Militia of Hate, Called Forth Beneath the World

Five years ago, the underground city of Villes fell in a single day. That battle left too many things unexplained: an enemy unlike any seen before, a front line that collapsed without warning, contradictory eyewitness accounts, and a survivor who should never have made it out alive. His name was Zetaev. Five years later, Zetaev took out a thirty-year loan to buy a mech. On his first deployment, it was wrecked. The good news was that he was still alive, and the golden-haired girl who rescued him was the Defense Force commander. She promised to repair his machine and apply for a bounty on his behalf. A month later, there was no bounty and no mech, but there was a debt-collection letter. Then the commander showed up too, or rather, the former commander. She'd started her own company and was setting off firecrackers downstairs to celebrate its opening, while also blowing out his windows. Zetaev, a "militiaman," wanted to yell at this little ball of sunshine with far too much energy. But his new boss offered to advance his wages to cover the loan, so he promptly signed the contract and climbed aboard the pirate ship. His first job: infiltrate the Administration and steal back their own ST. As for Villes five years ago, some things have merely gone unmentioned for a while.