In an clearing, in the middle of an dense forest, it can be seen a very serene and calm scenery.

In it, there is a small lake, where there's a heard of elk like animals, old and young, with some drinking water and resting while the others is keeping watch.

Though these animals are far from simple. They have antlers that shine with a great luster giving it an crystal like apparence and they have overall bulkier bodies that makes them more intimidating than normal elk.

They are called: 'Imperial great elk' due to inhabiting various planets that are within the human territory, and they shouldn't be treated as your run of the mill elk. They are more than capable of killing an careless hunter and when threatened are much more likely to fight rather than flee.

Suddenly the calm and quiet atmosphere is disrupted by a sound of some twigs snapping.

The ones that are keeping watch, hearing the disturbance stay in alert, keeping an watch on the direction the sound came from, but being unable to discover the source of the disturbance due to the heavy vegetation.

After a few seconds, the tense atmosphere is interrupted yet again, but this time by a much larger sound. The sound of gunfire, and in that split second an elk that was the closest to the sound collapsed on the ground, releasing an last scream, alerting the rest of the herd of the danger.

Normally, an imperial great elk would not shy away from an confrontation, but seeing that one member was slayed and they still couldn't detect the danger, the whole herd made an speedy retreat deeper into the forest, completely vanishing.

After surveying the location and seeing that no other animal was on the vicinity, an youth stepped out into the clearing with an rifle on its hand, cautiously approaching the animal on the ground, and seeing that it was still alive, he pulled out a knife and finished what he had started.

Not much later another figure emerged from the woods approaching behind the youth before starting evaluating his performance. 

"Good job! You have made an excellent job from finding the tracks, tracking and stalking. But you almost lost the game at the very end because you were impatient, being over eager to get the kill had alerted the deer and it almost made you lose it or even worse it could have chosen to attack you. In the end, despite that little mishap you managed to bring it down. I'm very proud of you". The one who was speaking was Augustus von Graad and the one he was speaking to is naturally his son Alabaster.

"..." Alabaster doesn't say enything back, only nodding to acknowledge his father's evaluation while proceeding to drain the blood of the animal to prepare for them to carry it back. By the frown on its face, it's obvious that he isn't satisfied with his own performance.

"You are being to harsh on yourself, this is an outstanding performance for someone who is hunting great deer for the first time. When my father first took me to hunt, I couldn't even find the animals tracks and ultimately came home with empty hands and with my head full of lessons from my old man". He tried to show him how great was his performance, having limited effect.

He could only softly sigh, His child has a habit of demanding to much of himself, to the point he thinks that doing everything perfect is 'natural' and 'what is expected' and constantly blames himself for the tiniest mistake.

'I guess this is the price of being too competent, you start having too high standards for everything you do'.he thinks being a little worried this that this way of thinking may lead him to start having standards even a genius like him can't meet.

Knowing that trying to cheer him up when he is like this will have the opposite effect, he silently waits for him to finish his job and puts the animal on his shoulder with the two now making their way off the forest.

While they are walking Augustus uses the opportunity to ask something that has been on his mind for a while and have been weighing him. Hopefully it will also help clear his son's mind

"Al, do you know why I am so insistent in you attending an military Academy?"

Alabaster looks at his father a bit surprised by the sudden question, but quickly adopts a thinking posture while pondering on the question.

"Because you have been on the military and as your son I should continue your legacy as a great general?" He responds a bit unsure, he never really questioned his education plan, to him it was natural for him to follow his father's steps.

"No! I do not wish for you to follow my legacy, your mother and I aways wanted for you to follow your own path and make your own decisions". He says in an soft tone, speaking the truthfully of how he felt. Then he continues giving his son some time to process everything he just heard. "I have persistently insisted to have you sent to study on an military environment to have you make connections and  broaden your horizons".

Alabaster starts to open his mouth to make an retort, but his father interrupts him before he does

"I know that you have read more books and studied harder than any other noble children out there, but you will eventually realize that to live in this society you need to obtain a certain knowledge that you will not find in books." Then he starts explaining his reason. "From all other places, I think that an Academy is the best place for you to learn the nuances of living as an lord. The children that are sent there are typically without any right of inheritance or impoverished lords, although they are not the most useful connections, it can be  made far away from the eyes of those old foxes and the knowledge you share are less likely to have lies since they have nothing to gain.

Then Alabaster starts thinking about what he just heard, and the more he thinks the more sense it makes 'the military academies are one of the few places that noble status doesn't matter and is completely free from outside influence since the imperial family prevents other powers to take root in one of its most important institutions, and I'm much more inclined to make connections there than with pampered noble children'. He thinks while starting to see its good points and he has to admit, it looks very promising.

But he is forced out of his thoughts by a sudden feeling of danger that makes him go stiff.

Out of the forest, rushes an shadow that charges through everything in its path and pounces on the two.

Before he has time to react, His father swiftly pushes him behind him with one arm and draws a sword that is hanging on his waist with the other having already thrown the animal corpse that he was carrying aside.

The shadow finally steps out of the forest revealing itself to be an enormous black furred bear, it's size easily surpasses 3 meters when in all fours, His eyes are blood red emitting an immense bloodlust and ferocity, in his back there are various bone white protrusions that increase even more its dreadful aura.

The bear charges toward the duo with an furious roar while Augustus steadies himself and prepares to recieve the impact.

The bear attacks with a claw swipe while Augustus swings his sword to intercept, the impact that insues leaves both of them in an impasse, despite the difference in size Augustus doesn't lose any ground, acting as an bulwark between the beast and his son. His entire body flickering with an energy that enveloped him before decipating.

Alabaster recovers his bearing quickly and without the need for any commands retreats from the area without hesitation, he knows that his father cannot properly fight while protecting him and his presence would only distract him.

With more room to maneuver, Augustus desingages with the bear and calmly awaits for an opportunity to strike, he knows that although he was capable to fend of its first attack an direct confrontation would be unfavorable for him.

The bear, completely unaffected by its previous clash continues to advance while sending an flurry of visceral claw swipes and bites witch are easily dodged and parried by his much more experienced opponent.

Finally, after enduring the onslaught for a few minutes, he finally manages to get the opportunity he was waiting for.  When the bear loses its patience and goes for a tackle, Augustus rolls to the side and draws a lazer pistol, using the opportunity he aims two Lazer shots on its hind legs and shoots, with his two legs injured the bear loses balance, giving him the perfect opportunity to go for the killing blow.

But apparently Augustus severely underestimated his foes tenacity as even with his injuries it was still capable of retaliating, forcing Augustus to halt his advance and prepare to parry, having him forced to wait for his next opportunity.

But within a split second the situation changes as the bears retaliation stops and he roars in agony as blood gushes from its eye.

Augustus unwilling to lose another opportunity rushes towards the beast and jumps on its back, thanks to the distraction the bear doesn't swat him off and decisively, he plunges his sword onto its now exposed neck, deciding the winner of this confrontation.

As the beast falls, he jumps back to the ground and takes a second to recover his breath, he than looks towards his son, to see him holding his rifle with smoke coming out of his barrel, revealing the one responsible for his easy victory.

When Alabaster slept away from the fight, he didn't just sit and watch but readied his rifle and waited for an opportunity to help.

Although his more archaic hunting rifle was too weak to Pierce the bears skin like his father's military issued lazer pistol, a shot on its weak spot would still do a lot of damage and distract the beast.

Quickly surveying the surroundings to see if there is more predators nearby, seeing that they are safe for now he approaches the carcass and says to his now recovered father:

"Looks like the years out of the battlefield haven't slowed you down old man" He says trying to break the heavy atmosphere.

"He-He"Augustus chuckles."Maybe seeing your father in action has made you see how awesome warriors are or maybe even finally made you see the beauty of swordsmanship." He says very aware of his son's distaste for melee combat and being secretly a bit disappointed that he will not be able to pass on his techniques.

"Dream on!" He replies in an exaggerated way.

With all that said the two finally go back to the most important topic

Alabaster is the first to list his analysis. 

"I have read about this type of beast on an xenobiology book, they are called 'black terror bear' by those that were unlucky enough to stumble Into one. But it's weird, almost all listed attacks happened because someone entered their territory by mistake or have provoked them, they shouldn't be so aggressive as to attack unprovoked and with such ferocity."

After a bit of pondering Augustus then replies. "Indeed, perhaps it has lost its mate to some hunters making it become extremely aggressive and have such a murderous intent, after all, they usually have their mates together with them when they hunt but this one is alone."

Alabaster then checks the bears body to find any anomalies. "It seems to be a female, her bony protrusions are much longer than normal, her eyes are bloodshot making more sinister, and other than the unusual size it also have bigger claws and teeth." He says while being concerned that this bears abnormalities seem to all coincide in making the beast that was already fierce even more dangerous.

"I will notify the planet governor to stay on the lookout in case other hunters encounter other beasts with the same characteristics. But moving on, I have to admit, I am very impressed with your patience and focus" The atmosphere then shifts as he starts to again evaluate his son's performance, while the former still seems to be thinking about the bear's peculiarities.

"You have seem to have my previous lesson to heart and improved. Very good! Before you have almost lost your prey due to your haste, but now you were able to realize that you couldn't help by staying close so you choose to retreat and that was the right call, then you managed to wait calmly for an opportunity and decisively took it. It seems that this hunting trip has earned you more than the game, the most important is the experience after all."

This time the words have reached him and he seemed satisfied with his performance, it would be a lie to say he wasn't nervous when his father fought the beast, but he persevered because he trusted him. 'My father isn't a centurion just for show' He thought.

The reason that his father fights with swords despite carrying a gun with him or people use this types weapons at all considering the current technological advances is the following:

When the collapse happened, humanity have suffered an enormous technological regression, but the loss in knowledge didn't happen evenly in all fields and this has brought many particular developments. One of those is in the field of weaponry, in particular ranged weaponry, before this field aways advanced in tandem with the personal energy shielding, when one saw an breakthrough the other followed soon after. But the colapse broke this balance, making the available guns unable to Pierce those shields, so in order to be able to combat this they started employing melee weapons wich although not very popular before the colapse were still developed enough to damage those shields.

Although the energy shields are highly efficient at deflecting projectiles they were never made with blocking melee weapons in mind, being hyperspecialized to combat guns, so they are quite vulnerable to it.

Another thing to keep in mind is that the shield blocks all projectiles including those that are fired from within the shield. That is the reason his father only used his gun when he got the perfect opportunity as while shooting he would become vulnerable.

This has created an type of warrior that uses mainly melee weapons, being almost completely immune to bullets and laser fire, being only contested on the battlefield by artillery, tanks, mechs and other warriors using melee weapons, among these warriors they can be classified by three ranks: initiate, centurion and preathorian that can be further divided into five stages: apprentice, adept, expert, master and grandmaster.

Father is an adept centurion, while uncle Leon is an Master centurion almost reaching the rank of grandmaster and I heard that uncle Jonathan before receiving his wound were an apprentice centurion before retiring.

Having finished our business and without any other surprises, we take the carcasses to an Bucher, before boarding our ship and returning to Arcadia. 

I tried go find an logical reason to the coexistence of both melee weapons and firearms in the universe. I will delve into its different types and functions after the prologue.