Buried City Night Raids don't creep up on you so much as dare you to do something stupid. I went in meaning to keep it quiet, grab a few parts, and bounce. Then I remembered I'd been hoarding flares like they were ARC Raiders Items I'd never actually use, and I had this awful idea: light the highway up until the whole place looked like it was bleeding. It wasn't smart. It was loud, bright, and basically an invitation for every trigger-happy player to come check my pulse.
Lighting The Fuse
The first few flares felt cheeky. After that, it turned into a ritual. Pop, hiss, red smoke rolling across the asphalt, then another. Visibility in that raid is already rough, so the world becomes silhouettes and sound. You hear boots, a reload click, the scrape of someone sliding into cover. And now you've added a big glowing line that says, "Hey, I'm right here." You keep thinking you'll stop, but you don't. You just watch the dark map turn into this shifting red curtain and hope you haven't made the dumbest choice of the night.
The Wiggle Deal
On my way back toward extract, I caught a figure moving near the wrecks. In most extraction shooters, that's the moment you shoot first and sort it out later. But this guy—name tag said RageQuitTaco—didn't raise his gun. He did the wiggle. Then he dropped a Vita Spray at my feet like we were trading in a back alley instead of a killzone. Meds aren't pocket change in ARC. You don't hand them over unless you mean something by it. I took it, gave a little crouch back, and suddenly we weren't enemies. Not friends either. Just two people agreeing the night had enough problems already.
High Ground, Bad Attitude
That truce mattered fast. RageQuitTaco pointed up and hissed about a guy camping the ruins, taking shots from above. You'll learn quick that vertical angles in Buried City are brutal—half the time you don't even know where the bullets came from. We pushed anyway. Flashlights snapped on, muzzle flashes strobing, footsteps bouncing off concrete. I went forward because hesitation gets you pinned. We closed the gap and dropped the camper, and the second he hit the ground he started whining in prox chat. Not "nice shot." More like, "You that desperate?" Then it got crude, the usual ego bandage after losing a kit. I told him straight: that's why you're down.
Getting Out Alone
When the noise settled, RageQuitTaco was on the floor too. Maybe the camper tagged him on the way out, maybe I clipped him in the mess—friendly fire happens and it's always ugly. His yellow suit beside those red pants felt like a snapshot of how quick a "team-up" can end. I grabbed what I needed, including the same kind of meds he'd offered me, and I didn't hang around to feel noble. I just moved, listening for the next shadow, thinking about how one reckless light show can buy you a moment of kindness and still leave you searching where to buy ARC Raiders weapons before the next raid decides to chew you up again.
