The first world visited by their tour of the Coalition Army was a high technology one filled with autonomous drones and holographic billboards. It was losing quite handily to the monsters. There were signs that nuclear weapons had been deployed. Hector didn't know if they had done any good, but they certainly had caused a lot of collateral damage. The land outside the blast radius of each bomb site was littered with corpses mundane and monstrous alike.

And the people… well, they assumed there were now two invasions. Apparently they had past dealings with the big three species. Not good experiences, judging by the way they ran in terror and hid any time someone with power arrived.

Hector found himself assigned to a mixed unit. The Lord General's only explanation for the move was that Hector 'was unlikely to pick fights with the lesser kinds'.

His new unit could not have been more different than Misfit Squad. They were a platoon of Jinn cyborg special operators with two Arahant Savants and a Xian attached to them. The jaded Jinn in charge puffed on an inhaler while he welcomed the three outsiders. "Discipline is strict among the Burners. That obviously can't be the same for you three. Your commanders would have to sign off on any punishment, and we all know they'd just laugh in my face."

The staff sergeant blew blue vapor out. "Mission parameters are simple. We fight in the streets wherever there are too many locals for the big shots to feel comfortable bombing the hell out of a place. Minimize collateral damage if you can. If not," the man shrugged.

"I'm not going to micromanage you guys. The way this works is I give orders to my soldiers. Then the three of you use your best judgment to fit into those plans. Anything else I've ever tried was a disaster, so I don't even try anymore. Just kill more monsters than civilians. The bigger the difference in those numbers, the happier my bosses will be. Any questions?"

The Arahant woman spat on the ground. "You got a name?"

"Liam," the staff sergeant said.

"I'm Miriam."

The Arahant man tapped his chest as he puffed it out. "Lucas."

Eyes turned to him. "Hector."

The staff sergeant took another puff. "Best friends already," he deadpanned. "My platoon moves out in five. We'll leave room for you on the troop transport."

Miriam nodded towards Hector. "What do you do?"

"I fight exclusively with my domain."

She shrugged. "Better than a chaos bolt. Your kind can be a bit wild when attacking."

Hector couldn't fault her for that opinion. "And what do you do?"

"Bleeding," she said.

"Bleeding?"

"Yeah. It's not complicated. Give a good scratch and convince blood to be on the outside instead of the inside. Most things die pretty quick when they run out of blood."

Lucas grinned at Hector. "I've got a silence realm. Real good for sneaking around. Stick close and I'll make sure no one hears you coming. Tear them apart with your kinetic domain powers."

"Just give them a wound and I'll do the rest," Miriam said.

"Sounds good to me. I've been told I need to be more cautious in battle."

Miriam chuckled. "Every Xian could stand to hear such advice, in my opinion."

"War isn't sane, so why should any of us be?" Lucas appeared proud of his edgy statement.

This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.

"Shut the fuck up with that nonsense already," Miriam said. "You don't sound wise or tough or whatever, you sound like an idiot."

The two Arahant Savants turned to Hector like he was a referee. "It is a bit cringe."

"See? Even a Xian has better sense than you."

"Whatever." Liam made a crude motion at waist level and then flicked his wrist at Miriam.

The woman snorted a laugh. "Just so you know, Xian, these special forces Jinn don't make friends with outsiders. The two of us are all the socializing you get for a while, you poor bastard."

"If that's the price I have to pay to save the multiverse, then I will bear it."

Miriam gestured to the boxes being loaded onto the nearby troop transport. "The main punishment is nasty field rations and offensive body odor. Shitty company is a bonus."

"Body odor?"

"Those rations will tear you up," she clarified.

Hector frowned. "I have a superhuman constitution, so I'll be fine. The question is how bad are the rest of you going to smell?"

Liam spread his arms wide. "War is so insane, you can smell it!"

"The most ironic thing you ever heard is that this man has the power of supernatural silence. Seriously, Liam, why do you never use your best quality?"

They climbed onto the troop transport with the Jinn, an action which thankfully put an end to the half-friendly, half-antagonistic banter of his new Arahant companions. The transport lifted into the air on a gravitonic field and shot forward aggressively.

The staff sergeant addressed everyone while they were on the move. "We are liberating a series of coastal towns. Beach resorts, fishing villages, that kind of thing. They have all grown into a single interconnected metro region, so we're not going to make any distinctions. We sweep southward. The plan is to move slow and make some noise. When we pass through an area, we want it absolutely clean to minimize the chances of us getting hit from behind."

Minutes later they arrived at the coast and dismounted. Another troop transport stopped beside theirs and a second team began sweeping north. Hector noted the hints of deeper strategy not shared with the troops of his level. Or maybe the Jinn all knew already. The way they responded to each other without sound or gesture made Hector think they might be in constant radio contact.

Plasma rifles fired. It wasn't the wild volleys Hector often heard in the dungeon or on Aes. The shots were doled out with miserly efficiency like the soldiers had to pay for each round out of their own pocket. Liam and Miriam lagged behind the formation of Jinn, levity forgotten as cold eyes sized up the environment for threats.

Hector strode along, feeling like an intruder to their war game. Everyone else was facing serious consequences if they made a single misstep. Jinn and Arahant lives were cheap on the battlefield. A level seven Xian, on the other hand, could bumble his way through a war zone without having to worry too much. Somewhere along the line he had stopped working on the virtue of humility. At the moment, he wasn't sure if he should resume that practice. Pretending he possessed the same vulnerabilities as his comrades wasn't virtuous. If anything, holding back would be disrespectful of the risks the others were taking.

So what should he do? Running in front of the platoon like an egotistical hero would disrupt their tactics. His domain footprint lacked the range to use against their foes while standing among the Jinn formation. Yet more and more he felt a pressure building inside him. He wasn't doing enough.

Hector noticed aquatic monsters swimming towards the commotion created in the streets of the coastal town. "I'm going to take out the ones in the ocean."

"Not a good idea," Liam said.

Miriam spoke on top of her counterpart. "The Jinn can hit them when they reach land."

Hector ignored the protests and the followup complaints about working with Xian battle maniacs. They could think what they wanted about him. He'd never been in the business of seeking attention. Not during his Earthly career, not when he brought the Coalition Army back, and certainly not in the middle of a fight for another human world. He'd accept whatever label they gave his actions without complaint so long as he was able to make a positive difference.

He ripped the face off of a gator effortlessly as he waded into the shallows. Then he punched a leaping stingray into a spray of guts when it was too fast for him to catch with his domain. Fish and fowl swarmed his location, forcing him to whirl a cable defensively. The monsters fared no better than a mundane creature sucked through a jet engine.

His touch sense warned him a seal approached from behind, having circled behind his position with a glimmer of intelligence granted by its form. Hector didn't even turn, simply bisected the monster with a downward lash.

Periodic glances at the shore proved that the Jinn were moving as slowly as their staff sergeant indicated they would. He kept pace with them, intercepting anything from the direction of the water. Though no one had assigned him his current duty, Hector approached it with absolute dedication. He was protecting this flank of the platoon.

Having acted, the pressure within his psyche faded into the background. His thoughts narrowed to concern only immediate concerns. Keep pace with the Jinn. Prevent anything passing. Kill monsters. Simple objectives that aligned with his values. For a time, even with the long term fate of humanity hanging in the balance, everything felt right with the world.

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.