A single temple stands between a Warzone in a world void of life. Each side refuses to claim it or fire a single shot at one another. Both Union and the federation patiently wait as a single ship lands in between their camps. The ship seems heavy landing on the planet; its weight seems to buckle the landing gear. The ship’s bay door opens, showing a squad of legends. 

Squad 912, a legendary team whose exploits have garnered the respect of the nations and one of the few squads who reach Nation rank. A rank equal to the entire strength of a nation’s army. Each leader of each army approaches the Squad. The Union army leader is a Pixie whose almost mechanical wearing her best formal uniform, littered with medals and awards. The federation army leader is a dragon who wears a ceremonial garb of his nation to show his respect. 

The squad leader Colonel Break (Lur) an Orc known as an immortal soldier from his days in the Union Corp. He stands 8ft 2inches wearing his Union BDU (battle dress uniform) but the patches are X’d out except a single patch on his chest of the Cartographers crest.

“What’s the situation?”

The Federation commander is the first one to speak. A dragon of purple scales who smells of death. “It’s an honor to work beside a legendary team, but we have no information to give. We have sent recon teams, but no one has returned to or sent an update.”

The Union commander, a pixie whose body is mostly mechanical interject. “The opposite is correct. We have no information about the temple. Even a platoon alongside an elemental haven’t been able to confirm the situation inside.”

A voice cuts in, “Wow, even an Elemental couldn’t figure it out. Some serious stuff is happening inside. I recommend we blow it up.” A goblin who named himself Sarge after being forced into retirement by his commanding officers. He stands 5ft 5in, wearing his union uniform with his hat and goggles on as well. The uniform patches were like Break’s uniform. The smell of certain explosive chemicals emitted from him strongly.

“We have tried, but the building has a dense shield protecting it and the energy giving off is equal to a majestic class ship. Both sides have nothing of that size or power. It’ll take years to break it at our current strength, but the front door is open, as if it’s inviting us in.” Answered the Pixie commander.  

“Sounds like a wonderful challenge! Let us go already!” The biggest and strongest of the team, Warrior Guls (pain). A manticore standing at 15ft wearing only his pants to flex his muscles, wings, and swings his spiked tail around at the thrill of battle. “An excellent death may come for me!”

“Per our agreement with the cartographers. We won’t be sending any troops to help as we shall be here to ensure nothing leaves, or until your return.”

“That’s a bummer, a cramped building, but it’s better than working with a dragon. I’ll be on the ship taking a nap. Wake me when we get someone more open.” Replied one of the laziest beings alive and the sniper of the group, Lake (bieso). She is a zephyr, a flying race of the galaxy, standing around 6ft. She wears a collar around her neck, allowing her to print dresses and armor. Lake is one of the best shots in the galaxy, able to shoot accurately while diving bombing over 400mph.

Lake tries to wake back into the ship, but another member of the squad grabs her, ensuring she doesn’t escape back to the ship. “Sorry about her, the long trip here made her very sleepy and she’ll wake up soon.” Responded Comet (anāu). A Male moon elf-cold blood hybrid. He has purple hair and skin with scales of cold blood on his parts of his body that are exposed. 

“It doesn’t matter. I have read the accounts of the squad and I realize you all shall solve this dilemma with ease.” Expressed the Federation commander.

 “Suit up!” The squad leaves so they can suit up. The army commanders return as well till they hear a childish voice coming beside them. “Hey don’t forget about me, I’m the mascot!” They turn to see a little elf girl standing beside them. She has pink eyes and a mixture of brown and pink hair. She can be no older than 8 or 9 years old and is probably a wood elf given to her brown skin. 

“Hello! I’m Ink and I shall be live broadcasting our adventure in this temple of death! I have sent you both and everyone here a link to our live feed, so please like, share, and comment. Also, don’t forget to buy our merchandise! We have shirts, shoes, blankets, anything you can think of and best of all if you join our premium squad, your favorite member will send you a signed mech.” 

Ink lifts her wrist, allowing her holographic connection code to appear with signed documents ready for them to sign and a virtual store. The federation commander, being a big fan, signed up immediately. He ordered a pair of signed shoes by Gul. The Union commander didn’t sign up but bought a pair of squad 912 gloves that look like Lake’s claws. The two were very pleased as they walked back to their camps.

“Ink, hustle!” Ordered Break as Ink comes running as she goes over the receipts and begins the live stream. She pulls out orbs from her pockets as she walks around the squad. 

Ink live streams for the billions of viewers across the galaxy. “Hello viewers from across the galaxy! The squad is now preparing for their latest mission, the temple of death! Let us check out the squad for all those fresh and stale viewers. Let us start with the Leader of the squad Break.” announced Ink.

Break equips his changed Union tactical gear that covers most of his body, leaving only the joints exposed and his changed coil rifle, which shoots condensed energy in a concentrated beam or bursts rounds with metal projectiles. Alongside his trusty sidearm, a heavy custom made duke pistol. A gun able to fire 1 round per reload and enough power to knock someone like Gul on the ground. Break never acknowledges the cameras nor interacts with them, yet he has the biggest fanbase. 

Ink broadcasts Sarge. “Alright, now let’s check out our second in command, the explosive Sarge!” Sarge grins and waves at the camera and even does a few poses as he places his living metal gas mask, which allows him to survive almost anywhere, also powers his goggles, allowing better sight and energy readings. His weapon of choice is his multipurpose grenade launcher. It can shoot party favors for small nuclear warheads able to blow up a city block. Finally, his charged vibration blade can cut through most metal by forcefully melting them. 

“Now onto the triple threat package. The muscles, the brains, and the good looks of the group, Gul!”

Gul looks at the cameras with his flowing golden mane making the livestream filled with hearts. He flexes a bit before donning his armor. A gift from the giant race. A race made up of warrior knights making Gul combat prowess in close range combat soar. Leaving only his wings exposed to remain able to fly. Guls wields many melee weapons, but has dedicated himself to wielding a war hammer of almost his height. He never uses guns as in Guls, his own words “it’ll be too simple.” He also has a nasty surprise with his spike tail. It is strong enough to break through armed soldiers and release a deadly toxin upon impact.

“Now before the livestream crashes, let’s head towards the bombshell with the hips and aim to shoot a bug moving at light-speed, Lake!”

They filled the comments with marriage requests and other things that are quickly banned by mods. Lake places a metal box on her back. The box opens up, showing three different guns on mechanical arms. Her sniper is a custom made 55mm elemental rifle which was given to her by a dragon lord. It can shoot various elementals from acid to radiation at different levels of power, alongside kinetic projectiles imbued with elemental properties. The other two rifles are rivet federation rifles. They have two fire modes: a powerful slow shooting main or a shotgun secondary, each mode has its uses. Last, are her stake drivers, which are connected to her legs. If she ever jumps on someone or needs to swoop in for a stealth kill, those drivers will pierce through most armors ensuring a quick kill. Many hotels, spas, and resorts requests flood in as lake yawns as they comment they have wonderful rooms to rest in. 

“Alright everyone, it’s his first time on stream, so let’s give him a Squad 912 welcome. He takes the role of protector and is the second elf, but the first elf hybrid to be on the squad, so Let’s give it up for Comet!” Comet waves at the camera and gives a heartfelt smile. The screen fills up with love letters which annoy Guls a little.

The Empire fans go wild seeing an elf but a male moon elf, since they are rare in their race. Comet is the medic of the team but also the defense. He has a copy cube filled with his own hospital equipment and more than enough medical supplies to supply an army of 100,000,000. Comet comes with his father’s weapon and armor, a sundial, an 8 barrel Minigun before it became a wrist cannon gun in the modern Jade Empire army. It is heavier, slower, but more powerful with three modes: turret, rapid fire, and burst fire. The sundial can charge itself using sunlight and can keep up intense fire for days without issue. His father’s armor is an older style of Jade Empire military armor, able to punch harder, but it’s heavier. Last but not least, His secondary is a gun of his own design called a bubble gun. A gun able to shoot various bubbles to capture, burn, stun, poison, etc his target. Finally, his twin daggers, which were his mother’s.

“Alright everyone, that’s all the squad members, and they have readied themselves, so now the cameras are switching to their chest cams and remember you can switch between cameras to follow your favorite member.” 

Ink returns to the ship after ensuring the cams work. They then placed the ship on autopilot and it’ll orbit the planet with defenses activated to ensure no one will try to capture their mascot. Ink cameras also work as mics, sensors, radios and have different viewing modes to allow the audience to be more immense. Also, while on the ship unbeknownst to the squad, Ink allows the best way to keep them immense and that by gambling. “Alright, our lovely viewers, place your bets on what will squad 912 find in this temple of death. User sniff_my_butt has placed 10,000 union credits on the undead. Who wants some action?!” 

The squad stopped at the entrance of the temple. Break began giving orders. “Alright, Gul, you up front, I’ll take second, sarge last, lake third, and comet fourth.” Everyone took formation as Gul ran in his head first. Comet, being new, wanted to say something. Everyone started running, so Comet ran as well. 

Gul arrives yelling at a large but empty room Gul quiet downs as nothing occurs. “Well, this is boring.” as he leaned on his war hammer, waiting for the others. The remaining squad appears, seeing a Gul just relaxing on his weapon. “Hey everyone, nothing here and it’s a big room with nothing except a split in the path. Who is going where?”

Break walks over to Sarge as he scans the room. “Sarge, have you learned anything?”

Sarge’s mask lights up, scanning the room for any clues. “Plants? Possibly underground spring with a bunch of moss? The smell of plants is not unusual.”

Guls looks around, seeing familiar designs around the room. “It is older than the war of survival. It has an elf’s design with a dwarf’s craftsmanship. The place was probably a culture exchange between the two nations before the war.”

Ink on her live stream is currently placing bets on who is going where. She offers cuts of Gul’s hair for the prize of whoever wins as Break gives orders.

“Comet goes with Sarge and Lake. Take the left path. Me and Gul, we’ll go right. Keep comms silent till needed and if being overrun, retreat here and hold.”

They agree and split up. 

Left Path

Comet, Sarge, and Lake head towards the left path. The path is long and narrow. Comet placed first, being the best choice, Lake second, and Sarge last. Comet points his heavy weapon down the narrow path as he flips a switch, making a flower bloom around the gun’s barrels. The flower is a bright orange color to it with blue markings making a spiral pattern. 

Comet’s first mission with the squad is tense, but Lake and Sarge don’t seem fazed as Lake is nodding off and Sarge cleaning his teeth. The team keeps walking forward, waiting as a bright green light emits from the end of the hallway. Comet posts against the wall and peaks into the room. He sees nothing, just 6 glowing green pools.

He signals to move into the room, but Sarge grabs him before he goes anywhere. Sarge pokes his head into the room, using his goggles to scan the room from top to bottom. After a few seconds, Sarge lets go of Comet. Sarge turns a dial on his launcher and fires a round into the room. The round goes off, making an electrical field emit throughout the room. 

“Listen, kid, I have lived way past goblin life expectancy and I’m old by goblin standards. I got here by being cautious. You’re gonna have to adopt a similar mindset because we almost got ambushed.”       

Comet looks in to see weapons dangling from the walls and ceiling. If they followed Comet's command, they would’ve died. “I’m sorry, I’ll do better next time.” 

“Leave him be Sarge, he is still new. Let’s hurry so I can nap.” said Lake.

Lake enters the room with the others. Comet investigates the liquid pools, each bigger than Gul's size, as Sarge and Lake check out the room. “The room has only one way in,” said Sarge. Comet pulls out his copy cube, printing out a small medical testing kit. He takes a few drops and the medical kit lists off thousands, perhaps millions, of different chemicals. “What a strange liquid?” 

“What is it?” asked Lake as she leaned against the wall.

“A long list of things that I need to study further.”

“A summary then, because I don’t want some slime from an unknown region of space that makes zombies only die with some bullshit!” said Sarge.

Lake and Sarge nodded when Comet wanted to ask for more. “So this liquid is plant based with enough plant juice to make the Emperor seem at home but it is mixed with so many different materials it’s hard to keep track of.”

Ink currently watching the feeds is enjoying the comment section, blowing up with theories as many well-known alchemists, scholars, and mages watch the livestreams. She uses sound effects to hype up the viewers, but the feed is suddenly cut. The camera turns to Ink as she enrages.

“Who in the winds dare cut off my livestream!?” Ink curses through the ship’s speakers at the both army’s encampment of why they cut off her livestream. They responded saying “We did nothing.”  

Ink has never had this issue before. There were lags, delays or minor issues but never a full cut off. Ink checks Break and Guls feed to see they are still streaming but are having issues staying connected. “Break, can you hear me?”

“…” no response. She tries to contact the others, but still no response. “I hope they're fine.”

“What else?” asked Sarge

“A few minutes and I’ll tell you more.” 

Once Comet’s medical mind works, it’s hard for him to stop. Sarge stands guard at the door while Lake is currently napping. Comet examines the liquid, finding more and more unusual things about it. “Hey Sarge, so these pools are like giant blenders. It’s filled with various cells of members of the Union, Federation, Empire, and Imperium.”

“Imperium? This far out and in this age?” 

“Well, that’s one of the many issues I found. The Imperium cells are parasitic. They live with no basic function besides consuming living cells, but when exposed to this green liquid, it fuses with the cells, making them into a thing.” 

Sarge gives him a look through his goggles. Comet fakes a cough to get back on topic. “The liquid itself seems to be a pure mixture of every being. Most of these cells are older than augmentations… oh, this is bad.”

“What's wrong?”

“These cells are… fresh.” 

“Fresh?”

“The other units before us were just harvested. They didn’t die quickly because of the exorbitant amount of pain chemicals in the liquid.”

Sarge grabs the camera so he can get ink attention. “Ink, this may be a problem. Go into orbit and get a secure connection code up and…” Sarge notices the camera isn’t working and the connection codes aren’t working either. Sarge looks over, seeing Lake in a stalking pose.

Lake walks over, covering her mouth with her winged arm. They must not make a noise. Lake slightly turned her head, gesturing to the pool behind Comet. The two notice a goblin finger floating in the liquid, then something pulling it underneath. Lake slowly walks over as Comet and Sarge get their weapons ready. Lake pulls out a small orb emitting a blue light.

She gives a signal, dropping the orb as she flies upwards, using her claws to latch onto the ceiling. The orb falls into the liquid, releasing a powerful current. The unknown creature pops up from the liquid. Its flesh is distorted and melting. The creature resembled a goblin but had pieces of dwarf, Orc, and elf fused together.

Lake asked “what in the four seasons is that?!”

Comet unleashes a full barrage, ripping the creature into pieces as it falls over lifeless. The three retreated and regrouped. Comet walks over to the body, but Sarge grabs him again. Sarge points at the creature’s neck showing. Slight movements around the base of the jaw show it isn’t dead. Comet lifts his Sun-Dial, making the creature lunge once again. Comet lets loose another barrage of heated solar rounds, ensuring it is cut down into small chunks. The creature’s eyes and fingers still move without reason.

“How remarkable. It’s connected to nothing, but it still moves, even the eyelids still blink. I have never seen such wonderful medical science before.” 

“Comet, don’t make me put a hole in your chest. I don’t want a mad scientist arc again.”

Lake nods in agreement. “Sorry, but I’m curious how it’s done?” then the liquid pools drain, leaving them empty. The pieces of the creature flow downwards as well.

“Seems like that thing was blocking the drain.” The door slams shut once the pools drained, trapping them inside. “Great, now what?!” said Lake

Sarge and Comet look at the empty pools. “Seems this is our way out.”

 “No, nope, by the 4 magnificent beasts of seasons, no! I am not going down some tube. You know how hard it is to clean these feathers!” Sarge and Comet grab Lake by the wings and drag her to an empty pool. “I really hate you both right now.” 

“At least we’re all going together. There probably leeway before we drop into whatever pool of whatever this crap is, so you might not get wet.”

The three jump into the empty pool for a ride further into the unknown.

Right path

Break and Guls walk down a long, narrow path. Guls massive size makes it difficult for him to move properly, but Break can move fine. “Boss? The new guy, what do you think?”

“Truth be told, I’m glad we have someone with real medical experience instead of depending on whatever concoction by that blue horn who thinks he is a doctor. I never wanna taste medicine that looks back at me.” 

“I rather enjoyed the favors, but seriously. What do you think about him?” 

“He is a good kid, but he needs to grow a pair.”

“Good old Break honestly.” 

“What do you think of the kid?”

“He reminds me of you, but nicer and a better cook.”

Break lifts his fist in the air, making Guls stop. Break examines the wall, seeing scratch marks on the wall. “What’s wrong boss?” Break examines Guls armor, he notices the same colored material of the wall on his shoulders. 

“Seems like we’ve been going in a circle. You made those scratches earlier, and this is our second time passing them. Guls break the wall.”

Guls swings his hammer, smashing through the wall. They hear debris falling into water. Guls pokes his head through the wall, seeing many halls of similar designs moving and connecting all at once. A large pool of green liquid is beneath them. 

“Seems like we’re in one big maze. Oh, I see a way out, but I’m gonna have to fly you up there.”  

“You see anything else?”

Guls looks around, seeing nothing else but something in the water moves. Guls reaches into his waist and pulls out a small white triangle. He drops it in the water as bubbles surface. The white triangle bursts open, sending out metal wires as a rotting Taurus jumps forward, being cut into small pieces. The pieces fall into the water.

“Alright, I think we’re clear.” Guls swings his hammer again, further breaking down the wall. The sounds made echoed throughout the chamber. Once Guls finished his practice, he spread his wings and started warming up. The sounds of shattering stone weren’t like as the sounds of mutated roars echo throughout the chamber.  

Break didn’t like the sound of it as the different halls connect and move towards their direction. As Guls readies himself to fly, Break aims his weapon down the hall as they all finally connect. Break and Guls could hear the sounds of a large amount of footsteps heading their way.

“Guls, I think you need to skip the warm up and start flying.”

“Why boss? You know I need to warm up or I could pull a muscle.” 

Break fires a round down the hallway. The electrified round makes a dim blue light as it travels down the hallway. The round hits a soft target, making a bolt of plasma travel through the target body into others. Dozens of rotting corpses being illuminated by blue plasma send an icy shiver up Break’s spine, but Guls hammer is ablaze as you can sense him smiling underneath his helmet. 

The horde of corpses bellows out a roar that shakes the path they are on. Break fires rounds as they charge forward. The rounds and bolts of plasma seem to have no effect on them as they continue to charge. Headshots which are a universal cure for anything seem to have no effect on them. The viewers of the livestream are losing their minds about the undead and their immunity to guns. Guls slams his hammer onto the ground, sending a wave of fire towards the horde. Guls quickly grabs Break and flies towards the exit. 

The horde of undead break through the walls of the path as they try to jump up but all fall into the lake of green liquid. “Easy part boss.” as Guls hovers for a bit to appreciate the show, then about a few dozen rotting dragons, fairies, and pixies flap their wings to fly upwards towards them.

“Guls, next time shut up.” Guls nods in agreement.

Guls flies towards the exit as Break fires rounds trying to shoot down the corpses. Ink pops in to ask for help, but the signal is then cut. A few rotten pixies trying to cut off Guls and Break escape. Guls lifts his hammer of flames and swings, turning the two into fireballs as Guls swats them away. Guls and Break tumble into the exit as the swing makes Guls lose balance. Break quickly pulls out two spiked orbs and throws them at the ceiling. A rapid beeping begins as Break and Guls run. The flying dead fly into the exit, but the beeping stops as the ceiling collapses onto the flying dead. 

Guls wanted to say something, but Break wasn’t in the mood. Guls, being 7ft taller and could lift several tons, feared the look Break rarely gave when he wasn’t in a laughing mood.

Time to see where this place leads?