At the break of dawn a single knight was standing on top of a sandstone wall overlooking a decrepit village in the middle of a desert wasteland, but instead of surviving the surroundings outside the village protecting it from external threats, this knight instead looked into the village.
This knight wasn't a protector, but an invader. He was part of the Kingdoms notorious suppression unit sent to stomp out the numerous uprisings which had bloomed inside the Ivory trade federation after their keeper of knowledge declared a holy war against their occupiers.
"Sir, we've received new orders!"
"What?... Why the fuck can't those old farts just let us stay one place long enough to do our fucking job… Well, what do they want us to do now? Suppress another demi uprising or just the usual farmers unhappy with their taxation?"
Although the knight really did enjoy his job, and enjoyed staying busy in it instead of spending all his time just writing reports or training like the gryphon knights, there was a limit to the times he felt the impotent leadership back home could jerk him around before it became annoying.
(First they absolutely want us to train up a new detachment, then they rush us out to this bordertown shithole to capture the saint of knowledge but don't give me the time to do either effectively, then they complain and complain and complain and complain and-)
"Sir, the gryphon knights have lost most of their numbers chasing down what is believed to be a second living saint of the hunt. He fled to the south and is believed to be hiding out in one of the numerous hidden demi villages in the area."
"Ha! So that fuckface got run over by a single saint, and now they want us to clean up after them? That's hilarious! HAHAHA HA AH!-"
Just remembering the face of that gryphon knight captain and imagining it twisted in despair made the knight, captain of the suppression unit break out in a loud and extremely obnoxious laugh which lasted a few minutes. While the captain started pounding the ground out of amusement, his subordinate messenger stood perfectly still and at attention as he waited to deliver the rest of his message, not because he partially respected his captain, (quite the opposite in fact) but because he didn't want to have his eyes gouged out like the last messenger who interrupted the captain.
"Ah~ That made my entire week, thanks for making me imagine that pathetic fucking loser all depressed… So? What are we to do with our current assignment? We've been here an entire fucking month searching for that nerd of a saint and still no luck."
While the captain recognized that he should properly obey orders once in a while, there was still the issue of his current assignment, he couldn't just up and leave after 'politely asking' all these villagers to give up their saint.
"The brass back at home said you're to close out your current assignment as you see fit…"
"Is that so~ Hmmmm."
Given free reign to close out his current assignment as he saw fit, the captain realised how desperate the old farts back home were, it seemed they had finally lit a fire under their own ass's that they absolutely needed him to put out.
"In that case, dump the rest of our 'persuasion aid' down the well and cull all the remaining livestock… Make sure not a single one of these worms ever make it out of this fucking shithole alive."
"... Roger."
Having gotten up at first light, Tom assigned additional homework to Lisa before leaving for the village chiefs house, finding him already up and about Tom went straight for the information he was after.
"Good morning, is there anything near here worth hunting?"
"Excuse me?"
"Like monsters or something, preferably monsters with parts you and the village could use in some way."
Seeing the village chief's gears spin in real time, Tom left him alone but didn't miss his overall shity attitude.
(Is he just not that much of a morning person?)
"If you really want to aid this village you would leave… But seeing as you're doing whatever there is a population of massive boars about half a day's walk south."
(Ah, he's just being an asshole, got it.)
Not bothering to humour the grumpy old man with a response, Tom turned to leave with a wave.
"HEY!"
(So being an apostle of their god isn't enough, the fact that I'm human is enough for them not to respect me. That's great to know if this place comes under attack… Now, which way is south again? That way.)
Having completely tuned out the village leader's shouting, Tom left the village, oriented himself towards the south and secured his rifle in its sling before he broke into a sprint.
(Half a day's walk? I should be able to make that in an hour.)
Making full use of his (literally) god given body and endless stamina, Tom quickly covered 10 kilometres before he took a knee to rest and get his pulse back under control.
('Half a day's walk' my ass, is that old fart trying to get me killed, or is he really just that incompetent?)
By morning propper, Tom had already come across clear signs of monster activity, giant footprints, marked trees and the lot.
This was clearly way closer than what the village elder had told Tom, nevertheless taking the chance of Tom getting jumped by a monster was almost nonexistent.
(... Two about 700 metres to the south, one about a click to the west with babies and what seems to be the alpha currently charging towards me 400 metres out.)
"Hmm."
Getting his rifle ready, Tom didn't fret about the 8-ish ton, minivan sized boar charging towards him as no matter how thick its skull was, the eyes were still a weak spot. Waiting until the boar crashed through into the same clearing he was in, Tom placed a burst of 8.75mm armour piercing with his M-909 DMR in each eye of the boar, turning its brain into mush.
CORRUPTED_CREATURE(S)_DESTROYED
2500_POINT(S)_AWARDED
END_OF_REPORT.
(That's like… 5 boxes of ammo, neat.)
Getting up from his knee, Tom suddenly got the urge to wipe out the local population of massive boars, this intent was recognized by his neural implant and soon, all 52 massive boars were marked for him to target.
While Tom was acting on his urges, Lisa had awoken to find something strange, instead of her guardian, some kind of strange device laid in his bed with a single note next to it that said 'press me here'.
"... I swear to god if this is another of his fucking pranks."
With no other options coming to her, Lisa pressed the thing and made it let out a bird-like chirp before something even stranger happened.
['ello, I'm a bit busy at the moment but happy that you're up and about Lisa.]
"... What is happening here?"
[You're currently looking at a radio, tl;dr is that I can transmit my voice to you to it the same way I 'talk' with the Albatros. Yesterday when I was setting up some stuff it occurred to me that it would be a good idea for the two of us to be able to talk together like this no matter the distance.]
Although it felt a bit cliche to describe it like that, Lisa found the so-called radio magical, she had heard about human court mages being able to transmit their voices over long distances to send messages, but this was something else, it was instant communication.
"So where are you right now?"
Half expecting Tom to burst through the door to start laughing at her, Lisa got worried when she didn't get an instant response, instead she heard the sound of a gunshot over the radio before Tom spoke up again.
[I'm about 9 click's south of the village dealing with a herd of massive boars to regain some points - hold.]
Stopping to focus on aiming, Tom zeroed his sight for the rapidly closing distance before steadying his aim and squeezing the trigger to kill the juvenile but still car sized boar that had been charging at him.
[- When I asked if there was anything nearby to hunt he pointed me this way but massively downplayed the proximity, danger and numbers of monsters. Don't trust him, or any villager for that matter.]
Feeling she was immediately struck with a migraine, Lisa was now wide awake as she learned back and let out what could only be described as a mix between a deep, resentful groan and an annoyed sigh.
"... This is why I didn't want to ever go back here, I swear this race only consists of stuck up old hags and pissy old racist farts that have their heads so far up their own ass that they can see shit-stained sunlight…"
Spewing words like they were poison Lisa was no longer hiding her ears out of instinct, what's worse her eyes had started glowing with rage somewhere along the way.
"I'm going to fucking skin them alive, flay their wrinkled old faces before reintigrating what remains of their shrunken brains with the top soil…"
[Woah, cool it a bit missy, take some deep breaths and leave the application of violence to me alright?... Lisa, are you still there?]
Hearing nothing but silence on the other end, Tom accessed the Albatros through his neural uplink as he broke off contact with the monsters.
(There she is… oh shit.)
Even lacking sensors to 'see' mana, Tom could clearly see Lisa heading towards the village elder's house growing thorny vines around her as the ground broke with each of her steps.
While Lisa felt her entire mind consumed by rage, she was calm and capable of controlling every minute muscle of her body, she even felt this control extended out past the limits of her own body.
"WHERE IS THAT OLD LYING SACK OF SHIT!?"
Her voice booming amplified by mana, Lisa easily attracted the attention of the entire elver village as her rage, race and even identity became apparent to them.
There was only a single elven family line who had been blessed this strongly by the most compassionate lady of the hunt, only one living saint of her most revered lady and she only had a single child.
And as it had just happened, this village had somehow offended this great family line. Seeing what was going on, Nick fell to her knees in front of Lisa to stop her rampage as he attempted to appeal to her.
"M-my lady-"
"WHERE!?"
Of course this appeal didn't work and Nick found himself blown back by the force behind Lisa's mana filled scream as a group of terrified villagers ran off to find the elder before the rest of their village got turned into an impromptu thorn field.
In no more than a minute, the village elder was dragged in out in front of Lisa as he had failed to run away the second the sensed divine mana in the air.
"P-Please-"
"NO! YOU'RE HAD YOUR CHANCE!"
This had gone on for far too long, for all the years Lisa had lived in elven lands she had realised that appearances were all that mattered, just because of who her mom was Lisa was treated the way she was, just because Tom happened to be human it didn't matter that he was a saint. This hypocrisy had gone on for long enough, it made her sick when she was fawned over just because of who she was related to, but when Lisa realised the village leader had tried to get Tom killed just because of how he looked she lost all control.
"LISA!"
"... Huh?"
Next thing Lisa knew Tom was standing in front of her, but somehow she was looking down on him, even though he was significantly taller than her.
"Are we good?"
"Yeah, I guess…"
Although she didn't know what Tom was talking about all of a sudden, Lisa answered in the affirmative before she noticed she was standing upon a mass of thorny vines that were now sprouting all over the village.
"Then, if we're all good then reset. Release that senile old fart, he's not worth it."
"Release?..."
Looking to the left side of Tom, Lisa noticed the village elder (who had long since soiled himself) lifted into the air by a mass of vines and thorns. Bleeding superficially from most of his body, the elder would still be pleading loudly for mercy if it hadn't been for the fact that he passed out from whatever trivial pain he was in from the thorns.
"Ah, yeah I can do that, I think."
Focusing on the vines wrapped around the village elder, Lisa reached out towards him as she closed her eyes to focus. As Lisa started concentrating, she eventually felt the vines, plants and nature around her as if it was part of her own body, from there it was easy to return everything to its prior state, save for a few holes in the ground here and there.
"Good job."
Seeing Lisa had gotten her powers back under control along with her rage, Tom roughly planted a hand on top of her head before roughing up her hair for a bit, and for once, Lisa didn't reject his headpats.
"... Thanks."
"Okay then, I'll handle the rest."
"Mmm."
Having gotten Lisa's permission to handle things, Tom's usual shit-eating grin disappeared from his face as his eyes turned cold. Walking over to the still unconscious village elder, Tom used a single hand to pick the elver up by the neck before he smacked his face to wake him.
"ARH!-"
"Shhh."
Cutting the elder scream short with a punch to the gut, Tom waited a few seconds as the elder figured out what was happening and where he was.
"I'm only going to say this once, so pay attention… This regards the rest of you people too so listen up!"
Making sure that not only the village elder was paying attention but that he had the attention of the entirety of the elven village, Tom raised his voice as it turned authoritative like a drill sergeant.
"I came here with good intentions! I only exist in this world because my employer, the cruel lady of the hunt, deemed I could help save her faithful! This morning I asked you if there was anything nearby to hunt, anything I could do to help the village and you fucking tried to have me killed!"
Looking around, none of the villagers, or even Nick wanted to meet Tom's gaze, they all knew they had no right to act like they had.
"NO MORE! This is how this is going to be from now on: I will no longer be asking, I demand, for the sake of my employer, that you all stay the fuck out of my way! This is no longer a request, I'm here, I'm going to stay here! So find a fucking way to deal with it! From now on if I catch any of you people even so much as staring at Lisa here I'll instantly demonstrate why exactly the cruel lady of the hunt picked precisely me as her cruel instrument!"