’m a bloody General of Yu Jing, heck Field Marshal even as you well know, you even sent me a congratulations card not too long ago if you remember…”

At my mentioning of Yu Jing, something like anger embedded itself on my mother’s face, and with a harsh tone she waved her hand aside in a sweeping gesture “Not anymore son, you are no General of Yu Jing anymore, not even a Citizen by now, your disappearance in combination with your fathers action has led to you becoming branded as a traitor by those in power who had just waited for this opportunity. As you well know they had been suspicious of you ever since you rose in power, and this was just the opportunity they needed. The ISS was already charging your house as you saw the news about your father I’ve been told, if we hadn’t extracted you like we did, you’d now be serving your so beloved ISS as one of their Kuang Shi at best, a fate which might still lie in store for all of us if things don’t work out…”

The realization of what my mother had just said hit me like a truck, I had already expected part of it really, but I didn’t have time to understand the full meaning of my father’s actions and my own disappearance for my life and that of my family and friends. “A traitor….I can’t….I need to…the Emperor! I’m sure I can explain things if given the chance…oh screw it, they never will give me a chance to….I’m doomed….we’re all doo..”

Another harsh gesture from my mother cut me short, quickly followed by her grabbing my shoulder and slightly shaking me before looking me straight in the eyes. “It matters not, we prepared ourselves for the consequences when your father decided to act like he did, and you would have been branded a traitor sooner rather than later anyways, like I said, things have been set in motion…things bigger than you or your father, bigger than our family.”

Shaking lose from my mother I rose my hands into the air in frustration, turned away and walked for two steps before realizing that I was still in the elevator, and then turned back around while throwing my hands down in anger again “What are you talking about Ka-chan? What the hell is going on?”

With a slight “Ding” the elevator stopped and its doors opened, and my question was suddenly answered by someone else outside of the elevator “You’re about to find out former Field Marshal Fuyu…we’ve been waiting for you…”

As I turned around to face the person interrupting my conversation I was surprised to find a short old man with wild grey hair and chin beard, upholding himself with a wooden walking stick dressed in a japanese style business suite not unlike myself standing right in front of me, flanked by what seemed to be two soldiers dressed in some sort of uniform in red and greys which I couldn’t assign to any unit or even army I knew of.

“Come with us please, what you are about to hear is important, and we want you to listen closely….”

The man walked away from me with the confidence of someone fully in charge, and towards a traditional Japanese looking door which, after a scan of the man, quickly slid wide open, revealing a long table with several people already sitting next to it, staring at me intently the moment I came within view of it.

Surprised and intrigued by the man’s behavior in my own families building, I followed him into the room, quickly taking in the people already waiting there. It was quite an intriguing crowd, some of the people seemed to come from a military background, while others seemed to be scientists, Kuge Delegates, and some even looked like ordinary citizens from the street, heck I could swear I even spotted a Yakuza or two among them.

They all had one thing in common though, and that was the fact that they stared at me in silence, awaiting my next move.

“Please take a seat….”

Everyone was staring at me in anticipation, and as I quickly glanced over to my mother who just gave me a confirming nod, I sighed, and then reluctantly took a seat. “This better be good….I’ve had a rough day…”

“And I’m afraid it’s going to get even rougher once you hear what we have to say…”

And with that the doors behind me closed, and my day indeed did become even rougher….

What followed was a several hours long explanation of the events which had recently been set into motion, as well as heavy emphasis on the reasons behind it.

I was shown recordings of Yu Jing Military sending Japanese Troops to their death in wasteful and meaningless ways, mere cannon fodder for the grinder in some cases. I saw recordings of court cases getting ruled in favor of Yu Jing citizens and against Japanese citizens on a regular basis, even though the culprit was more than obvious and evidence clearly showed the Japanese citizen to be innocent. I saw Japanese citizens getting spit at in the street by Yu Jing nobles, carelessly driven over by government official’s limousines during a demonstration, and even worse.

At one point I was even shown a recording of a hunting party made up of flashy dressed Yu Jing officers chasing some poor Japanese girl through the dark streets of her little town with mechanical dogs and hunting rifles like it was some kind of sport.

Propaganda to make me loath the Yu Jing, the sort one would see in the Japanese Areas of Yu Jing every now and then when the ISS wasn’t looking too closely or the Tatenokai was active in the area on that day.

I even saw the incident with Minister Fu Meng Huo which caused my father’s death, but this time depicting the Japanese units infiltrating a complex and blowing it up, as well as my own father chasing and eventually executing Minister Fu Meng Huo for his crimes. He was depicted like a hero of old, bringing retribution to an enemy of Japan, and right afterwards more videos like it where shown, operations by the Tatenokai and Kempei to save Japanese from Yu Jing oppression in all sorts of ways.

To be honest it was enough to make any proud Japanese citizen enraged with Yu Jing and swelled with pride for his own people, but I had seen most of these before, had known about these things for quite a while. It was things like these that made me want to rise in the ranks in the military, to prevent Japanese troops from getting thrown in the grinder for no reason. To maybe one day get enough influence to change things. Though obviously that was all for naught now….

After that one of the Kuge delegates started a presentation, explaining that the Tatenokai as well as the Kuge themselves have had enough of these horrible events, and have secretly plotted to undermine Yu Jing rule in Japan for quite a while now. This of course was nothing new either, everyone in Yu Jing knew that the Japanese weren’t too happy with their current situation and that there were some more violent elements among them actively plotting Yu Jing’s demise, but what was a surprise was the sheere scale of it all that presented itself to me.

From what I could see this was a very large scale operation, spanning several planets, and in some shape or form, almost all of japanese’s society was somehow involved in it, most of all the Kuge families and corporations, my own family among them. Since the Fuyu are a Samurai Clan of old, we have been part of the Kuge pretty much since their founding, though that hardly had much impact on my own life besides my early childhoods education period. In fact by the time I had hit puberty and my “wild phase” I thought I had shaken off this side of me completely, but with my recent rise to power, I had grown more and more connected with those parts of my upbringing again, and apparently it had caught up to me in full swing now….

It became obvious that what had occurred in the days before my disappearance was more than just a period of heightened Tatenokai activity like many Yu Jing intelligence officers had assumed, this was MUCH bigger than that, and it was all confirmed as the presentation came to its end and the old man suddenly stood up again and turned to me, addressing me as much as the crown with a very direct and demanding tone.

“Yasashii Fuyu, you saw what we wanted you to see. There has been doubt within our Ranks about your loyalty, and some of us even went as far as to attempt assassination to ensure our cause wasn’t compromised once everything starts for real. But the actions of your family and not the least your own father have convinced us that you surely must be able to see what is the right course of action for yourself, your family, as well as for Japan as a whole….you have seen the atrocities that being part of Yu Jing has brought upon our people, you have seen that this cannot continue, you have seen what we are willing to do to prevent that, what we are about to do …..There is only one thing leftto decide….will you be fighting at our side? Are you willing to serve with us and the true Emperor for the freedom of our own people from the Yu Jing oppression? Are you willing to rise with us from the shadows to lead Japan and its citizens into a brighter future?

As the man mentioned “to rise” my mother suddenly appeared next to him, and then bent down on both knees, holding out a Daisho on a cushion towards me with anticipation in her eyes. I would have recognized that Daisho from a pile of a thousand blades within a heartbeat. It was my father’s Daisho, the pair of blades I had seen at his side ever since I had first seen the light of day.

Apparently not only the full assembly of strangers in the room expected me to join them, but even my own mother was on their side. I was completely out of my depth, surrounded by people who apparently had planned the downfall of the system I had been serving until only a few days ago from my perspective, but as this thought crossed my mind it instantly dawned on my….had been serving….even unconsciously I no longer considered myself a servant of Yu Jing it seemed…the events unfolding and the dramatic death of my father had apparently triggered a change in my thoughts……it felt right to do this….even though I didn’t fully understand why. And of course to be honest I didn’t have much choice…refusing at this point would mean my death obviously, I knew too much, and the armed guards in the corner of the room had become more and more tense as the presentation progressed, following my every move.

So for now, until I fully understood what was going on, I decided to trust my gut feeling and my families decision, and stretched out my hand to pick up my father’s long sword.

I thought about making some sort of grandiose pose or speech or whatnot, most of the room apparently expected me to as well if their anticipating looks were anything to go by, but then I decided against it, and just placed my father’s Daisho at my belt where my own Daisho used to hang for most of my life until now, and just nodded while proclaiming in a commanding tone:

“Hai!”

And the room erupted in cheers and people knocking their fists on the table, as well as the guards slightly relaxing. The old man just looked me deep in the eyes and then nodded in approval.

Chapter 3.2: Crossing the red, bright, phantom Gate

May 2, 2018 / Yasashii Fuyu / Leave a comment

(In case you were wondering about the odd chapter name…I was listening to this song while writing part of this story, and I liked the line ;-P Akiko Shikata – Akakushi )

In the days that followed several more assassination attempts had been made on my life, most of which had been stopped before they even really began based on information acquired by Kanren Umibozu and his team, as well as Kabuki Queen and her spy network.

A few of them had been more noteworthy however, on one occasion for example an unknown infiltrator had somehow managed to replace the soap in my bathrooms soap dispenser with highly corrosive acid, a fact which “luckily” my bodyguard/housekeeper Yuki found out before me as she tried to wash some cleaning oil off her hands, only to find her hands missing soon afterwards.

Naturally the amount of complaints and heroic “I saved your arse there didn’t I?” quotes from Yuki following that incident made me almost wish I had washed out my ears before her, but truth be told this one was too close for comfort indeed, and it was never found out who actually had managed to so easily breach my security systems and even remain undetected by Yuki.

On other occasions a bridge had been detonated while my transport was on it, causing several civilian casualties and a brutal headache for me the next morning when I woke up next to Sophotect Akaseni in the Neon-jo’s medical facility, and a group of children walking towards me on the sideways turned out to be a bunch of dressed up crazy koalas, resulting in two dead Bao Troopers as well as a thank you letter of mine towards the “Ten no Bushi” development center that had come up with my enhanced reaction systems.

At first these assassination attempts seemed very odd and a bit “out of nowhere” given that I had always been a big supporter of the Japanese communities within Yu Jing, at least to the small degree I had any influence on these matters at all, and to this day I could proudly claim that I never “wasted” Japanese lives during my operations like so many other Yu Jing officers apparently did when using the JSA Assault units under their command, but these days showed that something bigger was going on in the shadows, something that even assassination attempts on a Yu Jing Field Marshal paled against.

The Spy Information Network was rampant with all sorts of speculations, little tidbits of intel, mention of a black ops mission here, a missing person there, a successful assassination of a Yu Jing official on one side, a suddenly missing Japanese battalion on the other, but nobody managed to get the bigger picture together, or at least not in time before it was too late.

I was about to leave for an emergency staff meeting in the Neon-jo when Yuki suddenly called out for me to “Get your ass in here, you might want to take a look at this”, which I begrudgingly did after realizing that her tone wasn’t so much smug superiority like it usually was, but rather honest concern.

What I saw next would change my life from that moment onwards, as I saw a live broadcast of a group of Japanese men dressed in white funeral garments, next to a flashy dressed woman called Candy-something-something who’s show this apparently was, sitting in a dark traditional Japanese room, their swords next to them as well as a few other Japanese men standing next to each sitting person. The front one of them was holding a piece of paper with Japanese calligraphy on it in his hands, and though it took me a few moments to realize it, it was my father, who uttered the words spoken next.

“We, the seven Bushi present here in this room, hereby announce that the assassination of Minister Fu Meng Huo, as well as the explosion destroying most of the Meng Huo Company headquarter, was planned and executed by us.

Minister Fu Meng Huo has continuously caused harm to the Japanese citizens of this nation, his company kidnapping unwilling Japanese inhabitants of Kuraimori and using them for horrible human experiments, and some of his products have been mixed into the water and food system of certain Kuraimori districts without the knowledge of its inhabitants, the side effects of which caused incredible suffering and countless “unexplained” deaths among the affected, all in the name of petty profit.

Attempts to stop this horrible behavior have been blocked by the Yu Jing ministry of commerce and internal affairs, with reasons like “You have no proof”, “It’s for the greater good” or “This has been sanctioned by all required instances” being given, but we ask you, how can the unnecessary suffering of innocent children and citizens be for the greater good? How can an act like this ever be sanctioned by any reasonable institution? What more proof does one need then his own dead child in his own shaking hands?

We say there is no excuse for such behavior, and thus we took action where our country and our fake “Emperor” failed to, we did what was necessary for our people and our future, and now we are here to take responsibility, so that no one else shall suffer for our actions like they did for other’s inaction.

May our sacrifice serve as a warning to those in power who neglect their duty, the Japanese have suffered more than enough; it’s time for change….”

And with this, my father and the other 6 men sitting in the room unsheathed their swords, and committed Seppuku together, the standing men next to them beheading them as they did, cutting right where their Cubes were placed to ensure true death, as was tradition since the advent of Cubes in the Bushi culture when reanimation was not acceptable.

The broadcast then continued with a documentary descriptions of the events that had lead up to this event, as well as some background on each of the men present in the room by the moderator Candy-something-something, but at that point I was barely able to notice my surroundings anymore, blood rushing through my head like a roaring tide, panic and confusion and sadness mixing together into a hurricane of emotions that forced me to drop on the couch, all thoughts of the upcoming meeting forgotten.

I had to find out what the hell was going on and why nobody had told me about this before it happened, I had to ensure that this wouldn’t fall back on me or the rest of my family, ruining my career or my family’s company/family honour…..I had to visit my parents’ home in Japan…talk to my mother to find out why dad had done this…..had to leave before the ISS would come and question me about this….I had to…..and the world went dark.

The next thing I noticed was the scent of some sort of fruit as well as freshly washed clothes, followed by the feeling of laying on something soft which felt oddly familiar and alien at the same time.

Not sure where I was I decided against opening my eyes or making any movement other than what I might have made unconsciously while waking up, and instead tried to listen as closely as possible to my surroundings while trying to feel what was going on with my body as well.

A humming noise as well as occasional shaking made it obvious that I was in some sort of moving vehicle, and if the way the shaking moved me was any indication, I was lying sideways. I tried to figure out whether or not I was restrained, mostly because I expected to be in the custody of the local ISS authorities by now and on my way to interrogation or execution, depending on whomever was doing the investigation and how little trust I had managed to gain in the last few months, but without making any obvious movement it was almost impossible to determine whether I was wearing any sort of cuffs or other restraint devices.

Suddenly some sort of movement seemed to happen right next to me, with my head shifting slightly forward causing some unpleasant feelings of vertigo, and as I strained my ears even more in hopes of hearing anything more useful in my surrounding about what was going on, a sudden almost unbearable loud seeming “I know you are awake O-san…would you mind sitting up? This is embarrassing…” exploded right next to my ear.

Shocked by the horribly loud seeming yet somehow familiar voice right next to my ear, I instantly rose upwards, ending up in a sitting position as I opened my eyes, realizing that I had been laying on a bench in some sort of limousine or transporter all this time.

As I inspected my surroundings a bit better I realized that I had not only been laying on the bench of the vehicle I was in, but apparently my head had been resting on the lap of Yuki, and I could have sworn that her head turned a bit red as I quickly looked away from her lap after realizing that, though I’m pretty sure that must have been my imagination, as I doubt she even COULD get red on her face…

“I…I wasn’t…you…you kept wobbling off the bench, so I had to steady your head obviously! Wouldn’t want you to die from falling off the bench after this much effort was made to save you, you know right? It was totally gross by the way, I’ll totally need to clean my clothes after this…”came the annoyed and hasty reply of Yuki right afterwards, but I didn’t much care for it, as I was still too confused and busy taking in what the hell was going on around me.

“It’s alright Yuki, I’m sorry for the discomfort I caused you….now if you wouldn’t mind…could you tell me what exactly is going on?” I was apparently alone in the vehicle with Yuki, the driver compartment sealed off from the area I was sitting in with Yuki.

Before Yuki could answer a Racoon “Geist” suddenly materialized on the bench in front of me, only visible to me and those granted access to my Patina obviously, which did include Yuki by the way. The little creature was the all too familiar representation of “Kabuki Queen” I had grown to trust and enjoy throughout those last months and even years.

This time the Raccoon “Geist” (It’s actually more like a Ghost Avatar, but let’s not get into too much details here) was wearing a big straw hat and a giant sake gourd in his hand, and looked around all sneakily and conspiring before whispering “Don’t worry Oyabun, I’ve got you covered…” As it said so it wobbled forwards on the ground and flipped its hat from his head into his hand and presented it in front of me like the Yakuza tended to do in all those old holo flicks while bending down.

I couldn’t resist a smirk, and as the Raccoon saw that it burst out into a chuckle as well and hopped back on the couch, taking a sip from its gourd and tossing the straw hat to the side of the limousine where it vanished into thin air. “It’s been a close call this time! You might think you have fallen unconscious due to the stress of the whole situation, but that was actually the ISS flooding your room with gas to capture you more easily, they already had a team in front of your door waiting to breach and take out Yuki once the gas took care of you. But luckily some of our friends got wind of this setup and I managed to prepare a little “surprise” for the team. Don’t worry, nobody you know got hurt…who knows, they might still be useful in the future….anyways…”

The Racoon made a little pause there to allow me to take in this information, and as a little anger crawled onto my facial expression due to the apparent ambush being laid on me without my knowledge, it continued “I managed to send a warning to Yuki just in time and she managed to escape with you through the window and eventually to one of the automated garbage disposal trucks which I managed to “confiscate”, which brought you to safety. From there it was just a little fake identity, false flight records, a bit of ka-ching here, a bit of ninja-ing there, and a good contact on one of the circulars, and voila…you’re here…”

At the mention of the Circular my jaw almost dropped to the floor. “Wait…what? How long have I been out?!”

The Raccoon just nodded and moved its hand towards the window of the vehicle, at which point it began to slide down, blowing the scent of my surroundings inside with a strong gust of wind, which also revealed that I was in a flying vehicle in the air. “Well….for quite a while to be honest, we kept you sleeping to avoid complications during the transit…you are actually on…”

“Earth…..” I cut her short as I took a deep breath and recognized the unmistakably familiar scent of old Earth. Those of you who had the privilege to travel to several planets obviously know of this, but every planet has its own kind of “scent” to it, no matter where on the planet you are, and even though I hadn’t been on Earth for quite a while, the scent still felt strangely nostalgic to me.

The Raccoon continued as I noticed the vehicle quickly started a descending flight pattern “Indeed, to be more precise, Japan. As you might imagine an endeavor like this isn’t done easily, and we had a little help…”

As the vehicle descended further and further, a rooftop suddenly appeared below it as the clouds parted, and on top of it a giant holo logo manifested itself which was all too familiar to me. Mount Fuyi on a snowy day with a blooming cherry tree in front of it…..the Logo of the Fuyu Clan….the Logo I had been bearing ever since I was born.

As the vehicle landed and made a small rotation at the end, I saw a stunning yet very traditional looking female standing there in a modern Kimono, her hands folded before her as she slightly bowed and then nodded at me. “Hello Son….”

Chapter 3.1: When the cicada cry

February 21, 2018 / Yasashii Fuyu / Leave a comment

It was a beautiful afternoon in Shentang, the sun was high in the sky, the cicada’s cry could be heard regularly in the background, and there were even cherry blossoms falling down in my field of view every now and then.

I felt instantly reminded of my youth as I could have easily been sitting right in my own backyard back then, if it wasn’t for the entourage of sternly staring Japanese sitting right in front of me, watching my every move with distrust and even hatred in some of their eyes. One wrong move from my side would jump them right into action, and I was sure the blades lying on the floor at their side weren’t just for show, just like mine and my associates next to me weren’t.

But maybe I should spend a little bit more time to explain how I had even gotten here in the first place, so the events that will unfold in the next few minutes won’t be too much out of context…..

After the events of the Wotan Blockade where I was tasked with coordinating the few Yu Jing Elements of the Blockade alongside the mysterios Voice of the Dragon who only went by his codename “Masterofmelee”, and the apparently unavoidable breach through the blockade of the Combined Army Infiltrators, all signs indicated a soon to follow invasion of Huangdi (Svalarheima).

Even though my performance during the Wotan Blockade was deemed admirable by the Celestial Emperor and the resulting Imperial Service Investigation Task Force (searching for someone to put the blame on after what some deemed as “another failure”) it was decided that it’d be best for me to vanish from public attention for a while once again, and since it had worked so well the first time around after the Flamia Island incident, I was sent back to “The Neon Dragon”, with the official duty to protect the military and economic preparations in the area, and the inofficial agenda of “staying out of trouble for a while”…

As a General it had been somehow silently accepted that I had been sent for training to the Imperial Service Outpost in The Neon Dragon, but now that I had been promoted to “Shogun” Rank (actually Field Marshal, but due to my japanese heritage someone in the administration department, or at least someone with sufficient hacking skills to disguise himself that way, apparently had found it funny to enter the title as “Shogun” into the registries, and it had stuck…) this no longer was acceptable.

One of the main reasons for that was the simple matter of security…a Shogun of Yu Jing was a valuable military target if there ever was one, and even though I already am accompanied by two very capable bodyguards, I used to live in a simple flat apartment before I departed for the Wotan Blockade.

So by the time I had made it back to The Neon Dragon on board of the “Dancing Panda”, this time having to take the longer route of the circulator until it passed the system again, some adaptations had been made, not only to my living quarters, but also to the way The Neon Dragon would function in the near future.

The Neon-jo, a giant asian style castle relentlessly reflecting the countless neon lights from all around it and former headquarter of the local Imperial Service Branch had been hastily repurposed (or better said was mostly still being repurposed when I arrived) into what would become my official headquarter, with me now being tasked with coordinating all Yu Jing Military and Security Forces present in the area. The Imperial Service Units that had been stationed there mostly remained in The Neon-jo or where sent to smaller outpost stations.

The local Military Barracks would now also fall under my juristiction, and with the increase in weapons production and research in The Neon Dragon which was supposed to happen in the following months, further troops where stationed in The Neon Dragon, including my old JSA Regiment which had followed me here from the Wotan Blockade, resulting in a few very fond memories.

Sadly I didn’t have time to make quite as many fond memories as I would have loved to, as my new responsibilities made days feel like hours and months like days as I struggled to wrap my head around all the tasks a Field Marshal of Yu Jing had to deal with even during times of relative peace, at least officially.

And to make things worse, by the time I had finally gotten used to everything, and had actually found some time to spend with friends and things I’d love to pretend where still my hobby even though I barely got around to them anymore, rumours of a Japanese uprising had started to spread, and for some reason some of the higher officials of the party seemed to think of my name when they heard the words “Japanese” and “Problem” in one sentence, resulting in some unexpected and unwanted sudden attention.

I mean I had thought that by now the fact that diplomacy wasn’t exactly my strongest point had gotten through to those in charge of my assignments, which frankly weren’t too many people anymore as a Field Marshal didn’t have to answer to too many people besides the Emperor himself, yet somehow I had still ended up here on Shentang, tasked with talking to the local representatives of the japanese population in order to find out how much was true about the rumours of rebellion. Apparently it was found that someone of japanese descent would cause less stress during the talks as I’d at least know the customs that had to be adhered when talking to traditional japanese representatives, even though there officially of course wasn’t any such thing left in the Yu Jing society….

Apparently someone had even loudly proclaimed to “Let the filthy dog deal with his dog companions, no true inhabitant of Yu Jing should have to bother with these second rate citizens…”, and to my knowledge that person was now serving the rest of his time on a new assignment on Huangdi, as apparently the Emperor wasn’t too pleased with people like that pouring further oil into the fire, especially at times like this.

Nevertheless, here I was, sitting in front of the japanese representatives, all clad in traditional japanese clothing usually shunned at in other regions of the Yu Jing Empire, their traditional swords resting next to them, just far enough away as to not directly provoke, yet close enough to be used when needed. I myself had been granted the right to bring my own associates, and thus I was sitting there in a mixture of or traditional japanese outfit and Yu Jing General’s garb, specifically designed for the occasion so as to represent my heritage, but also make it clear that I spoke for Yu Jing as a whole and was loyal to none other than the Emperor and the State itself.

Beside me sat Pheasant Agent Kuang Fu Bao, who had stayed in his role as my more or less adjutant ever since I had been promoted, as well as Kanren Umibozu, whom I had brought along for his fast experience in undercover and terrorist matters. He clearly wasn’t too compfortable all slicked up and finely dressed as he was right now, but he had adapted like he always did when undercover, and was eyeing each and every movement around us closely.

Of course officially both of them had just been presented as my assistants, so nobody really bothered to interact with them at all, all eyes focused on me instead.

“So….you have come today to talk to us about…what exactly…Shogun…Fuyu…they call you now if I recall right?”

Almost stunned by their sudden directness without any bells and whistles I took a second to answer, but then resolved myself and answered quickly.

“Indeed that they do, and I have been sent here, as I am sure you already were informed, by the Celestial Dragon himself to inquire about a situation that seems to be unfolding as we speak”

Apparently the spokesperson of the japanese delegates enjoyed my original surprise as the faintest hint of a smirk dashed across his face for a second before it was replaced by his usual stern demeanor again. With a short nod he responded “You are talking about the Tatenokai I presume?”

Straight to the point again, I started to actually like this man even though he clearly didn’t seem to like me too much. “Indeed, there have been rumours of the Tatenokai finally having gained enough strength to start openly rebelling against the Party and the Emperor, and we obviously can’t let such terrorism unfold under the Celestial Dragon’s watchful rulership…”

At my mention of his majesties watchful rulership one of the other japanese representatives suddenly started to snort in disgust, obviously considering my words a tasteless joke. He quickly earned a punishing gaze by the spokes person of the group and fell silent again, but it was clear that some of the people present weren’t exactly fond of out Emperor … “We have heard of these rumours as well, but I can assure you that they are nothing but rumours indeed, the Tatenokai have been quite silent in the last few months. Some claim that this is due to the tightened security and regular search parties for Combined Army Infiltrators, apparently quite a few of them have been captured or killed in those raids as well, instead of actual Combined Army Infiltrators….”

The man seemed almost sad as he mentioned that, but I didn’t get a chance to inquire him about that fact, as suddenly a group of Geisha’s walked towards us, each one carrying a covered plate in front of her which hinted at some sort of food beneath it.

“Ah excuse me Shogun Fuyu, I forgot to mention that I organized a few apperitives for our talks, just a sign of good will for our cooperation in this matter in the near future…”

Before my own alarm bells could ring at the odd way the man had pronounced this just now, Kanren Umibozu was already grabbing my arm hastily to warn me that something wasn’t quite right.

The Geishas had placed the tables in front of us and as they quickly stepped back, they uncovered the lid on top of the table, revealing what wasn’t traditional japanese sweets or other culinary niceties, but rather a set of chopped off heads, each cleanly cut at the neck by what I assumed was some sort of blade, a Katana most likely by the context…

Disgusted and alarmed both me and my two companions rose to our feet, unsheating our blades as we did so, and with a cruel laugh on their lips the japanese men in front of us did exactly the same, while almost spitting at us in rage “These are the heads of the search party that killed Kempeitai Yumiko Harada instead of the Combined Army infiltrators they where actually supposed to search for….she was my wife! And today, you will pay for your crimes against the Japanese people! And it will mark the rise of our people against the Yu Jing oppressors! Cut them down!!!”

At this all members of the japanese delegation dashed towards us, swords ready to strike, and even the Geishas pulled blades from the back of their Kimonos and came rushing towards us.

Luckily my subordinates were quite capable at close combat and I myself had served in a japanese Domaru unit for quite a while as well, which meant that we managed to easily cut down most of the supposed Geishas before the real threat of the men behind them managed to reach us. These men were apparently real trained warriors instead of the more indirect assassins that the Geishas had apparently been, and I didn’t look forward to the melee that would undoubtly unfold within the next second or so.

Luckily I didn’t have to test my somewhat rusty skills against those stern warriors, as at this point the familiar sound of a heavy machine gun started to ring out across the beautiful garden as my Hac Tao Bodyguard Lu Bu revealed himself a few meters to our side and behind me on a section of old fashioned japanese house wall, peppering the onrushing group of men with a hailstorm of bullets.

Their traditional styled clothes were no protection at all against the high tech bullets that came flying at the men, and in a shower of blood and gore most of them hit the ground instantly. The leader of them miraculously survived the first salvo and came rushing further towards me, hatred and surprise as to his failed ambush clearly shown on his grim face “I’ll take you with me Fuyu, for Yumikooooo!!!!”

His angry shout was quickly silenced in his throat by a blade piercing straight through it from the back, skillfully thrust by my other bodyguard Ninja “Kabuki Queen” who’s flickering silhouette could be seen right behind the man for a split second, before vanishing from view once again. I could have sworn that her helmet display had depicted a grinning racoon as she stabbed the man, but maybe my eyes were just playing tricks on me…..

With their leader dead and the return salvo of Hac Tao Lu Bu ripping through the last remaining members of the japanese delegation, the garden suddenly fell deadly quiet, the only sound being occasional blood drops hitting the ground, and the cry of the cicadas in the background…

Just as I was about to say something my wrist armband suddenly played the urgent alarm sound and a holo echo of Celestial Guard “Shen Jing” appeared in front of me “Sir! We have just found the the japanese delegation in a truck not far away from your location, they have all been killed and branded with Traitor marks and a traditonal letter from the Tatenokai next to them! Sir, whomever you are talking to, they are not who you think they are!”…

With a frustrated sigh I shook off the blood from my blade and sheated it….maybe this time they’d believe me that diplomacy just never worked out for me….

Interlude: Going Home

January 29, 2018January 29, 2018 / Yasashii Fuyu / Leave a comment

“Take that suckers!” was the last thing that the poor soul in front of me heard before a storm of razor sharp shrapnel tore him to shreds. “Take that suckers!”, the final release of my pent up anger after countless days of hunger and torture by the very people now dashing for cover right in front of me. But to no avail, they where within my reach, my rifle spewing death wherever I pointed it, vengeance wherever one of them hit the floor screaming in agony before screamig no more.

Somehow I had made it, I escaped where so many of my friends before me had failed and paid the prize, so horrible even the thought of it made me almost vomit, but there was nothing to vomit left inside of me, only rage, and so I pressed the trigger again, and again…

They had ripped me out of my home, out of my wive’s arms, away from my child’s bed, my terrified daughters screams echo in me ears even louder than the sound of my rifle, even now, as I make them pay, as I’m on my way back home….

Enemy of the state they had said, sentenced for penal duty their verdict, torture is what it was, nothing more, no duty, only suffering, stuck in a machine for days. My arms bent backwards, my head inside of the machine, force feed, both propaganda and proteine, both equally foul and intolerable.

But they had been sloppy, thinking me broken after all those days of torture, weakened and about to collapse they had left me in that room, went for lunch or to do whatever those vile creatures did whenever they grew tired of torturing innocent citizens like me. I broke free, my head bleeding as I pulled it out of the machine, the needles stuck in my skull breaking with every pull to freedom, the pain too much to stay sane, but not enough to stay.

One of my wrists almost snapped as I wrung it out through the metal shackle, and I ducked, fearing for the noise to call my tormentors back, just like the poor creature in front of me now ducks in hope of escaping my justice, but only one of us got lucky, and so I ran, out of the room, hid in one of their supply trucks, behind the big crates inside of it.

I don’t know how long I waited, in pain, covered in blood, shaking all over, with nothing but home and my family in my mind to keep me sane, or what was left of it. And then, the noise of an engine starting, a gate opening, and the fresh breeze of freedom coming through the cracks, of the town I grew up in for so long, greeting me back into its arms with the noise of the streets, and the noise of an Imperial Service Patrole.

Confused and enraged I reached for the gun in front of me, quickly covering the entrance of the transporter’s cargo area, of my sanctuary, where had the noise come from? Where had the gun come from? Had it always been there? It didn’t matter. The noise stopped and so did the Transporter, and no sooner did it, than the ramp of the Transporter suddenly opened up, and I could hear footsteps running away from it.

Had the bearer of those feet seen me? Was he calling for his friends to torture me again? No! Not again! I dashed out of the Transporter, through the dark street in front of me, crusted blood and tears making me almost blind, until I reached the corner, and there they where, the monsters that had tortured me, all of them, just as surprised to see me, as I was to see them all. They didn’t have time to aim their weapons.

And so here I am, on my way home, once I’m done with those that tormented me, on my way to my wives arms, once I take out the one that’s aiming his pistol at me, does he think he can stop me? A bullet to my arm, laughable, soon they will hold my daughter again, what is a little pain compared to that? One in my chest, it burns, but not as hot as the rage inside of me, as the longing for my loved ones. I scream, as I fall to my knees, as I release all the emotions in my heart to burn those monsters away, I scream the names of the loved ones I’ll hopefully meet again soon…..I scream…“Yu Jing!” and then I meet them again…..

—————————-

A loud Explosion marked the end of the Kuang Shi that had just stumbled around the corner in front of us, clearing the way for our advance. In awe and terror I mutter to myself “Damn, sometimes I wonder what they see as they march to pay for their crimes…this one almost seemed eager to die…”

“Maybe one day you’ll find out for yourself…” came the unexpected answer of Sheng Ji, the Kuang Shi Controller of my Force, as she commanded yet another one of those poor souls around the corner, a smirk on her face. I turn my head away as a cold shiver runs down my spine….

CHAPTER 2.12: BATTLE REPORT 16: OPERATION ONIGOKKO: LIKE GIVING A KANABO TO AN ONI

October 30, 2017 / Yasashii Fuyu / Leave a comment

To my surprise the enemy soldier that came into view wasn’t another PanO soldier, but actually a Nomad soldier!!

Apparently they had been busy fighting each other, which had tripped the security alarm, and now that we took our the PanO troops, they where wondering where their enemies had gone, and who had taken care of them.

With the same troops at my disposal as before, another Tiger Soldier on its way to replace the downed one, and the Invincible having temporarily healed his own wounds, I prepared my troops for the enemy advance as good as possible, taking cover behind the structures and crates of the cargo hold.

The Nomad forces apparently where just as numerous as the PanO forces before, not only consisting of a few Alguaciles, a Grenzer, and a Mobile Brigade, but also a Reverend Healer, who’s religious nonsense chanting was audible even to my position

They didn’t waste any time, advancing with a few of their Alguaciles followed by a Mobile Brigada which advances on their right side to flank my troops, but my Bodyguard Ninja “Kabuki Queen” had reacted even quicker and was already in position to ambush the Brigada, shooting an arrow in his back which stuck in the armour, but apparently didn’t really wound the Brigada.

Annoyed by the Ninja’s ambush the Mobile Brigada turned around and opened fire on Kabuki Queen, but the Ninja was too nimble and dodged all the bullets.

Using the fact that the Nomad’s attack had faltered I ordered my forced to advance on all fronts, and as the Brigada heard my troops yelling as they raced towards him, he decided that they where most likely a bigger thread than the Ninja, and turned around to face them.

Kabuki Queen however had only waited for an opportunity like that, shooting another arrow into the back of the Mobile Brigada, and as it once again seemed useless, she advanced within striking distance of her Katana, and cut down the foolish Brigada with it.

As I advanced alongside my troops, covering the right flank as my troops covered the center, the replacement Tiger Soldier arrived from another access hatch on the ceiling of the cargo bay, dropping right into the action only meters away from the Nomad Frontline.

Apparently not too fond of her own life this Tiger Soldier then advanced towards the Nomad Lines, opening up on them with her Flamethrower, dowsing two Fusiliers and the Grenzer in fire with it.

Apparently the Nomads where quite used to the heat though, as only one of them died from the fire, and the Tiger Soldier herself was taken out by the returning fire from the Nomads where she stood.

With the ambush failed I knew it was time to defend from the for sure coming counterattack, and myself and some of my troops went ahead and supressed the advance routes of the Nomads.

It seemed however like the Mobile Brigada that Kabuki Queen had taken out was actually the Nomad’s Lieutenant, and like the uncoordinated bunch of wannabe soldiers that the Nomads actually where, instead of advancing and launching an offensive, they broke into bickering, one of them dashing to savety, and the rest busy arguing with each other, barely able to supress the area in front of them as they did so.

Not one to let such an opportunity go easily, I decided to advance myself, but as I did so I was attacked by a Nomad Spektr, which had apparently waited just around the corner for my advance.

We exchanged a few rounds of bullets, but in the end the Spektr was no match for my Hsien Armour’s advanced Multispectral Visor and heavy machine gun, his lifeless body dropping to the floor while I was already on the move to flank the remaining Nomad troops on our right flank.

With their backs to me I opened up on them with my Nano Pulser, the Nanites eating away the Reverend Healer as the Grenzer dashed for cover, his coat saving him from the worst of the Nanites.

Not wanting to let the Grenzer get away, I advanced towards his new hiding position, opening up on him with my HMG, but it was hard hitting the guy at such close range with the disolving body of the Reverend Healer in the way, and so the Grenzer’s easy to handle pistol got the advantage, but bounced off my armour uselessly.

After another fire exchange where my bullets where stopped by the Grenzer’s armour, he dashed for cover once again, forcing me to take care of a Alguacile that was standing around the corner to avoid getting shot at by both.

Just as I took out the Alguacile though, another one of them suddenly appeared from a Cargo Container in front of me, opening fire on me at close range. I had nowhere to dodge to and frankly too surprised to react in time, and thus a hailstorm of bullets impacted on my armour, just as the container next to the Alguaciles was riddled with bullets from the Invincible which the Alguacile had apparently ignored but which was shooting at his back.

Luckily for me, my mastercrafted armour was more than a match for the puny Nomad bullets, and they all bounced off of it. Even the next salvo which also managed to hit me fell uselessly to the ground, but this time the Alguacile wasn’t as lucky as the Invincible found his mark and ripped the lowly Nomad trooper apart with his Combi Rifle.

Being the last man standing and in terrible reach for his weapons, the remaining Grenzer decided to go for a bold suicide attack, rushing at me with his Knife in hand, but just as his blade crossed with my Katana, the Nomad soldier dropped to the ground lifelessly, his back riddled with bullets from the Invincible who’s field of vision he had crossed during his advance.

With the last Nomad trooper down I gave the order to cancel the alarm as the Cargo Deck was now clear, and called for a cleaning crew to take care of this mess. Most likely it’d be easiest to throw the corpses out the nearby airlock, for scum like that didn’t deserve a proper burial….their cubes would obviously be stored and prepared fór the next Cube exchange cycle between the the factions…

———————————————————————

Game 2 of my games with my colleague and his friend that started Infinity a while ago with Operation Icestorm. Once again sorry for the lower table quality than usual, we where playing at my colleagues house with his Icestorm terrain, which actually was quite the fun change for once ^^ I hope you enjoy reading the report just as much as we enjoyed playing it!

Chapter 2.10: Battle Report 14: Blood is on the dance floor

October 6, 2017 / Yasashii Fuyu / Leave a comment

(Note this battle report was part of the Global Online Campaign Strikezone Wotan. During the campaign I barely had time reporting the battles on the official tool and didn’t get around to post it here on my Blog, I now finally have time to do so, so I hope those of you who haven’t read them yet will enjoy them! ^^ )

(Sorry guys, this one will have a long Fluff part at the beginning, if you don’t care much for my story but rather just want to see the action, please scroll down until the part where you will see the army lists and pictures, that’s where the action will begin…)

After the events on Sygtir 2 we returned to the „Dancing Panda“ for some R&R to lick our uncalled for wounds. I know why I’m not a fan of secret diplomatic missions, something always goes wrong, and then suddenly you are at the other end of some scandal or firefight or worse.

Luckily this time it seemed like the overall chaos going on in the Wotan Blockade masked events like these quite effectively, and both parties had apparently continued on as if nothing had happened, which was all good for me…

Most likely that was because we had bigger problems to face anyways, the continued operations on La Forja to cleanse the sepsitorized Nomad troops apparently caused so much stress to the station’s structural integrity that it eventually broke apart and collapsed, causing heavy damage to all of the stations areas, making it not only no longer inhabitable, but basically destroying it for all intents and purposes of the Blockade.

Now obviously destroying a station in the Blockade wasn’t exactly what the intention of these operations had been, but since the Nomads had no longer shown any intent of cooperating with the other factions anyways, and even high ranking commanders of them had indeed been corrupted and joined the Combined Army, it might have been the best result in the end.

Sadly this wasn’t the end of our struggle in the sector though, as not only did the Nomads get reinforcements in form of some obscenely named wannabe spaceship, basically a crappy old freighter that they stuck some guns unto and called it a job done, typical sloppy Nomad work really, but due to the increase of war refugees and trade requests from foreign nations for military and aid goods in the sector, we also had to open up our Embassy Station Baijing to the public to show our good will….which as expected some of the other factions promptly took as an opportunity to send armed troops in instead of refugees and traders.

Luckily it really didn’t matter, the station has no real worth for the Blockade or Huangdi, we can easily build another one or force them to seize control of it later on, so I say let them have it if this is how they pretend to defend humanity in these dark times.

Now as for them Tohaas invading our Shanqiang, that’s a different matter entirely….in fact I was just about to ready a strike team to cleanse some of these filthy Artichokes off our Frigate, when another complication hit our command channels.

It seems that there has been some sort of drama going on in one of the recent O12 meetings, with Ariadna representatives apparently refusing to share the results of their investigation with the other members, and since Yu Jing and Aleph had fought side by side with them and agreed to share information afterwards before the operation even started, our representatives understandably weren’t exactly happy about this breach of contract.

And as representatives of O12 are wont to….they didn’t exactly care about our current situation in the Blockade, and simply decided that it was “time for a little accident” to happen to the Ariadna stronghold…..and our troops in the sector where supposed to “see to it”….

Now previously I would have most likely avoided such a shady mission such as this, but if my time in the ISS has told me anything, it’s that sometimes subterfuge and covert operations matter more than brute force, and that the concept of “Face” was an important one…

It also didn’t help that for some reason I had recently been promoted to the Rank of Field Marshal, or to name it by the JSA counterpart, Shogun……

Me becoming a Shogun of the Yu Jing army was something I had never even dared to dream about…and for most of my life wouldn’t have cared to aspire to either, but recent events have shown that there is more at stake than just honour for my family, or some personal sense of achievement, humanity was under serious threat from an alien menace, trying not only to defeat us, but also to occupy us, brainwash us, and turn us into fuel for their giant E.I. controlled war machine…and if for some strange twist of fate this Law student dropout, ex biker gang member, and shame to his family human that I am should turn out to make a difference by becoming not only a General, but even a Shogun, then I it was indeed my duty to comply, and give my best for my Empire and its people.

What I mean by all these fancy words is…..as a Shogun I basically couldn’t avoid following our O12 representatives wishes, as the inter faction diplomatic backlash of that would most likely hurt the whole Yu Jing command in the Blockade, and make it harder for myself to achieve my goals as well…and of course it never hurt to earn some favour with high ranking politicians, one never knew when it’d come in handy.

So instead of leading a strike team on our Shanqiang Frigate to roast some Artichokes, I instead found myself breaking through a sealed exterior airlock with the help of Shen Nung’s superior hacking skills.

It seems like at some point a PanO Spacecraft had made a not so gentle emergency landing in this area, causing several hull breaches which lead to certain landing airlocks being temporarily sealed and no access to the area being allowed. Since no one expected a bunch of idiots to try and enter such a hostile environment security in this part of the orbital has been decreased as well, at least that’s what our Intel has announced, and so it fell to my strike team to prove them wrong and show them that there ARE idiots foolish enough to try it…

The target was actually quite a good one I had to admit as there was supposedly a little armoury in the blocked off area, filled to the brim with Teseum ammunition and even whole sets of armour as replacement for the Caledonian Mormaer nobles, and that was worth quite the fortune even for Ariadna standards, so they’d feel it if that’d somehow get “accidentally vented into space”….

But of course things didn’t go quite as easy as we had hoped for as, the moment we breached the air lock and stormed into the place, we could already hear loud Caledonian voices shouting at each other.

———————————————————–

Voice Recording of Operation Dancefloor, 10 seconds after Airlock breach

“Goddamn it! Hurry up you fool, this area isn’t save and it sounds like it’s about to collapse completely!”

“All the more reason to get our gear out of here!”

“All the gear in the world isn’t worth it if you get vented into space while trying to retrieve it!”

“Oh come on, this place has been sealed for several days now, if it was going to collapse it would have already done so…”

“Didn’t you hear that just now? That hissing sound? Things are definitely falling apart!”

“That was just your imagination or maybe Mac Pea over there crapping his skirt…again…”

“Screw you Mac Duffins! If anyone here crapped himself it was you last frid….”

*a loud growling voice disrupts the conversation*

“Shut up, I smell intruders…”

“Yeah right, as if…”

*Conversation ends with the sound of heavy machine gun fire and a painful growl*

——————————————————————–

Hearing that the Caledonians that for some reason where present in the area where obviously distracted, I decided to use this opportunity to lay a little ambush for them by placing the Husong Yaokong HMG Drone together with two Kuang Shi on the left flank, conveniently overlooking the Caledonian’s approach route to the Arsenal in the middle of the battlefield.

Since the main objective of this mission was the Arsenal, I decided that the center would need to be the strongest, and thus not only positioned there myself, but also posted another Celestial Guard, a whole team of Cranes and Celestial Guards, the remaining two Kuang Shi, and Father Anderson there, to ensure quick access to the Armoury.

Since the Caledonians weren’t exactly prepared to engage enemy troops at their home base at this time, their troops where basically just walking together in the center towards the Arsenal, the only exception being a Mormaer which had advanced along the flank, most likely tired of the other’s chatter or annoyed by the Cameronian’s smell..

The battle was started by an especially eager Cameronian that tried to advance straight for the Arsenal, but ran right into my little trap, the Husong Yaokong’s HMG ripping him right apart as he crossed it’s field of view.

Warned by his comrade’s demise the second Cameronian advanced more careful, and then began to cover the advance route of his comrades with smoke grenades, effectively rendering the HMG drone useless for the moment.

The moment the advance route was secure, a Caledonian Hacker, still a funny concept for me, quickly advanced towards the sealed Armoury doors and opened them with her access code.

(For those with high attention to details….we actually forgot that the Armoury doors where closed at the beginning *lol* so my wife sent in the hacker to open the doors a few turns after she actually should have…didn’t really change anything though, so it’s all good)

Promptly the Cameronian advanced through the now opened door, dodging my bullets as he did so, and proceeded to throw a smoke grenade into the entrance, apparently unaware that my armours highly advanced sensors could simply see through it.

One of the Caledonians apparently was aware of this fact though, as suddenly a Highlander Grey burst through the smoke screen on the left flank, and opened fire on the Husong Yaokong, taking it out in a storm of heavy Teseum bullets, most likely worth more than the Remote it destroyed…

With the route from the flank secured, a Caledonian Highlander team lead by what I assumed was their commander entered the Armoury from the side, preparing to defend it from all potential attackers, while simultaneously grabbing some gear from the boxes within.

Just as I was about to give the order to advance, the Mormaer on the enemy flank decided to try her luck as she opened fire on the Crane Agent covering a corner on my right side. At first the exchange ended in the Crane’s favour, but his bullets bounced off the heavily armoured Caledonian noblewoman without any effect, and with her second volley he Mormaer managed to wound the mighty Crane Agent with her armour piercing heavy machine gun.

In the meantime the Highlander Grey dashed back into cover, knowing fully well that the smokescreen was about to dissipate, most likely through the slight hull breach inside of the armoury which had been sealed by the closed armoury gates before.

With the Kuang Shi stumbling forward, no longer able to suppress their righteous zeal for the Yu Jing Empire, I finally gave the order to storm the Armoury.

It started with the Crane’s team advancing in the center, his Spitfire supported by his comrade’s covering fire easily ripping apart the Mormaer that had wounded him before.

Knowing that the Armoury was full of enemies, but also aware that means lots of easy targets, the second Crane Agent in the group sneaked towards the entrance of the Armoury, and opened up fire on the Highlander Team within with her Nano Pulsars, in exchange receiving several rounds of Chainrifle fire from the defenders.

Once everything was said and done, the Crane herself lay on the floor heavily wounded, but every highlander besides one was dead, and the one highlander was heavily wounded and about to bleed out as well.

Aware that there was still at least one Cameronian alive inside of the room, hiding behind the other corner of the room, the remaining Crane Agent thus decided to advance more careful, positioning himself just outside of the reach of the Cameronian’s Chainrifle, but well within his own Spitfire’s reach as he took position to fire though the door, and sure enough, his Spitfire riddled the Cameronian with countless holes while the creatures Chainrifle’s load sprayed the area without any real effect.

Knowing that we had to secure the Armoury before the Caledonians plundered it dry or called for reinforcements, the Crane’s team thus advanced into the room, the Crane’s armour easily deflecting the chainrifle shoot from the bleeding out Highlander as he disintegrated the fool with his double Nanopulsers.

With the rest of his team securing the room, the Crane Agent then proceeded through the door that to the Caledonian side of the battlefield, surprising the Highlander Grey and the Caledonian Hacker that had taken cover there with his Nanopulsers. The Highlander Grey was quick enough to dodge out of the deadly weapon’s arc, but the Hacker wasn’t quick enough and got taken out by the cruel weapon.

Meanwhile a little further back on the battlefield Father Anderson decided to leave his cover to bait a Cateran Sniper that he suspected was hiding on the far end of the battlefield, and true enough the Mercenary Sniper revealed his position by firing at one of Father Anderson’s Holoechos the moment they rose from cover. The first salvo from Father Anderson wasn’t quite enough to take out the Sniper, but as Father Anderson repositioned himself just in case his next salvo would fail as well, his bullets hit the Cateran straight in the head, reducing him to a puddle of sludge dripping from the Container he had been standing on.

With their Commander dead on the ground the Caledonians were in disarray, the Highlander Grey managed to live through another Nano Pulser attack from the Crane Agent, riddling him with her Teseum bullets in return, downing the agent, and it seemed like a bunch of camouflaged units where moving towards the Armoury. A Caledonian doctor tried to advance as well and heal the Caledonian Hacker with his Stim Pistol from his Medipack, but since he couldn’t get any closer without getting fired at from inside the Armoury, he was just out of good reach for the little pistol, and kept missing his patient.

Determined to exploit the enemy’s temporary lack of coordination I ordered Celestial Guard Shen Jing in the Armoury to provide a Smokescreen on the side of the room, and advanced to flank the Highlander Grey’s new position. Since the primitive Caledonian lacked any way to see me through the smokescreen she barely managed to fight back as my heavy machinegun rounds ripped through her primitive armour, downing her where she stood.

Since I was the best option to press the attack further, I quickly advanced into the armoury, shooting down the Caledonian doctor from inside, and then advancing through the door like the Crane Agent before.

As I exited the room through the doorframe I was instantly ambushed by a S.A.S Agent that had been hiding next to it, but while the S.A.S.’s Chainrifle managed to actually wound me, my HMG downed both him and the Volunteer that had been hiding behind the Caledonian Doctor.

With only herself and a 112 Emergency unit left on the field, the remaining S.A.S Agent decided that the Armoury simply wasn’t worth dying for, and instead decided to flee, most likely intent on calling for backup.

By the time the Caledonian reinforcements arrived, my squad and the content of the Armoury was already on our way back to the “Dancing Panda”, undetected by the Caledonian’s primitive systems easily overcome by Shen Nung’s hacking skills. Any evidence of our little insertion besides the meaningless opinions of the two two surviving Caledonians had been erased by a “accidental” detonation of a nearby fuel tank, ripping most of the sealed off area completely into space, the Caledonian Corpses vanishing into the void alongside most of the battlefield we had been fighting on just now.

I hoped this little “accident” would be enough to appease our O12 representatives, as I feared that another such venture would most likely not be as easy…

Chapter 2.9: Battle Report 13: Waiting in the Rain

October 6, 2017 / Yasashii Fuyu / Leave a comment

The next few days after the incident with the Ariadna security team were filled with diplomacy, command decisions, and Propaganda. Being a General of Yu Jing in an area that starts to go to shit isn’t exactly a relaxing and easy job, and thus there was little to no time at all for personal matters other than dropping in my bed at night and falling asleep instantly…

Not only did the Nomads in this sector who’s greed has started this whole campaign turned out to be mostly sepsitorized mind slaves of the Combined Army in need of heavy cleansing, but they somehow affected the Tohaa as well, who now where attacking our light frigate the Shanqiang in force. And as if that wasn’t enough, the Combined Army itself has shown it’s ugly head as well, attacking the PanO defense platforms in force.

As is custom in situations like these it was Yu Jing’s duty to offer assistance to PanO in such times of need, and due to bad luck and a lost round of Jan Ken Pon I ended up being the one that had to deliver said offer of support to PanO in a secret diplomatic mission on their Sygtir 2 Platform.

Obviously, just as expected really, PanO declined our offer of sending troops to their precious little weapons platforms, after all who would want heavily armed foreign forces stationed on their space stations in times such as these, especially from your biggest rival.

So I found myself at the edge of a Hangar Zone waiting for my shuttle back to the “Dancing Panda” to arrive, when all of a sudden everything went black as the whole station apparently shut down.

Now even though I’ve heard about PanO technology being not nearly as reliable as PanO merchants would like to make their customers believe, a station wide blackout seemed quite unlike them, and so I wasn’t too surprised when seconds later a giant explosion shook the whole station and gunfire could be heard from several directions.

Apparently we had ended up in the middle of yet another Combined Army attack, and even though I wanted to fight the Combined Army just like any other commander in the Blockade, I knew my duties lied elsewhere for the moment, and thus I was relieved to see that only moments later emergency lighting came back on again.

Sadly it seemed like communication was still offline, and so where all landing lights and landing vector transmitters, so the shuttle pilot wouldn’t know where to find us, unless we helped him out a little…

So instead of waiting for PanO to solve this problem, or a Combined Army squad to stumble over us while we waited for that, I decided to send out my agents to tap into the emergency power supply and connect it to our emergency beacon which we had brought with us for just such a possibility. After all one could never be too careful….or so at least Shen Nung had said as he handed us the beacon before we went on the mission.

“Saberrider”, who’s real body was onboard of the inbound shuttle, strapped into a Su Jian Control capsule, informed me that the device was working now that it had been tapped into the power source, and informed me that it’d take about 15 minutes for the shuttle to arrive, mainly due to a firefight going on outside of the station against some sort of Combined Army Stealth Ships, and the space rubble that’s been flying around everywhere due to that.

I was just about to kick back on a nearby bench and relax until the shuttle would arrive, when a loud “Hey! Who’s there? Shit! It’s them commander! The heretics are aboard our ship!!” disturbed our waiting periode. It seemed like our beacon had attracted someone else instead, and since our mission was done in secret, most PanO forces most likely didn’t even know we where here…

Since my Agents where already near the Power Supply I simply spread out my away team a little, Shen Jing and two Kuang Shi protecting the left flank, myself, Special Celestial Guard Operative “Chuan” and another Kuang Shi in the center, and “Saberrider”, Kuang Fu Bao, another Kuang Shi and the Warcor “Xin Hua” taking care of our right flank.

The PanO troops seemed to just have arrived in the area and thus where in a rather center focused position, but having faced this commander before I wouldn’t have been surprised if he had some tricks up his sleeve still…

No sooner had I thought so than Croc Man already revealed themselves and placed some mines near the Emergency Power Nodes we had tapped, and one of them promptly proceeded towards the Node, most likely in an attempt to disconnect our Emergency Beacon. I had a Ninja prepared just for such a situation, but not only did she fail to hit the Croc Man due to it’s TO Camouflage, but she also got instantly taken out by a Nisse that had taken position on a nearby building, leaving the Croc Man free reign to disconnect our Emergency Beacon from this Power Node. Luckily the device was capable of running with only one of the beacons still in our hands as well, so nothing was lost yet.

On the other Power Node’s location the Croc Man that had revealed itself there apparently had enough of the Warcor that had been filming him until then, and he quickly took out “Xin Hua” with a burst from his combi rifle, the Warcors Flashpulse ,not precise enough to blind the invisible attacker in time.

Knowing well the danger of a well positioned Nisse Sniper, I quickly advanced myself towards a nearby bill board, strangely still active even through this power outage, the company most likely paying extra to have it lit by the emergency power source…what a decadent society PanO was, and took out the Nisse Sniper with a controller burst from my HMG.

I then ordered Celestial Guard Shen Jing to cover my advance on the right flank with a Smoke Screen, but for some reason the blinking emergency lights and overall darkness besides them seemed to have a terrible effect on her, as she repeatedly shot after shot missed with her Smoke Grenade, covering rooftops and the interior of buildings in choking smoke, but failing to secure my prefered advance lane…

Frustrated to no end I instead moved into position to lay some supressive fire, while Shen Jing sent her Kuang Shi to take care of the Croc Man, losing one in the process though.

Sending “Chuan” and another Kuang Shi to protect the center I then braced for the inevitable attack that was about to happen, hoping that our shuttle would arrive quickly, for we didn’t exactly stand a chance should more PanO reinforcements arrive…

At first the only thing that happened was a Palbot sneaking up to the downed Croc Man and healing him back into action with a Nano Injection, but only moments later a HMG salvo which ended the last Kuang Shi on the left flank, and a loud explosion that took down “Chuan” and the Kuang Shi next to him in the center openly announced that we had less time than we had hoped, as a Squalo was approaching along our left flank, his heavy Grenade launcher spewing death.

The Croc Man on our left flank went invisible again, but as the last remaining Kuang Shi stumbled forward in a fit of Propaganda inspired rage, it’s position quickly was discovered again, though at the price of the Kuang Shi’s life, who was ripped apart by a HMG Bot stationed at the flank…

I once again ordered Shen Jing to cover my advance with a smoke screen so I could take care of the right flank and get into better cover from the approaching Squalo, but she still hadn’t gotten used to the environment it seemed, and more smoke grenades crashed into random windows around the location they where supposed to hit originally…

So without the cover I had originally hoped for, but no other choice left, I decided to advance towards the right flank anyways, and promptly paid for it by one of the Croc Man’s bullets piercing through a weaker part of armour on my arm as I dashed for an advantageous position to open fire.

The Croc Man was out of luck after that though, as my HMG quickly reaped my just reward in the form of the downed Croc Man as well as the destroyed HMG Bot behind it, finally clearing our right flank.

Sadly at this point the Squalo was already on the move again, so all we could do was prepare for it’s appearance by supressing the area he’d most likely appear from and hoping for the Mad Traps that “Chuan” had positioned there to do some work.

The enemy commander wasn’t going to have any of that though it seemed, and so instead of the Squalo, a Palbot suddenly came rushing around the corner, triggering both Mad Traps, and getting ripped apart by our supressive fire.

The moment the Palbot had sacrificed itself, the silhouette of the Squalo could already be seen in the distance, just out of range for our supressive fire, and I had just about time to dodge the first salvo of Multi HMG bullets flying towards my position, before I eventually blanked out as yet another salvo of armour piercing bullets pierced my armour, sending me unconcious.

Naturally I only heard about what happened afterwards from Kuang Fu Bao, but it seemed like the Croc Man from the left flank then decided to advance towards our Emergency Beacon, taking out Shen Jing as he advanced, and eventually grabbing the Beacon.

Kuang Fu Bao wasn’t about to have that though, and taking over command after I had fallen, he strolled down from his defensive position and took out the Croc Man with his Combi Rifle, ensuring that the Emergency Beacon was still in our hands.

Knowing that the shuttle was just about to land, “Saberrider” decided to at least take some vengeance to save our honour, and quickly advanced his Su Jian towards the Emergency Beacon, firing at the Squalo all the while to cover his advance.

Just as the Shuttle rushed in above us, it’s heavy guns sending the nearby PanO troops for cover, “Saberrider” stomped down on the Croc man’s neck, howling his defiance into the Hangar’s air over the loudspeaker of the Su Jian, and even though he was eventually blown to bits by the Squalo, the rest of us managed to pull out in the shuttle, where “Saberrider”‘s real body just opened the side of his control capsule, waving us in with a smirking “Time to go I think…it seems we’ve overstayed our welcome…”

With several of our soldiers requiring medical aid, the shuttle pilot quickly turned around and rushed off towards the Dancing Panda, leaving Sygtir 2 and the PanO forces behind us…..

———————————————–

Comment:

That was a tough game! Commander Sorbus definitely knows what he’s doing, and my inexperience with proper Ninja Placements against TAGs has cost me dearly during this game, heck my Kitsune didn’t didn’t even get to show herself due to all the mines around her and her useless positioning…

The fact that not a single Smoke Grenade wanted to land where it should didn’t help either ;-P

Luckily Commander Sorbus is a great guy, so playing against him was a lot of fun even though I received a heavy beating, and due to my reckless Su Jian charge at the end…I even managed to turn this slaughter into a Draw!

Can’t wait for my next chance to play against Sorbus! Oh and if you are new to my stories, you can read the story of our first encounter here:

https://thegentlewinter.wordpress.com/2017/05/28/chapter-2-4-battle-report-8-judass-kiss/

Chapter 2.7: Battle Report 11: SABERRIDERS X MEGA JUSTICE WARRIORS: “THE BEGINNING”

June 6, 2017 / Yasashii Fuyu / Leave a comment

Comment:

If you are participating in Strikezone Wotan, please consider also visiting the version of this battle report that I have posted there, and leaving a rating/recommendation, it’d help me out a lot and bring some extra motivation for me 😉

https://wotan.warconsole.com/battles/yasashii-fuyu-vs-lady-wazabi-1496759270

No sooner had I ensured that Sergeant Onizuka was well taken care of, his heavily wounded body on its way for restoration at Sophotect Akaseni’s station, than I already received another security warning, this time by my Su Jian Pilot “Saberrider”.

As I blinked the holo communication on the main screen of my helmet’s visor, I was greeted by the familiar fat and frankly ugly face of “Saberrider”. Normally a guy like him wouldn’t be fit to serve for the Yu Jing Empire, but the ISS always had a place for talent and his skills as a remote pilot where so extraordinary that his plump and unfitting body had been tolerated. We did however make sure to never include him personally in any sort of official meeting or event with foreign officials……claiming that “the presence of his Su Jian would be more impressive to those “foreign devils”.

Luckily he himself seemed to prefer it that way as well, apparently feeling more at home inside the head of his machine than in his real body anyways.

“General Fuyu! There has been another attempt of security breach near the shuttle bay where the Caledonian Boarding Party has landed. Apparently they are trying to get their shuttle free so they can flee from the “Dancing Panda”.

Letting out a loud but short laugh I contemplated this development for a second, and then replied with determination in my voice. “Understood, follow them and intercept if necessary, I will be there shortly with a strike team.”

So it seems they weren’t in the mood for further plundering anymore…and the rats would prefer to leave the dragon’s nest now…well they would have to fight their way out if they really wanted to leave, that was for sure.

With a good chunk of my troops already busy cleaning up the aftermaths of the previous engagements, or securing key areas, I just took Kanren Umibozu, Shen Nung, “Chuan” and Father Anderson with me, and ordered some reinforcements from the Command Center to meet me and “Saber Rider”at the control access to the Shuttle Bay Area.

As I arrived in the area about a minute later, carried there by one of the stations transport capsules at high speed, I was pleased to see that “Saberrider” had already arrived, and the reinforcements where just arriving as well. I had called for a new contractor that I had hired before we left for the Wotan Gate, but who hadn’t had an opportunity to show her worth yet, a woman called “Nebel”, apparently a half German half Japanese sniper mercenary that had decided to work closely with the ISS from now on. She had arrived alongside Celestial Guard Shen Jing and her group of Zombie like Kuang Shi…and for some reason a reporter from Yu Jing News…what the hell was that?

As I was about to walk over to their group, I received a communication from Shen Jing, her friendly yet somehow creepy face appearing on the corner of my helmet display “Don’t worry General, I made sure to “instruct” the Warcor on what is appropriate footage and what isn’t….and he agreed to our terms, most likely cause he didn’t want to end up in my collection….isn’t that right Buttercup?” at that point she was looking away from the holo recorder, most likely talking to one of her Kuang Shi’s… to be frank, her behavior towards them was the main reason she came across as creepy, but she was the best at coordinating and maintaining those repenting servants of the State, and her combat reports more than made up for her odd nature…and really, who cared about how she treated those things, they deserved nothing better, traitors and enemies of the state the lot of them…at least those under my command, I gave special instructions to ensure that.

Having apparently snapped back to reality Shen Jing then added a snappy “Oh, his name is Xin Hua by the way, just for the record should he fall in battle or betray our trust…”

Nodding once I replied “Thanks for the heads up…I was about to send him on its way, but I guess a little inspirational video for our troops won’t hurt….”. Switching to command communication channel so every one of my subordinates in the area would hear me I continued. “Look good out there today ladies and gentlemen we’ve got news coverage this time…so give them swift justice!”.

Now obviously this didn’t bode well with my original plan of simply having the Caledonians “vanish” from the records….but then again the Caledonians never would have believed us anyways…so with this news report about the “Caledonian Rebel Raiding Party” attacking the “Dancing Panda”, they could at least claim to have no ties to the troops they sent to our ship…keeping face in the process….making diplomatic interactions in the future easier…or whatever..

Anyways, Kanren Umibozu had forward deployed in the area of operation, and reported that the Caledonian forces consisted of a Wulver Team as well as a Highlander Team with a Cameronian on their left flank, a truly brutal assault force for sure, as well as a Volunteer Team accompanied by a hacker and another Cameronian on their left flank, most likely tasked with accessing the Network to free their shuttle from its holding clamps.

I deployed to counter their heavy advance with the Su Jian “Saberrider”, the Kuang Shi Team as well as the Warcor on our right flank of the battlefield, Shen Nung, “Chuan”, Nebel and myself at the center, and Father Anderson at our left flank.

Since we had arrived a bit late to the party, the Caledonians where already on the move, one of their Cameronians dashing forward on the left flank, while the other tried to sneak along on the right flank. Such creatures where obviously not very capable of sneaking though, and the giant furball thus walked right into “Nebel”’s sight. His animal instincts somehow saved him from the first bullet, but as he tried to dodge out of the way, “Nebel”’s second volley hit the creature straight in the head and chest, the viral ammunition quickly disintegrating the creature into a puddle of sludge, almost blocking the area in between the buildings that it had tried to advance in with its biological waste remains.

In the meantime the Wulver Team had advanced on their right flank, coming dangerously close to our own lines, but apparently they realized they had been overstretching a bit, and thus decided to wait for the Highlander Team to advance alongside them.

It seemed however like our Warcor “Xin Hua” had noticed this advance as well, and was trying to grab some footage of it…

Recording of Freedom News Channel Reporter Xin Hua:

“This is Xin Hua for Freedom News Channel speaking; I report today right from the frontlines of the recently opened Wotan incident. It appears that a group of Caledonian Plunderers, most likely outcasts from their own clan with no ties to the Ariadnan nation, have infiltrated the “Dancing Panda” that had just arrived in the system, pretending to make a routine security check, but then proceeding to plunder and attack the inhabitants of this fine Space ship.”

“Rest assured though fine citizens of Yu Jing Empire, General Yasashii Fuyu has arrived in the sector on board of the “Dancing Panda” and is engaging the attackers as I am recording this. I have already heard the first shots being fired, and can now see a group of Caledonian Highlanders approaching in my direction…..I shall now zoom in so you can see what I’m talking about.”

*Camera changes view from Xin Hua to barely visible Highlanders advancing in the distance. Instead of zooming in a bright light blinds the screen for a second though*

“Oh…erm…that was the flash pulse for range finding….whoops…I think I blinded one of them there….Ehem, I mean I obviously just tried to heroically support our troops by blinding the leader of their Highlander Team…Glory to Yu Ji..” *BANG ZING*

“What the…damn! Someone is shooting at me!” *BANG ZING*

“There he is! Some sort of sniper….wait, let me zoom in on this..” *another bright light suddenly blinds the screen*

“Wángbādàn! Wrong button again….Erm…I mean…don’t worry fellow viewers, I have successfully blinded this attacker as well! Remember….don’t do this at home, your camera’s range finder can be dangerous if you are not careful…in this case however it was all for the betterment of Yu Ji…..”

ARE YOU SURE YOU WANT TO CANCEL THE RECORDING? [Y]ES / [N]O

Which resulted in the leader of their team as well as a Cateran Sniper that had tried to take out the Warcor being blinded and the rest of the Team dispersing to not get blinded as well.

On the other side of the battlefield the Caledonian Hacker woman tried to access the shuttle’s docking clamp control system, but just as she was plugging her connector port into the antenna, a humming sound grew louder, followed by a sudden electric discharge right into the hackers primitive hacking device and through its keyboard right into her body, roasting the poor soul where she had knelt down to connect. An animated .gif of a Raccoon shaking it’s stretched out index finger with a speech bubble saying “No No No…bad Caledonian! Bad!” could be seen on the slightly smoking Network Antenna Display.

I decided to use this opportunity to send Shen Jing’s Kuang Shi team to flank the distracted enemy, and spouting a number of pro Yu Jing Propaganda, and a couple or more…odd…choices of words, the Kuang Shi stumbled along the left flank alongside Shen Jing, and eventually around the corner to attack the Wulver Link Team.

The first Kuang Shi took out one of the Wulvers and wounded another before he got shot to bits.

The second Kuang Shi finished off the wounded Wulver and wounded another one, both with his Chain rifle and the following explosion of his own body as he got too heavily wounded by the returning fire to continue fighting.

The third Kuang Shi finished off the Wulvers, and even survived doing so.

Satisfied with the results of Shen Jing’s advance, I ordered Su Jian “Saberrider” to now advance on the right flank as well, with the danger of the Wulvers out of the way.

With Xin Hua’s camera filming every second of it, what happened next would eventually become the start of a new animated Movie Series, known as “Saberriders X Mega Justice Warriors”…

In its animal form “Saberrider” advanced alongside the right flank until it had some of the spread out Highlanders in its view. Without changing pace, he opened fire on the two Caledonians who could do nothing but trying to dodge the hail of bullets. They weren’t fast enough though and where ripped apart by the Spitfire.

Leaping for a buildings corner, transforming in mid jump, Saberrider, now in his humanoid form, opened fire on the blinded Cateran, as well as a Volunteer that had been taking cover on a nearby corner, and the surprised Caledonian followed their Highlander brethren’s examples and died on the spot.

Not satisfied with his advance, Saberrider then pushed himself away from the Buildings corner and dashed for the Antenna in the middle of the Battlefield, pummeling the blinded Highlander and the giant Cameronian with yet another salvo from his spitfire as he did so.

No match for the targeting sensors of the highly advanced Su Jian and the incredible talent of its pilot both the Cameronian and the blinded Highlander hit the ground dead as well, countless bullet holes all over their body.

On our left flank, just as “Kabuki Queen” vanished back into the shadows, Father Anderson advanced towards a container box on the roof he had been lying in ambush on until now, and opened fire on the 112 Emergency Unit that had apparently been on its way to help the roasted Caledonian Hacker woman. Sadly he would never make it in time as he himself got reduced to a puddle of sludge as Father Anderson viral rifle’s ammunition ended his attempt preemptively.

Intercepted communication between Caledonian Infiltrators, recorded by “凸(￣ヘ￣)”

“Erm…Mac Dunkan….what are our orders? Isabelle just got roasted, and our 112 is dead as well!”

“……”

“Mac Dunkan? Orders please, we’re dying out here….”

“……”

“Seriously man, this isn’t funny! Give us an order or we’re done for!”

“…..”

“Mac Pea, don’t bother, Mac Dunkan got killed by some crazy Mecha cat thing along with everyone else on the left flank, I’m on my way to your position! The Mecha cat thing as well I think by the way…”

“Holy goat balls….they are all dead?”

*suppressed laughter could be heard on the other side before the Volunteer manages to calm himself again* “Yes Mac Pea, they are all dead….didn ‘t stand any chance at all…”

“But….then…what….damn it, who is our commander now? Seamus?”

*another voice enters the communication*

“Don’t look at me lad, I’m not even in the command structure of this little disaster..”

“But then…”

“Calm down Mac Pea, wasn’t your grand grand father Earl of whatever and so? I guess that makes you the commander now…”

“What? But I didn’t even know him..oh screw this! Screw this to hell and back! RETREAT! We’re leaving!”

*A female voice chimes in* “But…erm…Sir? We’re suppressed from all sides….”

“Then shoot us a way out damn it, I’m leaving! Gogogo!”

*Sound of Heavy Machine Gun firing ends the recording*

Stunned by the extremely fast demise of his troops the enemy commander called for an all-out retreat of his forces, realizing that they’d have to find a different way off this ship. One of the Caledonians, a Highlander Grey, managed to take out Father Anderson with her Teseum bullets spewing Heavy Machine Gun, as she tried to free an escape route for her comrades, and the three remaining Caledonian troopers escaped off the battlefield together, a fourth one not so lucky and getting shot by “Nebel” on his attempt to reach the rest of the group.

Not having fired a single shot myself this time, I sat down on the stairs I had been guarding until now I sent Su Jian “Saberrider” in pursuit of the Caledonians and accessed the station’s security grid so search for any other potential escape routes the Caledonians could take.

Just as I was about to contact Madame Captain for advice, a name on the ships map came into my field of view….”Escape Pods”…..

Comments:

Aiaiai, that definitely wasn’t my wives best day….my Warcor blinding her advance on her left flank and even blinding her Cateran took away all the orders she would have needed to murder me with her Wulvers….but her long going grudge against the Warcor (he had done similar things before…) kept her from realizing that before it was already too late…and then Su Jian happened….

Chapter 2.6: Battle Report 10: Drivers High

May 30, 2017 / Yasashii Fuyu / Leave a comment

Comment:

https://wotan.warconsole.com/battles/yasashii-fuyu-vs-lady-wazabi-1496160944

With the first team of Caledonian „Security Personal“ taken care of, but with one of them apparently having escaped the cleansing of their remains, there was no time to idle around, so instead I left behind those tasked with cleanup and just took a few of the Celestial Guards with me.

Apparently another one of the Caledonian Teams had caused a huge commotion at the Quarters Area of the station where one of the JSA Regiments had been stationed for transport to the Wotan Gate, claiming that they were an illegal invasion force illegally transported to the Wotan Gate to attack…whatever…I didn’t really care about what silly excuse they had come up with for their accusations, now that we had cleaned up one of their teams, the other ones had to go as well, and quickly at that.

By the time I reached the described area of the incident, I could already hear chatter on the encrypted Yu Jing military frequencies as a Sergeant “Onizuka” asked for backup because he and a few of his comrades apparently got into a fire fight with the Caledonians.

Joining the frequency I quickly interrupted the plea for help with a direct “Don’t worry soldier, “Dancing Panda” Security is on its way, we’ll be there in 15 seconds. General Fuyu out.”

As I rushed down the streets a patch of silence remained the only answer to my com message, and just as I was about to repeat myself, wanting to make sure that the Seargent was still alive, a surprised sounding voice answered me “Did you say Fuyu Sir? As in Yasashii Fuyu?”.

With a smile on my face as I began to recognize the voice and finally connected the name to a face in my memory I joyfully answered “Indeed Onizuka, it’s me! Haven’t heard from you in a while, still riding that sweet machine of yours I hope?”

A spurt of laughter answered my question, followed by a slightly more controlled “Hell yeah, it’s the Taichou guys! Them Dogfaces are gonna shit their skirts once he’s here! Oh ehm…sorry Taichou, eh I mean General, I’m just glad to have you with us here in Wotan again….anyways, yeah I’m still riding my sweet little lady, wouldn’t trade her for the world, I even added new slicks to her feet and enhanced that rear end if you know what I mean!”

Restraining myself from laughing out loud because of the old memories flashing back from hearing Onizuka’s voice, I replied in as composed a manner as I could “Let’s keep the dirty talk for later alright? I’m in position now and can see you are already prepared to roll out, station security scans show that the enemy unit is amassing on the left flank of yours, why don’t you go for a little ride, greet them the old fashioned way, you know, like back in the day, I’ll be covering your flank and make sure no nasty surprises come around alright?”

“Wuhuuu just like the old times then, I’m on my way Taichou!!” and with that his voice was suddenly canceled out by loud blaring music from his speakers, which I could now hear even without the com, shouting “ADORENARIN zutto nagashite ….boku no hou ga O-BA- HI-TO shisou …..bakuhatsu shite hai ni natte mo….kono mama da to waratte’ru ne kitto…” as the Aragatou roared past below me on his bike, straight for the enemy lines, no sign of fear or hesitation in his movements at all.

The enemy had heavily deployed on the left flank, with their Commander and his Wulver Bodyguard, a Cameronian, a 112, and another one of those tin cans all cowered up there behind some form of cover. Apparently this team composition was their standard lineup for their “security inspections”, because on the right flank the security cam footage sent to my helmet display revealed another Volunteer Link with another Hacker, as well as a second Cameronian. One of the Volunteers seemed familiar, an old guy with blood smears all over his body and clear signs of a too close encounter with a chainrifle on his outfit.

Well at least that would save us the trouble of searching for the guy, as the survivor from last battle had apparently made it to his comrades position here, and was as it seemed just warning his colleagues that we weren’t going to play nice with them anymore….

My own team consisted of a 2 Celestial Guards, one of which was the old guy with the Mad Traps…definitely needed to remember talking to him later, the guy really seemed interesting, and the Spec Ops from before. Sadly I still hadn’t managed to see his face properly as he’d instantly assumed a new Holo Camouflage, this time looking like a Domaru, most likely to scare away too cuddly Wulvers or Cameronians…

Kanren Umibozu had advanced ahead on the right flank, securing a big storage room with his Mad Traps, and I myself had taken position on top of a roof in the center, with a Spit fire wielding Domaru on my left flank.

The two Aragatou, one of them Sergeant Onizuka with his Spitfire, where riding the streets below me ready to dash straight for the enemy lines.

Before Sergeant Onizuka made it to the enemy lines, I decided to clear a path for him. At first I tried to cover my position with a Smoke Grenade from the Celestial Guard next to me, but once again she failed to hit anything, the smoke grenade plopping through a nearby building’s window, most likely choking out anyone inside.

So instead of wasting more precious time, I simply advanced towards the edge of the building, activating the hilariously over the top “Mon Display” system of my custom made Hsien Armour, which promptly proceeded to project a giant holo image of my family crest above my back, mount Fuyi with snow falling from clouds above on it….basically proclaiming my position to anyone within 500 meters at least and painting a giant “Commander here, please kill him” on me….

I still wasn’t too sure why they had even added this idiotic system to my armour, maybe they thought that’s how Japanese liked to walk around in private, but for now, it actually served it’s purpose, as a Caledonian Cateran that had been hiding on a nearby roof instantly took the bait and opened fire on me.

Expecting just such an occurrence, I quickly sweeped my HMG over to his now revealed position, riddling the cocky Highlander with a shower of bullets before he could get a clear shot on me.

Apparently noticing my fire fight Sergeant Onizuka honked the horn on his ride twice In sympathy, openly proclaiming his arrival to the enemy just as he did with his loud music blaring through the speakers on his bike.

The Caledonians didn’t seem ready for the madness that was driving straight for them on the open road ahead of them, the first of the Commanders Wulver Bodyguard instantly getting taken out by Sergeant Onizuka as he cruised towards them, his Spitfire spewing death and destruction just as his loudspeakers spewed forth JPop Lyrics like there’s no tomorrow.

The Wulver behind the first victim instantly positioned himself before his commander, protecting him with his bulk and aimed at the Aragatou, but his swift movements where too quick for the Wulver, and in another hail of Spitfire rage the second Wulver hit the dust, revealing the shocked enemy commander right behind him.

Screaming his defiance into the Aragatou’s face the Commander opened fire on Sergeant Onizuka, but his bullets where wasted just like his defiant scream, drowned out by the roar of the bikes heavily tuned engine, the Spitfire and the music as Onizuka leaned out of the bullets path and sent the enemy Commander to a humiliating early grave with another burst from his Spitfire.

Not content with his work so far Sergeant Onizuka then slightly slowed down his bike so he could wedge in between the building and the heavy sake distillery at the back of it, the security feed from the station’s camera displayed on the inside of his helmet revealing to him that there was another Caledonian hiding behind there.

Apparently completely overwhelmed by the massacre that had just happened before his eyes, the 112 Emergency Unit Member couldn’t even muster a proper defense as Onizuka suddenly appeared in between the Building and the Distiller, instead trying to jump behind the construct for protection, but Onizuka was on a roll and he wasn’t about to let it end right there by a coward, and thus proceeded to riddle the cowardly 112 with another shower of his Spitfire.

Since Onizuka’s Aragatou Units motto always was “If you’re on a roll, you need to keep on rolling”, he instantly speed up again, driving around the Distillery and flanking into the Caledonian Mormaer which had until now been hiding behind a Wazabi Creations Freight Container.

But there was no hiding from Sergeant Onizuka while he was on a roll, and as he rode over the corpse of one of the Wulvers, he opened up with his Spitfire, taking care not to hit the Noodle Hut as well, and even though the Mormaer was more metal than woman, one of his rounds actually found it’s mark, wounding the Caledonian Nobility. Now most people would have been taken out by a shot like that, but the Highlander Nobility was made from sterner stuff and just gritted her teeth through the pain, readying herself for the end.

At this point however a roar could be heard that even managed to overpower the Aragatous bikes tuned engines and the music, as a Cameronian that too had been hiding behind the freight container suddenly jumped over the building, opening up on the Aragatou with his duo Chainrifles. Sergeant Onizuka tried to dodge the shower of shrapnel, but his new slicks weren’t made for gripping power on a carpet of blood and he thus slided slightly to the side, unable to avoid the full brunt of the attack.

With his bike ruined and his body bloodied all over, the darkness welcomed Sergeant Onizuka, but not before he could utter a satisfied “What a riiiide…”

The Mormaer could hardly believe her luck, but decided to make the best of it, leaning against freight container and taking aim at my position with her X Visor. As countless T2 slugs began riddling the wall in front of me I decided that caution was the better option right now and ducked for cover.

With the threat of my HMG out of the picture, the Caledonian Volunteer Team advanced along their left flank, set on revenging their fallen commander. A Smoke screen for security later, it was time for the team to deal with Kanren Umibozu and his Mad Traps….

Logged Communication near Security Antenna H-34N:

“Wait! Wait! Don’t move any further! Did you hear that? What the hell was that noise?”

“Sounded like a goat to me…”

“Yeah right Mac Pea, everything sounds like a bloody Goat to you, stupid goat fu..”

“Shut the fuck up everyone, I’ve had that exact same conversation before, and everyone I’ve had it with is dead now! Yes Angus here is right, those things are called Mad Traps, yes they sound like goats, yes they even look like goats, we need someone skilled at dodging goats to take care of them or we’re done for!”

“……..”

“How about the goat fu…”

“Die you scumbag! Fine fine, I’ll go!…but wait…did you just say they’re all dead? That was my brother you know? My brother is dead? What the fuck!?”

Conversation interrupted by the sound of triggered Mad Traps jumping into action, followed by the characteristic Baaaaaalaaargh sound of them detonating in a blob of instant hardening sludge

Apparently the Caledonian Army was full of goat dodgers, as this one too managed to easily dodge both Mad Traps, allowing the Volunteer Team to advance into the room, taking out Kanren Umibozu with their Chainrifle, the old man unable to dodge through the sheet amount of shrapnel flying everywhere.

The moment the Mormaer had to reload her primitive rifle, I instantly poked my head up, took aim, and finished off the already heavily wounded Noble woman with a salvo from my HMG. With the Cameronian having advanced to the middle of the battlefield the left flank was cleared now and I focused my attention on the right flank where the Volunteers had been advancing.

The moment I took my gaze away, a silhouette of a giant warrior suddenly slid away from a nearby building, dashing across the street towards the Cameronian at the center. The Aragatou next to it later swore that he saw the thing moving, and claimed it was one of them Hac Tao soldiers, but to be fair he had never seen one for real before, and neither had I, so it could have been anything really….maybe it was “Kabuki Queen” in a funny disguise…

Anyways, the silhouette seemed to scan the Cameronian from behind a wall with his hacking device, and once satisfied with his scan results, dashed around the corner, opening fire on the giant creature.

The Cameronian however had apparently already smelled the threat around the corner, and opened up it with its twin chain rifles, both of them taking each other out, the supposed Hac Tao instantly vanishing into thin air the moment his body would have hit the ground.

On the right flank in the meantime the Spec Ops revealed his true identity as he moved closer to the entrance of the storage room, and shot a dart from his Medkit at Kanren Umibozu in attempt to bring the old man back to his feet.

He even managed to hit Umibozu, but to his distress the Spec Ops had apparently picked the wrong vial, shooting a sleeping dart instead of an adrenalin dose, and Kanren Umibozu dozed off, the battle over for him.

I coordinated the Celestial Guard, Domaru and the Spec Ops to take a better firing position on the right flank, but even while the Spec Ops was still moving, the Cameronian on the right flank advanced towards him, ignoring the bullet I placed into his chest, and opened fire on the Spec Ops with both his Chainrifles.

I managed to make him pay with his life for this rash aggression, but the half human still managed to take out the Spec Ops in a hail of hot metal before he fell.

The Volunteers inside of the Storage room decided to make their last offensive, everyone else of their team already dead or bleeding out, but since the Celestial Guard had brought along his Mad Traps, a breakout wasn’t that easy….

————————————————————————-

Logged Communication near Security Antenna H-33N:

*Sound of a Mad Trap scanning the area can be heard*

“Aaaaangus…..do you hear that? Your lovers are calling for you!”

*Sound of a heavy object hitting flesh*

“Next time you say something like that it won’t be the stock of my Shotgun hitting you!”

“Oh come on Mac Seamus, where’s your humor eh?”

“My humor died out there next to your bloody commander! Don’t you get how serious this is? We’re all about to die here!”

“Yeah, but might as well do it with a smile on our face right?…and we all know nothing puts a smile on Mac Pea’s face like a goat’s Pe..”

“Fuck you guys! I’m out there dodging them Mad Traps once you’re finished ‘aving a giggle mates…”

*Sound of triggered Mad Traps jumping into action, followed by the characteristic Baaaaaalaaargh sound of them detonating in a blob of instant hardening sludge*

“Oi Mac Pea, dodging, not dogg….”

—————————————————————————

But once again their Goat hopping expert seemed more than capable for the job, dodging both the Mad Traps as well as the Celestial Guards bullet, allowing for the Volunteer team to advance outside of the room.

One of the Volunteers was within rifle range and opened up on me, but my heavy armour was more than a match for his primitive bullets. The goat hopper from before wasn’t as lucky though, the Domaru ripping him apart with her Spitfire while he covered for the rifleman’s attack.

Maybe I had gotten a bit too cocky a bit too soon though, as my armour didn’t prove that impervious to the armour piercing Teseum HMG round that suddenly hit me from the other door frame, shot by the Highlander Grey of the Team, wounding me and forcing me into cover. The old Celestial Guard used the Highlander’s focus on me to plant a bullet in her shoulder though, wounding the woman but not taking her our completely. A few more rounds of shooting at each other later however, the Celestial Guard had actually won, and the Highlander Grey lay bleeding on the ground. I seriously needed to have a talk with the guy…

Angry at their Team leader’s death the rifle man that had been running for cover before, now inched forward again, and opened fire on the Celestial Guard as well, but he too was no match for the seasoned veteran, who promptly took him out as well!

With the remainder of the Volunteers unwilling to run towards their dead like their comrades, I was just about to order the Domaru to clear the room, but the Celestial Guard below raised his hand and shouted in a slightly exhausted matter “Don’t worry….old Chuan here will handle it..” and with that he walked over to the entrance of the room, sticking his rifle around the corner, and pressed the trigger of his underslung light flamethrower, a loud female scream the acknowledgement that he had cleared the room as it slowly died down.

As we entered the room to dispose of the Caledonians and to recover our wounded, I once again had to notice that the bearded guy they had called Mac Seamus was missing! How the hell had he gotten away this time? As I was about to access the security camera footage of the area, the guy suddenly appeared right in front of me, waving at me with a smirk on his face.

I instantly punched the guy with my armoured fist, but all that did was distorting the Holo projection that had come from Kanren Umibozu’s Holo Projector, who was still lying unconsciously on the floor next to me……bloody Scotsman! He’d pay for that one!

the gentle winter

A Infinity and Hobby Blog

Story

Chapter 3.4: My Family

Chapter 3.3: Foxes in the Temple

Chapter 3.2: Crossing the red, bright, phantom Gate

Chapter 3.1: When the cicada cry

Interlude: Going Home

CHAPTER 2.12: BATTLE REPORT 16: OPERATION ONIGOKKO: LIKE GIVING A KANABO TO AN ONI

Chapter 2.10: Battle Report 14: Blood is on the dance floor

Chapter 2.9: Battle Report 13: Waiting in the Rain

Chapter 2.7: Battle Report 11: SABERRIDERS X MEGA JUSTICE WARRIORS: “THE BEGINNING”

Chapter 2.6: Battle Report 10: Drivers High