The One They Fear 1 (Patreon)

The One They Fear - or ‘Within Death, a Soldier finds the Tools to Keep on Fighting, within the Right and Wrong’ (Taimaninverse/Onimusha OC!MC)

My head… hurts.

Where am… I?

Why my arm is…

My thoughts were disconnected when I woke up. I was in pure darkness, my body sore and aching as I tried and failed to fully awaken myself from the unpleasant and unsavory feeling that something was immensely wrong.

Your soul was about to be tainted.

A voice hummed through the darkness, slowly ‘forming’ a purple flame- no, numerous purple flames that created a circle around… me?

The shadows were removed as I could myself- I could see blood all over my military uniform, my sight blurry but… I could clearly see my left arm was now missing. Blood slowly poured in a distasteful display that left me agonizing both physically and mentally.

“W-Who are you?”

We are the voice of those that professed harmony, but have been squashed. Those that have tried many times to achieve peace for so long, but no longer exist due to the ambitions of the Demon King.

“W-What?”

Apologies for how sudden this all is, human. But our time is short and your life is far from over. You were hurled upon the Dark World through pain, antagonized by foes of yours and ours, but also the hand of a former friend.

“I don’t… I-I don’t understand!”

What you need to know, mortal, is that your life is not over and that we are granting you the means to be the great obstacle humanity needs to stop the invasion that is forming. You will learn more as soon as you wake up, but you need to be ready to fight. The path to King’s Rock will be rough and arduous for someone with your new skills.

As the last voice snapped with that kind of guarantee, I felt my missing arm… rebuilding. First as a transparent construct, then obtaining color as it was morphed into an armored dark-violet limb with a single red orb under the knuckles.

I blinked, feeling reinvigorated by the event as I felt newfound energy pouring within my whole body. It got even weirder as everything exploded in a flashing white light that forced my eyes closed.

It didn’t last long, but as I opened my eyes… I found myself no longer floating into the void. I was at the center of a crater, with the noises of small green humanoids cackling with one another while looking at some items… that were once part of my uniform.

Goblins?

The one I was glaring at was busy tinkering with a cracked helmet that broke during the fall. He seemed to notice my staring, snarling as he raised a short sword and tried to jump me. The noise alerted the rest, but while the short beings assembled, they all saw how their comrade died due to his stupidity.

Despite the pace, I felt something click in my head. My body reacted by pure muscle memory as it assessed the speed and momentum of the attack together with the clumsy stance and trajectory.

One moment the Goblin was flying, the next one he was screaming as I grasped his skull with my new arm and used his jump’s descent to slam it onto the ground beside me.

Instantly so, the head cracked and I saw blue essence rush into the armored limb, giving me more strength. I was surprised by this development, but I didn’t forget I wasn’t alone just yet.

More goblins rushed down the crater, growling for battle as I retrieved the weapon used by the Goblin I just slain and… it was my Combat Knife. I twirled it in my palm with some familiarity before twisting it ready to engage the approaching foes.

It was one methodical execution after another. I was just stunned by the brief flashes of boot camp playing in my mind as I decimated the monsters and, without even thinking, I ended up disarming the last one of his club and poke his forehead with my handgun.

I didn’t even notice I had one and I didn’t even hesitate in pulling the trigger despite this. All Goblins were dead, and I found my attention aimed at the gun. It was indeed my handgun– but something was wrong about it.

The Colt Delta Elite was a rather unique choice for a regular soldier, but ideal for a special agent. While the deceiving appearance may suggest it was a standard-issue M1911, this gun was usually packing 9 bullets of the 10mm kind. Stronger, more compact and yet just as fast as a regular 9mm.

The Laser sight- I remember there was that accessory which I added a while back. And it was lighter in weight, as if it didn’t have a cartridge despite the fact I just shot with it. I aimed away and took a shot. It worked. Again and it worked once more.

Does it have unlimited ammo? The notion sounded ludicrous, as if this was sort of a game… but it seemed to be the case.

Shaking my head, I holstered the weapon and stepped out of the crater. I expected for this ‘Dark World’ to have some crazy hellish setting, but I was greeted by a green field. The sky was bright blue and there was a sun.

…

Is this even the right place? Is this the Dark World?

I was perplexed by what I was looking at. Glancing around for anything crazy but… there was nothing that would suggest this was any different from a normal countryside in Europe.

Well… Except the large towering castle set in a distant hill where a bright red pillar was creating a ‘purple spot’ within the sky. Perplexing.

Looking at my general surroundings, I also noticed that some other stuff had crashed from falling through the ‘large black hole right above my head’. Some were standard military crates with equipment that had broken up due to impact from the way they ‘cracked’ to show their content, but one in particular caught my attention.

Mostly dug into the ground, the rectangular box had lost its upper section as a reinforced glass container keeping what looked like a sci-fi armor had been cracked up a fair bit. Not enough to break, but enough to leave ugly web-like cracks within its surface.

I touched the glass casket, feeling a sense of… remembrance as I decided to open it. Memories flooded my mind as I remembered a bit more about myself. I had been deployed as ‘Agent Hexagon’ to investigate a small island between Taiwan and China.

With the PRC invading the small nation, a larger-than-needed border war between Russia and China against the US and Europe had created an End of the World scenario.

This mission had been issued for a reason: to check for any potential Russo-Chinese units, and destroy the research facility within the island. The first half confirmed some Chinese troops, but no Russians- the second bit resulted in this box surviving.

The Praetorian Unyx Armor was an experimental ‘battle-suit’ that Taiwan had been working on in secret. Official records mentioned it was a ‘Future Soldier’ project meant to modernize and improve the natural protection of regular troops.

That is… if one ignored the costs and the fact this armor’s energy upkeep was insane. In fact, I actually did lament that with…

Someone.

I clutched the side of my head as that memory came up. I just couldn’t focus on it and… I sighed. I couldn’t afford to waste too much time on this. If what the voices said is real, and it was clearly leaning into it being a thing, I didn’t have time to waste.

I opened the casket of glass, and retrieved the armor out, taking it piece by piece as I knew that, despite it being depowered and thus not working at maximum efficiency, I could still make use of it in its current state.

I was literally wearing tattered camo pants, a shredded white shirt and my boots were clearly damaged by the fall. Much to my relief, the armor was easy to put on as it was form-fitting. Once I was done… I could tell this was going to help a lot as the armor it had was light and yet sturdy.

A step up from the crappy stuff I had myself before and… hopefully enough to handle the threat I was meant to face. It was not my mission, I know I didn’t have the authorization to take any dangerous step forward but– if this invasion was allowed to happen, the world would be plunged into total annihilation.

It was pure luck that neither the US or China and Russia and used nukes, but if a Demonic Invasion was to happen- then fuck, WW3 would just be the beginning of the end for mankind and beyond.

I couldn’t allow this to happen. And, without any further hesitation, I started to march towards the large castle in the distance, despite the fact that I was going to be making a few ‘stops’ along the way.

Some of which may also hold some… positive results.

—--------d-d-d-d—--------

AN

MC’s Name? ‘John’ Hexagon ‘Doe’, US Agent deployed together with Agent <REDACTED NAME> ‘Sixter’ to handle a mission to limit the issues of a potential WW3.

The Taiwan Crisis is actually the catalyst event that triggers most of the Taimanin’s modern history. It’s around this time that the Dark World becomes more active, where familiar countries collapse and reform in bigger blocs, and nefarious groups plant the seeds of devious growth.

By going through the ‘cliche approximative time’ presented by some of the Lilith-soft’s games, we are ‘30 years before Taimanin Asagi’. Some characters exist at this point, but most of those you may be familiar with are not even alive within Arc 1. And yes, the story has arcs that will see major timeskips.