Colossus By Choice: B1V8 Side Story - The Unwanted Pests

[Book 1 Verse 8 – B1V8]
[Side Story]

“The Unwanted Pests” – Written by Skrill of the Roving Unorderly

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As per Radent tradition, I must chronicle my latest failures in my line of work and reflect on how our tales and history should’ve prevented said failures.

I may be a thieving no good smuggler without any shame about my profession, but I’m also an old and traditionally minded Radent who respects our roots. And I do also have to admit that I messed up badly on this latest job, hence why I’m now on my way to the Defence Watch’s eastern command centre to be debriefed on what I know about those damn dirty apes. They’ll probably drill me about my obvious criminal underground connections.

Ordinarily, that would be stereotyping my race and be considered discrimination, though in my case they’re right. I suppose I better reflect on my people’s history again, then. I don’t like it, but I have to do it.

=

The other sapient species contest it, but it’s a fact that it was the Radents that came first after those pesky Elder Dragons emerged from that clay moulded by the goddess Mothra herself.

Of course, being the tiny mammals that we were, we went relatively unnoticed by everyone else, even the True Titans themselves. We had a natural tendency to avoid attention, developing our infamous stealth skills from the moment we crawled out of that primordial foundation laid out by Humanity. Unfortunately, this ability to escape the gaze of those larger than us meant that we weren’t recognized as the first people. We were robbed of our achievement.

So we decided to rob back.

Unbeknownst to the other races that came after us, we had taken the spoils left behind by Humanity for those that came after them, leaving them only the barest scraps of wondrous technologies and magics for themselves. We carried the riches of the ancient Humans with us to the planet of Shadow of Sunder and became a prosperous civilization that quickly advanced. Unfortunately, this period of prosperity and lavish opulence brought about by our research and reverse engineering of the mortal gods’ devices wouldn’t last long.

=

It was those damn Elder Dragons who learned of our deception. They were the ones to learn of what we had stolen, after which they informed the other newly risen sapient species. Despite the early conflicts that they had engaged in at the cusp of creation, these disparate races were joined in their hatred of us robbing them behind their backs. They created a temporary alliance in order to stand a chance against our numbers and technological advancement.

The ensuing invasion and subsequent war lasted many years, with neither side showing any signs of backing down. It was at that point that the gods stepped in. The great Godzilla herself sent her fury upon us by calling forth a champion from the ground that, while nothing to her immensity, was nonetheless an indestructible giant of skyscraper-sized proportions and strength to us. This champion was the first of many that would one day watch over the very core planets they slumber within to this very day, a veritable Kaiju as the old texts gleaned from Humanity’s records tell us.

The champion, a creature known for its gliding wing membranes and reptilian nature, came to be known as The Unbelievable. Despite being immune to all forms of our attacks, The Unbelievable relied more on its impressive gliding flight to avoid harm. It was as mesmerizing as it was terrifying to see it streak across the sky before then diving down and impacting our people’s ancient fortifications with the force of a small extinction event. The Unbelievable had crippled us, and Godzilla prepared to command it to finish us off once and for all.

But before we were wiped from existence almost as quickly as we had entered it, the Queen of Peace intervened on our behalf. We may have begun as thieves and deceivers, but the great goddess Mothra felt we were worthy of redemption, that we could change our ways. She stripped us of whatever remaining technological advancements we had but restored our peoples. She warned us that she wouldn’t intervene again should we stray from the path again. It was from that point forth that Mothra became the patron saint of Radent kind, for she showed us mercy and faith where everyone else had forsaken or hunted us merely for daring to strike back at a lack of recognition.

=

The lesson we learned that day was a different one than intended, though. We were not wrong for having undertaken this theft to begin with, nor for using it to advance ourselves. We were not even wrong for engaging the other sapient species at the time in a war that could’ve resulted in total annihilation.

We learned that we were wronged for daring to be ambitious, that our talents weren’t recognized. Not even the True Titans themselves had noticed us. What we lacked was proper concealment of our tracks to prevent the Elder Dragons from ratting us out, a term we ourselves use despite its derogatory nature as a reminder of our failure to account for potential setback factors. We still have great ambitions, but we must always temper it with the wisdom to see it through successfully without it being taken away from us.

=

So what went wrong with this last job?

I didn’t have the foresight to maintain control over the situation. My own partner Beeba was having doubts, but I was too preoccupied with trying to calm her down and rationalize things to her. Because I lost my eye on our surroundings and got too invested in her personal issues with our line of work, I ended up neglecting to catch wind of the Rathalos that had set his sights on the herd we were stealing eggs from.

I had to quickly retake control of the situation, but it was already lost at that point. I should’ve just abandoned them and scattered to the wind. What’s 1 or 2 more Radents lost to the wilderness, after all? We were smugglers anyway. They wouldn’t have been missed by folks that actually mattered in this universe. But I was too prideful, too invested in my attachment to them to see the job through like I should’ve. Instead, I ended up trying to be the hero at the risk of my own life. I stuck around to make sure they were okay, which ended up leaving me ill-prepared to escape capture from those damn ape men.

Though I suppose I happened upon a stroke of luck meeting that naïve youngling, Taum. Oh, and also that oafish brute of a woman, Yun-Tao. No casualties, and we’re being taken back to civilization. The authorities are none the wiser to the fact that I’m actually a criminal compared to their discriminatory assumptions of such. They’ll probably release me. I’ve done this song and dance plenty to know not to talk if they don’t have hard evidence, especially since I’ve taken the liberty of dispensing of my stolen loot before we reached that honey farmer’s homestead.

Overall, despite the immense failure, I’ll make like our ancestors and bounce back from this wiser.