RMB Chivenor, Devon
Day 6.75
"What does it mean, clear the Villages. We're holding them back sure, but that isn't the same thing." Brigadier Goodman stated. He had no desire to throw away good soldiers, which this Quest thing sounded very much like it would be. Fighting these creatures head on had been a losing endeavour. Creating safe zones had worked well. At least for now.
"Sir, I believe this Quest would only require myself, and possible Marine Fisher to clear the Villages. Backup would be appreciated Sir, but I expect to do the majority of the clearing." Colin really just expected to cull the Cursed by day and return to base for the night. Then rinse and repeat till the job was done. Anything on top of that was a bonus from his point of view.
The Quest did say the timeline was open.
It was even possible he could hole up in the Village, if he found a secure location.
"Yes Recruit, I would imagine you would believe that. I did mention the trouble I have with Royal Marine Commandos and their idea of a chain of command didn't I?
I may have a mutiny on my hands if I left them out of a mission like this. Especially since they have been ASKING to performance just this task themselves already."
"Return to barracks for now Recruit. I have Operation Planning to do"
"Yes Sir " Colin didn't salute, he didn't think he could without fucking it up.
He did make an effort to about-face and exit with a certain amount of military decorum though.With that he made his way back to the barracks, and to Sergeant Connelly.
"Well, what did the base Ruperts have to say Recruit? Get what you want did you?"
"Not really sure Sarge. The Brigadier sent me back here while he did Operation Planning. Not sure what that means"
This seemed to cheer that Sergeant up no end. "what that means Recruit is that we may actually get to do the job we are paid to do, which at the moment means that anything that we don't like the looks of, we make it lay down. Clearing out Wrafton and Braunton has been a priority of mine since all this started. cant have a nest of those things sitting on our doorstep''.
Colin had to agree with the Sergeant. He basically had the same attitude towards the Cursed as himself. Make them all lay down and be good Cursed''
''So what do i do now Sarge?''
"You? Nothing Recruit. Hurry up and wait has been the backbone of all armed forces for centuries lad. I however, will be letting the rest of the boys know that we will be going back to work clearing buildings."
Colon headed to the common room. A few Marines were sitting around talking, Hudson and Jonesy among them.
"So what did Higher want with you Braithwaite. Something to do with your superpowers I imagine?" Asked Jonesy.
It sounded like he was being made fun of, but their expression all looked honest enough.
"Brigadiers Planning an Op for us I think. If not, I'll be headed into the Village on my own"
"Like hell you'll be going on your own!" snapped Hudson. "We've been wanting to go in and clear out those Corpses for days!"
He was angry alright. But at the situation, not at Colin. These were men of action. In more normal times they'd be off training somewhere, to blunt their killer instincts.
Colin held up his hands in surrender. "Alright alright I guess you can tag along. Though there was some Army blokes I was thinking of asking?" His mock thought look got him a magazine thrown at him and a lot of laughter.
RMB Chivenor, Devon
Day 7
The new day brought no new news of a clearing mission. So Colin and Fish got on with their quests.
[Contender Daily Quests Available.
Physical Training - [Heartrate] - 0/60 minutes.
Weapon Training - 0/60 minutes
Nothing about culling Cursed today, maybe because of the upcoming mission? Who knows.
The other Quests were hard enough to complete. Raising their heartrates took a lot more effort. As usual, the Sergeant had the solution.
"Fight each other. After Marine Fisher's sudden need of a weapon yesterday, I got the engineer boys to whip up some training weapons to use. They're still working on a few Broadswords. Those lads are as bored as us right now, so I asked them to knock out anything they could think of that you could use."
" I dare say you'll have quite the armoury in the days to come, if they can quit arguing over the merits between mid and high carbon steel."
He handed them each a steel training broadsword. Well balanced, though without an edge. They would do a lot of damage if they struck a vulnerable spot.
"Don't get too excited though, Higher doesn't want either of you to hurt each other. So you're gonna have to sheath them in these." The Sergeant handed each of them a padded sword sheath that slide over the blade section and secured at the handle.
I was a bit worried there for a moment thought Colin.
The strike came swiftly at waist height. He blocked it and countered with an overhead strike while stepping to the side. His actions were fluid and instinctive. Years of muscle memory developed in minutes.
"Move those feet damn it. Be agile against an agile opponent" Sergeant Connelly kept up s barrage of instructions, at a speed that should have been overwhelming.
Sergeant Connelly in reality was barely keeping up with the two Contenders.
Their movements quickly became a blur.
Marine Fisher's superior training gave her enough edge to equal Recruit Braithwaite's real-world experience.
Colin however chose to be bold in his actions. He really wanted to push himself, to see what he could do. Maybe because they had gotten themselves an audience as well, Marines had shown up to watch the show, staying well back of course.
After blocking, he threw himself backward into a flip, completing it with ease and widened the distance between himself and Fish. He then launched himself, effectively a rapid step forward at a diagonal to the left, repeating the action to the right in a zig-zag pattern, attacking with a Flurry of strikes. Marine Fisher could do nothing but block the strikes.
"OK that's enough for now" The Sergeant called. Colin stepped back panting, not having felt this tired ever, as far as he knew. Fish looked equally exhausted.
"God knows how you two could go at it like that for so long I have no idea. Just over an hour going at that pace should be impossible. But the boys got a good show."
[Contender Daily Quests Complete.]
Physical Training - 75/60.
Weapon Training - 75/60
[Contender Bonus Title Reward - "Train Together, Fight Forever".
Strength Increased
Endurance Increased
Intelligence Increased
Constitution Increased
Agility Increased
Weapons Upgrade
Combat Equipment upgrade
Well Done Contenders
The God's Are Pleased
"Whoa, that's a big fucking upgrade"
At that moment Sergeant Connelly received a call on his radio. His earpiece prevented hearing the other side of the conversation, but the Sergeant looked exceedingly amused by what he heard.
"By any chance did that "Big fucking upgrade" include a weapons upgrade? "
" Yes Sarge it did. Mainly because of something called a Title bonus " Colin looked to Marine Fisher to confirm she had also gotten the Title bonus. She nodded, with a somewhat shocked expression on her face.
" That was our fine Royal Engineers on the radio, informing me that all the weapons they were constructing have completed themselves. The Engineers are both highly impressed either the quality of the weapons, and mightily pissed that they no longer have a task to be going on with"
"I think we're going to need a new Armoury Sarge" Marine Jones commented.