4 Chapter 4: Horrors of War

Entering the portal, Adriano felt as if he the world under him had shifted, a retch climbed his throat unable to escape outside. After stabilizing he looked around and found himself in a different world altogether.

The sky had turned entirely purple with billowing thick black smoke belching from the burning buildings and vehicles strewn across his view like toys of a capricious god. The air itself had turned fowl with a mixture of burning fat and charcoal assaulting his nose. He had already smelt something similar once, when a bully had used a lighter to burn off his mustache.

The retch resurfaced and got free as Adriano realized the cause for that smell. In the plaza next to the portal dozens of people had turned to smoldering black statues still reaching towards him with their arms, as if they knew their salvation had just been at hand's reach. In particular one of the corpses belonged to a thin figure shielding a smaller one in her arms, both of them disfigured beyond recognition. However, a small peluche still held in the little one's hand survived the attack, many different emotions mixed within his heart seeing the little teddy bear hanging from its dead owner. The main one being wrath.

The other members of Folgore barely stopped one moment, offering their respects to the dead before continuing. One guy beside him even slapped his shoulder, "Move!".

He wanted to retort. However he understood why everybody was in a rush, the more they spent here, the more people would end the same. Reluctantly he looked away and followed his comrades towards the danger. As they ran, Adriano noticed many pale faces leering at them from the shadows of hollowed buildings.

Mew's voice chirped in his ears. "by the way. You wanna hear your briefing or not?" before waiting for a reply Mew simply started reading. "Experience your first battlefield and survive. Any civilian survivor safely brought back to a teleportal will add to your rewards." Adriano grimaced at the words chosen, "survive" as if living on was already at the limit of his capabilities. Looking around for civilians to save, a burning building caught his attention. Following with his eyes its plume of smoke, Adriano saw a tear-shaped purple aircraft heading straight to his little group.

Apparently, somebody had noticed where he was looking, because suddenly a loud cry exploded next to him. "Wail!" someone pointed in the direction of the oddly shaped aircraft issuing an order. "Take cover!" Like ants being showered, almost everyone scampered off taking refuge inside the surrounding buildings. Some braver people aimed their weapons at the enemy letting off a storm of bullets, while others set up portable shields.

Suddenly from the bottom of the wail, little-eggshaped objects appeared seemingly growing out of the metal before detaching and heading towards the ground at a dangerous speed. When the first egg touched the ground, it exploded with a powerful sonic blast. Any window or glassware which had survived until then suddenly vibrated before transforming in shrapnel bombs. The closest to the explosion even fell to the ground clenching their ears in pain and foam out of their mouths.

The aforementioned portable shields formed a 2-meter tall wall of pure blue light. Every deployed shield linked to the other quickly forming a line of defense. When the vibrations impacted the shelter, they created ripples on its perfect surface before disappearing. As the bullets didn't manage to bring the wail down, one of the bulkiest soldiers started assembling a series of tubes he had been carrying on his back.

As Adriano observed the man's actions from the false safety of a devastated window a few meters back, he couldn't identify the weapon in his hands, however, as the man was about to fire, the wail exploded in a purple inferno. Whizzing through the scraps, a way more human-like jet made its glorious appearance.

"A longsword!" erupting in a cheer the soldiers waved their hands at the aircraft, unbeknownst to them, even the pilot was waving at them. The fire group from before started taking apart their little makeshift fortification as people came out of hiding.

"Advance!" With another shout, the people obediently continued forward. Some smaller groups detached looking for achievements.

"Achievements and honors are part of the reason why everybody is risking their life," explained Mew. "Any completed mission, order successfully carried out, and even enemy elimination will earn you honors, think of them as a currency. Instead, achievements are for great actions like taking down a wail only using a knife or saving a VIP, the more achievement you have, the higher your rank will be and the more items you'll be authorized to buy with honors. As an example, the longsword you just saw require one to be a colonel, roughly equivalent to ninety achievements and to use up to a hundred thousand honors to buy."

Adriano suddenly felt like following those detached groups, that was before realizing that great rewards require sacrifices. He wasn't going to risk his life until he had a certain degree of confidence in not dying at the first danger. Suddenly the group halted, looking at the people in the front he noticed they were looking forward in horror, however, he couldn't see anything.

"Oh shit," Mew's voice once again appeared startling Adriano. "The other AIs sent me a single line. Run, it's an ambush." Adriano froze like the others, the surroundings dark windows and empty doors suddenly became ten times scarier. The situation of stasis lasted only for a moment more, then the bulky man carrying the tubes on his back exploded in a red mist, hit by something too fast to even register in Adriano's eyes.

Everybody broke off in a mad run while mysterious lights and bullets reaped their lives in various ways, from being nailed to the ground with giant crystal spikes to melting like ice cream left under the sun. Again, some tried to return fire, and while it was impossible to know whether they had managed to hit anything, it was sure that their defiance hadn't passed unnoticed to the attackers, as they quickly became the focus of the fire.

Using the chance bought by his comrades in blood, Adriano ran to a side alley disappearing in the shadows. His heart loudly beating in his chest like African drums. "What sort of nightmare have I landed in?!"