Arknights: When Hunters Meet (A Tacet x Projekt Red novel)

Chapter 2 - Of the Weary and the Dead

Still it felt wrong, and oh so wrong it went.

In a few years it had gone rampant as I had suspected. By the time I was in my late teenage years there was already an outbreak of horribly mutated beasts, killing and pillaging. Spreading upon the entirety of our protean world. Abhorrent creatures that brought forth with their menace an evolved and highly infectious strain of rabies as well. So much for those medical breakthroughs in our benefit.

''They really did play God.'' I thought to myself.

The hands of many played God, and it was to be our downfall. They couldn't contain what they had created. More so even than what I knew of at the time. They couldn't stop their breeding and evolution. As highly trained extermination teams were going more often missing during their missions, open war took its place. All while a decadent and divided society exacerbated by the corrupt Authority made everything so much worse. To the point that an entire region seceded from the Authority, prompting a war between ourselves. I realised I drew the short straw with the timing of my birth.

I was born in time to experience the fall of Humanity.

''Strong men create good times. Good times create weak men. Weak men create bad times. And bad times create strong men.'' I thought. And I just happened to have nailed myself in the worst times.

It was a decision of good fortune that I decided to join the armed forces early in my late adolescent years. Just a year before the onset of open war and conscription. Being a volunteer gave me many perks. Though at the time I would never have believed I would live so long. Quite frankly I thought I would have the time of my life and probably die too early by a shrapnel to the head. Heh, looking back though I would have likely died more from a claw to the head, considering the kind of war that was coming.

It was just a month before I would leave for my boot camp training that I looked upon the sky and saw many fiery dots plunging back to earth.

''The orbitals...''

We were being cut off. Exiled on our own world. Rejected by our own kind for our choices and our regression as a society. There were enough hardships pressing on our race out there, they didn't need our own. After that I would have no more leave from the military. The war would escalate to engulf us all.

It was all to the point and noble at first. Defeat the mutants and the monsters. Protect the population and secure infrastructure assets. Until it slowly eroded our morals. War was Hell after all, who would charge us because we did what we had to do? Or because we executed a few suspected beast sympathizers? More lines were crossed as the war was getting more desperate for us. My squad and I were smug. And I was young and stupid. Quite an eager and inexperienced little shit I could say.

But I had my buddies, and we covered for each other. That's how I stayed alive longer than most.

-Sigh.

Yeah... than most.

I knew each and every one of my three squad mates even before the war. We were an odd bunch that strangely found common ground as different as we were. I would survive, but I would lose all three of them in the first hellish eight years of cutting through that struggle.

Phesius, he was an old and close friend. Part of the same unit while not part of my squad. I had long-lost contact with him when his squad went missing in action. I would miss his council and the long, even philosophical conversations we had.