"YOU WANT SOME OF US, YOU COCKSUCKERS?!" I howled at the top of my lungs, the voice of the Dragonborn rattling the trees, as Kildeez and I readied ourselves for the coming battle. Silhouettes in the treeline began to take shape, and with them, the echo of gunfire. Bullets picked apart the building behind us, spraying concrete and glass all about. One bullet bit into my unarmored shoulder.
And I absolutely lost it.
With nary a recoil from the force of a bullet, my mind and body were flooded with a sudden, absolute fury. With a sharp inhale, I returned the casual gesture of our attackers with a shout. The blue wave of energy that spread outward from my Thu'um carried with it all the wrath that was bundled in my form, the energy released pushing aside and toppling trees, and after a moment, the screams and curses of the dying echoed out of the forest.
Kildeez was about to mutter something, but it was silenced by another raging cry bellowing out of my throat. With no forethought, I raised my shield and charged into the brush, bullets ricocheting off the thick metal. Some more rounds caught me in my exposed thigh and upper arms, but I barely felt more than a prick due to the adrenaline coursing through my veins. The drums of battle beat as I crashed into the first meaty target- and I recognized it as a unicorn, holding a pistol up with it's magic. Well, it was, before I broke it's neck with the force of my shield charge.
A voice. Male. Behind me. Unfamiliar. Without even thinking, I whirled around and brought my saber machete high, slicing through the meaty neck of a human. Humans and ponies, heavily armed, working together- to what end? Our annihilation? Control of the world?
Who the fuck cares. These bodies are all meat, now.
The sound of whipping tendrils and shotgun blasts echoed behind me, and I only assumed that the half-breed had gotten to work on his own victims, as I stopped forward heavily and flung my shield into the neck of a stallion, crushing his windpipe. As he fell over, I took note of how different he was from the one who I charged into. Less modern clothing. Ragged, torn- and I noticed that he had a sword in his teeth. Like a barbarian.
Twirling around, I parried the downward blow of what I could only assume was a roman gladiator. His spear snapped to the side and stuck in the dirt, as my blade came up and cleaved his chin in half. Before his corpse could fall, I snatched the gladius off his belt and brandished it against my machete. With a primal yell, I turned to the rest of the army assembling around me in the woods. I felt lasers line up against my body, could feel eyes of burning wrath on every part of me.
A roar ripped through the forest- and it wasn't my own. The lasers on my form whipped upward, and I saw it, then. Huge, hulking- covered in green fire. A goddamned minotaur. Kildeez changed into the very face of power, and began to whip aside the army, moving towards me. He pulled a tree from the ground, and let loose a bellow. I took advantage of the army's stunned state, whipping my gladius into the head of a Nazi soldier, immediately sweeping forward to scoop his MP-40 out of the air.
With one arm, I sprayed in a wide circle, wounding or outright killing several men and stallions. As the chamber clicked with the hollow echo of an emptied weapon, I hurled the gun into the target on my immediate left, brought my blade around on the right to decapitate a techno-barbarian, and barely managed to dodge what I assumed to be a Chaos space marine's chainsword.
Wait, Chaos space marine?
No, no no no, wait-
CHAINSWORD?
Oh, FUCK YES.
The marine scoffed, but it was a short lived noise- I hurled my spare machete at his head, and his superhuman reflexes managed to bounce the blade off of his heavily armored forearm. As his hand came back down to regard me, I was already letting loose my shout.
"Fus Ro DAH!"
The marine flew back, dropping his chainsword and crashing through the men and stallions behind him, most certainly killing a number of them with the sheer weight of his armor. Swooping forward, I picked the sword up and gave it an experimental rev. The scream that ushered out of the engine, the spinning of a hundred razor-sharp, armor-ripping blades- I was in love. Blood seeping out of my wounds, I turned towards an approaching cyborg- and I grinned evilly.
There was no fleeing from my wrath, it was almost certain. Anybody with a ranged weapon could barely line the sights up before I was cleaving their arm off. Steel shields and plasma armor met with the edge of my frisked blade, but they all failed against the constant, every-burning screech of spinning death that I let loose upon them. However, it seemed that, no matter how many of these fucks that I killed, there would always be more of them, trouncing in from the bleak.
I was no superhuman. There was wear. The chainsword was becoming a burden to swing. But regardless, I fought on, for there was not much to do. Any break in the slaughter, and I would find myself on the receiving end of a sword or few. The bullets in me were already starting to make their presence very, very known.
And just like that, I found my end. A stallion had found himself a Lancer assault rifle, and was using his magic to perform a chainsaw duel- chainsaw bayonet against chainsaw sword. Sparks flew outwards in all directions, my eyes locked on the stallion, who's magic was indeed very powerful to perform a duel for such an extended period. As I finally broke through, sawing his weapon in half, and with it his face, a piece of gleaming steel appeared in my gut.
All the air left my lungs. I collapsed to my knees, feeling my slayer put his boot on the back of my head, and roughly push me off his blade. With blood beginning to pool around me and warm the deadened earth, I stared off into the side as dozens of footsteps, both human and equine, stampeded towards the building K and I came out of.
"Oh, fuck it, then!"
The half-breed's voice was distinct over the clamor of hoofbeats and footsteps. Backed by an almost demonic tang due to his current form, I tried to turn to see what he was planning, but couldn't. There was no energy left in me. The will to live was the only thing keeping me conscious, but my body refused to do anything. I lay in that pool for what seemed like an eternity, but must have been barely twenty seconds, before a massive, blue hole tore itself in the sky. Another rip in the veil.
Because of this, portals begin to tear through at the ground level. The army that had come to stop us ended up getting sucked into a few of them, losing limbs as the portals closed as suddenly as they appeared. I silently wished the same fate would befall me, death gnawing on my mind, but I quickly dismissed the fact. Choking down on the grip of my chainsword, I let out a grunt. A deep breath. The dying sensitivity made me very aware that I had lost my watch. Was such a nice watch...
There was a vacuum of air. I felt my legs begin to drag backwards without any grabbing. No. No, no, no!
And thus was my end. A nearby portal pulled me in. All I could remember, falling through that black void, is wishing for a swift death.
Swirling nightmares. A hero, constantly blasting and slashing his way into the darkness of the abyss, only to be slain by the monster at the end. But again, he tries. Nothing more to do in this world but fight, die, repeat. His armor shines through it all, a personal light in his sea of darkness. A blade, gleaming with the power of old, strikes down any demon or ghoul in his way. No matter how many times the hero is struck down, he would get up again. Finally, he catches the monster off guard, sinking his blade deep into it's heart, splitting it's soul. The darkness begins to shine, almost blindingly.
Christ, that is really fucking bright!
--
I woke with a heavy jolt, breath catching in my throat, causing me to cough roughly. Memories flooded in, and I immediately felt for my arms and legs, one hand flailing about my exposed chest. It occurred to me that my wounds were no longer present. Scars, most certainly, but...
"Ah, you're finally awake!"
Voice, female. Rocking my head over to the direction of it, I took in the shape of a woman in the dark. As she walked forward into the dim candlelight, I noticed a head of red hair, tied back in a bun. Pale skin, with a long, ornate robe, a staff tucked into her back.
"Listen, I know you're probably confused, but I'm sure we can fill the gaps."
The woman- who's name I learned to be Triss- was out adventuring with her significant other, when they came upon me, dying in the forest. They dragged me back to their home base- a fortress, called Kaer Morhen- where I have been staying, healing. According to Triss, I've been here for a month, having healing magic applied to my injuries. Her companion noticed my armor, wounds, and weapons, and immediately recognized me as a swordsman.
I've been in this world for almost six months. Her companion, a white-maned man named Geralt, trained me to fight like he did. His sword style was incredible. Fast, brutal, acrobatic, adaptive. It was unlike anything the Wardens could do. The only thing he wanted was for me to share some of my own skills, which I did gladly. I debated getting back to The Known World, but I figured that the portals would claim me in time. I kept hoping, but as time passed, I stopped.
Geralt revealed to me that he was part of a whole group of swordsmen like himself, called Witchers. Professional monster slayers. I knew how to work a sword, and this impressed them. Witchers were often the last hope of whatever part of the world they found themselves in, their skills unparalleled by normal men. Geralt, and all of his kin, invited me to become one of them. Through grueling rituals and consumption of a dozen different kinds of potions, I found myself changing. My eyes took on a yellow glow, and my scars became more prominent. I learned a sense of ethereal creatures that rivaled the Wardens' sense for the Taint.
I was a Witcher. And it felt amazing.
--
Two swords rested on my back. One of silver, one of steel. Another was resting on my shoulder, my chainsword, still fully powered thanks to it's nuclear battery. My hair had grown to my shoulders, uncut. I expanded on my armor, adding steel to my shins, knees, elbows and forearms. Ornately laced cloth hung from my back and off of my unarmored left shoulder. Though heavily armored, the strength of a Warden and the skills of a Witcher kept me fast and agile in the field.
I was on the road for a while now. Lost count. There were many small towns being assailed by ghouls, or that had a stray bruxa eating their youth. I had no true goal in mind; simply wandered the land, slaying monsters, accepting payment, honing my skills. It had been a whole eight months since I was spilled out into this dimension, and I had given up hope of ever returning home. Even if I did, who's to say the Darkspawn haven't already conquered the world? Slain my old companion?
I thought of the old half-breed. He was a good sort. Hopefully he managed to get out of that whole debacle alive-
The birds stopped their song. The breeze no longer whipped through the forest leaves. The silence was somehow deafening. It was then that the sound of ripping caught my ear; not a rip, like paper or cloth, but an almost organic, fleshy sort of ripping. I felt it more than I heard it, if that would make sense- and remembered that only one thing causes that feeling.
A tear in reality.
Focusing my hearing, I took off in the direction of a faint vacuum noise. Hurdling over logs and using my sword to catch myself around trees to change directions, I tore through the forest, until a distinct blue light, contrasting the green and brown of the forest, became brighter and brighter. In the middle of a clearing, an almost familiar spot of forest, was a portal, a tear in reality. It hit me, then, why I felt that distinct tear throughout my being. This portal had an ethereal connection to me.
Without a breath of hesitation, I dove right in.
--
I awoke in a field. The sky was overcast, but not dark. The forest around me was dying, but not dead. There were corpses all around me, and a small building in the distance. From the damage to some of the rotting flesh and a few of the limbs laying about them, I recognized these as my previous victims, so long ago. But a corpse would have rotted away if that much time had truly passed.
Something caught the glow of my yellow eyes, laying down in the grass. Rolling to my feet, I quickly ran over to investigate, and found my old watch that had fallen off in the midst of my killing spree. Scanning over the surface, I rotated it around, until the display came on, leeching power from the dim sunlight that could pierce the cloud cover. Tough device. The date had changed, two weeks forward from last I had checked it. This watch was incredibly powerful, so there was no lying from it.
Two weeks. A relatively small amount of time compared to how long I spent on the other side, but considering the war boiling in Equestria, who knows what could have happened?
And what of my companion, the Half-Breed? Kildeez? Where the hell was he?
Looking up and into the distance, Canterlot Castle still shimmered, untouched by the Blight. Perhaps I still had time?
Without further ado, I hefted my chainsword onto my shoulder and began my march into the forest.