Judgement: Arc 1, Chapter 1 - Exodus

It was a quiet, peaceful night, out on the outskirts of one of the many port cities that lined the Caldean coast. On the outskirts of one of the mainland ports, it was calm. Then, as the clock struck midnight, from the port itself, came a train barreling out onto the tracks. The train was speeding, and it's perceived destination seemed to be a abandoned factory. 

On this calm day, all hell would break loose, and a trial would begin.

A trial, of judgement.

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"Hey Mike, wake up."

That was the first thing Michael heard as his eyes started to open up, looking at the dim train car that he was in. As he looks down at his hands, seeing the usual marks on his palms. His gray hair brushed to the side as he turned to look up.

"Yeah, I'm up, Joseph." Joseph, his friend and squad-mate, stood beside him, next to the train door. They had met in initial training, and were put in the same unit. Joseph has his signature duel revolvers filling both holsters on his uniform.

"Man, you look like death. You're like, 21, and you already have grey hair?" Joseph joked. Michael says, "I didn't choose my hair color, and why did you wake me up? We haven't made it to the target yet." Joseph explained, "Roy had some information to tell us, so I'd thought that you would want to know." Michael asks, while calibrating his radio, "What frequency is he on?" Joseph tells Michael, "The usual."

As Michael set up the radio, a voice came through. "I thought you would never wake up." It was Roy, who had joined their team later through training. "Since I'm still resting from last mission, I'll just be giving information over the radio, and I'll come pick you both up after everything's all fine and dandy." Joseph says, "Can I get a briefing too? I kinda… forgot about the exact details." 

Michael sighs, before saying, "Well, we got some organized crime hiding down in the factory. Wouldn't be a big deal, but they have some very high-tech weaponry, and some stuff that would be better if it didn't exist.

Joseph then asks, "So, we're gonna go clear it out, and then blow the whole thing up! Right?" Roy said over the radio, "Yes, we're gonna blow it up. You both have about 180 seconds until you get there properly, so make it count."

They activated their armor, and took out their respective weapons, with Michael wielding a extendable sword. Joseph told Michael, "Alright Magic Man, make sure not to overheat in your own flames." Michael grinned, "Don't shoot yourself either." The train slowed down. Michael pressed the palm of his hand on to the wall of the train. In a second, the wall was instantly blown out onto the ground, with what seemed to be armed gangsters running out from the shadows of the factory.

Michael and Joseph jumped off of the train, onto the burnt wall. One of the gangsters said, "Don't move! We'll fire!" Michael and Joseph nodded at each other, before moving into action. Michael quickly created a flame shield. The gangsters started firing at the wall of flames, but their bullets were melted before they could impact. Joseph rolled out from behind the wall, and began firing at the gangsters, while Michael fired bolts of flame from his hand. The gangsters fell one by one, before the entrance was cleared. Michael and Joseph both rushed inside. Before they went inside though, Michael noticed that in the area that they were in, there was a large area that was covered in tarp and which seemed to be something big.

Roy told them from the radio, "Alright, you need to plant one of the bombs in the primary production area, then one on the roof." They decided to take the production area first. They met light resistance as they went through the maze-like hallways, and eventually made it into the production area. As they were investigating the area for a good place to plant, they heard a loud thud from above them. 

From the ceiling descended a quad-pedal military robot, akin to a spider, and was about as wide and long as two trucks side by side. It had a turret on top, with a 40mm cannon mounted on it. It was controlled by a pilot.

Michael raised his hand forward, and within a instant, a large blast of fire burst from his palm, engulfing the robot, but it didn't seem to have a great effect. 

He jumped on top of the mech, and began trying to bait its turret. As he was doing that, Joseph aimed for it's legs, and fired at the weak spots. The legs began to break down, before Joseph jumped up into the air. While in midair, Joseph switched the ammo type in his gun to a custom type that he made. Joseph shot at the turret. The bullet that he shot had been magically ingrained with the ability to store metal in it, before dispersing it as shrapnel on impact with any non-metallic object.

The turret exploded, and Michael cut the hatch to the pilot area open. Michael grabbed the pilot, and tossed him to the side, before slicing through the control panel of the mech. After the destruction of the unit, Michael's blue uniform had been burned in some areas. Joseph grabbed one of the bombs, and planted it below the mech. They set off to the roof. Joseph said, while they were running, "Hey, did you ever think about checking the enemies comms?" Michael said, "No, but if you want to, I'm not gonna care." 

Joseph tuned into the enemies comms, and the first thing he heard was, "Crap, we're screwed! Release the mech, and maybe we can get out with our lives! Maybe boss won't kill us either." Joseph told Michael, "I think that they're about to release a mech, and I also think that they are going insane." Michael said, "Let's just plant the last bomb, and signal for Roy to get us." They finally made it up to the roof, where Michael would plant the last bomb. As they planted though, they heard very worrying and mechanical groans. They saw, that from where they had entered, jumped out a MK-10. A very recent development in technology, the MK-10 is a very large military mech, about 5 stories high, this one was outfitted with one arm having a rail gun. 

Michael quickly tuned into Roy, saying, "Roy, we need evacation now!" Joseph turned to Michael, saying, "I'm sure we manage, we've beat worse things!" After finishing that sentence, a 6ft tall metal bolt was shot out of the mech's rail gun and landed only mere feet away from Joseph. Michael yelled to Joseph, "Follow my lead!" Michael then turned to the mech, and began running on the roof to it. Joseph would've liked to asked how he would have followed his lead, but Michael was too far away at that point. Michael jumped on the robot's arm, and began cutting it. As he was cutting it, small turrets began sprouting from hatches on the robot's arm. Michael turned to hit them, but they were quickly shot out by Joseph. Michael continued to run up the arm. He dodged the projectiles that were being thrown at him, and ran up to the head of the mech.

Michael jumped up into the air, above the mech, before turning to the head, and saying, "Flame Magic: Eruption!" Fire began to envelop Michael's sword. He cut down the mech's head. As Michael jumped back onto the roof, a helicopter was hovering above them. A rope came out of it, and they heard Roy say, "Get up here! We are leaving!" They both grabbed onto the rope, and began climbing up. But, the mech wasn't done. The mech, now headless, got back up and jumped onto the roof. If it shot down the helicopter, this mission could be over.

Michael knew what he had to do. 

Michael leaped down from the rope and began running at it from the side. The mech started focusing it's shoulder-mounted machine guns at him. He leapt up in the air, and jumped on it's other arm. He began to run across the arm, cutting it apart with his sword, and then leaped into the hole in the mech's head. He cut a hole in it's core, and pooled all of the mana in his body to fire a blast of fire so hot, it can melt diamond. He blasted it into the mech's core, destroying the computer inside. He then jumped out and got down to the ground, right before seeing the giant mech fall to the ground.

Michael jumped back up on the helicopter, before saying, "I think I'm gonna take a rest." 

Eventually Micheal passed out on the floor of the helicopter, exhausted.

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In a building, far away from the action

Samuel was crawling to the back of his room, terrified. Out from the darkness emerges a man in a black suit, with a mask on like the doctors of the plague times had. The man said, "I'm disappointed, I did all of this, and you messed it up! You know how much time, effort, and funds it takes to get mechs! The strange man would press his hand against Samuel. Samuel said, "W-wait! Boss, trust me, I'll make it up to you!" The strange man said, "Make it up to me by dying." In a split second, the life seemed to drain from Samuel's eyes. 

From behind the strange man, a voice came.

"Come now, Doctor, wouldn't you think that to be too harsh?"

"Not at all, Lord Sigma, not at all."

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