The confines of the Iron Maiden were to be dreaded even by the bravest of n; that is why it was known as the Mother of the Bellarium.
Even with all the safety thods, even with the redesigned drug, even with the Commander and the Sergeant putting their hearts and souls into this machine, as well as the drug recipe that took so much effort to produce, there was always this shadow of worry and expectations.
As he stepped in and got strapped, there was no backing out. Actually, he needed to do this more than the others; that's why he spoke to Elena about this behind Biscuit's back.
Funny! He heard all sorts of drama about married life from Dusty, and now he's committing the taboo by not discussing big decisions like these with his partner in life.
He had been stuck as a private auxiliary for too long, and he had taken the Auxiliary Trial before. He needed it to be more than that—maybe to rise to corporal one day and undergo grunt training. He wanted this for the betternt of the family he found himself building, and he took it upon himself to do better, to be better.
As he was injected, nothing happened at first. It took a while for him to feel the dizziness that Patch spoke about. He adjusted himself twice and took in a deep breath before feeling a tingling sensation at his fingertips. One side of his head started feeling heavier, and the more he tried thinking, he found his thoughts more difficult to organize.
Then he heard a buzzing sound followed by a crisp ringing that grew thinner, as if trying to form into a sharp blade and pierce the central part of his brain.
The goggles before his eyes suddenly brightened up, causing him to quiver, but the cage that held him forced him still, and he felt an electrical sensation running through his body.
After what felt like an hour in his state of lucid awareness, he started drifting deeper into an altered state of consciousness, and the world around him started to feel like he was being imrsed in thick, heavy liquid. After that had passed, he felt as if he had gone through that liquid like a single droplet passing through a filter, and felt a strange sensation around him.
The sll of dust!
The faint light of an exhausted lamp.
Creaking floor, poorly installed!
Wooden interior and…
BOOM!
… artillery bombardnt that shook the earth around him!
He looked around closely, and a sense of familiarity struck him. This was a battlefield, a trench base to be exact, an underground bunker where soldiers hid from bombardnt.
It was empty, as if it were newly dug, save for a table in the center, which had nothing and looked totally unremarkable.
The only problem was that he was alone, and he had nothing on him. But the mont he thought of his orders or any task he was supposed to do, a voice ca from behind him.
"Private! Why are you standing here? We need your help up there!"
He turned, his heart almost jumped out of his chest, as the figure standing behind him all this ti was a Justiciar.
Black coat, black arched cap, a golden Solarium dal under his collar, and a deathly stare, staring deep into his soul. His face was old and white like a ghost, likely in his seventies, but if looks could kill, the lone good eye of that Justiciar should have taken his life already. As for the other eye, it was covered with a bionic implant, glowing nacingly like the crystal muzzle of a blazer.
"Orders, Justiciar!" Hamrhead imdiately saluted, right fist ahead, showing utmost compliance towards the Justiciar, a man who would have blown his brains out in a mont's notice if he was suspected of desertion.
The grim-faced commissar approached Hamrhead with a nacing stare. Hamrhead swallowed hard, almost shaken from the unnerving face of death staring viciously at him.
"Private, pick up your blazer from the table." The Justiciar said and beckoned Hamrhead to move.
"SIR!" Hamrhead banged his chest and felt pain reverberating through him.
He turned to the table, fully aware that it was empty, but if a Justiciar was telling him to pick a Blazer from it, he would pick a blazer from it even if he was going to pretend to.
But as if magic were real in this world, Hamrhead found not only one blazer, but three of them: a standard-issue semi-auto blazer, a smaller full-automatic blazer, and a longer overcharging blazer.
He didn't think and picked the semi-auto blazer as it was the one he usually used.
"Now go!" The Justiciar spoke, and pulled out his Blazer that had probably killed more n-at-Arms than xenos or heretics, "For Sol Imperius! For the Solarium!"
"YES, SIR!"
Hamrhead's legs started moving, and he rushed towards the doorway, running in the dark trenches he found himself in. But as soon as he felt lost, the Justiciar appeared behind him.
"Sol Imperius lights the way!" The old Justiciar spoke and aid his Blazer up, squeezing the trigger, with a powerful blast, causing half his blazer's charge to deplete.
A red glowing ball of light started rising in the air, and the world was lit in a red hue.
"HAAAAAAA!"
Hamrhead turned and felt a presence rushing through the array of trenches ahead of him.
"HERETICS! SEND THEIR SOULS TO THE FIRES OF HELL, PRIVATE!"
The Justiciar shouted with zeal, but rather than rushing ahead, he took cover as his blazer was clearly overheated, aning that whatever ca through that trench, Hamrhead had to fight it alone.
The odds were not bad; the trench was tight enough, filled with covering positions, and he didn't need to rush out since this position was more advantageous for defense, so he imdiately took cover ahead of the Justiciar and braced for the coming onslaught.
With a war cry, one mad figure rushed through the trench with an axe raised, wearing a pointy red hood, and a red brand pulsating on his bare chest.
A Cultist!
"Filthy Satanists!"
Hamrhead knew the Brand of Hell the mont he saw it, and without an ounce of hesitation, he fired his Blazer with a thundering recoil, hitting the cultist right in the center of the brand.
The cultist slowed down, fell to his knees, and shouted sothing that was muffled by the sound of incoming Blazers.
Two more cultists appeared, red hoods and all, the sa aesthetics as before, but these ones were using corrupted blazers, firing demonic charges.
Hamrhead took cover and changed his stance, lying down to erge from a different place from his cover and imdiately peeked with his blazer, taking two quick shots at where he assud the cultists were coming from. This must have pushed the two cultists behind cover, so he kept shooting as he stood up again and switched cover before they could erge.
The two cultists moved up again at the sa ti, covering for each other. However, Hamrhead positioned himself behind an advantageous angle so that only one of the cultists would have a line of sight at him, and vice versa, of course.
The mont the cultist got out of cover, Hamrhead fired his Blazer thrice, hit twice, and retreated at once. The other cultist tried to charge him beyond cover, but Hamrhead imdiately charged at a critical angle, bashing the cultist's weapon and aiming his Blazer from point-blank range.
BZZZ-CRACK!
The last of the three cultists fell, but Hamrhead knew there had to be more. If those demon worshipers had breached the trench with no defenders to be seen along the area he scoured, they must be coming in hordes.
"Good job, Private."
The Justiciar, however, got out of cover, walked to Hamrhead without taking any cover. His steps were weird and arrhythmic, unlike normal footsteps, so Hamrhead took a glance at the Justiciar's legs to see that one of them was a peg leg, made from a rifle stock.
The Justiciar reached Hamrhead and signaled him to follow, which Hamrhead did while making sure his corners were covered.
"Sir?"
"There is useful gear here, Private. Since you did all the work, I'll let you pick one."
The Justiciar stood by a small table that Hamrhead could swear wasn't there right before he turned, and on it were three pieces of gear: a bayonet, a blazer cell, and an optical sight.
"Just one, Justiciar?" Hamrhead asked, as he could really use all of those useful items.
"Just one, Private." The Justiciar grimaced nacingly as his words carried a hint of a bloody threat.
"Yes, sir." Hamrhead replied and reached out for the blazer cell imdiately, but he paused and went for the bayonet instead.
The Justiciar grunted and took the other two items, slapping the optical sight onto his pistol and the blazer cell on his belt. He then aid his pistol up and shot another flare into the air.
"MOVE AHEAD! GO GO GO!"
Hamrhead was urged to move once again by the grim-faced Justiciar, pushed forward through the bloody trenches to face more cultists, demons, and abyssal horrors.
Upon every stop, the Justiciar would find three items lying around, allowing Hamrhead to choose one, then hoard the other two for himself.
✧ ✧ ✧ ✧ ✧
The carnage unfolded on the hologram, Hamrhead fighting through trenches like a one-man army, going through different scenarios, using different tactics, picking up weapons, and bracing for bombardnt when it was aid at his position.
Adam watched every action with analytical judgnt, perceiving how the simulation operated, often changing the view to get a better grasp of the fight. Elena and Biscuits stood silently the whole ti, one trying to discern the performance of Hamrhead while the other was watching with worry.
As for Kave and Buzz…
"GO, HAMRHEAD! GET THEM, BRO!"
"OH! WATCH OUT! WATCH OUT!"
"YEAH! HE MADE IT!"
The two turned it into a cheering troupe for Hamrhead, minus the jerseys and the beer. But right at Hamrhead's 7th round in the Roguelike run of the Iron Maiden, he was cornered by the enemies he was facing in a dead-end trench branch, and was blasted with a bomb.
The Iron Maiden shook, probably from the imrsion feedback that went through Hamrhead's body, making everyone turn to it at the sa ti. Biscuits ran towards the Iron Maiden, stopping before touching anything, as she knew better than to abruptly eject Hamrhead from the simulation.
Adam, on the Iron Maiden's terminal, nodded to her, indicating that it was safe to open. She imdiately unlocked the doors of the Maiden, removed the cage, let the binds loose, and waited as Adam lowered the cage from the terminal.
Hamrhead's appearance looked as if he had been through a trench battle without the blood and dirt that ca with it. There were burn marks on his body from where the cage was holding him, since it simulated the physical trauma inside the simulation through electric shocks, sothing that was both brilliant and horrifying at the sa ti.
Everyone helped Hamrhead get down as he was put on the ground, lying down. Patch used a dical flashlight to check on his eyes, nostrils, throat, and ears before asking the others to help move him upstairs.
He was mostly conscious, but the drug and the virtual dream he was subjected to induced too much strain on his brain, causing him to need a full hour of recovery and one precious mug of instant coffee just to get him up.
Hamrhead then recounted his experience inside the Iron Maiden, and he was unsettled by the fact that he died from a bomb as a trauma from a past life started to echo in the reinforced part of his head.
"It's alright, you have done exceptionally well." Adam patted his shoulder, "And I think you exceeded the standards of an auxiliary man."
"That's… good." Hamrhead said and looked at Elena, waiting for her to say sothing.
She looked away, dreading monts like trying to say sothing nice without it sounding sexual, so she just followed Adam's lead.
"You have done well." She said, looking past Hamrhead through the window, trying not to make eye contact with him.
Both Hamrhead and Biscuits, who were sitting beside him, looked up at Elena, eyes wide from the complint they just heard, but as she sensed their gazes, she stared at them viciously, causing them to avert their eyes.
Well, not that hopeless! Adam saw the exchange and let out a chuckle. He then turned to the notes he took from Hamrhead's feedback on the simulation and decided to do so tweaks later.
But before that, he had sothing more important to do. Miniature Summoning was on schedule this afternoon since Elena had no drilling.
Adam dragged her along to his workbench, holding a miniature in each hand, and showed her what he had in store. The first was for a chanic like herself, which put a smile on her face, but the mont she saw a Fanatic on his other hand, her face turned sour, as to be expected.
After so persuasion, she followed Adam outside the base, dragging her steps, while Adam was walking very excited for a man who was just about to et an Urdic Fanatic.
But even as the summoning was fated to go well, thanks to Adam's influence over his summons, none of them expected that their days of peace in this isolated base were soon to be over.
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