Beneath the Dragoneye Moons

Chapter 480: The Han Civil War VI

I teleported into my [Vault] and fumed for a minute while I navigated to where my ‘Ironside Brigade’ gear was, and started to get dressed.

First thing first - makeup. Not my usual set of cosmetics, but some subtle pieces to change the shape of my face. Long lasting, sticky putty for my nose, a ridge on my cheeks and around my eyesocket, all designed to make me look like a different person. Someone who knew me or had the right skills would see through it, but it would hide me from the majority of the Legion - or anyone who knew Dawn and happened to be around.

Weirdly, my vanity helped here. I wasn’t fitting in with my personal image of how I looked best, but I was determined to look good either way. It was like a high-quality mask. Not my normal look, but I could make a mask work for me.

A strong, long-lasting alchemical foundation went over that, and I slipped away to my ‘Elaine feels pretty’ room to grab some extras on top of it. It was going to be clear that I was wearing makeup - I might as well lean into it and wear more, helping soothe myself while campaigning, and creating an obvious layer of “Bunny wears simple makeup and reapplies it” so nobody would question me fixing up my disguise.

I slipped what was hopefully a few week’s supply into my pocket, knowing I’d need to sneak away to visit [Vault] again if it got low. A midnight trip to the latrine would probably work.

Back to my armory!

Long chainmail went from my shoulders to my knees, while a metal helmet called to my fantasies, begging for a pair of horns on them. Sadly, they were to remain fantasies, and my helmet remained hornless. I suspiciously eyed a heavy fur cloak, remembering that nobody I’d seen was wearing one. Heavy leather boots promised protection from the elements and not much else, and the shields were round. A seax - a type of short sword - and a spear completed the ensemble.

The gear was enchanted, and the Sixth had three whole lines of [Enchanters] who tried to keep everything running properly. Bunny didn’t know how to enchant. Bunny would need to semi-regularly bring her gear over to the enchanters to get it fixed up. Then again, I think it was a whole-line exercise done on a regular rotation…

Bunny was going to need to smile, nod, and go along with what everyone else was doing a lot. Most of this stuff were basics I should’ve already been taught.

I felt and looked like a Lithos raider. Just needed to get a longship and I was all set! That was the whole point of the different gear. A layer of deception and deniability. Oh no, it wasn’t Exterreri sending a whole damn army somewhere else; we were ‘just’ raiders. That happened to build forts.

Frankly, the excuse was paper-thin, but apparently even a paper-thin excuse was all the [Diplomats] needed. I didn’t think we were fooling anyone, but that layer of thinking was far over my head.

Which brought my thinking back round to my new moniker.

Legionnaire Bunny.

My knee-jerk reaction was I didn’t like it. It wasn’t a good name.

I mulled it over as I got dressed, moving at impossible speeds.

I’d held different identities over time. Healer Elaine, Sentinel Dawn were my big ones, core to my identity. The whole idea was a layer of deception and subterfuge to hide the fact that an Immortal, a powerful asset of Exterreri, was in a place I had no business being.

And I’d be in the army proper for some time. Given the expense and the scale, from everything I knew, we weren’t here for a battle or two. We were going to be here a while, unless there was an unexpected breakout of peace.

Why make myself miserable?

Why not embrace Legionnaire Bunny? Have a persona?

The weirdest thing happened. As I started to mull the idea over, it was like it was hijacked. I had the urge, the impulse, to do an amazing job with it. To put on the best ‘show’ possible as Legionnaire Bunny. The thought was so bizarre, so foreign, I stopped what I was doing and examined it, looking at it from every direction.

The cause was obvious.

[Companion Bond between Elaine and Auri].

It was the vanity aspect. I couldn’t half-ass it, not when it was how I looked and displayed myself. It was how I was going to present myself to the world, so of course I had to do a great job with it. It was only natural!

The insidious thing about the bond-induced vanity was it made perfect sense with itself. I was extra glad that the System didn’t permit foreign mental manipulation and influences, because wow, doing it to myself was bad enough.

There was no good reason to fight it though, unlike an operation where I had to be smeared in mud or jump into a pigsty, so I let it flow through me, all working on answering a single question.

Who was Legionnaire Bunny?

What were my assets, what mix of abilities could I display as my persona? What was required, and what abilities could I keep under wraps?

There was no hiding my [Healer] tag. But I didn’t need to be a strong healer. Like, sure, in a battle I’d be quietly and subtly healing the entire Legion - sorry, brigade - but what did I want to show?

I think I’d tell people that I could fix up minor injuries and diseases. Anyone with something more severe - a broken bone in training, for example - either had the Brigade’s actual medics around, who could use the experience, or it would be so bad that I had to immediately step in, at which point I could hopefully use a ranged heal to fix the issue.

If I couldn’t? Well, I wasn’t going to let someone die for a deception.

I wanted to make a cohesive whole, and with the name Bunny speed was a natural contender. I had enough speed to make most speedsters blush. There was one easy aspect.

Healing and speed - why would I have both?

Well, that implied I was getting hurt running around, and it made me think of a [Messenger] or scout. The Brigade had three whole lines of [Messengers] already, it didn’t make a ton of sense for me to be one unattached to Optio Ardenus. Scouts and recon were under Optio Apollo, but most centuries had a few attached ‘natively’. [The World Around Me] along with my senses gave me fantastic scouting abilities.

One medium ability and two strong abilities was about the limit of what I thought I could reasonably show, without breaking everyone’s belief that I was ‘only’ level 256.

Oh! Wait! Bunny was also energetic. [Sunrise] was a fairly simple skill that I’d need to keep going and going and going.

That was it for abilities. Now, who was Bunny?

I couldn’t stray too far from who I was innately, otherwise I’d never maintain the facade.

Hmmm.

Okay!

Bunny was bright, cheerful, energetic, bubbly, enthusiastic, and always willing to help out. Maybe channel Harper a bit.

Yes!

Bunny also had no head for names. She was a little harebrained.

Perfection.

What else was there?

Bunny had no contacts in command. She didn’t know Katerina, apart from her being the far-away Legata. She was relatively new to the Legion. I’d have to see if Katerina had any details about that, she probably had a rock-solid backstory already in place. Bunny didn’t have a phoenix companion, and the valkyries were only a story to her.

Alright! I was ready!

I finished buckling my belt on, made sure my Sentinel badges were safe strapped to a shelf, and grabbed the heavy backpack filled with my personal supplies. My share that I needed to carry around. I teleported out of [Vault], back into Katerina’s office. She arched an eyebrow at me.

“Order came down to leave the capes behind.” The Legata said.

I briskly nodded.

“Yes ma’am. Except it’d be weird if I didn’t have it packed somewhere in my supplies, yeah?”

“Good thinking. Here’s your background.” She handed over a sheaf of papers. I was done reading them before I collected them.

[The World Around Me] with [Manuscript Mastery] was broken. I grinned in delight.

“A Ranger washout? Oh Katerina, you spoil me.” I was trying to get into the Bunny mindset. Wasn’t quite nailing it yet, but it was a work in progress.

Katerina grunted.

“You’re a bit of a mess in some respects, but you’ve got skills. Need to have a reason for those skills, and a Ranger background should excuse anything you show. It’ll also let me tap you for more interesting tasks if needed. Also, I made a mistake earlier. Sorry. You’re going to have to wait here for a few minutes while Reed issues the newest commands, then you should be able to blend in with the crowds.”

I swallowed nervously. Katerina had gone from nice at the start, to a note of irritation at the end.

“Should I know what these commands are?” I asked, fearing the answer. “Also, I’m assuming there’s a provision for getting the [Batteries] near me in a fight?”

I got another evil glare.

“Yes. Leave it to me, we’ll work it out. For the commands: They’re the ‘we’re rearranging half the lines because we need to hide one idiot Sentinel' commands. I want you to take a good look at all the complaining and disorder going on, and know that you are the singular cause of all of it.”

I shut up and saluted.

“Legionnaire Bunny, you’re dismissed.” Katerina said, already getting into the deception.

She’d also said to wait for a few minutes before leaving, so…

I pulled out one of my spellbooks and activated the Greater Invisibility rune, making a mental note to just bite the damn bullet and make a spellbook with only invisibility runes. It was way too useful of a utility spell, and I found myself using it all the time.

Heck, let’s make Bunny’s second class a Mirage Speedster scout class. Sentinel Dawn didn’t have Mirage as an element, she famously had Radiance and a little bit of Spatial. The rune in my chest could be a silent ‘public’ activation, and when I had nobody looking I could use my spellbook or draw the rune out manually.

It was clear when I should get going. Lots of soldiers filled the dirt ‘streets’ between the various tents, some complaining, some muttering, all of them carrying backpacks full of their personal supplies.

[Blink] would end up with my stuff scattered all over the place, probably outside of my invisibility, and it’d be way too clear I had powerful Spatial magic. Instead, I opened the door a crack and slipped out of it, knowing that Katerina had ‘seen’ me leave but knowing she wasn’t going to say anything. Getting through the rest of the command post was easy. It was small and temporary, disguised as a normal scribe’s office, and I dropped my illusion right before I pulled the curtain aside and joined the crowds. Just another soldier moving from A to B.

“What is with this shit.” One soldier complained to his buddy. “Go join a new Legion to get deployed, fine. All new lines, sure I get it. But to come here and get told ‘wait, no, actually, all new lines again?’ What the fuck is command thinking?” His frustration was evident, and echoed by a number of other soldiers.

“Always fucked, never surprised.” His buddy sagely replied.

A dozen similar conversations were going around in other places, but the reactions differed.

“Just be glad it’s reshuffling the lines.” One experienced soldier pushing his 50s was advising a younger one. “If the worst we have to deal with is a reshuffled line, we’ll be blessed by all the gods.”

I flowed with the crowds, feeling it was suffocatingly slow and conscious of my relative height. I’d seen all the soldiers before, I’d worked with them, but I hadn’t quite realized how basically everyone towered over me, and what it felt like in a crunch of chainmail and furs.

I found a moment to slip away, and a hastily constructed mandala in the palm of my hand summoned an invisible flame, one that Auri should be able to see. She was all about Fire after all.

The Legion continued their standard setup, and I was able to find the tent our line used without any issue. Two soldiers were already there, a man and a woman, along with the servant/helper that every line had. The beating heart of every line, the man who helped make sure everything got done. The man was older, with a grizzled look and a grey 5 o’clock shadow. A subtle insignia on his uniform indicated he was the line leader, my new boss. He was on the larger side, with muscles that made me think he had some skills pumping him up. A big old bear - but not a nice, fluffy one. A mean old bear, except the mean old bear was on my side.

Was he in the know? I didn’t think so.

The woman was lying down on her sack and idly juggling a dozen darts with one hand. She lifted her other hand and gave me a lazy wave as I approached.

I saluted.

“Bunny, reporting in! I think I’m supposed to be here? 1st, 1st, 5th?” I asked.

Grizzly - I was nicknaming everyone - got up, returned my salute, then offered his hand.

“Bunny. Welcome. Grab any spot on the left-hand side of the tent. Is Bunny your real name? I was curious when I saw the names for the new line.”

I laughed nervously as I placed my bag near the end of the tent, next to Darts as I was calling her. First come, first serve, and I didn’t want to have everyone pass me in the night as they needed to leave. That, and Darts seemed like an inoffensive bunkmate at first glance. Better the evil I knew than to roll the dice on an unknown.

I didn’t want to start off lying to my new line commander, but I couldn’t tell him the truth.

“I go by Bunny on all my paperwork, and it’s what everyone calls me. My actual name is… somewhat worse.” I explained with a nervous chuckle. “I’m quick, but I’m not particularly strong.”

Grizzly held up a hand.

“Let’s wait for everyone else to get here before we start the introductions, yeah? That way we only need to do them once.” He said.

I was getting strong Julius vibes off him, crossed with some Arthur, and it was helping me relax.

The other members of the line showed up, some faster than others. We were about to send out a search party for the last member when he showed up sniffing. It had been enough time that I had a set of nicknames for everyone already.

Lucius was the servant of the line. A freeman, I wasn’t going to risk getting on his bad side by nicknaming him.

Grizzly was the boss. A big mean old bear of a man, I had to imagine he wasn’t a [Centurion] because he didn’t want to be.

Darts was the lady from earlier who was juggling them, and had quickly shaken all of us down for our allotments. With Grizzly giving his tacit consent, we’d all handed our 2-3 darts over to her. Hey, she had a bunch of skills around throwing things, and I didn’t.

Specs had crystal or glass lenses over his eyes like glasses, but they were so foggy I couldn’t imagine them helping him see. There had to be some skills at play there, and I was sure I’d learn what they were soon enough. I was resisting reading a few heavily dogeared books in his bag.

Boots put her gear down next to Darts, and the first thing she did was take off her boots, take out a leather polishing kit - that wasn’t standard issue - and start polishing her boots. I could see that she had three more pairs in her bag. Given that she was over level 300 and one of the older members of the line, and how important boots were, I resolved to find myself a few extra pairs myself.

Only ones that looked fabulous, of course.

Ginger arrived on Grizzly’s shitlist. The ginger arrived drunk as a skunk, smelling of gin and complaining that the sun was ‘a vast conspiracy against mortal eyes’. The woman was barely able to slur out a greeting. She also had a number of interesting herbs in her bag, but I wasn’t about to rat her out.

That wasn’t what Bunny did.

This was also a small scale operation, and if I pretended it was a Ranger team instead of a line in the Legions, the proper way of handling it would be to quietly pull her off to the side and discuss it there. Only if it escalated as a problem would I need to do something.

Publicly calling her out in front of everyone, when I wasn’t the boss?

Nah, my training said that was a terrible move, although maybe if Grizzly and I had a shift together or something I’d drop a word with him and let him deal with it.

Blockhead didn’t seem to have much going on upstairs. I’d met quiet soldiers. I’d met average soldiers. But it seemed like he’d taken a few too many hits to the head, and just… there were no lights on. The hamsters had quit. He took a moment to process anything Grizzly said, and was just sort of checked out.

I reserved judgment. Soldiers didn’t need to be smart or quick, and he could be a perfectly competent, loyal comrade-in-arms. Brains were not an indicator of value.

Last was Drippy, who arrived sniffling. I gave him a friendly pat on the shoulder, blasting healing through him and fixing whatever problem he had.

“Hi! I’m Bunny! Welcome, welcome!” I enthusiastically greeted him.

He sniffed in a way that set my teeth on edge, visions of murder running through my mind.

Grizzly stood up.

“Welcome everyone. I feel like I was doing this speech just three weeks ago,” He paused, letting most of the line chuckle weakly.

Oh.

OH.

Shit.

He had done this speech three weeks ago. It was my fault he needed to do it again.

It was my fault a third of the Legion had to do this speech again.

I’d really fucked up.

I chuckled in embarrassment as Grizzly continued his introduction. Long story short, he was a lifer, with no ambitions of moving up and on. The Legion was his life.

He pointed to me.

“First off we’ve got the most interesting name here. Bunny, would you mind doing your introductions? And your level of [Soldier’s Solidarity] if you have it.”

Oh shit. I didn’t have[Soldier’s Solidarity].

I got a series of mixed looks at that. I hopped up, bouncing a little. I didn’t want to lie if I could at all help it, which required some clever wordplay.

“Hi everyone! I’m called Bunny!” I waved cheerfully at everyone, giving my best sunny smile. “It’s so nice to meet a buncha new friends! I went to Ranger Academy at one point, so I don’t have [Soldier’s Solidarity], buuuuut at the end of it they didn’t have a spot for me on a team.” I let the memory of those few terrifying seconds pass through me, hunching my shoulders. “But I’m here now! I can’t wait to meet you all! I even have nicknames for all of you! Grizzly! Darts! Boots! Specs! Ginger! Blockhead! Drippy!” I pointed to each one in question, who got various looks of horror on their face before laughing at the next name.

“I’ve got minor healing! If you’ve got little scrapes or bumps let me know and I’ll fix you right up! Diseases, gone! If it’s more serious like a broken bone go see the medics! I’m really, really fast but not very strong. I’m good at spotting things! Like, Boots, you’ve got extra boots in your bag! Super good idea! Darts, I can’t wait to play cards with you! Specs, do the different gems do different things for you? Grizzly, I can’t wait to hear what nice tunes you’ve got with that whistle! Blockhead, you’ve gotta personalize a little!”

I almost said Ginger’s name then stopped myself. Nope not going there. I stumbled verbally a little, but was so quick I doubt anyone noticed it.

“Anyway yeah that’s me!” I gave another cheery wave and sat down.

Holy shit that was exhausting. How did bubbly people do it all the time!? ALL THE TIME! They didn’t just do a quick little talk and be done with it, they lived like this.

How did anyone live like this!?

Grizzly looked poleaxed and coughed lightly.

“Well, I think Bunny’s going to be on a lot of guard duty. Darts, you’re up next.”

I slowly got to know my fellow soldiers.

Darts was a throwing expert. Blockhead was the highest level and a pure [Warrior]. I hadn’t mentioned the drawing of his family in his bag, it seemed too personal to call out. Drippy was an Ooze spellsword, and claimed he was pretty good at cooking the standard rations. I wasn’t sure how close I wanted his drippy nose to my food. Ginger knew how many minutes were left until she could leave, ‘assuming Exterreri time’. Boots had a husband and three kids back home. Specs was a Radiance [Mage] - Gemstone [Warrior] split, which was different from a Spellsword. He could blast Radiance from his eyes, and the Gemstone class helped ‘modify’ his abilities.

Grizzly took it all in stride.

“Excellent! Now, we’ve got the rest of the afternoon free. Why don’t we do some drills and start getting together as a line?”

I mentally shrugged.

He was the boss.

I’d done the entire thing backwards. Ranger, Sentinel, and now finally I’d try out this ‘soldiering’ thing.

Just as long as nobody asked me to be an adventurer.