Pioneering Certification Examination

I departed Port Coimbra for Reboldeux today, headquarters of the Office of Pioneering Support where my application for a formal post of captain of pioneers led to a most gruelling entrance examination.

4 hours and 22 solid pages of calligraphy later I finally emerged back into the Espadan sunlight seeking a well-deserved meal and just about ran right into you, Carmen, for I can barely see anything after so much work in candlelight.

I am happy to learn that you have made new friends during your routine patrols of the frontiers but I am concerned at eventually losing yet another of a beloved sister. You seem very happy at your recent experiences, and I am joyful at that, yet a part of my heart remembers the time when Los Condenados conducted its last mission into Tetra in an attempt to stem the outpouring tides of Hell.

I fought in the assault detachment, the one position most feared by any pioneer for its job is to open the engagement and "fix" the enemy while the main force deploys its overwhelming firepower to destroy it. Room after room we cleared; the hallways of the catacombs were literally piled high with demon corpses which we used as tactical cover, one team leapfrogging ahead of the other as the other laid down as much firepower as it could on the advancing hordes.

With our effort our main striking force simply steamrollered the opposition. An hour passed like this, or maybe ten, I do not know, before the forward units got enveloped by what seems t o be a coordinated assault by not one but two demon lords. We held our ground as pioneer after pioneer fell to the waves of solid demonic muscle after our repeating rifles ran out of ammunition... hoping that our friends back in the main body would come forward to assist with their heavy weapons.

That help never came; they simply abandoned us for a more "profitable" avenue of advance. I looked behind seeing them just leaving us to die... and promptly lost all will to fight. I got cornered and was brutally maimed by this hideous... thing, with four legs with an ebony staff, they say, before a group of indepndent mercenaries managed to drive off the horde overrunning us with some well-placed incendiary grenades. I would never know, for I only opened my eyes again 5 months after what was infamously known as the 4.3 Incident.

That's what "friends" are for.