Chapter 2:

0.3 Dr. Hero

Frontline Worlds: Zero Mission


The bunker corridor was cold and unwelcoming as Lem and Isamu moved through it, clutching their makeshift weapons. The concrete walls, lined with cables and flickering emergency lights, gradually turned to rough stone. The air grew heavier, and the familiar signs of a bunker base faded, replaced by glowing symbols and twisted roots creeping down from the ceiling. It felt like they were leaving the modern world behind and stepping into something ancient and unknown. Lem wondered how could such a blend between real and fantasy could exist.

The corridor opened into a wide chamber, somehow repurposed to fulfill that of a hidden base. Large pillars, carved with scenes of battles and strange creatures, supported the ceiling. The floor was uneven, scattered with equipment and scientific tools. At the far end, a massive stone archway loomed, surrounded by half-finished excavation work. Beyond the archway, the chamber expanded into a path marked by strange circular domes on the sides, which provided enough light for them to have the right footing. 

Lem's eyes followed the pathway and spotted a makeshift laboratory on the other side.

"Look at that," he said, pumping Isamu on the shoulder.

Tables were cluttered with modern computers and ancient, arcane devices humming with faint energy. Strange artifacts lay half-buried in dust alongside advanced technology, creating a blend of old and new. Monitors flickered with indecipherable data, and shelves lined with vials of glowing liquid and crystal shards hinted at experiments bridging science and magic.

"This is really cool," Isamu noted, walking down that path without hesitating.

"Seriously?" Lem said.

"What? If Raena sent us here it means it's safe, right?"

"The way you trust people like that is cool when we are not surviving a demon invasion we know little about."

"But Raena—"

Lem just rubbed his eyes in exhaustion as he followed Isamu, "Let's just focus on finding this Dr. Hero, judging from the computers and the ongoing experiments on those tubes, he should not be far—"

The ground suddenly rumbled beneath them. 

"What the hell did you step on, Isamu!!" Lem screamed in panic.

"I didn't! I didn't touch these little domes on the sides!" Isamu said as he held his pipe tube hard.

"Sick bastard, you're gonna get us killed!" 

From a crack in the stone floor, a massive centipede monster burst forth, its segmented body bristling with razor-sharp legs and mandibles snapping menacingly. Before the boys could even react, the creature lunged toward them—but it never made contact. A forcefield, invisible until then, flared to life, electrocuting the centipede with a blinding flash of light. The monster screeched in agony before being incinerated into ash, leaving nothing behind but the smell of burnt flesh.

"What the—" Lem exclaimed.

The boys barely had time to process what had just happened when the ground outside the bunker began to tremble. Hundreds of spider monsters, each with gleaming red eyes and venomous fangs, erupted from the earth, swarming toward the bunker.

"Lem!" Isamu called, shaking, "I don't think pipe tubes will help here."

Lem gripped at his own useless tube, bewildered, his mind racing as to what to do. He glanced over his shoulder and saw how it was the same thing on that side. 

Then, a dozen hidden flamethrowers suddenly emerged from the walls and ceiling, unleashing torrents of fire that engulfed the advancing horde. The spiders shrieked and writhed as they were consumed by flames.

The boys' eyes lit up before the amount of destruction unfolding.

As if that were not enough, stone altars descended from the ceiling, their surfaces glowing with ancient runes. They unleashed beams of magical light, blasting away any creatures that dared to survive the fire. The boys watched in stunned silence as the attack was repelled with almost absurd efficiency—no bug survived the onslaught. Lem scratched his head, and Isamu let out a low whistle.

"Those things never learn," a voice said, coming from the lab. The two boys turned to spot an ashen-haired man, perhaps in his thirties, standing at the limits of that lab site holding a cup of coffee and wearing a lab coat, his glasses gleaming at the blazing flames scorching the entire area, "pay them no mind, my A.R.E.S. system has dealt with these things since we established this base. Unfortunately, we had to occupy this dungeon for our base, but it is a small price to pay in order to go undetected by the demons' sensors. Dungeons are packed with feral monsters, you know? So many of them flood these ancient ruins in so many worlds that no one, not even the Demon King himself, dares step into these without taking serious casualties," He took another sip at his coffee and cleared his throat, "You may wonder why is the IRA so invested in establishing forward bases in such lethal places, and you would be right to wonder... yes indeed. Let's just say that while the demon king would not tread and face these many critters or waste resources like that, we know how to adapt to these situations. I mean, we wouldn't be a resistance group if we couldn't do it, eh?"

Isamu and Lem exchanged glances as the man took several sips to clear his throat yet again. Lem reached to his head and tried to adjust his black beanie, only to realize flames had somehow sneaked and reached the leather hat. He took it off and threw it up in the air in panic, but one of the altars above picked up a flying, unidentified object and promtply blasted it with its magical beam. Lem's eyes watered as he stared at the blowing sky.

"My lucky beanie," he uttered, sulking.

Isamu patted his friend on the back, "It's all right, you're alive, that's all it matters, we'll get you another one."

"My favorite store is probably gone now," Lem mourned.

The man in the labcoat scratched his head, "Well, shit, I'm sorry kiddo, but hey, know what? If those turrets and altars did not destroy you right away!"

Isamu and Lem turned to the man, who just grinned, "Worry not, my sensors picked up your arrival at the warehouse, and my portal detection software determined the portal to be heroic, not demonic," the man's eyes furrowed as he adjusted his glasses unnecessarily, "I must ask though... who sent you here, and why did they send you to the storage room next to my lab and not the usual hangar bay where the recruitment is taking place?"

Lem collected himself as he cleared his tears, "I bet that one is Dr. Hero," he said, clearly fed up with the whole thing.

"Maybe, excuse me, sir, are you Dr. Hero by any chance?" Isamu asked.

"Who's asking?" the man said.

"We were sent here by a girl named Raena," Lem explained.

The man's eyes lit up, albeit with a bit of worry, "What happened to her? Is she okay?"

"I think she's fine," Lem answered, "Last time we saw her she was going all out against some demons."

The man cleared his glasses and took another sip from his coffee, "That totally sounds like her... that pyromaniac drake... Forgive my manners, it's just that since the UDR attacked Earth, we've been scrambling to get everyone settled around the shelters... things have been quite messy."

The boys still looked at him puzzled. 

"I am, indeed, Dr. Hero," the man declared, sipping from his mug, only to realize he had finished the coffee. He sighed and turned, gesturing the two boys to come with him, "Well, my name is Minimus Onesimus Septentrius, a hero to a destroyed world, lover to a murdered princess, centerpiece to a disbanded harem..." 

Dr. Hero gripped his fist and lifted it to the air, "...and I will have my vengeance, in this world or the next."

"You lost your loved ones?" Isamu asked, redundantly.

Dr. Hero served himself another full coffee mug and took three sips, as if compensating for the lost sipping time, "Aye, that I did, people here call me Dr. Hero because I am the first and foremost authority in the scientific field of heroics."

"H-heroics?" Lem asked, almost grinning at the absurd name.

"Heroics!" Dr. Hero emphasized, lifting his hands to the air almost maniacally, "the science that studies everything about heroes around the many worlds that battle demon lords, princes, kings, and whatnot. I was a hero myself, born with special blood, magic, and a mind to invent things, but since the UDR attacked my world, I have dedicated my entire existence to doing what no god or spirit dared to do: create an army of heroes to battle the enemy!"

The silence that followed seemed not what Dr. Hero expected, so he reiterated his hand gestures to the air with more maniacal intensity, "HEROICS!"

"R-right," Lem said, smiling in order to get the mad scientist to settle down.

"UDP? Army of heroes?" Isamu said, "You help Raena-chan fight the demons?"

"Aye, Raena is a victim of the UDR as well, but unlike me, she's not a fan of exposition as much as she loves using her powers to burn demons, so I bet she did not explain what was happening back home, did she?"

"You got that right," Lem said, scratching his head and mourning his lost beanie, "care to explain?"

"No," Dr. Hero said bluntly.

Lem and Isamu stared at the scientist speechless.

"I mean, that's not my job, If I tell you everything I won't save anything for the general's briefing." Dr. Hero concluded. 

"This was a waste of time," Lem said, turning away.

"Oh, I sincerely differ, kiddo," Dr. Hero said, "You see, recruitment for the IRA military branch is something no one is ready for—no one is ready for the general and her antics," he noted, sweating coldly by saying that, "I bet Raena, in all her rushing and burning, attempted to give you the best edge at surviving."

"Surviving?" Isamu asked, puzzled.

Lem's eyes frowned at the implication of them being there with Dr. Hero, feeling a very cold sweat as he glanced over his shoulder at the scientist.

Dr. Hero said to Isamu, smiling, "Hey, the boy who lost the hat, mind if I make it up to you?"

Lem turned to face him, "How so? Are you returning us home and removing the demon invasion?"

"Eh... no," Dr. Hero said, "I can't fix that, but as I said, I can give you an edge..."

He reached for a group of magical cubes behind him, his eyes locked on Lem as he grinned. He then held it in his palm and the cube gleamed, materializing into a black gelatinous lifeform.

"This is the black slime, it is not smart, but it holds the capacity to run indefinite amounts of data, I retrieved it from a world that saw fit to collapse its core and turn into a black hole."

Lem watched at the slime, which seemed to eagerly wait for the boy's touch, "I still fail to see how this is a good compensa—"

"Fusion!" Dr. Hero shouted, and the black slime jumped on top of Lem's head. The boy barely had time to let out a slight moan before having his head covered by the slime.

"What have you done!" Isamu yelled, as Lem's consciousness drifted into blackness, "Dr. Hero!"

"Relax, kiddo, your friend will feel okay soon enough, very well if I dare say..."

There was nothing else, the sounds deafened, and all vision blurred into the pitch-black liquid that suffocated everything.

Kurobini
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