Master of Warfare

Exploring the first level

Amy Nevens was just as excited as many teenagers across the world, that the best VR game in a decade had just been released, and it had a launch party that the game maker had said would grant all those whom attended rewards they couldn't imagine. Millions of copies had sold as soon as it was released, making it one of the hottest games of all time. Her copy had arrived in the mail the day before, and she knew it had to be finished updating her gear to play it. She had started it last night, allowing it to run the entire day she was at school.

Fortunately her parents were both out of town on this weekend for a conference, and she planned to spend as much time as possible playing the game. She walked into her room, and was glad when the monitor the gear connected to showed that the updates had been made, and she would be able to login. She wasted no time throwing her bag on the bed, and running over to the pod that her gear was in to climb in and launch the game as she put all of the gear on as it was meant to be. She knew it connected into her mind via this gear, translating all of her neural inputs into controlling the body her mind would be in I'm the virtual world.

The white screen allowed her to select the type of character she would be, and knew that it would greatly effect how she played the game. She also saw the warning that once selected, sje would be unable to change the class in the future. For now, it was also the only one she would be able to create, and unlike most games for the VR, the classes were not based on things like warrior, rogue or spell caster. As a military game, she could select Infantry, Heavy Infantry, Marine, Pilot, Medic and other various roles that one would normally be found in a military unit. It took her awhile to look through all of the classes, and found that it was the Scout that relied on Agility and Speed, and had another stat she wasn't expecting of concealment. It was one that would normally be found for a Rogue in other types of games she played, but when she went to allocate points she realized it was one that she could not put her initial points into.

What surprised her most before the game launched is it allowed to use two different types of firearms, one being light assault rifles. The other was a sniper rifle for extremely long range shooting. She realized that the reason for it was the role the scout could play, as either close range scouting for large military units, or long range scouting missions into enemy territory for assassination missions, or lasing targets for long range missiles or bombs. She liked how realistic it was being, including giving her a weight limit based on her strength, stamina, and endurance. The other skills she had that she could influence were agility and charisma, and she knew as a scout her main ones would be agility, endurance and stamina. Strength would mean she could carry more, and charisma affected how many troops could be under her command at once. She wasn't to worried about it right now because of the role she would be playing, and only put a few points into strength so that she would be able to carry more supplies both in and out of the combat zones.

She was excited to launch the actual game, and was surprised when it launched into a tutorial that showed her how her gear was actually set up, and how to use the different guns she had selected to start with. It was a good thing, because unlike other games, this one was more involved than others as she had no idea how to control the troops.

For NPC characters, it was actually easy if they were a lower rank than she was, because they had to follow her orders automatically. Other players however would be able to do their own thing, and she knew from the start she would mostly be playing alone. Despite the Alliance system, she knew there would be benefits to playing alone as she completed the tutorial and earned her first two levels. She was surprised each one gave her 5 stat points to assign, and decided to equally apply them across her 5 stays for now. She knew she would not always be a balanced player, as it launched her into the first campaign battle that all players would have to complete.

As a sniper she found herself high in a church tower, and was using her sniper rifle to take out enemy troops as the squads on the street below advanced. It was ironic that just todaybl they had covered this battle in History, and she knew that the American Forces were able to hold the advancing Russians as she used the system to call in an air strike, and used the laser on her rifle to designate an enemy stronghold she could see from her position.

As soon as the missile struck she saw many system alerts go off, as she was ordered into a different building with a vantage point. She stood up and changed weapons to the M4 assault rifle she had selected, as it would allow a 3 round burst or full automatic fire. She had the burst option selected, and was glad that her spotter was armed with an automatic rifle as well as they ran down the stairs of the church just before the bell tower they had been in was hit by a tank round. Fortunately the debris was stopped by the stairs they were in, because it had been reinforced after WW2 and the Europeans knew it would be necessary if war ever broke out again. The ground however was a mass of confusion as the men nearest to the church had lost their leader, and they were under heavy fire from a team trying to flank the main troop column that was quickly advancing.

"Who is your CO Corporal?" she demanded as he looked at her hiding behind the sandbags as bullets kept thudding into them.

"Killed sir, which would make you the highest ranking officer here." Corporal Dawes replied to her just before she went up onto the bags and began shooting back at the troops who were running down the street.

"Well get your men doing their job Corporal and defend this flank." she ordered him as he relayed the order and suddenly his team of 3 suddenly appeared under her icon on the system display she could easily ignore. They did exactly as she ordered as they kept firing from cover, using their weaponry. As soon as they got a break from the 20 men that had been rushing them, she saw the previous Sergeant had an M40 grenade launcher that she took from his gun and equipped to hers before she stripped him of all the ammo he had. "Listen up boys, you are with me now. We are going to advance as quickly as we can in a 3 by 2 stack. Our objective is the town hall, where you will find whatever you can while my spotter and I make our way up the tower." she said as they nodded and the 3 of them lead the way while she and her spotter covered them.

It took the better part of an hour to get to city hall with 5 additional teams that they had encountered along the way. As soon as she got to the top of the tower, she could see that the battle was nearly over as she took out her M110A2 and began selecting targets as she spotted a General in the enemy command center. A soft squeeze of the trigger, and she saw his brains splatter all over the maps pinned to the cork board he had been looking at as she began looking for other targets.

To her it didn't matter what rank they were, as she knew they all needed to die. For 10 minutes she kept shooting as she called in air strikes every chance she got, selecting targets that gave her maximum casualties as she supported the ground troops as best she could. By the time it was over she was on her last magazine of ammunition, and only 6 rounds left for her sniper rifle when she got the order to return to base.

As soon as she got to the ground, she was surprised to see that they had advanced the base to where she was currently stationed. The General in charge of capturing this city surprised by what she had done, as they had kept track of the number of kills she had with their system.

"Sergeant, it seems you have already secured our new headquarters. We owe you alot for what you have done today, and will determine your exact reward at a later time. Go rest with the men who supported you, and we will make sure you know exactly how appreciative we are." the General said as he saluted her which she quickly returned.

She went to the area indicated on her map, and was surprised it was a mess hall as 15 men followed her. As soon as she sat down, she pulled up the system messages, and was surprised about what it was showing her. Because of what she had done, she was credited with over 3,000 kills, 382 of them done with her sniper rifle, and an additional 87 with her M4 carbine. The rest were grenades, or air strikes she had called in, ensuring targets of opportunity were destroyed from her vantage point. The rewards so far were also great, as she had gained another 8 levels, and been promoted multiple times during the battle, and was showing she was now a Lieutenant in the NPC combat system.

When she was finished however, her new quest was to report to the General, and she knew it was going to be interesting tonsee what it did after this. She decided to allocate her 50 points first, knowing she would need to be able to carry more ammo and be faster if she was going to keep being a sniper. She liked the close quarters combat, but she loved being above it all, and ending the lives of the men in her sights when she pulled the trigger. She also looked at her kills, and because of targeting the command center, she had killed 14 different officers with her sniper rifle, not including the ones killed in air strikes called in by her.