*

  I even saw a couple of Guards runnin' back to higher ground while other Guards on foot below were readyin' and aimin' their weapons at us... Nah... At somethin' in front of us.

  Comin' to that realization, I swiftly turned my head to face front, squeezin' the machete in my hand as my eyes stared into the morbid darkness ahead.

  Sweat dripped from my face, lookin' at the shadowed parts of the Gate, where the dim glowin' markin's of the vines were the only source of light. They hadn't ventured into that area.

  I was lost in thought for a second there, only to be snapped back to reality when the Team Leader drew out a flare gun, shootin' out the flare after arcin' his arm 75 degrees into the air.

  The flare broke through the veil of shadows, flyin' a great distance through the air, before fallin' under the call of gravity.

  In that moment, numerous pairs of vicious eyes shone with madness in the shadows.

  The eyes began moving... moving towards us.

  Soon, a horde of hideous, hairless, disease-lookin', grayish-blue skinned creatures on all fours came into the light from the bulbs wired onto the grand inner walls of the Gate.

  They paced forward, increasing their speed with every step, but it was slow enough for anyone to get a good look at these creatures.

  Their backs shot up like a hump, with their spines pokin' out of 'em, almost like the flesh on their backs could barely contain 'em.

  Each had maddened, glowin' eyes dyed a faded blue.

  If they were to stand on their hind limbs, they would be at least 4 feet tall. All in all, they looked like some unholy offspring of a diseased canine and a rabid hog, possessin' no nose, with limbs as thin as a twig and as long as a human arm.

  Despite lookin' like somethin' strugglin' to live, they gave off a vibrant aura of savagery. They were strong, clearly strong enough to carry that wretched body of their... that's what Zipper-spines look like.

  They grunted, makin' ear-scratchin', eerie squeal - That fuckin' sound, with Blanc foam fallin' from their mouths. More and more of 'em emerged from the darkness; their estimated numbers were probably in the hundreds.

  Our Team Leader slowly drew his sword from his back. The neatly arranged array of unknown markings glowed on his greatsword, pulsating like a shivering testicle. A small cycle of shimmering and dwindling.

  He stood firm, head held high, the tip of his sword touchin' the ground made of alien soil and vine. Then the Zipper-spines were already at full speed by this point, coverin' tens of meters in seconds.

  “HOLD STILL!” the Team Leader shouted in a loud, domaneering voice, stopping those of us who were about to charge the vile throng.

  From behind us came the thunderin' sounds of arcane machine guns and rifles, followed by the sight of many Zipper-spines being torn to pieces by ruthless heavy-round bullets, leaving behind a brief glowing trail like streaks of lightning.

  The sound of their impact was a deafening crack, strikin' fear in my own heart even though I was nowhere near the onslaught.

  The Zipper-spines couldn't care less about their annihilated kin, even tramplin' on their carcasses tryin' to get to us.

  I found myself looking back at the Guards on higher ground, slowly movin' their machines of war as they spat bone-shattering bullets from their muzzles. Then I quickly turned my head back to the chaos in front of me.

  Many Zipper-spines continued to fall to pieces under the ferocity of the arcane machines of war and death, but their numbers didn't seem to dwindle at all.

  They still came in their hundreds, looking as mad and vicious as they could be.

  Even some that had parts of their bodies ripped away but didn’t drop dead still pushed for the kill.

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  “HOLD STILL!” he said, finally puttin' on his headgear with his free hand. We stood still in our combat pose, ready to pounce on those motherfuckers as soon as they got close enough.

  “HOLD STILL!” our Sergeant repeated, still not takin' a combat stance even as they reached about 20 meters from us. As soon as they were as close as 10 meter, he shouted with the force of thunder – “GO!!!” – leaping meters into the air then spinnin' vertically like a whirlwind. Using the momentum he gained as he spun, he landed a powerful, descending, earth-quaking blow with his sword on the first Zipper-spine that was closest to him, to any of us.

  The blow not only sliced the Zipper-spine in two from its head to its waist, but the small shockwave it produced also slammed the sliced carcass, turning it into a puddle of mush.

  A wave of blue watery energy followed the shockwave, enhancin' and extendin' it as it swept through the Zipper-spines on both sides of the blade, shatterin' the bones and organs of the Aggressors closest to the blast and pushin' them away with great force. The impact covered a 3-meter radius, leaving behind a small crater and sending debris of blue alien soil and Gate vines into the air.

  Tens of Zipper-spines died from that single blow, and many others either took serious damage or were very disoriented from the enhanced shockwave. The rest of us made battle cries before jumping into the mix, massacrin' the disoriented and approachin' Zipper-spines.

  One Zipper-spine from the left stepped over its severely injured kin, endin' its life immediately, then jumped into the air with its jaws wide open, its tongue and saliva dancin' in mid-air too as it aimed for my face.

  I stabbed it under its jaw, then used my strength to hoist and drag it from mid-air over my head, smackin' its back down onto the bare ground behind me. I immediately dropped to one knee, quickly pullin' out my machete from its jaw and slashin' its face repeatedly, until it barely had anythin' left for a face.

  My eyes quickly caught another Zipper-spine bearin' its sharp fangs at me from my right. With my machete in my right hand, I reacted fast by spinning on that one knee, slashin' its wide-open mouth. It fell to the ground, but still far from dying.

  Before it could get itself up, I had already gotten up and ran towards it, stabbin' the tip of my machete through the top of its head.

  I pulled out my blade, lookin' for my next target, and saw three Zipper-spines ganging up on a Mercenary-Guard whose back was on the ground.

  She was struggling to fight 'em off as they bit and roughly dragged at her hands and other parts of her body with their jaws, tryin' to tear her apart.

  I ran and slashed one Zipper-spine at the side of its neck, then turned to another one and began hackin' continuously at the top of its neck due to the thickness of its very visible spine.

  The third Zipper-spine noticed me and leaped onto my right shoulder, sinkin' its fangs deep into it, causin' me to shout in pain. In that pain, I switched the machete to my left hand and stabbed the Zipper-spine in the side of its belly before it let go of my shoulder. As it fell, I swung my left hand downwards, missin' its head but hackin' into its shoulder instead, not killing it with a single blow.

  As I attempted to pull out my machete to correct my mistake, I heard someone shout “RPG!!” and almost instantly felt an explosive force sendin' me and the Zipper-spine flyin' sideways.

  I was out... disoriented.

  All I could hear was a high-pitched ringing in my ears, and I felt like my lungs were clogged, causin' me to cough on reflex to get rid of whatever it was.

  Coughing roughly and staggerin' to find my footin' for a few seconds that felt much longer, I managed to get a bit of myself back.

  I remembered I was trying to hack a Zipper-head and tried to get up, findin' it unnaturally hard to stand, pushin' myself up onto my hands and knees.

  I looked around, searchin' for my blade in the ongoin' chaos, then I saw it lyin' on the floor, a meter outta my reach.

  I slowly crawled to retrieve it when I heard a grunt again and turned to see the Zipper-spine I was about to kill before the explosion; its shoulder was a complete bloody mess. It now had shards in the right side of its face, and the motherfucker bled like crazy, but it still had the bizarre strength to leap at me.

  I managed to grab its shoulders, pushin' its head back a bit from my face as I fell onto my back on the ground. It was frantically snappin' its teeth right in front of my face, spittin' saliva all over me, tryin' to bite my fuckin' face clean off, but I held its shoulders back. The motherfucker was strong too.

  I didn’t know how to turn the situation around, still pushin' it away by its shoulders with all my strength. The Zipper-spine stopped moving right after I heard some gunshots. There were lots of sounds of gunshots, explosions, wailin', and metal clashin' on the battlefield, but these ones sounded like they took it down.

  I pushed the Zipper-spine’s corpse off my body and looked at the person that took it down.

  My eyes fell on a Viper-Guard holdin' an arcane assault rifle, its stock restin' against her chest, the muzzle aimed at the monsters like a fuckin' commando.

  She was walking calmly through the battlefield, shootin' the Zipper-spines around her. Some Zipper-spines closed in on her too fast for her to introduce 'em to the barrel of her gun, but she swiftly switched to her katana.

  She dodged their wild attacks like a pro, delivering deep, clean cuts and slashin' off heads and limbs from the Zipper-spines with any opportunity she got.

  I crawled to my machete, pickin' it up as I got to my feet, and looked up to see the battlefield.

  Explosions rocking the place here and there, the roar of heavy guns, the rain of bullets on Aggressors and some unfortunate Mercenary-Guards, the sounds of tearin' armor and flesh as Ripper-spines devoured Guards, the screams of Guards bein' torn apart – I took it all in and made up my mind to fuckin' conquer this place like I'd done before. I ran toward incomin' Zipper-spines, givin' a fuckin' battle cry, and unleashed hell on all of 'em.