A middle-aged man, donning a black suit and dress shoes along with a bastard sword sheated at the side, scavenged around his boxes looking for something and pulls it out. His well-kept and preserved Eterna Recorder™, played the recordings.
Recording 1 - HY 1427
Eli: Testing, testing. Is this thing on? Yep,, my name is Eli Klein, this is a recording meant to be passed on to my apprentice or whatever if I ever get one in the future. Still, spent two years working as a Hunter and I'm not dead despite some shit jobs. Things are looking pretty sweet and WAY better than being some corp's test subject.
My life began as a simple Southeastern Quadrant slum dweller outside the City. I used to have parents until both died when I was about 8. Left me a sizable chunk of credits after they died. Turns out they were former 7th Class Hunters turned homeless since their Office couldn't afford the City's residence tax and kicked them out plus without a Corp's sponsor or work, they ended up in the slums.
I received a decent insurance payout and following some clues they left behind. Managed to get my hands on some minor body modifications. Strong stomach, reinforced skin and muscle fibers plus a new pair of eyes. Thanks to that, I could at least survive even with them gone. But, without much money, all I could do was survive by taking on some odd jobs and being a test subject. Hafta say, they rig you up into some weird devices. Eat this they'll say before strapping you to a chair and spin you around reallt fast to test any new reaction to G forces.
On HY 1425, I got to hit my 15th birthday and signed up for the Hunter evaluations. I wasn't really way better than most, just above average amongst the examinees. There were a few City folk, almost couldn't tell they were molded at all. Wish they wouldn't speak though, that City-born arrogance was practically hanging from their faces. Try to avoid getting to know or appearing weak in front of them.
There's a ton of reasons why City folk would even join the examination at all but most if not all are bad news. Get hooked by their false promises and you'll be dead in some Entity-infested gutter two missions later. I got my license about a month later along with an acceptance letter.
Did about half a dozen missions in the 1st year, first three were probably testing my reliability. Transport this package here to this warehouse past an Outpost and don't get caught. Move some corp's illegal equipment to this secret lab near-(the following has been removed)and make it back alive. A minor business partner's niece was kidnapped by some no name Syndicate hoping to hostage her. Take care of them and retrieve the kid safely back to the nearest branch. Salvaged a couple reinforced skeletal frames from that Syndicate which gave me quite a power boost. No worries, I made sure to leave a few spares fot whenever you join.
The current me is probably about half as strong as those City folk Hunter examinees. Should be able to slaughter a couple hundred slum dwellers without any difficulty. Only after those three did I get my first proper 6th Class request. Guard and transport the Silverfish(a 5th grade Entity) to the Hunters Guild branch at Evelyn Outpost. Not gonna lie, nearly died but I was young and wanted a proper mid-tier request completion on my file.
Now I'm looking for some help, maybe a reliable partner or apprentice. As long as they can keep up. Oh, shit the batte-
The video ends. A few of them seem corrupted and unplayable.
Recording 3 - HY 1433
Eli: Got that battery problem fixed forever
I finally started an Office with Reina. Interesting how things turn out, eh? Being on the verge of death made me understand that pride is useless and I stopped working solo. A promotion came through too, we're now both Class 4 Hunters. Three years of hard work finally paid off. Finally at the same level as those genuine City-born Hunters. Snagged a couple of promising seeds too at the evaluation last week. Should be fun with each of us having an apprentice. Hey, wai-
A woman appears on the screen. Red jacket, sea-green eyes and blonde hair visible with an estoc and shortsword at the hip.
Reina: Why an Eterna Recorder? You could've bought half a magazine with that money.
Eli: Our Office supply should be more than enough. Besides, this was from way back before I met you. Bought this with a third of the paycheck that I got in my first year as a Hunter. I get that your nervous about having an apprentice but we have to teach them how to properly stand as a Hunter not like those young City-born Hunters who run around and get themselves killed. Here, add something in.
Reina: Hi, It's Reina here. I'm a Class 4 Hunter and my partner here is one too. Lemme show the Office. This is the pantry, it has the greatest fridge ever with miniaturized restoration to reset the passage of time, worth every single bit of those five hundred thousand credits. Here's the soundproofed black room for our more shady clientele, completely padded with Assassin Shark leather. This took a month to gather this much leather from the Great Lake.
Geez, I almost forgot, we have a new installation here. The mini gym, thanks to a connection we have with Alda Group, we managed to get a expanded gym-cum-training grounds, fully decked out with training gear and proper stuff from a couple developing Workshops. That's all for now. I'll add in something new next time.
Recording 4 - HY 1435
Eli shows up on the screen, haggard, depressed and injured. Blood drips from his mouth, bone stocking out of his right arm and a hole where one of his kidneys used to be.
Eli: It's me again, haaaaa~. God I look pretty bad, don't I? I'll live, probably. Herbert Corp's DNA modifications makes it so my blood clots way faster over my injuries. Reina's fine but unconscious. Phew, that medipod works wonders. Right, probably should clarify why I look terrible and have a couple weapons sticking outta me I suppose.
Both Reina and I took on students, I taught Alex mostly survival tactics, quick judgement skills and a hybrid form of swordsmanship I picked up whereas Reina taught Adina her Paler-something sword style and gave her a decent set of dual swords. We took on a Class 3 request, those scouts never fucking mentioned jack on the swarm, and nearly got wiped from a Terror-Class Entity. I still remember telling Reina, ya gotta teach the kid some better judgement. She ain't strong enough to just charge in and out like you do.
The mission was easy at first, contain a Class 2 Entity that looked like a giant spider with some chess piece like symbol on it's back and bring it to that big name Grace Workshop. Took awhile but we figured out the chess piece symbol kept changing and the stronger the chess piece, the stronger its abilities became and vice versa. The problem wasn't really the mission but the extraction. We encountered 06-05 The Undying Swarm, its a swarm of giant mosquitoes with ridiculous regeneration capability and speed.
It tried to take out Adina and Alex but Alex managed to retreat fast enough. Adina, on the other hand, wasn't quite as fortunate. I tried using part of the spider as a distraction which sort of worked and retrieved Adina while she was alive, barely. Retrieval and extraction were "successful" to say the least but Adina died on the way back. Those R Corp nanomachines couldn't restore the large amount of blood she lost. Then those assholes at Grace Workshop tried to fleece us since we couldn't bring in the 'complete' Entity. I tried to ahold of Miracle Industries' MiraLife Insurance Representative but they said that since a portion of her brain was damaged they couldn't revive her. Told me something about wishes and a star so I still have a lead.
I'll add in more details after I rest up a bit. Just lemme hit th-
Eli falls on the couch unconscious, the recording goes on for another 5 hours without any changes before going black.
Recording 6 - HY 1436
Eli appears, battered, bruised and certainly in grief. He tries to put on a more indifferent appearance but fails.
Eli: Haaaaa~, we incinerated Adina's corpse, couldn't risk any possibility of the Undying Swarm's implanted eggs hatching and draining us for their first meal. Alex, he's changed, we've all changed too I suppose. Reina's been looking into possible revival methods but we've only found possibly outright Taboo methods and none of us want to get killed off by the Council. I've had her look into Star and Wishes considering the tip I got, she says she found a small lead and I'm starting to feel a little hope. Alex has been hounding me everyday to spar and train since the her death. I've been helping him train while looking into why the scouts messed up.
Hah, turns out those bastards had been requisitioned on the third day by some rich City kid and could only finish 70% of the work. This is borderline unacceptable within our contract with Five Eyes and still violated their own terms for that which we are entitled to claim a year's worth of Office revenue for compensation. I wanted to kill the little bastard but it would've been too obvious regarding my motive. I'll probably keep it on the drawing board.
The Mask Maker has shown up in the Southwestern quadrant, something smells fishy. Then again, that Class 2 Entity's corpse is still in storage, any mask made from it will be pretty strong with that gimmick. Reina won't be back for at least another 8 hours and I've still gotta train Alex in a bit so I'm ending it here.
The recording ends here.