NoveLight ™
“Briefing file check complete, data preparation complete…damn it, doesn’t look like there’s anything to hide…check the cleaning status of the command and control room and the conference room!”
“No issues!”
“Five minutes until Dagger team’s landing!”
“Check the transport plane’s landing route and send the vehicles for our distinguished guests! Make sure there are no loopholes!”
End of June, somewhere in Canada. Clear weather, Dagger team landing scheduled at the base.
The golden epaulet on the shoulder of the base commander, also known as Brigadier General Aaron Della Sovitch, sparkled continuously under the ceiling lights, as if it never rested. His partially balding scalp reflected the same shine, but the beads of sweat trickling down it glittered even more brightly.
In a way, this could be considered natural. Since the start of the Dark Winter crisis, until the end of the great war, Aaron had been stuck in Canada almost by force, thinking only of the safety of the facility, leading a relatively peaceful life compared to others. The president’s call, however, was a bolt out of the blue.
‘Now that the great war is over, they want to clean up the front yard. They let the reports I sent slide all this time, and now they’re sending these terrifying people. They should have told me earlier…’
Naturally, Aaron hadn’t been neglecting reports up to this point.
Since the outbreak of the Dark Winter crisis that escalated into a full-scale war, a few years passed. As the northeastern, southwestern, and western parts of the United States were rapidly reclaimed with the help of the Shadows, a relatively small number of Shadows had appeared near Aaron’s base in Canada – this, too, was a matter to report.
But, as one might expect, his reports had been dismissed with little concern during the urgency of the great war.
The reason was simple. Amid the endless flood of reports about shortages of almost every conceivable resource across the United States, how would upper management have reacted upon reading a report that said, ‘A few odd things happening, but everything is running smoothly’?
‘They’d probably think everything’s fine.’
And indeed, that’s exactly what happened.
Thus, Aaron had been able to get through the Dark Winter crisis in relative peace compared to others, but now, it was no longer the same.
The Dagger Task Force, the sharpest spear of Icarus, the death knights, the dogs of Eden… These individuals, infamous and intimidating, were now landing in Canada’s forward base, with weapons of destruction equivalent to tactical nuclear warheads.
Though he knew it was unlikely, if the situation escalated to the worst-case scenario, he had to be prepared for the possibility that the base might literally be flattened.
Not metaphorically, but physically.
“Dagger team landing complete. Currently circling the runway.”
“Make sure to take them this way. The duty personnel should prepare a simple refreshment. We have a facility next to the newly built research lab that can accommodate more than ten people…what’s the purpose of this facility?”
“It’s a high-value material storage. However, currently, all materials are being used for construction as they arrive, so it's an empty space no one is using. It has heating, ventilation, and power, so if we convert it into lodging, it should only take about 3 hours to make it livable.”
“Good. Most of the issues are resolved. Let’s move to the conference room.”
The heavy sound of military boots echoed through the entire hallway.
Various department heads responsible for the base’s operations were already present. Aaron exchanged salutes with them before taking his seat—normally, it would be his job to receive the duty briefing, but this time it was entirely different.
A few minutes later, with a heavy thud of a doorknob turning, nine people entered the room. The pleasantries quickly ended, and the representative of Dagger team shook hands with the base commander.
“Nice to meet you. I am Anthony Owens, the operation team leader of Dagger team.”
“Nice to meet you. I’m Brigadier General Aaron Della Sovitch, responsible for this base. Thank you for coming such a long way.”
“It’s my pleasure. Once we’re ready, I’d like a briefing on the current situation at the base. Is that possible?”
“No problem. Please take a seat.”
The first impression of Dagger team was… ordinary.
It wasn’t entirely ordinary, considering there were two manifested individuals among them, but when one considered the fact that these were the very same individuals who had killed over 100,000 people during the five-year-long Great War with gunfire, bomb guidance, and many other methods, one could indeed call them ordinary.
However, beyond that, there was an undeniable… smell. The smell of death. It wasn’t something that could be washed off easily, almost as if it had soaked into their very souls—like the faint, acrid smell of gunpowder mixed with dirt.
Aaron unconsciously felt his throat tighten. Nine people—just nine—had wiped out entire divisions.
Feeling an inexplicable pressure weighing down on him, he picked up the remote control and started manipulating the holograms.
The briefing began.
“Well then… let me briefly go over the current status of the base.”
The details of the base slowly began to appear.
The electronic documents, which had been dryly written in sentence form, now turned into a voice as they came out of Aaron’s mouth, and everyone began nodding. The details, which had been reported but never thoroughly checked, started to be revealed. This was even more true given that the Shadows had only appeared around one or two years ago.
The more the facts were revealed, the more the expressions of the Dagger team changed in peculiar ways. One of the key points of suspicion—whether the base commander had any ties to Artemis—turned out to be nothing more than a smear. This was easily disproven by the fact that the base had been attacked and destroyed just a few weeks ago.
In other words, it was purely by coincidence that Artemis Technologies, which had fled, had set up shop near the base that Aaron was in charge of.
It was truly a tangled situation.
“…That’s the general story.”
“That’s quite a series of complications. Still, it’s fortunate that the presence of the Shadows helped get through the crisis somehow.”
“Indeed.”
And so, the accusations were cleared up.
But that wasn’t the end of it. Aaron moved through the slides and began explaining the base and the surrounding operational zones. He briefly covered the base’s structure and then moved on to introduce various areas, such as the shopping mall, customs, coastline, research facilities, and lighthouse.
The Dagger team, with slightly less interest, checked the situation with indifferent expressions, storing some information on Artemis before nodding.
After about 20 minutes, Aaron sat back in his chair and spoke.
“Now that I’ve provided most of the data… may I ask you a few things?”
“Of course.”
“The order I received directly from President’s office allows us to support you without any issues, but I find the purpose of the mission somewhat strange. Can I ask about that?”
“You’re referring to the part that says ‘complete annihilation of Artemis,’ correct?”
“Exactly.”
“Hmm.”
A brief exchange of glances.
After a few seconds, Aaron saw a refined lady, one who appeared to have no reason to be on the battlefield, walk out next to the operation team leader and deputy, and sit down. It was Christopher ‘Specter’ Laurentina, one of the two manifested individuals responsible for Dagger team’s firepower.
She spoke.
“First, I’ll make it clear that you don’t need to worry about ‘how we’ll accomplish that goal’—none of you here need to be curious about that. Does anyone not understand what I mean?”
“…No.”
“Good, then.”
In other words, it was classified.
With a satisfied look on her face, Laurentina pulled a folder from inside her jacket, containing a few photos. There were two photos seemingly taken by a UAV, and next to them was a photo of Eugene, clearly marked with the word “classified” in English. The most notable thing was that the weapon in the UAV photos looked eerily similar to Eugene.
Naturally, Aaron could only stare at the photos—he didn’t know what connection Eugene had with the Dagger team. The reason was simple: he had no access to the Icarus database, nor to the personal details of the task force members.
But once he knew, things would change.
Laurentina spoke a few more words about this, and Aaron began to feel a sense of dizziness before speaking.
“I think I now understand why you came all the way here.”
“Well, the rookie has officially returned, so there’s no need to worry about that. What’s important is that Dagger team is here, and we need your support. It’ll be a short time, but we’re counting on you, General Aaron.”
“It’s an honor for us.”
The handshake ended.
However, that didn’t mean the schedule was finished.
Logan, who had been silent up until now, spoke.
“Most of the discussions seem to be over, but I have one request.”
“Speak. What is it?”
“I know that the base has a new prototype weapon… I heard it’s based on the rookie. Can I check it out?”
Here it comes.
Aaron nodded, indicating his approval.
The meeting with Dagger team ended there.
“Living in a damn stinky place, huh.”
“Hm, so this is the weapon you’ve heard so much about. What should we call it? Mecha rookie?”
“Archetype. There’s another one of the same model as the one that came to the gear box last time. What’s going on here?”
“Oh, so you already knew about the ‘rookie’ there. ‘Archetype,’ huh? That’s a pretty fun name.”
“Ah, really! You all just came to give advice, huh!?”
Eugene could not be happy.
The younger member of Dagger team was starting to raid the gear box with a grinning expression.
"Just when I thought everything was over after sinking all those Union forces who had been wandering around the West into the waters off Seattle, you ended up picking up a gun again."
"That's how the world works. I wonder what’s next… After we finish off Artemis, maybe the Mexican cartels will start causing trouble again."
"This time’s an exception. If you weren’t so closely involved, I wouldn’t have cared about this."
On a day without streaming, somewhere in the Dark Zone’s unidentified area, I paid the price for underestimating Dagger team’s ability to put their actions into practice.
Jin, who was sitting next to me, was staring blankly around. Naturally, her presence was the hot potato, and unfortunately, she had never been in such a situation before. She didn’t know how to react—literally had no clue.
Of course, it had nothing to do with Dagger team.
The subject was still me.
"I always feel this way, but Eugene... maybe you were destined to never handle things in a normal way."
"...I sometimes think the same. But if the results are good, then I guess it’s fine... ugh."
"Even if it's not normal, a thoroughly controlled process yields predictable results, but when chance gets mixed in, don’t blindly accept the outcome... you know that, right, Eugene?"
"Yes, of course... mmm."
Naturally, I was lectured hard.
I couldn’t really argue, nor did I want to. In the end, the way Jin became part of the family was due to a series of coincidences overlapping, leading to a third option being born—of course, if I hadn’t been a Shadow and was still part of Dagger team, I wouldn’t have done something like this.
As the operation team leader said, luck in battle shouldn’t be blindly trusted.
The gist of the story ended there. But Dagger team seemed like they had no intention of leaving my gear box. Of course, there was a reason for that—something about accommodations not being assigned yet.
Anyway, apart from that.
"So, the reason you came all the way here... it's still about Artemis, right?"
"Yes."
Serkins responded from the side.
"There’s a Chinese saying, 'Chanchojegeun' (translates to 'cutting the grass after putting out the fire'). In this case, it’s like putting out the fire in the village and now the front yard is overrun with weeds, so we have to dig it all up."
"Is the odd test weapon you brought with the plane part of that plan?"
"Of course."
It was a very basic form of antimatter weapon.
It seemed they were seriously planning to completely annihilate Artemis. During this, our eyes met, but Jin didn’t seem to care at all—well, I guess she wouldn’t. If she had even been slightly concerned, there wouldn’t have been that decisive attack from earlier.
Anyway, that aside, there was still a problem I needed to solve.
I briefly manipulated the Icarus gear in reality and sent a message to two unknown individuals while I pondered.
‘Strictly speaking, Dagger team in the game could be considered NPCs, so if I just smooth over the current situation a bit more, I could probably get a pretty decent result.’
Anyway, now that these people, who were like my hometown, had landed in the unidentified zone, it was inevitable that we'd carry out a joint operation. The problem was that, in the process, this situation could very well seem strange.
For example, if the Laurentina from my world finished a meeting with government officials and then returned to my house to play games, and there were two sharks in my session… that would lead to a considerable disaster.
In that case, it might have been better to publicly announce Dagger team’s involvement, just like last time, while only hiding their faces.
In short, it was like this.
-[@^#^ : Just when in-game events were lacking, this might not be a bad time. Let’s step up the prototype Mecha Eugene raid.]
-&$*! : I’ve fully copied Dagger team’s data. In a few days, we’ll upload it to the unidentified zone and make it function as an NPC to assist in gameplay.]
-[*&!% : Of course, considering that only Dagger team existing in Eugene’s session is the real one… we can call it the Archetype session from now on.]
Such naming sense.
Of course, what was just said would never be revealed to anyone other than us, and in a few days, Icarus International would be advertising Dagger team’s EU involvement all over the place.
Moreover, fortunately, the groundwork had already been laid.
And so it was done.
In the world where no one would be embarrassed, things were slowly coming together. Laurentina, who had been quietly watching, stealthily approached me from behind. As a monstrous shark fin was placed above her head, she continued speaking.
"By the time this is over, it’ll be around the end of July or early August. How about we go to Miami Beach around that time? I trust there will be no objections."
"...Is it really okay to decide this suddenly?"
"Just the fact that you didn’t mention the gritty Norfolk side of Virginia Beach is praiseworthy—ow."
"Fist speed measured... 279 km/h. Dangerous attack."
"Oh, Mecha rookie can talk like that, huh? You have a good sense of humor. Seems like the rookie has a lot of work to do here. How about joining Dagger team instead?"
Does that make sense?
I was left speechless at the unimaginable conclusion that a new member filling in Dagger team would be Mecha Eugene.
"Stop with the weird talk and hurry up and grab a room."
"We need a new rookie in the absence of the original... ack, ack!"
"Sorry, Eugene. See you later."
"No, what’s wrong with recruiting the same-looking, budding Mecha rookie to Dagger team—ohhhhhh!"
"Sorry. See you later."
"...You can come tomorrow."
With Logan’s smooth suppression, the shark was dragged out of the gear box, and Dagger team sneaked out, forced smiles on their faces.
In the midst of this strange unfolding, there were more words.
"I like those people."
"...Why are you like this?"
As expected, it seemed there were only strange people around me.
It was two weeks ago when I realized that Laurentina’s words had been a hint.