BOOM!
Nova hurriedly deactivates her [Photon Blast] skill and forms a round sphere around the owl and herself. As they slid down to the foot of the cliff, she kept turning her head, trying to figure out where the heck they were.
Just a moment ago, she was in a chase with the thieving owl around the areas of Coity. But they had taken their fight even outside of the island, speeding over the ocean. And then...
Nova couldn't think of an explanation. They had suddenly disappeared from right above the ocean into this strange mountainous place. Where was this place? Was it even on Ansel?
Neath, Penmark, Wenvoe and Coity. She had gone through all four provinces of Ansel, and neither one of those places were filled with mountains.
Maybe she somehow made a wormhole while she was moving so fast, and then teleported out to some unknown place. But on second thought, that shouldn't be the case as this wasn't the first time she had used [Photon Blast]. Besides, teleportation without any technical support was impossible. It was like saying a man could fly in the air without the help of any sort of craft in pre-evolutionary times. But then again, man can do just that now, so anything was possible.
As soon as they got to the ground, safe and sound, Nova tightened her grip around the owl's chest feathers and formed three spears of light. "I'll make this quick."
However, before she could plunge her melting hot weapons into the owl's chubby body, the towering rock above them suddenly exploded.
———
"Crap! I need to eat!" Desmond, the Infected said as he looked at the see through hole that was almost ten centimeters in diameter wide in his chest. "Oh well, I can probably still take on these guys anyway."
Desmond looked at the large white owl on the ground, and then the beautiful woman sitting on it. As he looked into her radiant golden eyes that were placed over her white and rosy cheeks, he couldn't help but think—
"Meh, the owl is fatter." Oh right, Desmond was the type of psycho who couldn't appreciate beauty. To him, Nova and the owl were just small meat and bigger meat.
On his descent from the top of the broken cliff though, he suddenly struck an invisible floor, in mid air.
"Oof." Desmond stood on that floor and looked around in confusion. But he soon shrugged and just stomped the barrier broken.
"Kim!"
However, before he could continue his fall, a solid brown spear was suddenly hurled towards him. Desmond reached out to his left, stopping the spear before it even touched him and shattered it into pebbles with his ability. But soon, more spears struck from multiple directions, heading straight for him.
Nova looked at the giant rocks over hers and the owl's head. It looked like it was floating above her head, but really it was just being held up by a transparent barrier, like the one Desmond stepped on and broke.
"Who is doing this?" She thought out loud, and then looked down at the owl.
However, the owl shook it's head vigorously, surprising Nova that it had understood her question.
Monsters, although sometimes tricky and smart, couldn't understand human language. The only way they could communicate with humans was by getting physical, a chat that would most likely end with the death of one species. However, it is said that monsters of the grade 7 and 8 were capable of human language understanding and maybe even communication.
But although Nova hadn't met one of those two grades before, she was sure that they were definitely not as weak as the white owl below her.
"I got you, girl." A man's voice suddenly sounded behind her and the rocks were all turned into mud, sliding down the barrier above her.
Harry folded his transparent barrier into a spherical shape, with Nova and the owl in it. "Go somewhere else citizen, it isn't safe here for you and your pet."
After lifting up the sphere and making it float far away, enough so it would only stop when they were out of the range of his ability, Harry walked to stand in front of his squad.
"Now, where were we—"
BOOM!
Desmond suddenly jumped straight at the squad leader, after finally landing. However, he hit an obstruction ten meters in front of Harry.
But that didn't mean he stopped. Desmond broke through the barrier in half a second and collided with another one which also shattered like fragile glass.
After breaking through eight more of those barriers in the middle of one jump so easily, Desmond threw a punch at Harry's face.
BOOM!
To the red eyed man's surprise however, he was the one who flew twenty feet backwards. Looking forward, he noticed that there was a spinning black circle in front of Harry's smiling face. "Nice one Aaron. Yun, you're up next!"
As he ordered, a man ran towards Desmond, with a silver spear in hand. When he got to a close enough distance, he swiped his spear from down, up, releasing an energy filled crescent attack.
[Crescent Slash]
Desmond's figure blinked, dodging the attack and reaching the front of Zhao Yun. He once again threw a punch using only brute force, but like last time, a small black portal showed up at the point he was aiming at and it was he who took the brunt of his own attack. 'If that strange portal can really redirect attacks then it's lucky I started with punches.'
Zhao Yun activated [Crescent Slash] three more times and in quick successions straight at Desmond who was still sliding backwards from taking his own attack.
Desmond casually stretched his hand out at the attack to crush it when the orange crescents suddenly changed course and flew into different directions.
The three different crescents started moving around Desmond in a confusing pattern, under the control of Harry. His barrier like abilities could wrap around some abilities to control their movement.
"You pests are really annoying." Desmond stood still, welcoming the attacks heading for him.
However as soon as the crescents came close to thirty centimeters around him, they suddenly suddenly broke and dispersed, under the effect of a skill of his.
Desmond was badly injured so he had to tread carefully around these people that dared to approach him.
"Pests? Not what we're going for but... " The ground beneath Desmond's feet suddenly sunk. But instead of an abyss or a hole underneath, Desmond found the open black mouth of a large snake instead. "... it works." A woman muttered indifferently.
"Woah!" As he couldn't fly, the snake swallowed Desmond whole with the crescent attacks and pulled them underground.
———
Nova was floating far in the sky, away from the battle field as she held the owl by the feathers on its head. But this wasn't really necessary as the owl just flapped it's wings beside her without showing any intention of running away. It too looked down at the ongoing battle, as a second spectator.
Nova didn't like it when Harry had set her aside like that, but he was just doing his job anyway so she let it go.
That aside, she was more focused on other things."What's wrong with that red eyed man?" Nova had seen the look in his eyes and couldn't explain it. It was like the man was looking past her even when their eyes had met. It was strange, like his goals were more than the single entity she was, like she wasn't a person, but just a stepping stone he could walk over to a higher height.
In a word, his presence was domineering, even to a strong willed woman like Nova.
The owl beside her pulled it's round head down into it's body, imitating a shrugging motion, seemingly at Nova's question.
Nova squinted her eyes as she stared at the strange owl. "I'm still ripping my amulet out of your stomach." Fascinating or not, the owl still stole something important from her.
The owl sighed hopelessly. But soon, it seemed to sense something wrong was going to happen, it could sense a bad premonition that would soon come true.
Nova's eyes left the panicking owl and glanced at the scene below.
Liv, the woman who had created the enormous green snake suddenly felt an arm around one of her ankles.
"Wha—" But as she wanted to mutter a word of confusion, a horrified scream came out of her mouth instead.
KRSH!
As if an overwhelming force was placed on her feminine body, she was suddenly compressed so unnaturally that she was able to fit into the fist sized hole on floor and disappear.
The environment was quiet, with the eyes of the witnesses almost falling out of their sockets.
"Li... Liv!" Reality soon dawned on Harry as their brains slowly started to assimilate what had just occurred.
Harry wanted to walk over to where Liv had stood before, however, his teammates wouldn't let him move any step closer to the bloodied hole in the ground.
The freakish hand that felt Liv's body the last rose up again, but this time, to pull the man that was underneath.
Desmond licked his lips, savouring whatever was left of the dead woman's body as he crawled out of the floor. Without minding the frightful gazes he was receiving, nor their useless attempts to keep calm, he looked at the hole in his stomach and noticed it was almost fully healed. All Desmond needed now for a full recovery was about two or three more of those red balls.
"Man, that old man really messed me up good." He chuckled as he rubbed his wound.
"You... What... are you?" Harry muttered with his arms drooped down his sides. Their plan was to stall the Infected without any casualties? How did he think that was even possible in the first place?
Oh, it was from the belief that the Infected wouldn't possibly be able to control it's newly gotten strength efficiently and that the teamwork of his team could take advantage of that. But no.
From the moment 'it' woke up, the skills it could use so perfectly, its flexible mind and ability to think on its feet, all of these properties the Infected had exhibited wasn't fitting for someone who had just gotten a massive growth boost and was using their powers for the first time. How could this occurrence be explained then? It couldn't possibly have been that it was learning those things as he went along, could it?
It seemed like an impossible option, but then the only other one they could think of was that it had this amount of strength from before the hibernation state and knew how to fight with an excellent mastery. Alas, that possibility had already been crossed out as zero.
Desmond's casual expression suddenly warped in anger at Harry's question.
"I'm a man! A person, just like you, and you and all the other f#ckers I've killed. So the right question is, Who the hell am I?" He hit his chest and pointed at the group. "Listen, chumps. I'm the last thing you'll see on your way to h*ll!"
The only man who had referred to Desmond as a person, had died by his own hands, so the death of this group of people in front of him...
Was going to be much more worse.
———
"Sir, I've ejected your son from the training chamber."
"Ooh, shh! He'll kill me if he knows you call him that."
Katie's eyebrows dropped as she stared at Lucius. She was waiting for him to take his finger away from her face, albeit it being intangible in the first place.
"Oh, oops." Lucius scratched the back of his head as he headed over to his office building, wearing only swimming trunks. "But when you say ejected, do you mean pull him out forcefully?"
"No." Katie suddenly answered, making Lucius turn his head to look over his shoulder in confusion.
But Katie soon explained, "I sent psychic images of the Infected's power, and Nova not being far away from him."
Hearing her monotonous voice, Lucius suddenly stopped walking. "So you're saying you threatened him with my daughter?"
The childish image and playful demeanor he usually wore was no where to be found at all, as he stared with an unblinking cold gaze at his assistant.
Katie's eyes subconsciously turned down to look at Lucius' feet. She couldn't meet eyes like his right now. "No, I just didn't know what else would convince him to —"
"Ha." Lucius' eerie chuckle sounded in her ears as he walked towards the door. "You better keep an eye on her. Because if she dies then I don't care what holds this world together, I'll set it all on fire."
Katie bowed apologetically, her head going as low as to almost reach her knee level. "Yes... sir."
As she replied nervously, the Dean went in and shut the door closed behind him. His mood had already been soiled.