《Vagus》


 Pursuit of interests

    A list of warnings so I can kill expectations before they are birthed. You know how some demon king goes around killing children of a certain age group to prevent the birth of a hero or something like that.


    Warning 1: There will be copious amount of focus shifting, and character jumping. While an MC does exist, I will usually jump to other people almost every other time, sometimes lasting individual arcs. Expect to see the MC roughly 50% of the time.


    Warning 2: There will be some terrible poems, and songs. Why is it even here? IDK, I read too much wuxia.


    Warning 3: No hot blooded exchanges here folks, just mellow fights. Do no expect thrills, tension or anything like that. It''s all mellow.


    Warning 4: Characters will not be relateable, they aren''t designed to be.


    Warning 5: Pace, and focus are changed depending on my mood, often for the worse.


    Warning 6: Fights are steampunk/Animeish, expect superhuman things, due to the nature of the world itself.


    Warning 7: Info dumps galore, conversations are trojan horsed as info dumps. A normal conversation? Info dump. They are having breakfast? More chance for me to info dump. Someone is dying? Looks like It''s time for more info dump. A guy just sat next to you, and is talking really loudly? It''s an info dump!


    What''s on my mind right now? I--o D---p


    Warning 8: Forced character building.


    Warning 9: POV changes depending on my mood, often for the worse.


    Warning 10: This story is designed to be a dumping ground of ideas, and less about being a sophisticated story meant to attract readership.


    Warning 11: Here for review purposes.


    Warning 12: You would probably think you have an idea on where I''m going as you read, you are most likely wrong. It''s better you expect nothing if you''re assuming an expected pattern I will go.


    Warning 13: I will never explain mysteries that I deliberately nuanced. If you can''t figure it out that''s fine, as it does not impact the overall story. Just know that the hints exist.


    Warning 14: Will be cheesy in some ways, and overly dramatic in others.


    Now that the list of warning are done. Here''s the chapter..............


    Above a ruined city various buildings could be seen scattered for as far as the eye can see, like an endless sea of scrap metal. A gigantic dome is hovering above; it''s massive size casting a permanent shadow over what used to be a bustling city. It was covered in what could be described as a black glass that absorbed all light. Five thick, and curved obsidian pillars looked like a giant black metallic claw holding the dome in it''s clasped hand.


    This bio-dome is called Galileo, inside the dome a large amount of fresh water existed, like a snow globe half filled with water, and with five grey towers situated around the dome like a pentagon. In the center of the water floated a giant metallic disc, with numerous sky scrapers, and buildings all crumpled together on top of it. It resembled a enormous porcupine made of steel, with massive highways connected from the disc to each tower.


    Only one building on the disc was glowing a faint blue light from it''s windows, inside this building numerous tubes, and circuits covered the entirety of the inside of the building. Pulses of golden light could be seen travelling at blinding speeds to the center of the hollow building like a infinite highway of lights. At the center lies a human sized tubed filled with green gel, inside the gel lies a little girl.


    A few meters away stood a solitary man, he looked to be in his fifties. The man''s limbs were all mechanical, one of his eyes were covered with an eye patch, and his dull brown eye looked steadily at the little girl floating in the gel.


    The man''s name was Elithas, he has spent countless years modifying his body to keep it from aging, all so he could create this place, and watch this little girl grow up. The little girl had long black hair that was messily floating in the gel, she looked 5 years old, and could be described simply as a doll.


    After what seemed like hours, the little girl finally showed movement, and slowly opened her eyes, Elithas smiled.


    "Welcome my daughter, you have finally awakened, I was waiting for this day."


    The little girl stared at the man, and she smiled gently.


    "Father."


    The disembodied voice directly penetrated his brain, it could be described as telepathy.


    She stretched out her arms to him while inside the transparent tube. Even though she was not able to completely awake before, she received knowledge of many things from Elithas during her half-asleep state; the machines were sending data packets into her brain. He always kept her company by talking to the tube for many years, so she knew many things even before awakening, both from the information flowing into her brain, and the constant one sided dialogues from Elithas.


    Before Elithas could open the tube, and let the little girl out, a large rumbling sound could be heard. Red sirens were blaring, and explosions shook the room. Black rifts inside the dome were opening one after another slowly multiplying from tens, to hundreds, and to thousands. The rifts looked like black murky whirlpools stuck in the sky. Humanoids with fiery wings, and golden Armour poured in, each one had golden emissions of light flowing out from their bodies.


    With a light fizzling sound, 3 holographic screens popped up in front of Elithas.


    In the screen thousands of beings slowly poured out from the black whirlpools.


    "The divine race is invading? Now of all times! Lana, are you there?"


    A mechanical female voice responded, "yes professor."


    Elithas screamed, "what happened to the security force!"


    "I''m sorry professor, something is interfering with my controls of the automated security, apparently my program is being invaded by a time lapsed virus."


    Elithas hurriedly tried to get the frightened little girl from the tube hatch, as he was about to open the hatch the air around Elithas vibrated, and hummed. Moments later, the man was flung two meters away, slamming into the wall. The little girl looked in shock at the sudden impact.


    A large murky rift appeared next to where Elithas was standing. The handsome man had a chiselled face, and flowing blond hair. He wore a red, and gold robe, accompanied by four fiery wings. The oppressive heat from his wings could be felt by Elithas, the strange man looked like he was in his early twenties. His piercing blue eyes glanced at Elithas, and he formed a charming smile.


    "Thank you very much professor, your ''goddess'' will be an immense help to us, as thanks, you can die peacefully."


    Within seconds a glowing red magic formation appeared from the palm of the young mans hand, a beam of fire raced forth at blinding speed, penetrating Elithas'' body, the heat evaporated his blood, charred his bones, and melted his skin.


    The only thing left were  charred bones. The little girl could only scream wordlessly as her body futilely tried moving in the tube.


    The man grinned at the little girl, and summoned forth a black magic circle under the girls feet. She slowly started to sink into the magic circle like quicksand, and after thirty minutes she completely disappeared.


    Slowly another rift opened beside the unknown man, a woman with short golden blond hair appeared. A gigantic scar was covering half her beautiful face, and on her back were four fiery wings. She looked at the charred remains before turning to the man standing next to her.


    "Is that ok? Shouldn''t we keep the old man to recreate more."


    "It''s fine, Elithas can''t produce that anymore. As for the child, the restriction code on the her brain hasn''t been unlocked, we have someone that will help us with it."


    "We probably didn''t even need to bring our army, looks like the defensive forces really were immobilized."


    With that the two people standing in the middle of the room opened a rift, and slowly disappeared.


    The system avatar Lana slowly recorded it all, it''s priority programming informed it to contact Elithas'' personal friend should anything have happened. Lana could feel that a virus was slowly eating away at her systems, with her remaining administrative power, she sent an independent drone from Galileo''s launch pad to certain co-ordinates received remotely from a far off frequency.


    One hour later the system known as Lana was completely wiped out, a single capsule shaped air craft could be seen escaping Galileo, and zooming to the south.


    The sky was pitch black, and for some reason no stars could be seen. The suns golden rays had long been absent from this world, the capsule shaped aircraft passed countless ruined cities, all signs of vegetation had long since ceased to exist naturally on the planet. But instead, have been replaced by mutated variants.


    The air craft flew past a battle field between two bio-domes, where thousands of humans fired ammunition, and clashed with each other. It flew past a small ruined village being set on fire by mysterious creatures, it flew past a floating land mass surrounded by mist. It finally approached a large shore of red, and purple. Countless wreckages of bio-domes, and ships could be seen littered for several kilometers. It slowly approached a land covered in ice, and snow, with howling winds, and blinding white skies.


    After passing through the eerie ocean, and into the frozen land mass, the capsule entered a mountainous region, on top of this snowy landscape floated a similar dome as Galileo, known as Advantis, which was covered with a thick layer of snow, and frost.


    The air craft sent a landing signal to the bio-dome and prepared for a landing at one of the flat edges on the side of the dome, the ice, and blinding snow caused an unsteady flight, but the capsule landed safely.


    Despite landing safely the hatch never opened, it just waiting quietly in the edge of the ice covered surface. Fierce winds blew, and heavy snow eventually encased the small capsule, like a coffin slowly entering it''s cold, and lonely grave.


    Comments:Regular chapters are not this long, but I''m just using re-upping, so it doesn''t really matter until I reach the latest.


    Shortly after a capsule shaped air craft flew past the wreckage of ships, and bio-domes, a small vessel could be found floating in the midst of twisted metal, and filthy water. The salvage ship was rocking back, and forth, and on top of the ship stood a young woman. The wind was blowing her long silver hair wildly, strands of her hair brushed against her face. She was wearing a black black suit with silver stripes, her red tie was blowing as wildly as her hair. The woman standing among the graveyard of metal made quite the eerie sight, like a ghost guarding a massive grave.


    Her skin looked pale, and her face resembled that of an elegant young woman around her late teens to early twenties, from an objective stand point she was indeed very beautiful. However, it causes one to wonder if such an appearance could ever belong to a flesh, and blood human. The person standing on the ship was named Kalithas, she had been standing their stiffly for over two hours, her face was oddly expressionless, and her red pupils had a sharp hawk like gaze as she stared at the surface of the water. It was as if she was expecting the water to come alive at any moment.


    From the depths of the water a blue diving suit could be seen, the suit suffered some scratches, and tears. The suit on the left arm looked like it was ripped open from the inside out, but Kalithas stared at the scratches rather than the much larger tear on the person''s left arm, she looked slightly worried, but remained silent.


    The man took off the diving mask that covered his entire head, he had short black hair, and a slightly roundish face, which gave off a slightly cute impression. He looked in his early twenties, he had a clean shaven face, and wore a wry smile, his left eye had a brown pupil, but his right eye had a slight mechanical glow.


    Seeing this, Kalithas sighed.


    "Professor, your eye."


    The man looked slightly puzzled, his right eye quickly lost the red light, and a brown pupil emerged. With a small smile, he slowly took off the diving suit exposing clean black pants, and a damaged white shirt. Oddly enough despite water seeping into the suit the man was dry. Kalithas narrowed her eyes, and saw countless microscopic silver machines across his body.


    Kalithas frowned, "professor, please don''t use nano-machines to dry yourself, the energy required for the nano-machines usage is limited, please do not use it for such trivial means. I could easily provide some new clothes for you."


    The Man scratched his nose a bit, then looked at his destroyed shirt.


    "I knew the population of mermen in this area was growing, but to think they made a small colony near this grave yard. Anyways I already found some materials that I salvaged from some of the bio-domes, it''s already hooked unto the ship, lets leave before more of them show up."


    Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.


    "Professor, something new came up," a man with light brown hair, and a short ponytail walked unto the deck. The man could be described as nothing less then eerily handsome. A face that looked like it was made by an artisan, the handsome man looked to be in his late teens, he had brown eyes, and slightly tanned skin, which was odd due to the lack of sunlight.


    What''s unusual was that he wore a full body suit, silver, and black with thin metal plates, running across his body, occasionally slight blue electrical pulses can be seen skimming across the suit.


    Looking at Leon, the professor asked him what happened, Leon explained that some smoke had been spotted, rising from a nearby village, and signs of flames could be seen.


    Looking at the distance Saia''s mechanical eye magnified the view of flames, and smoke, "hoh...this is interesting, let''s go investigate."


    Kalithas stared at the rising smoke, she looked at the professor, and tried to speak up, but with a slightly annoyed expression she gave up, and kept quiet as they arrived on the shore. They took a land rover to cover the distance, since no paved roads were maintained, the ride was incredibly rough.


    On the land rover Leon was driving, he had already put on a black encased mechanical helmet, with a small red visor glowing where the eyes should be, to both of his sides hung what looked like remodelled semi-auto hand guns, with blue pulses of light running along the tip. On his back hung a long silver, and black sheathe.


    Looking at this sight the professor smiled, "isn''t that uncomfortable, especially with that sword, you might accidentally hurt your back. Let me drive, I think you''re really tired."


    Leon paled, if the Professor drove, it meant a one way ticket to hell, Leon shook his head furiously, and continued to drive.


    The professor looked at the landscape, a sense of nostalgia can be seen on his face. Towering black sky scrapers could be seen leaning on each other, fragments of glass, and steel littered the landscape for as far as the eye could see, the ground was barren, cold, and the sky was pitch black, as if the world was covered in a thin black shell. But for some reason, despite the lack of light, the surface of the world still retained visibility for the naked eye.


    Even the concept of night, and day still existed, because it could go from dark, to darker. The professor, otherwise known as Saia, could only assume the thin black shell covering the world offered some form of distorted visibility. The human eye needs light to reflect visual information, but how was it possible when no visible light source was available?


    Despite how long he tried, he could never figure it out. He could only assume the black shell had unknown qualities to it, that emitted a different form of ocular aid, different from the sun.


    He slowly thought about the civilization, and the world, as he stared dazedly at the ruined city. The humans who could not afford to live in the bio-domes after the 3rd great war, had survived by living off the unpolluted ocean areas. Some parts of the surface remained polluted, but the majority of it was still teeming with life, and untainted.


    The humans who could not live in the bio-domes gathered, and made villages across the edges of the ocean. They made their homes hidden inside of the towering dilapidated buildings, caves or underground pathways, all across the world. Some of them even formed small countries for mutual protection.


    Occasionally armed soldiers, and war machines from the bio-domes would scout out, and raid the earth bound villages, using the men as slaves, the women as toys, and the children as commodity. The old, and sick were of no use, so either they were killed, left alone, or used as test subjects. Not all bio-domes operated in such a barbaric manner, and the grounded communities also formed their own nations for mutual protection, so the world wasn''t completely dyed in chaos, or depravity.


    As the professor thought about various things, the hidden village Arcadia could be seen. It was a village built under a large bridge, smoke, and fire could be seen heating up the atmosphere, and lighting the sky red, and orange. The territory was owned by bio-dome Galileo, so other bio-domes would rarely cause trouble in this area.


    From the rover Kalithas'' seat was already empty, and she re-appeared five meters ahead. Her movements were similar to a ghosts, eerie, and incredibly silent.


    "I''ll go ahead," she exclaimed, as she disappeared from view.


    Leon complained what''s the point of the rover if she could run faster than it. After a few minutes drive, the rover pulled over near the village. They noticed bodies littered all around the bridge, hulking green humanoids in feral looking clothes could be seen scattered around, and lying dead on the ground. Some had holes in their foreheads while others had their heads cleanly sliced off.


    Looking at the corpses the professor confirmed.


    "Looks like the Orcs are raiding this village."


    Looking in the distance, a young woman with silver hair could be seen, holding the throat of one the orcs with her left hand, and a silver sword on her right hand digging into the skull of another orc. A loud snap could be heard, the hulking creature limply fell unto the floor, with a thud. Two orcs rushed at her from both sides, one used a large hammer to smash her skull, while the other used it''s long spear to sweep her legs.


    Kalithas jumped backward, in one smooth motion she landed on the orc''s shoulders, and lodged it''s head in place with her legs, she then twisted her body in one quick revolution. Blood splashed outwards, and the orc''s severed head fell to the floor, along with it''s body. Two silver blades were dyed red as they retreated back into the sole''s of her black shoes. As she was on her way to land on the ground Kalithas kicked up the dead orc''s body to prevent it from falling. As soon as she landed, she sent a powerful kick into the corpse, shooting the dead body into the other orc with the hammer. She then kicked up the spear that was dropped down from the dead orc, and threw it, skewering the two orcs together into a wall. As she casually approached the two impaled bodies, she stabbed her sword into the last one''s skull.


    While pulling out the blade, splatters of blood landed on her face as she grimly turned around. Kalithas noticed the professor, she spun around in a panic, and brought out a cloth to wipe her face, then immediately looked back, while trying to regain her composure, with her cheeks turning slightly pink.


    After wiping the sword she put it back into it''s sheathe that was on her back, and slowly walked towards the professor.


    Kalithas gave a slight wave indicating the area was cleared, as she casually walked towards them, she tilted her head, then pulled out a gun hidden in her sleeve, and fired a blue energy bolt towards her right side without looking. An orc with a dissolved head holding a cross bow, tumbled from a crack in the wall, and fell down with a thud, sending some dust floating in the air.


    The professor gave a light whistle, "around 30 orcs huh... Looks like you didn''t even need use your ability?¡±


    Kalithas gave a stern look, "it''s inefficient to use it on something like an orc, you should know how much battery power, and stored energy we have to save up for."


    The professor looked around the village, a red glow appearing on his right eye, "I can''t detect any bodies other then orcs, I can detect human hair, and human detriment though."


    After fifteen minutes the professor identified a group of human foot prints leading towards an open plain 10 km away. Dozens of foot prints from small to large going in a single line formation. To the left, and right side, gigantic foot prints with deep imprints could be seen running parallel. Trickles of blood, pieces of hair, and some tears could be seen on the path, followed by what could be a cart or wagon.


    The professor sighed loudly, "looks like a rift from the other world opened around this region, the orcs must have found the village while scavenging. All the people alive were tied up, and marched towards the rift, the corpses must have been brought along to be used as food later, if I had to guess the captured people would be used as food or slaves."


    The professor sighed again, annoyed at this unreasonable world, "what is Galileo doing?"


    Honestly even now the Professor had no idea how rifts kept appearing, but he did know it all happened after the floating continent had appeared. It was ironic that past experiments did not allow for them to go past the rift, but somehow the orcs, and invasive races could do so easily.


    As the professor grew more, and more curious, a light beep could be heard. The microchip loaded unto his brain was ringing, as Leon, and Kalithas slowly surveyed the area, the professor listened to the communication. A cheerful voice could be heard, "hi Saia, how are you doing? Where are you? And remember to bring me a souvenir."


    With a wry smile Saia looked at the dead orc''s body that he loaded unto the rover, "hah... I have an orc''s head, do you want it Maya?"


    "No thanks, you can keep it. Anyways, you do realize it''s your fault I have all this work you know?"


    Saia knew Maya was an valuable figure towards the management of Advantis in other words, she can be considered the manager of it. She took his responsibilities so he could live the life of a NEET, and pursue his hobbies to cure his boredom of the world.


    Because of his hobbies, Advantis had been morphed into a place with varying sections that further extended his past hobbies.


    One of those sections was the mercenary section, from armed conflicts, to escort duty, to protecting convoys.


    The second section was for research, and development from researching new weapons, furniture, to making different games.


    The third section is bio-technology, capturing various hostile alien creatures, and races from the other worlds, and researching them. So far only the lower races without any special characteristics were available. Researching new strain of poisons, and to some extent medicine, as well. Creating new crops or preserving old ones, were one of it''s main functions.


    The fourth section is transportation of goods to other bio-domes to bargain for materials, and services.


    The fifth was mining, and salvaging materials. Using robot workers to excavate, and salvage usable materials for other departments, but it was more related to maintaining the bio-dome in most cases.


    Of the 5 sections, mercenary work was the most lucrative, due to the inherent dangers of the present. At the moment excluding all machines, and robots, the population of Advantis was a measly 81. It could be said that the main modus operandi of the dome was the pursuit of interests.


    If a single term can be used to describe the nature of it all then it would simply be hedonism. Infatuation of tea, love of music, obsession of video games, courting of death, desires of war, and longing of adoration. Pleasure of exploring the unknown, rapture in experiments, joy of creating plant life, lust of creating machinery, pleasure of acquiring more knowledge, and fascination of culture. Some wanted to see the limits of flesh, and blood, others wanted to see the happiness of their siblings, while some longed for nothing at all, but only sleep.


    Everyone have their desires, the dome was merely a place where they all lived, and strived for those individual lusts. It was simply a den of hobbyist, that took their hobbies that border on hedonism. To those sisters, and brothers, Advantis is what they call home.


    Other departments existed as well, however those were not related specifically to hobbies, but vital functions for the dome in general, on it''s day to day operations.


    As Saia thought about random things involving his former bio-dome, Maya filled him in on what happened in Galileo.


    With a slight frown Saia called for Kalithas, and Leon. "We are heading back to Advantis, something interesting happened to Galileo, I''ll have your sisters on stand by."


    Kalithas wondered, "those from the Mercenary section right?  Is there going to be a trouble?"


    Saia thought for a moment, "no, they''re just for insurance, the political stability of the area around Galileo should deteriorate once the other bio-domes notice the oddity around Gallileo for not responding to invasions in it''s territory."


    A Sinking feeling was growing inside Saia, it has been many, many years since he felt the emotion known as foreboding, staring into the night sky he could only mutter.


    "What do you have for me now?"


    Comments: Despite what you may think, this is indeed magic fantasy, and not sci-fi. I labelled those tags properly!

 Strange direction.

    Four large air crafts could can be seen crossing over the ocean, the air crafts were shaped like a dart, large cylindrical shaped tubes can be seen on both sides of each air craft, they were tactical transports uniquely found in Advantis. Certain machines, robots, weapons, and ships are standard among bio-domes, as the technology for them were wide spread. However, technology between the bio-domes are different in many ways, due to new technology being guarded in order to try, and gain advantage over other bio-domes. Therefore newly researched technology would never be released carelessly to one another, making the environment between bio-domes very contrasting.


    On the side of these four ships a large silver ''A'' could be seen, on closer inspection a brown dot, and red dot can be seen on top of the ''A''. The insignia belonged to Advantis.


    On one of the ships a young woman was wearing a mechanized suit, sitting casually on a seat, and leaning on her red helmet. The mechanized suit is standardized among all the people among Advantis, however whats different is that instead of the usual black and silver, this suit was customized with black, and red coloring.


    Another unique aspect is that many small triangular machines, the size of an adults palm, can be seen decorated around her suit. The young woman had long golden hair, shaped into curls in front, and wavy hair at the back, which can be easily described as too high maintenance for a mercenary. Her face was young, and refined, she had a blue right pupil, and green left. She gave off a beautiful yet domineering impression. Her name was Anastasia.


    Sitting next to her were many humanoids wearing black, and silver mechanized suits. Their bodies hardly moved, and gave off an occasional mechanical buzzing, and whirring sound. Of all the humanoids here, she was the only ''human''.


    Anastasia casually grumbled, "really, I thought I could have enjoyed my bubble bath some more, it''s been so busy lately."


    She had been soaking in a bath tub in a half-awake state, before she was abruptly called by Maya to prepare for new a new task.


    The reason she had been busy lately was because of all the conflicts rising on the western continent.


    A person by the name of Mensk has proclaimed himself Emperor, and has been slowly conquering one bio-dome after another quickly creating his own mobile nation, known as the Holy Imperium.


    Antastasia clicked her tongue, "what a crude name, he should have some taste".


    Apparently the bio-domes afraid of the new emerging danger from the Imperium, created an Alliance between the remaining bio-domes in the western continent. Anastasia recalled all the skirmishes lately in which her group was hired by the Alliance to help tactical retreats, guard mineral deposits, and protect constant harassment on convoys.


    Maya had avoided engagements that could involve Advantis politically, so sent Anastasia to safer war zones. Ironically because of her looks, and her contributions in the skirmishes for the Alliance, Anastasia stood out like sore thumb, and was even given a nick name called, ''The Mobile Fortress''.


    Anastasia was less then pleased with such a vulgar name, but was also happy that she was becoming recognized. She liked attention, and liked being acknowledged, she felt it was the most natural thing in the world to strive for.


    After thinking about the Imperium for a bit, she focused on another troubling matter that''s also been eating away at her.


    <hr />


    Meanwhile on another ship, a woman with short red hair was sitting comfortably leaning on one of the mechanized soldiers in silver, and black. She had a blue star tattoo right underneath her left eye. She gave off the impression of an attractive but eccentric woman. She was wearing blue orb shaped earrings, which on closer inspection gave off slight sizzling sounds, like charged electricity was trapped in them.


    Her condescending purple eyes were staring at her leg rest. Yes, out of all the mechanized soldiers sitting on the plane with her, one was hunched down on its legs, and knees.


    This was her stool she used to rest her feet on, the red haired woman was Eliza, "who told you to move, act more like a stool."


    The Mechanized soldier replied in a mono-tone voice "yes Eliza."


    Eliza wrinkled her nose a bit, "call me mistress."


    "Yes mistress, Eliza"


    Eliza gave a wicked smile, "that''s a good boy"


    The stool replied, "it is my great pleasure."


    Unlike Anastasia, Eliza''s mechanical suit looked similar to the rest of the soldiers, the difference was that packs of silver needles could be seen all over her suit, replacing what one would normally expect to contain bullets, or grenades. The needles gave off a silver shine every so often. One could only guess what their use in a battle field was.


    Eliza suddenly produced a needle between her lips without even moving a muscle, with a slight spit, the needle tapped the mechanical soldier.


    One would expect the needle to bounce off harmlessly against the hard mechanical suit, but instead, the needle dissolved completely. After a slight silver sparkle, STOOL was imprinted on the mechanical soldiers head in silver letters.


    After being satisfied with her work Eliza smiled.


    <hr />


    On a ship trailing behind the other three, the mechanized soldiers inside looked fairly different, the main difference is that they lacked the humanoid appearance. The soldiers had mechanical spider legs, instead of tracks, or bipedal legs like humans.


    The body was a black shaped oval with glowing red sensors around its body and legs, its height slightly taller then a mechanized soldier making it 3 meters tall. Inside their oval bodies a mounted turret is hidden. Two small anti-infantry guns were attached to its leg,s and belly. Near the front of it''s black oval belly, contained dozens of red eyes, which gave off a creepy impression.


    There were black, and silver spiders decorated accordingly, and armed differently.


    At the far back, a figure could be seen crouching in the corner behind the mechanical spiders, it was a girl that looked roughly sixteen years old, or in her mid teens. Her long black hair was covering her face. The helmet to her side had 3 long red lenses sticking out. The suit was blending almost perfectly with the surroundings, if her helmet had not been taken off she would have looked exactly like the back ground. The mechanical suit she was wearing was much slimmer than those of the regular mech suits, small pouches could be seen all over her suit, and a slim metallic knapsack rested comfortably on her back.


    To her side a large thin gun that resembled a sniper rifle could be seen, it was swaying back and forth on the wall, eventually it fell on the girls head with a thud.


    "...Oww," a Small barely audible voice could be heard.


    The girl named Ciel finally looked up, her small cute face wrinkled slightly, her large black pupils slowly looked at the gun, and glared a bit.


    "...Stupid rifle," after making sure the firearm was secure she slowly curled up, and began to slowly close her eyes, she slowly mumbled, " ¡­...Stupid rifle, ...Stupid Saia."


    The transport was once again dead silent, barely an audible sound could be heard inside.


    <hr />


    At the head of the other transports, a silver haired woman named Kalithas was wearing a standard black, and silver mechanical suit. The same as the other mechanized soldiers, however the only difference is that inside her suit contained many battery packs, and energy packs, and nothing more.


    She was casually playing a game of cards with with a handsome man in a brown pony tail, the man groaned in an loud manner, "Ughh...I Lost again, once more! I want another game!"


    Kalithas stared pitiably at Leon with her ruby like eyes, without speaking, she silently continued the game.


    Saia was lying in a corner casually staring at the two, "the Aleos 80 huh...seems like they''re adapting well..."


    Originally the Aleos E-80 were made near the end of 2nd great war, the 1st great war, was a battle between all the human nations. The Aliens known as Tyrants had invaded during the aftermath of the 1st great war. Because the human nations were already weakened the Tyrants won in a one sided massacre, nations were ruined, and governments collapsed. Men, woman, and children without exception were abducted en masse.


    The tyrants were a race that assimilated those it captured, they sought the genealogy of humans to further their own biological evolution. After 10 years of occupation the tyrants have finally assimilated all the races, ages, and genders.


    After that they left the destroyed world. The fall out came from the many biological factories which were left on the planet, they polluted the atmosphere, causing disease to spread among the survivors. The diseased survivors were later known as The Infected.Should The Infected breed they would give birth to new tyrants. The governments that survived the alien occupation could not afford to wipe out The Infected survivors, due to the already low human population. So they implanted microchips in the brains of The Infected, the chip essentially curbed all forms of lust, and those that refused were immediately exterminated. Eventually a cure was found, and the microchip was removed.


    Saia had also lived during that era, however he had never removed the micro chip because it served another purpose for him, which was to modify the microchip and control the uniquw nano-machines he had invented, that housed a complex evolution program.


    During the period of infection, a scientist named Aleos proposed to create new humans as a way to artificially repopulate the Earth with subservient humans.


    They can be made to ''partner'' with the rich, and powerful, and generally act as slaves to increase labor, and be taught to fill occupations sorely lacking professionals.


    The new humans were made as physically attractive as humanly possible in order to hook powerful investors, and draw in attention to the product. Naturally they were also tools to repopulate the earth, so it was expected they be made attractive.


    Because the majority of people in power were men, naturally the majority of the new humans to be sold were made as female, and for certain men with special interests, a specified product would be genetically modified to fit certain tastes, and attributes. From size of secondary characteristics, height, hair color, gender, and whatever else.


    Unfortunately a problem arose in that cellular decay occurred after a certain period of maturity for the new humans. While the timing for the decomposition may vary, it will happen regardless. Because of the side effects, and loss of funding, the experiment came to a halt. So 80 new humans were abandoned, and kept in fetal form. Saia named them the Aleos 80.


    Eventually disaster occurred, and a floating continent appeared in the sky, the sky blackened, and earthquakes erupted throughout the world, changing the continents completely. Making a continent on the North, East, South, West, and many islands in the center. At the same time of the floating continents appearance, rifts connecting to different worlds also started to appear across the planet.


    From that event, something like black obsidian broke off from the floating continent.


    The new ores allowed anti-gravity without an energy supply, eventually giving birth to floating bio-domes. During that period Saia managed to secure one through various contacts, and deals he gained throughout his extensive lifetime.


    In that period when he was gathering materials, and breaking into long abandoned military depots, and research labs, he came upon a destroyed lab where the Aleos 80 fetuses we kept.


    The fetuses unlike normal humans, had already gained consciousness, intelligence, and senses. They were kept in test tubes for over fifty years, their bodies were slowly rotting away being eaten away by bacteria.


    Saia used the nano-machines in his body to clear away the bacteria, and disease, and restore their meat, and skin. He eventually relocated the Aleos 80 fetuses to his lab in Advantis.


    As the 80 new humans grew, he inserted nanites into their bodies, he also inserted microchips similar to his inside their brains in order for the Aleos 80 to be able to give more complex commands to the nanites.


    The nanites will replace the parts where the cells started to decay. Once all the decay has been replaced by the nanites, the Aleos 80 had outwardly no longer changed or grew older. Because the cells had been replaced with superior ones, the new humans became more healthier, and stronger then a regular human. Incidentally even if some Aleos 80 look older than others, they are all about the same age. However in order to blend into human society lying about their age is a much easier matter.


    With each disease or injury, their bodies were restructured, and improved, while they look the same on the outside, on the microscopic scale the new humans have been changed dramatically. Bones, muscle structure, immune system, hardiness, sight, mental processing, energy conversion of food, basically everything was improved from the microscopic scale and up.


    The Aleos 80 were now vastly different then their original design, aside from their attractive features. The more damage a new human receives the more they will evolve. For nanites to actively be used on a regular basis, enormous amount of energy was consumed. Saia had to constantly feed the Aleos 80, and sometimes hooked them up to energy generators to keep the nanites charged during the period of mass cellular decay.


    Eventually Saia had to give them a purpose in life, it was after all his responsibility since he brought all the 80 ''humans'' into the world. First he shaved them all bald, he introduced them all to various forms of literature, entertainment, and lessons on various subjects.


    Next he shamelessly introduced them to his hobbies, eventually the Aleos 80 developed their own interests, hobbies, names and personalities, they decided on their own hair color, and the style they preferred. Many even changed their own pupil color. He firmly believed at starting at neutral point, and letting the changes run it''s course over time.


    As a result the Aleos 80 had an incredible variation of personalities and desires, which also affected the nanites in their body. While the nanites still retained their original function, they machine evolved based on the hosts interests, and personality. Naturally some Aleos 80 would have better control of nanites than others. Whether it be on the recovery scale, or calculation scales, or something else.


    For example if an Aleos had an obsession towards music, the nano-machine would evolve in a way to lead to the realization of that obsession. They way it is realized depends solely on what aspect of music they truly loved, and how they desire it sub-consciously.


    After that, they were shuffled into the various sections of Advantis bio-dome, creating the current Advantis. Later their own desires, actions, and obstacles shaped the dome itself, while Saia remained hands off, and allowed their independent actions. The culture of the bio-dome at this point can be considered a self evolving entity, with a mix of varied desires. If it truly followed a single person''s command it would be Maya''s. Saia was someone they willingly lent their help to, but Maya was the one that had full control and lead day to day operations for the dome.


    Saia usually left, and traveled the world on his own, occasionally accompanied by Leon, and Kalithas. He would usually run into trouble with machine cultists, underworld organizations, fascist empires, mad scientists, and various other hostile entities around the world. Sometimes his actions would force Maya''s hand in helping him. In short, it was a weird relationship of mutual protection, often time acting on their individual decisions, rather than actual requests.


    He, and they could no longer be considered human. As he stared at the two people thinking about their origins, he couldn''t help but finally notice something very important, "huh, I forgot to have lunch."


    The robotic pilot announced, "the Scouts have found no hostiles around the region, Galileo is all clear."


    The four Tactical transports finally neared the bio-dome Galileo.


    During the process Kalithas placed a small box on Saia''s lap.


    "Here''s an artificial sandwich I made earlier."


    ¡°Thank you.¡±


    Saia grinned as he stuffed his mouth, while looking at the monitor, showing the approaching dome.


    ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


    Under a dim light, a massive hangar could be seen with row upon rows of air crafts, they lined up like dominoes forming a massive circle of black steel. In a group of figures walking along the hangar wearing slim mechanical suits, only one person stood out, it was a man that looked to be in his early twenties walking to an elevator that was on the side of the thick black walls.


    He had a slightly young face despite his age, and his hair was cut short. He was wearing a long black coat, and normal pants, the man was lazily eyeing his surroundings.


    The man called Saia couldn''t help but wonder where Elithas had been able to grab the funds to form a private air force of such a scale. A normal bio-dome focused on maintaining a delicate ecosystem to retain a certain amount of self-sufficiency. Over time those in charge transformed the domes to fit the owners interests, and the needs of the current era, honestly some have been converted into flying fortresses rather then a traditional bio-dome.Of course Saia himself was just as guilty, as the dome he once controlled can be considered a warehouse of items he never threw away, and the amount of items just kept piling up. But on the other hand the population in that dome was minimal so the needs weren''t that large to begin with.


    You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.


    They had manged to enter one of the aircraft hangars beneath the dome, since the independent aircraft from Galileo had contained the necessary data to enter the dome unhindered. Saia didn''t need to force open the hangar. However being an old acquaintance with the owner called Elithas, Saia had his own ways of entering the dome uninvited.


    Suddenly a sharp silver blur whistled through the air towards the back of Saia''s head. Before it reached his head, a person walking next to Saia immediately grabbed the object in mid air. The person was Kalithas, in between her fingers was a silver needle that immediately dissolved on contact.


    The person named Kalithas took off her black helmet, exposing her beautiful silver hair, she lightly looked behind her, and sighed gently, "Eliza, you''re really bored aren''t you?"


    Another woman wearing a similar suit, with short red hair, and a blue star under neath her left eye gave a bewitching smile, "hehe, you''re as good as always Kalithas, even if you''re his assistant, you should pay more attention to your sisters, you rarely show up in the dorms after all."


    With a light smile, Kalithas shrugged her shoulders, and continued walking.


    As Eliza was walking she reported to Kalithas. "Ciel is currently securing a perimeter around the dome, She''ll turn the area into a no-fly zone, and take down any aircraft that come too close to the area."


    "Anastasia''s group is helping her plug in the gaps, Leon is supporting Ciel as a spotter, and I''ll secure the entrance way to the domes."


    Kalithas gave a slight nod, and hurriedly led about a hundred mech soldiers ahead of Saia, "I''ll scout first, Professor, you follow after."


    After a few minutes, Saia had walked out of a massive black building, a towering bridge could be seen connecting the building to the center of the dome like a highway. There lay a disc shaped island floating on top of a massive amount of water, on top of the disc lay a cluster of skyscrapers. On the side entrance of the bridge many small electrical cars were parked on the sideways, on one of them Kalithas was waiting.


    "Professor, the area is strangely deserted, I had some mech soldiers stationed around the city, which building should we go to?"


    Saia immediately replied, "let''s go to the central command tower, it''s better to reactivate Galileo''s systems, before we get any more unnecessary trouble."


    After they reached a domed shaped bunker hidden in the midst of the city, Saia entered his key card into the lock, and with a slight pinging sound it opened.


    Saia''s eyes widened in surprise.


    "Even after so many years it still works huh, I thought for sure that guy would have invalidated my access card by now."


    Inside the dome they reached the second floor, it contained many screens over several meters wide, Saia calmly asked a question to confirm something, "Lana, are you here?"


    Lana was the AI in charge of the dome that acted as an assistant towards the domes internal systems.


    With a slight frown Saia could guess what happened, after typing on the touch screen and reviewing a massive amount of information he quickly went to work gathering information from the screen.


    Kalithas went to another screen, and looked at all the recordings from the security data banks.


    "Professor, it seem the data banks are wiped clean, I can''t see any recording of what happened here, after looking at all the surveillance cams, it seems the place is really empty."


    Saia silently listened after awhile he stopped typing, "looks like the AI was also wiped, whoever did this knew what they were doing, however after looking at past history logs I noticed a massive amount of energy was poured into a building recently, I have the address, lets go visit there first."


    Kalithas looked somewhat confused, "what about the security for the dome?"


    "The dome''s security will take about an hour to reboot, I already reported it to Ciel, anyways let go look at that building. It''s the only thing that stood out from the logs."


    Meanwhile about 1000kms away, a large bio-dome was hovering over a large valley, around the valley many tunnels could be seen, buildings were slowly being constructed by machines, and people.


    The people were dressed in dirty clothes with black collars around their necks, men, and elderly made up most of the workers, they were carrying equipment, and moving out the piles of dirt.


    The workers faces were grim, and dirty.


    Burly men with mechanical parts replacing their limbs stood around the workers, and were armed with weapons. They were ready to kill anyone that looked suspicious.


    An old man with graying hair could be seen begging one of the armed men, "please sir I just want to see her, I only wanted to know if my grand daughters alive."


    The armed man had a mechanical red eye, and left arm made entirely of metal, with smoke pouring out of of it. He gave off a intimidating sight, he looked at the old man, and kicked him the stomach, "fucker, get to work! Slack off anymore, and I''ll kill you!"


    The old man crumpled on the ground with tears streaming down his face, he had the air knocked out of him, he made a few hollow breathing noises, "why, what did I do to deserve this, dammit...Diane!"


    Hovering over this scene was the bio-dome Dunasteia, it was a bio-dome teeming with life, the population was estimated at about 2.4 million residents. Dozens of buildings sprawled out throughout the entire dome, it was more accurate to call it a floating mega city. The man in charge of the dome was called Alexei Dvorak, he was a fairly handsome man and was reaching 38 years old, the man had permed short brown hair, and a light beard. He was currently standing, and wearing a blue bath robe in his room. He was standing in one of the highest buildings in the dome looking fixedly at a single direction.


    Beside him stood a clean shaven man, with black hair wearing a small beret. He was about forty years old in a green military uniform, his name was Strauss.


    "Strauss, how are things progressing?"


    "We managed to raid a few more grounded villages, we''re putting them to use in making our new military base, since Dunasteia is too important to be in the front lines, were making a few air bases, and military outposts. The young men we captured are being put through re-education, we''ll be able to use them as militia in a few months."


    Alexei stood silently and asked, "what about Galileo?"


    "The mercenaries we hired are arriving at the location, but isn''t the forces we sent too few?"


    Alexei made a slight smile,"I don''t know what happened to Elithas, but it''s unlikely we''ll be able to secure that dome that easily, it seems the guys from Advantis got there first, while it is possible to overwhelm them, we risk exposing ourselves to other forces."


    Strauss was in deep thought, "true, the Alliance, and Imperium should be spying the Islands, and the east is as chaotic as ever, plus the situation in Galileo is uncertain, but if that''s the case, why did we send some of our forces?"


    Alexei narrowed his eyes, and smiled, "forget that for now, you have a fresh batch of girls from the recent raids right?"


    "Yes, I have one for you right now, her name is Diane, we left her untouched for you."


    A small girl around 15 years old with light brown hair in disarray was dragged inside by the man named Strauss, eventually she was taken, and thrown unto the bed, all she could do was to helplessly watch as the large shadow come upon her.


    Meanwhile a man, and a woman could be seen standing in an odd room with dozens of cables covering the walls.


    Saia had found the charred bones, and the strange room with a single tube in the center. He crouched down, and slowly analyzed the bones with his mechanical red eye, "yea looking at the machine parts, his eye patch, and doing a DNA analysis for the tissue around the room, it''s Elithas alright."


    Elithas was the owner of this bio-dome, Saia, and Elithas knew each other from a long time ago, they had met a few times, and helped each other with their projects. The last time they met had been around 10 years ago, when Elithas was holed up in his lab working on something."


    Saia looked at the charred remains steadily with a grim expression, "I''m sorry Elithas, even though I''m your friend, even though I have known your for many years, in the end I couldn''t even shed a single tear for you."


    It could have been shock, it could have been they weren''t as close as he had thought, or it could have been Saia was just a cold person, in the end Saia tears dried up a long, long time ago.


    Kalithas could only watch this scene, and made a slightly sad face, she reminisced a bit, She remembered a scene where a small silver haired young girl talked to a man wearing a lab coat in a small white room, "Saia I learned about birthdays, when''s your birthday?" With a bright innocent smile the little girl asked.


    Saia had answered, "I don''t remember anymore."


    With a slight frown the little girl puffed her chubby cheeks, "Then what present do you want?"


    "I''m not really sure", the man replied.


    The little girl then looked slightly puzzled, she then looked up at the man with her wide eyes, and asked, "then what do you value?"


    The man then responded with an ambiguous answer, then she asked, "---t -re y-- l----g --r."


    The man replied, "I ---t ---w."


    Kalithas mind grew a bit fuzzy, and the answer in her mind lost sound, and her face grew dark. She silently muttered to herself, "one day I''ll find it," and eventually her voice turned into an unintelligible murmur.


    Saia slowly walked towards a wall, on it was a frame, in the picture was Elithas, Saia standing by his side, a little black haired girl on Elithas'' lap, a young blond man, and a woman with short black hair wearing red framed glasses, with a lab coat.


    Saia looked at the picture, "To think you would actually betray him..."


    Elithas was a genius, few people exist in this world who can override the programs in this bio-dome without significant inside knowledge. Lana was a AI with high adaptive ability, for her to overlook someone intruding into her systems before it was too late, meant the person in question had a general idea about her programming. The location of the room isn''t something anyone can just find due to the massive amount of buildings on the disc. The barrier around the bio-dome had been brought down, which meant something or someone that needed to break the barrier down in order to enter the bio-dome, even though sneaking in would have been possible given the earlier intrusion done to Lana. The body was left alone, but the data had been cleaned. In short someone didn''t mind the crime being found out, but minded how Elithas was killed. Another point that bothered Saia was the tube, most likely a huge amount of energy had been devoted to whatever was inside it, but it''s now gone, and no traces can be found inside the tube, not even a single tissue or hair.


    Whatever was in the tube was taken, but the lab was left unharmed for some reason. The design of Galileo was widely different from how he remembered, specifically what was the point of all this water? Saia had also found a strange triangular disc with strange carvings, it situated in the main control center for the bio-dome. For whatever reason it was attached to the main computers, and circulating a strange energy around the bio-dome.As Saia prowled around the data banks, some data slowly entered the microchip in his brain, Saia blinked with surprise, "Elithas was expecting me?" As he was decoding the information, a small voice communicated to the microchip in his brain.


    "Saia, this is Ciel, hostiles spotted entering Galileo''s territory."


    "Ciel, hold them off for 30 more minutes, the dome''s defensive systems should be up by then."


    Around twenty tactical transports could be seen looking for landing zones, a few fighters had zoomed past but were immediately shot down before they entered too deep into Galileo''s territory.


    A young girl in a slim mech suit could be seen hiding in one of the ruined buildings, the building was high enough to look at the surroundings.


    Her name was Ciel, she had ordered the spider mechs hidden inside various locations around Galileo, Anastasia, one of her allies, would likely cover the areas she had missed. She had mounted a rather large Anti-aircraft laser unto the floor and using it to shoot down aircrafts, she had noticed that the transports backed off and unloaded the infantry in safer zones a little farther than her weapon range.


    A Large swarm of men came out, from her goggles she could identify they were mercenaries, judging from their lack of uniform, and equipment. Looking at the insignia of a red wolf, she immediately recognized the blood wolves mercenaries.


    Their gear, and discipline were poor, but they had enough man power, and underground connections.


    Giant Mechanized vehicles with bipedal legs slowly appeared from the transports, with large turrets mounted on various areas, making the mech look like a mass of guns.


    Ciel surmised that since the mechs had too much weapons they lacked enough space to mount personal barriers on the mechs, since the mechs have two legs they are bad with rough terrain, and since they do not have tracks on the legs they also lack mobility, and speed.


    Therefore the opponents are not ideal in a place with so much rubble, in short they will have thrusters on the mechs to get past all the rubble, they must expose themselves in the air, or have infantry rush in first to cover them.


    After realizing this she muttered "sniping mode," a microscopic silver sparkle escaped from her body, and the large mounted laser slowly glowed, and transformed into a long range sniper rifle. After ordering the mech spiders to perform an artillery shelling to collapse buildings unto the infantry rushing into the area, Ciel immediately began observing the battle field.


    She immediately blended into her background, and moved to a good location inside another building, there she picked off soldiers, one after another.


    "Ciel, this is Leon, I hacked into their communications, I''m feeding you co-ordinates of the priority targets, I sent the data already."


    Information began pouring into Ciel''s brain from the suit, She loaded a high explosive round, and started her work from the shadows.


    A towering man with many scars on his face, and a giant mechanical arm shouted, "this way! We''ve been ordered to rush in, and flush out the enemy, scouts have spotted gunfire from that building, let''s go!"


    As soon as the man had finished his sentence a hole was opened in his head with its contents leaking out, the other mercenaries were confused, and with high levels of adrenaline, they could only charge blindly.


    Ciel saw their movements, "guess they spotted the gunfire, I better relocate, she went into another building using inhuman speed. She also set up a few traps around the building, as she positioned herself near a squad of mechs harassing her spiders, she heard a silent beep.


    Immediately an explosion occurred, Ciel calmly thought.


    They found me?


    She sent four floating black orbs the size of tennis balls around the building, the orbs identified 30 men around the building in a different uniform. They looked disciplined, and the gear they had was much better than the mercenaries. "That uniform, their from Dunasteia..., so the target of this attack was..."


    1000km away in a small room located in bio-dome Dunasteia, a small girl could be seen naked, silently crying in a corner, farther away in the same room on a sofa sat Alexei half-naked. The man named Alexei spoke to another man in a military uniform, "to begin with, the chances of obtaining anything significant from Galileo wasn''t all that high; the moment the people from Advantis showed up on the scene before us. A drawn out fight would eventually end with up with us dealing with Galileo''s armed forces."


    Strauss chipped in,"Since the owner of Galileo, and the owner of Advantis are both close, and possibly share secrets, it would be no surprise if Advantis could fix whatever issues Galileo had, and we end up fighting two forces, and leaving our home exposed."


    Alexei smiled, "exactly, so how do we benefit? Advantis mercenaries have human members which are well known to have inhuman abilities, most likely from technology we do not have, if we manage to capture one of them, we can reverse engineer their technology, and do a hostage exchange for further benefits."


    "I also heard the women in Advantis are quite beautiful, why should that bastard Saia get to have them to himself, If we''re lucky I should also get some fun hehe", Alexei''s eyes widened, a brilliant flame can be seen in his eyes.


    Strauss commented, "but we end up sacrificing a lot of the blood wolves."


    Alexei sneered, "the blood wolves are nothing special, in this era there are many wandering mercenary groups looking for quick cash and easy women, we can easily replace them."


    In a large building a loud explosion had erupted from one of the rooms, five members lost their personal barriers.


    A man with a green suit, and wearing a gas mask shouted, "damn! They must have heard that! Leave ten people around the building, we have another ten on the roof, the rest follow me, we''ll corner the target from the top, and bottom."


    Ciel immediately sent three floating orbs into trapped rooms, and one orb to accompany her, she silently looked at her sniper rifle, and said, "duel mode."


    Immediately the sniper rifle changed into two guns, she held the guns firmly, and slowly blended into the background, and she silently whispered, "fifteen minutes left, let''s start".


    Comments: So when does the going to another world bit kick in? Meh eventually.

 Key

    The room was dark, and cluttered, and judging from the furniture, and decor it probably used to be a grand hotel. Now the rugs were worn, and dirty, and the new residents were rats, and insects.


    Major Jean Russel was currently leading a group of men in green crisis suits up an old hotel, that has long since lost it''s luster.


    The target they were hunting was a member of the Advantis mercenary corps. Russel''s men amounted to two hundred, they had spread out observing the battle field; trying too identify possible human targets for their mission.


    Judging from the behavioral patterns of a specific target, they considered that the observation subject was a possible human member, and decided to perform capture operations. He didn''t know the necessity for the capture, he just knew they were to take the target dead or alive, but preferably alive.


    The target was sighted to be around the 20th floor, ten men were allocated to the roof, and slowly making their way down. The entrance was rigged so the target likely had been alerted. Ten men were posted outside in case the target decided to scale the walls, my men would push up, and eventually enclose the target.


    Since five men lost their personal barriers they would bring up the rear while me, and four others would take the lead.


    We had occasionally run into sensor traps, and trip wires, but they were easily dismantled. As we approached the 13th floor we noticed a shadow run into the reception area.


    Immediately I gave the signal, and two men covered both sides of the entrance. Using mirrors we tried to locate any possible resistance, none were found after turning on thermal vision, we couldn''t locate anything aside from some rodents.


    Suddenly a shadow quickly ran into one of the rooms, we immediately opened fire, with non lethal rounds, it would break a few bones, but not kill the target.


    After not receiving a response with a counter attack, we kicked in the door, threw a smoke bomb into the room, and let loose more gun fire, but immediately we heard a loud beep, after that a large fiery explosion occurred.


    Three men were knocked aside but only suffered minor injuries as the armor, and barrier cushioned the force.


    Jean looked around the room, the floor had been destroyed, and the beds charred, but no body or evidence of another person was visible, he muttered, "strange".


    After that, he received a message from the roof team that they had encountered a target on the 28th floor, and suffered some injuries from an explosive sensor trap. Two people were slightly banged up but no fatalities.


    "Strange, so there were more than one person in this building?" As they approached the stairs, four shots rang out, two people in the rear immediately collapsed, the people around the two collapsed bodies noticed some debris falling from the ceiling.


    Someone shouted, "above!"


    Immediately a stream of bullets shot towards the ceiling letting lose and explosion of metal, and smoke, the ceiling immediately started to collapse. As we dodged the debris we discovered no return fire, only a gaping hole in the ceiling, and the floating dust in the air.


    Suddenly a small object rolled from the hole above, we immediately spread out for cover, with a loud bang one more person was struck to the ground with the kinetic force, but the barrier had absorbed most of the impact, and he was still safe.


    At this point Jean decided to become more cautious, he ordered the men to spread out more, and shoot first; the moment anything suspicious showed up.


    As we slowly reached the stairs, three men were ordered to watch the rear of the entrance, one person went ahead to look for traps, and the rest were on standby, and ready to provide cover fire.


    I was at the stairs pointing my rifle at the entrance way to the 15th floor, immediately shots rang out from the people at the rear.


    A persons shouted, "how did they get behind us? Did the ground team get annihilated?"


    Jean shouted, "No! They didn''t report any combat, the bastard must have sneaked behind us somehow!"


    As they were focused on the rear, three more shots rang out, two people in the front immediately collapsed with holes sticking out from their helmets, and red liquid dripping out.


    Russel immediately paid attention to the door, and let loose a stream of bullets, loud sounds of impacts could be heard as Jean fired on the door, and whoever was behind it.


    Immediately Jean kicked down the door, and had his team mate cover his rear as he charged into the 15th floor. After shooting first at the hallway he immediately found cover behind a wall, no return fire could be heard.


    Jean roared, "what the hell happened?"


    The people at the rear explained, "we saw a shadow running to one of the sofas in the waiting room, and immediately fired, the strange thing was we didn''t find any traces from the heat vision, or night vision, the figure completely disappeared."


    "What the hell! Are we fighting a ghost!" Jean immediately called the people guarding the entrance, and ordered six people from the ground to slowly reach the 14th floor, and clear anyone that was hiding on the lower floors that they probably missed.


    The other team members examined the fallen brethren, they could not be saved. Jean''s grip formed a fist, as he exhaled, and opened up his balled hand.


    Another strange point was how one of the people in the front died, he had his personal barrier on, how can so few shots penetrate the barrier so easily, and kill the target? The shot was from behind the door but so accurate.


    The roof team slowly reached the 26th floor, they kept seeing a target but kept losing track of them a few minutes later.


    The ground team had finally reached the 14th floor, and reunited with Jean''s group, they reported no sighting of any hostiles, after scouring the floors.


    Jean finally decided to advance, they reached the 17the floor, the floor was the typical hotel room lobby with massive a hall, and giant chandeliers on the ceiling.


    Too bad the Chandeliers now look like graying mounds of dust, and the once white tiled floors now looked like dirty soil.


    Jean ordered them to spread out, and search the rooms, eight people were spread out, and scanned the surroundings while four people checked the musty rooms.


    Immediately a loud explosion could be heard from one of the rooms, a burst of gunfire, a loud electrical discharge flashed, illuminating the room, and after a few more bursts of gunfire before all sound died down.


    Jean left three people to guard the rear, and the rest charged to the room, they found the corpses of four more members.


    Jean grimly spoke, "they all had barriers, how can they all die so fast, before we even got here?"


    Looking up, he saw a massive hole in the ceiling, with crumbling dust all around. Since he did not sense anyone exiting the room he guessed the target was on the 18th floor.


    With an angry shout he ordered three people to guard that hole in case the target decided to slip past them as they climbed to the 18th floor.


    Jean led the way reaching the stairway to the 18th floor, they saw a trip wire placed near the stairs, as two people went to disarm it, a single bullet was fired, the bullet exploded on impact, and caused the trap to set off, the kinetic force instantly killed the 2 soldiers who went to dis-arm it.


    Enraged at seeing his friends, and comrades who survived so many battles together, die one after another, adrenaline, and blood rushed to his head.


    Jean smashed into the 18th floor door, there he saw a lone figure, slim and slightly short. Since he had his barrier on he didn''t need cover, he immediately started firing lethal bolts of lasers at the enemy.


    The bonds of people who''s very survival relied on their comrades on a daily basis was immense. The bonds they shared where their life could be lost at any moment, had made them brothers, the sense of camaraderie was deep.


    The opponent was fast, and agile on an inhumane level, each laser fire was immediately dodged through rolls, and jumps, the bastard fired three shots at my head.


    Jean immediately lowered his body, and dodged them, before continuously using rapid laser fire in suppression mode.


    Before the operation, all of Jean''s team took stimulants, and physical enhancing drugs, that improved brain functions, and boosted physical ability. However he was barely enough to keep up with the enemy.


    Once again the opponent continued to shoot at his head with three more shots.


    The first shot was coming in front of my helmet, it hit the barrier and was nullified, the second narrowly missed, as it almost hit the same spot and nearly went through the barrier as it was weakened.


    Jean immediately threw out a grenade at the table in front of the target, The target jumped on the table, and leaped back, before firing 3 shots, once again Jean expected the shots to hit his head so leaned forward, immediately he noticed his body was losing balance.


    He noticed two holes on the floor, "that bastard kept shooting at my head so I wouldn''t notice the floor!"


    As he was falling, two more shots rang out, the first shot hit the barrier, immediately after the second shot hit the same weakened spot, it passed the barrier, and slowly reached his skull.


    Jeans life flashed before his eye, the battle fields where he relied on his friends, him being severely injured, and being carried away by a comrade. The beers they shared, the relief from surviving another war, the jokes they had, the same sorrow felt over fallen comrades, and the atrocities he was forced to commit in the name of his superiors.


    This was supposed to be his last job, he would get an enormous commission after this mission, and retire.


    He knew he wasn''t a good man, he did many things that he could not be proud of, but even he had wanted happiness, even he had wanted a happy end.


    But eventually he remembered the smile of his wife, how they first met, and how they had married, how he vowed he would retire, and get a safer job.


    Tears formed on his face, he had yet to meet his unborn child, and his loving, and caring wife. Even in death he wished he could at least watch over them, the regrets he had, and the feelings he had, were overwhelming.


    As the bullet smashed into his helmet, and approached between his eyes the only thing he could picture was his pregnant wife, her long graceful hair, her gentle brown eyes, and her tummy that contained another precious soul. His emotions burst forth like a tidal wave in his mind, he could only recall Shanon, and Sera. I love you, I love you, I love You.


    Reading on this site? This novel is published elsewhere. Support the author by seeking out the original.


    *BANG* With a small explosion Jean''s life ended on that day, the words left unsaid could no longer be delivered, and a small trail of red leaked from his forehead.


    Gun fire streamed in to cover for Jean, the hostile immediately back tracked, and fired a few rounds instantly killing three more people who had no barriers.


    Darren had been the first to witness the death of Jean, with a loud roar he charged in, but the target had already moved to the next floor, he took command and ordered everyone into the building, reinforcements also arrived, and were coming up.


    Eventually the enemy would be surrounded at the 20th floor, the roof team is waiting on the 21st floor, and more people were coming in to stop possible escapes.


    Meanwhile a slim figure could be seen near one of the windows on the 20th floor, the person was named Ciel. She had been waiting for a long time to drag in more soldiers, since she wanted to kill as much as possible. To avoid the danger reaching her sisters, and brothers.


    She slowly blended into the shadows, and scaled down the building, her gloves, and shoes emitted a small pulse that allowed her to cling freely to the walls.


    As she climbed down she noticed three people on the ground, she had emitted a slight silver sparkle, EMP(Electrical Magnetic Pulse) bullet, and 1 HE(Highly Explosive) round and 1 AP(armor piercing) ammo in each of her guns.


    The EMP would dissipate the barrier for a few seconds, the HE would explode causing shock, and the AP would penetrate the armor, delivering the final blow if the HE didn''t finish it.


    With quick successive fire, two enemy soldiers fell immediately, the last tried to let loose a rain of bullets at her body, with a light side roll she fired at his legs, with the same three bullets. The soldier crumpled to the ground, and Ciel sent an AP bullet to his skull instantly killing him.


    Ciel watched the 20th floor. She immediately pressed a remote controlled button, and with a loud explosion the building started to cave in on itself.


    Three black orbs could be seen floating up to her, there were images of herself being projected under the orbs, with a light snap from her fingers the orbs entered the knapsack on her back.


    "Guess I didn''t need to call Leon for back up after all," as she looked into the sky a swarm of black steel could be seen covering the area, like a swarm of locusts. The mercenaries in the distance were slowly retreating, but would sooner or later be devoured by that metallic swarm.


    If one were to describe Ciel, a sniper was not accurate, nor was calling her Gunner accurate, indeed if she was given a title Crafter would have been the most probable. Her ability was to craft/create firearms, and ammunition. In short she was a specialized crafter, if one were to be more precise she can be similar to a gunsmith.


    Her gaming hobbies had led her to using firearms, her addiction towards crafting in role playing games had led her to create items. The blue prints were provided to her by the research and development section, but she had to analyze the design, and structure. She was excellent in math, excelled in map making, very good land navigation skills, and enjoyed shooting as a hobby. She had the makings of a loner, observant, and also very patient. These qualities made her ability suitable for sniping, and using various ranged weapons.


    The psychological tests Saia provided shows her fit for the position.


    The nano-machines(nanites) memorized the materials, and compounds for each ammunition, and weapon, and Ciel would be able to reproduce them at her will.


    The more of a difference in mass of the object with what she already has on hand would be the amount of energy she is forced to use to ''craft'', naturally if the materials are missing, and the nanites are forced recreate material, a larger amount of energy is used up. In the end its cheaper to carry guns, and bullets already on hand.


    In terms of restrictions, the items must already have a working sample, she must thoroughly understand how the weapons work and the theories behind their creation. The materials must already exist and have been analyzed by Ciel, and finally Ciel must pick and choose what to memorize, as the amount of memory her nanites can store is limited. So she must pick, and choose what ammunition and weapons to memorize before a battle.


    In short she couldn''t create something with an effect that did not already exist. Currently her ability allowed for five weapon types (modes) and four ammunition types. Due to constantly carrying weapons, instead of crafting them, her evolution was at a lower level compared to the others combat type abilities.


    As Ciel was about to leave, a red glint illuminated in the shadows, revealing a silver humanoid figure, with bladed arms, and legs.


    "... A blade stalker; military grade, light class robotic soldier."


    With a silver glint the android moved, releasing a high pitched screeching sound as a silver blur dove into Ciel. The small gun on her left, hand transformed into a thick shotgun leaking white light. She jumped backward while firing a single blast, the space between her and the bladed soldier exploded, sending her flying backward, and the blade stalker flying in the opposite direction.


    The shotgun had a knock back effect, immediately the small arms in her right arm was now a rifle armed with EMP ammunition meant to dissipate energy, and shut down machines. A burst of fire, let loose streams of metal aiming at the human size robot. With a subtle beep the blade stalker continued charging forward, all the bullets were easily deflected by it''s bladed limbs, sending the bullets smashing into the concrete, and nearby buildings.


    Once again as she was about to send it back using the repel shot gun, the robot cut up the concrete launching it at Ciel, without even batting an eyelash she fired at the concrete storm, sending it back, as she was launched backwards a silver glint could be detected in the corner of her helmet.


    The blade stalker had dodged to the side, and used the concrete bullets as a distractions, then it kicked itself from the nearby debris, and launched itself at her. The momentum was so fast, she did not have a chance to dodge and it was already beside her, so instead she dropped down on her back. As the figure launched passed her, a small tear was carved into her helmet almost reaching her flesh.


    She bent her back on the ground, and kicked the creature upwards, with her reinforced suit helping her strength. The repel shotgun sent the creature flying higher into the air, and she felt her body smash into the ground from the impact, and recoil. As the metallic soldier was a few metres in the air, she let loose several EMP bullets directly into it''s open joints, and limbs.


    A terrific nova of static burst forth in mid air, as she rolled to the side, and moved away. The creature crashed unto the ground where Ciel had been, and a small grenade was tossed unto it''s fallen body. The giant explosion sent metal fragments everywhere, as Ciel walked away, slowly blending into the darkness.


    A few minutes later, a figure could be seen standing in front of the rubble, his body trembled, and his hands were holding unto his face, eventually he collapsed unto the ground.


    The man was filled with grief, and anger.


    Dark emotions started to seep into his heart, the world started to collapse, as these thoughts swirled into his mind, he muttered, "unforgivable, I wont accept this," he swore in his heart, that until he had to settle this debt, he would dye the world in blood.


    Eventually an annoyed sound could be heard in his brain, "hey Leon get back to Galileo, Ciel told me she forgot to call you back, you are the last one here, idiot."


    Leon crouched unto the ground from relief, after that his red face could be seen, as he slowly got up, he screamed, "Ciel you bitch!"


    Meanwhile Saia had decoded the message, it was apparently a short exchange Elithas had planned to send to him a few days ago, in it were some vague details about how he created a key, the key was used to emit strange particles around the dome, eventually allowing it to travel into the rifts, and reach other worlds.


    There used to be many experiments where they sent individuals to explore the rifts, however none came back, and it was only on an individual scale, never before had object the size of a dome been used as a subject.


    Saia was now holding a second key in his hands. Elithas had left out the details on where he acquired the materials, and where he had gone these past ten years.


    But now Saia was left with a dilemma, going to another world was without question an obvious choice, the problem was that the two keys were connected, if Advantis goes first then Galileo would lose the strange particles circulating the dome, and he did not know how long it would take for the particles to recreate in Galileo.


    Elithas had specifically mentioned for Galileo to go to the other world, but did not mention the order of which went first. Saia decided he would go first, and let Galileo go second, the problem was he needed people to manage Galileo in his absence.


    In short he would have to report back to Advantis, and hold a meeting for what to do next.


    Meanwhile over 1000km''s away in a giant floating metropolis, inside a towering building, located at the very top, was a glamorous room filled with richly adorned furniture, and paintings. There in that room lay a frightened young girl covering her naked body in sheets, with her messy long brown hair, and shivering uncontrollably.


    On the floor was a man laying limply, and silently there, an expression of surprise, could be seen permanently etched on his face, and a long running red scar across his neck. A small pool had formed, and a figure could be seen standing alongside the corpse.


    The figure was wearing a white mask, and a red uniform that belongs to workers in this hotel, the figure turned to stare at the young lady on the bed, and brought it''s gloved fingers to the lips on the mask, indicating silence.


    "He touched something that did not belong to him."


    It was an androgynous voice, that did not sound feminine or masculine.


    Instead of waiting for a response, the figure opened the door, and slowly walked out of the room. There in the hallway lay dozens of men collapsed on the floor, and red stains splattered across the walls.


    A few days later, Saia brought Elithas'' remains on a transport back to Advantis to meet with the others to decide the future.

 New world

    The sky was blue, and the white clouds were drifting lazily in the bright morning. The sun''s golden rays were shining on the emerald waters. The vegetation on the island''s were lush, and the waves were teeming with tropical colored fish.


    In this calm, and warm sky a small sizzling sound erupted in the atmosphere, a large gigantic blur began appearing, the curved shaped dome slowly emerged from the clear blue sky, and white clouds. Eventually the distortion became more, and more pronounced, unveiling itself to the world. A glass dome with five curved black pillars loomed over the once calm oceans.


    The dome eventually started to tilt a bit, slowly but surely it came to land on the waters creating a giant splash, and causing gigantic waves to form, smashing into the islands around. After many hours, the environment finally calmed down.


    The gigantic dome spanned around 2000 meters long, and 250 meters high, it eventually settled down in the waters, and blended into the scenery. Over time it became covered in moss, and it had lodged itself into a part of the island. Eventually the forest, and fauna covered the massive dome, years upon years had passed blanketing the dome with young trees, and plants.


    <hr />


    "Wake up, wake up," a small soft voice was repeating the same sentence for over 10 years.


    A figure with long flowing blue hair reaching her waist could be seen hovering over a small encased capsule. The woman looked to be around her late teens, her delicate features reminded anyone who saw her as a fragile doll.


    The girl was dressed in a long black dress, her slim figure kept blinking in and out, as if she was about to blink out of existence any time soon, small amounts of gray static could be seen all over her body. The girl had been over seeing the capsules for many years.


    Row upon rows of 2 meter long capsules could be seen surrounding the curricular room, red digitized numbers could be seen on each capsule, each one had a different number.


    The girl''s clear blue eyes constantly gazed at the capsule with a 0 digitized number in the front of the capsule. After what seemed like hours, a small amount of steam could be seen leaking the capsule lid.


    The hatch unlocked, and the top of the capsule slowly opened, inside was a man sleeping quietly. The woman looked at the man, she gently caressed his left cheek, and poked him a bit. Her finger merely went through the man, the girl gave a wry smile, and continued.


    "Wake up, wake up..."


    Eventually a small twitch on the man''s eyes could be seen, slowly but surely the man got up, his short black hair looked messy, his face was slightly roundish giving off a youthful look, anyone who looked at him would say he looked to be in his early twenties.


    "Good morning Saia," the blue haired woman smiled.


    Saia rubbed his eyes, "morning Ariel. How long has it been?"


    "Around 10 years Saia." With her hands spread out, Ariel made a grand gesture indicating all the capsules.


    "I see..., it''s been quite awhile, you must have been lonely, but what is with that appearance?"


    Saia had pointed his finger indicating Ariel''s floating figure bobbing up, and down like a ghost.


    "It seems during the travel through the gate, a small distortion opened near where my body was resting. Somehow the capsule fell into the distortion, a copy of my consciousness was made inside the bio-dome''s operating systems as an emergency


    measure."


    Saia furrowed his eyebrows, if the distortion took the capsule where Ariel''s body is, then they have absolutely no idea where it could be, they would have to search the entire world for it.


    Ariel tried to poke Saia''s forehead playfully but instead it went through his skin not touching him, "Saia, the body should retain a separate consciousness, I''m only a copy, so the main body should be able to take care of herself. Right now we better observe our surroundings."


    Saia shook off the cloudy feeling in his mind, before he immediately stumbled out of the small room, and entered an elevator, eventually leading him into the depths of the bio-dome. Inside was a massive control room with many gigantic screens over 3 meters wide and 2 meters tall, the room was littered with screens, and computer desks.


    Saia had entered the main systems to diagnose the status of the bio-dome known as Advantis, Ariel had peeked over his shoulder to watch what he was doing.


    "Looks like the dome had stored energy for 10 years, their is some minor flooding but nothing we can''t drain. The aircraft hangar looks fine, the motor for the bio-dome needs some minor repairs though, looks like the bio-dome sensors are being obstructed."


    Ariel floated down and tried to lean on Saia, but ended up going past him, "the vegetation, and seeds from the island pretty much crossed over to the dome, so many parts on the outside are jammed."


    Saia pondered for a minute, "I''ll go check the surroundings a bit, it''s been a long time since I got to move around," Saia stretched his body, and cracked his neck to emphasize the point.


    "Only after you had a proper meal, and exercise your muscles for a bit."


    As if the emphasize that point, small tubular robots, were carrying trays of supplements, and artificial food stuffs on plates.


    "Report to me if anything happens, ok? Or else I''ll get lonely again." Ariel pouted slightly as she slowly floated to the other rooms.


    <hr />


    After taking a long rest he went outside to enjoy the cool breeze slowly brush against Saia''s face, he just stood there staring at the orange sunset, and the beautiful pristine waters, hearing the waves calmly crashing against the shores, he let out a light sigh.


    "Beautiful, how long has it been since I was able to see the sun, and feel such a breeze." In the old world the sun had long since disappeared, he almost forgotten what it looked like, just staring into the sunset as the waves slowly drift by, felt quite fulfilling.


    Saia had etched this scene into his mind, burning it into his eyes, with a slightly disappointed sigh, he slowly went unto the islands to explore the surroundings.


    The island Advantis was connected to, was the largest one in the surroundings, a single gigantic mountain loomed in the distance, the trees were thick, and tall Spanning at the height of around 100 meters. Normally such trees were not found in such an environment, but Saia had other things to worry about.


    After going deeper into the forest Saia saw a massive pink flower bulb in the middle of an open field, the field was covered in thick vines that even dug into rocks, and boulders. The pink bulb in the center was 3 meters tall, and the heat in this area was abnormally high.


    Saia felt something wet hit his forehead, as he looked up, he saw vines several meters high entangled around the trees. Some were shaped like cocoons, on closer inspection he saw corpses of animals, and creature he had never seen before wrapped inside the vines. Blood was seeping into the green vines, like it was leeching unto the dead bodies, and draining it of liquid.


    Immediately he sensed trouble, the ground around him tore open. Mounds of dirt were blasted into the sky; green, red, and yellow vines several meters long, and about as thick as a male arm shot towards him.


    Saia immediately jumped several meters, and clung on a nearby tree. He noticed vines were hung all over the trees, covering over 10 meters in length. Saia lazily stared at the bulb in the center of the plain, the bulb slowly opened revealing a row of sharp teeth 20 cm long on the revealed inward petals, inside was a gigantic mouth that looked several meters deep, digging deep inside the ground.


    From its jaw more vines shot out, and rammed into the tree Saia was clinging too. As Saia jumped to another tree, the vines nearby slowly opened flowers, releasing seeds, and dust into the air.


    Saia felt slower, and tired, he lazily checked his body, "hoh..., the pollen has paralysis effects."


    Saia could feel the nanites in his body hurriedly trying to purify the pollen he had inhaled. As his body was slowed down, vines immediately shot forth from nearby trees restraining both his legs, and razor sharp thorns grew out, slowly tearing up his skin.


    "I shouldn''t play around too much," with a light sigh, Saia''s right eye slowly began to glow a mechanical red.


    <hr />


    In the small clearing in the forest a loud sizzling sound could be heard, and some minor explosions.


    Saia was standing near the maw of the plant that was scorched brown, a small green orb of light was seen flowing from the corpse of the dead plant, as Saia slowly observed the phenomenon a loud howling could be heard from the distance.


    He could sense hundreds of creatures were heading this way, with a light jump he slowly scaled the trees, until he could observe the the direction the sound was coming from.


    Hundreds of creatures with thick white fur, and massive bodies 3 meters tall and 5 meters in length were rushing into the forest, the creatures looked like wolves with 2 curved horns jutting from their foreheads.


    The wolves finally stopped near the green light. They cleared way for a Gigantic wolf that looked silver in color. The silver wolf quickly devoured the light, nothing had happened immediately, but a few minutes later the silver wolf let out a growling sound, immediately the wolf looked larger in size, the fur seemed to shine more brightly, and the horns on it started to emit a green light.


    The wolf stared in the direction Saia was standing, for a few seconds they were just staring at one another. Saia found this incredibly amusing, and lightly smiled at the wolf.


    The wolf stared at Saia then turned around and gave a slight bark, almost as if it was saying, "I''ll let you go for now," and the wolves ran back into the forest slowly disappearing from his view.


    "Looks like that thing evolved after devouring that small light from the plant I killed, is this how the creatures in this world grow?"


    With an amused smile Saia slowly jumped unto the ground, and continued his exploration.


    <hr />


    The water was cool, and fresh. Saia was currently swimming to a nearby Island, from his explorations it seems the Islands were not connected to any mainland, and were pretty isolated from the rest of the world. There were 4 Islands in total, the four islands all curved inward creating a irregular circle, with 4 gaps in between.


    The weather was warm, and the fish abundant. Most of the land creatures reside in the Island next to Advantis, the other islands were located to the left, bottom right, and bottom left .


    The island on the left only had rocky mountains, the bottom right housed a colony of miniature dragons with butterfly shaped wings. The creatures from Saia''s observation were fairly playful, and not aggressive. The land was mostly just plains, and some small forests.


    The bottom left island housed many tunnels 5 meters wide that ran across the entire island, even deep into the sea floor. Saia had found black scales around the tunnels, he hesitated slightly to be stuck in a tunnel, and encounter a creature in an enclosed space. He promised himself he would explore that later regardless.


    As Saia was swimming around a sandy beach, he sensed a ripple in the water, but the ripple was calm, slow, and gentle. The presence he felt kept that atmosphere, and finally surfaced beside him.


    A gigantic black turtle twice the size of a man was swimming next to him, the beady eyeball lazily stared at him, it gave the impression of lazy indifference.


    From the obsidian turtle''s back a white cloud could be seen forming, and floating up into the sky, eventually releasing a stream of rain.


    Saia couldn''t help but stare in wonder, "amazing, the turtle is somehow purifying the water, and releasing it back into the ecosystem."


    <hr />


    Ariel eventually reported to Saia, it seems it could take a few months to several years for some of the other people to come out of hibernation.


    Ever since the meeting, 30 people had decided stay in Galileo, Maya''s aide had volunteered to lead the new bio-dome, and deal with the loose ends until they reunite with us.


    The remaining 51 people had been sent into a deep sleep, where Advantis would slowly spread out the strange particles around the dome, encasing everything, and everyone. Once that was set, we would automatically enter a gate into another world. A rift was too small for the size of a bio-dome so the key we got from Elithas opened a gate for us, so we could slowly pass through.


    Saia climbed unto the roof of the bio-dome, he was holding unto a paint pallet while on a seat. He was using dark shades of black, purple, blue, and white to paint the night sky; the sparkling stars, and the pale moon were in perfect view.


    Back in the old world he had done a few paintings, the problem was the scenery was dull, and drab so he rarely had the chance to be inspired. The new world provided a perfect opportunity to brush up.


    As Saia sat there painting, he noticed hundreds of giant shapes flying in the distance, a small sound like an orchestra could be heard, in the midst of that procession he saw a gigantic figure.


    A dragon that spanned 30 meters was flying in the sky, the wings weren''t like a lizards, but had large white feathers, the scales looked like white marble, and looked even more exquisite underneath the moonlight.


    Saia''s right eye glowed red, the eye magnified the view and he saw a small carriage mounted on top of the dragon. A Golden insignia of a feathery wing and three red swords could be seen on the side of the carriage. Hundreds of figures could be seen escorting the dragon, armored humanoids riding on top of massive white birds flying in formation of 5 shaped like a ''V''.


    Saia casually watched them all disappear into nothingness in the beautiful night sky, "guess this world is inhabited huh..., I wonder when we should start visiting a civilization soon."


    A woman with blue hair could be seen floating behind Saia, with the image of leaning on his back.


    "This really is a fantasy world, isn''t it Saia?"


    With a wry smile Saia spoke, "yes Ariel, speaking of which, I wonder what your body is doing?"


    Ariel gave a small laugh then tapped his head, but failed, "well you should know how strong I am, we''ll run into my body sooner or later."


    Saia rebutted. "True, but you lack stamina, endurance, and are one of the few front line Aleos with limited combat experience."


    Ariel just pouted, and tried to pinch his nose to no avail.


    A few days later of rest, and relaxation, Saia once again began exploring.


    The tunnel was dark, and steep, it was half submerged in water due to being formed near the ocean waters. Saia found it really hard to be half-submerged in water, while trying to navigate the far reaching tunnels. Due to how far, and deep the tunnels were, he had no source of light, so had to rely in the night vision in his right eye. A small single red dot wandering the dark, and damp tunnel was quite an eerie sight.


    Sounds of crashing waves could constantly be heard from around him, as he moved deeper into the tunnels he couldn''t help but feel a slight sense of unease as to how far the tunnel went.


    He couldn''t tell if it was made naturally, and carved over time by the water, or made by some massive creature. He could only recall some black scales found around the entrance of the cave, but after exploring for a few hours he encountered nothing but darkness, and overwhelming solitude.


    As Saia intently studied the tunnel walls, he noticed the entire tunnel was covered with reefs, and corals, which meant that it was once submerged completely in water.


    He could only guess as to how long it would take before the water once again would come rushing into the tunnels, and sending him on a one way trip to nowhere land.


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    A constant scenery of damp orange colored walls, and pitch black water repeated over, and over again. Saia continued on, and noticed a part of the tunnel was completely submerged. He immediately brought down a breathing apparatus attached to his back, and started to swim into the tunnel depths.


    <hr />


    After 15 minutes Saia found the tunnel slowly expanding, leading to a gigantic opening. After swimming up to the opening he took a look at his surroundings. Gigantic underground walls encompassed an emerald green lake, the ceiling was covered with tons of stalactites. Gigantic pillars could be seen all over holding up the ceiling, and the rocky space around the lake was massive.


    Saia slowly approached the miniature garden located on the shore, the red glow in his eye pin-pointed a large black figure in the distance. A massive black scaly hide could be seen, it was shaped like a gigantic snake with 6 clawed legs.


    The Massive creature was curled around itself like it was in a deep slumber. Saia''s right eye indicated the massive life form''s body heat was abnormally low. As his eye magnified the view, he noticed chunks of its flesh were ripped apart, and numerous wounds could be seen on the body.


    He scrutinized the large body at a distance, "as I thought, looks like it''s dead."


    The wounds it suffered were fairly odd, it had burns running on some parts, and certain scales looked like its been frozen solid. Saia went closer to the body to inspect, next to the claws he noticed a few man made chests.


    "Did it attack a merchant or pirate ship and take some of its treasure, and goods?" Saia checked the snake''s body to make sure if it was truly dead.


    "No pulse, no breathing, and no living temperature, well sorry big guy, but looks like I''ll be taking your treasure." Saia lightly patted the snakes scaly head.


    <hr />


    A blue haired woman was currently hovering over a desk, on the desk was a soggy map, a small pile of coins that did not look like currency, and a collection of soggy books.


    "Hmm, is this what you found in the tunnels?" Ariel was staring at the books with interest.


    "Well I''ll tell you about the details later, let us cross reference the books, and writings in the database to see if we can figure out the language."


    With a slight nod Ariel began to remote control access the database in Advantis.


    Saia studied the map closely, apparently the map only indicated a section of an ocean, and was not a world map. In the map were 3 continents, 1 massive continent located North, 1 South west, and 1 East.


    He could not find any Islands on the map resembling where he was located.


    "Was the island not discovered? or was the map about a different area?" Saia grumbled as he slowly took a break, and formed plans in his head.


    Later that day Ariel had the few functioning machine workers to construct a small ship in order to explore the region, the aircraft hangar was still not functioning, and the aircrafts were still water logged, so sending a few simply designed ships was all they could muster at the moment.


    After a week she concluded that they were in an unmarked island, and near the southern continent(from the map) or more specifically merely west compared to their current location, the books had roughly been analyzed, and had a 90% correlation with an extinct language back in the old world.


    Saia had already downloaded the information to the micro chip in his brain, the ship already contained co-ordinates for the western land mass.


    <hr />


    The sun was dimming, and the skies were giving off a deep orange color, the ocean was calm, and on it was a small motor boat skimming past the waters.


    A blue haired woman was floating around the ship next to a man lying on the side.


    "Well this is where we say goodbye, I can''t stray too far from Advantis, and the ship should automatically follow the pre-determined route, say hello to my body if you find her, also don''t forget to gather information on this world."


    With a light wave, the blue haired woman fizzled out of existence.


    Saia waved back at the empty space, "looks like I''m out of range now...," He stared at the small radar in his hands.


    "This will help me locate anyone else with nanites in their body, the range is only a few Kilometers but oh well, I''ll manage somehow."


    With that Saia closed his eyes, and let the calming waters soothe him to sleep, after a few days the ship was nearing it''s destination.


    "Ahh...relaxing..," as Saia thought such things loud shouts echoed out from around him. As soon as he noticed the shout, a large beam of blue light was approaching the ship, Saia Immediately dove into the water.


    As Saia swam to the surface he noticed he was surrounded by many small row boats, and a bunch of rough looking men were staring him. They were indicating for him to get on board with their unique looking bladed weapons, with a light shrug Saia climbed unto the small boat, and was tied up before being carried to a much larger ship that resembled a primitive galleon.


    The galleon had 2 large crystals attached to it''s sides, at first the ship looked like it was made of wood but the moment Saia''s feet touched the ship, he felt the impression of iron, it felt fairly unusual.


    The man spoke a jumble of near incomprehensible words, after his body was searched for valuables, he was handcuffed, and thrown into a cell.


    Saia leaned on the wall and closed his eyes, "since the ship was destroyed I''ll at least wait for them to bring me near land before I escape, fighting them in the ocean would probably be too hard, I don''t want to swim too far after all."


    After a week, Saia eventually came to understand their language through recording their voices, and overhearing nearby conversation. After constant observation, pattern analysis, and recordings, he finally manged to form a database on their language.


    Apparently he was on a slave ship that was being funded by a local government, they sold the slaves in auctions to provide profit for the military. They apparently were on a trip to raid some other villages, and Saia was just the unlucky first victim.


    As Saia sat in his cell calmly he noticed a loud commotion on board, loud sounds of steel clashing, and rough shouts could be heard. After what seemed like 10 minutes, the commotion died down. Immediately later two rough looking pirates carried a woman in between them, and threw her in a cell next to his.


    The odd thing was that her restraints had strange glowing patterns on it, both her hands, and legs were locked, and her mouth had a cloth covered over it, with a strange glowing symbol carved on the cloth.


    One large bald man with a rough beard touched a scar on his face, and shouted, "bitch, I''m gonna mess you up later for this."


    The man beside him laughed, "hey, the captain gets to go first."


    With a light glare from the bald man the two slammed the cell door shut, and left.


    Saia casually observed his new neighbor. She was wearing a black leather suit, had tanned skin, and her hair was a very light purple, it was tied in a fluffy side-ponytail, she had beautiful feminine features on her face, and sharp purple eyes that were at this moment glaring daggers into him.


    But what truly drew his interest were her ears, Saia looked at her eyes directly, and smiled I''m guessing a "dark elf?" Saia had read enough books in his lifetime to be able to make a guess but that didn''t mean reality and fiction had a direct correlation, he waited for the confirmation from his new neighbor.


    After glaring at Saia for several minutes the dark elf shrugged her shoulders, and nodded then leaned on the wall, glaring a hole into the ceiling.


    With a slight smile Saia muttered, "how surprising, anyways... Should start tonight.."


    <hr />


    Four figures slowly walked into the cell holding area, the sun was down, and the outside was pitch black. Four huge men walked into the cell, and reached for the woman. The woman''s ears already noticed the sounds, and her eyes shot open, first a wide eyed shock was displayed, then cold hostile fury could be seen emitting from her eyes.


    The men who saw her eyes froze slightly out of fear, but immediately regained their composure. One of the figures casually laughed, "shes already been sealed, she won''t put up much of a fight."


    A large bald man with a scar on his face threw the woman to the floor then grabbed her hair, after pulling her face up to his, he gave a grotesque smile, "let''s enjoy."


    She tried to struggle desperately, but all the restraints prevented any coherent movement.


    The large man grabbed her chest and squeezed tightly, the woman winced in pain.


    "Man they''re huge," another man replied, "oh really?"


    The bald man turned around, and replied, "yea... Huh!?"


    As soon as the bald man realized what happened, it was already too late, and all he could see was a world of pitch black.


    Saia had picked his locks, and broke out of his cell. The four men were too busy with the woman to notice. With swift and silent movements he quickly knocked the three men unconscious before they could even react. The bald man was too busy with the elf that he never heard the noises of the large men hitting the floor.


    The dark elf could only stare in shock at what just happened, and was just dazedly staring at Saia.


    Saia stared back at the elf, and spoke, "I''m going to offer you a trade, if I set your free, and help you escape, you have to help me with my information gathering."


    With a light smile he continued, "you see I''m new to this area, so I have a lot I need to know, and things I want."


    The Dark elf immediately nodded, Saia smashed the restraints with his left arm, shattering the iron restraints into chunks. The Dark elf could only stare in utter shock, she then regained her composure, and immediately tore down the cloth covering her mouth, and spoke.


    "This contract I accept, I Seles Eldin offer my soul for this binding contract, at this moment I don''t know you well enough to form a magic contract, but you have my word." Before leaving, Seles walked up to the unconscious bald man, and repeatedly stomped him between his legs with her boots, after several minutes she finally gave a satisfied sigh, and followed Saia.


    Saia had wanted to retrieve his black jacket, and luggage bag, Seles needed to regain an item that was taken from her, it was likely they would head to the same place.


    He sensed two men were standing on the other side of the door, before he did anything Seles put on a strange black glove in her hand, with black runic symbols engraved on them. She then formed 2 dark spears from her gloves, and threw them, it impaled the two men from behind the door, instantly killing them.


    "Honestly judging from your moves, and actions I really don''t see how they caught you."


    Seles merely clicked her tongue, "they just got lucky."


    Saia stared at her gloves in curiosity, Seles ignored his stares and opened the door, "let''s go," she whispered.


    As they walked along an empty hallway a drunk man walked out, his legs were impaled by black energy, and his mouth was held firmly by the dark elf.


    "Obey my orders, or die, you choose. Nod once, to agree, any other strange motions, and I''ll immediately break your neck."


    The man which had his limbs pierced, and was kneeling on the ground, nodded once.


    After interrogating a captured sailor, they found the store room. Saia had found his long black coat with various metal canisters hidden in them. Seles had managed to retrieve what she was looking for, in her hands was a long black scythe that seemed to have absorbed all light, and blended perfectly in the shadows.


    Saia couldn''t help but remark, "shouldn''t you be using bow, and arrows or something."


    Seles glared at him slightly, "shut up, and lets grab a boat."


    "No wait! They still have my coins!" Seles ignored him, and dragged him to one of the small row boats attached to the side.


    As they were slowly approaching the deck, a loud bell could be heard, "escape, the slaves escaped!"


    Immediately the slavers started to pour out of the rooms searching for them.


    <hr />


    Seles slashed her scythe at the air, the slash created a small black ripple floating in the space in front of her, small spikes of pure black energy escaped from the ripple and shot towards the pirates charging at her, it slammed into their bodies causing them to fly back wards, and collapse on the floor.


    Saia noticed a small chant from his ears.


    "Bounty of the Ocean, freedom of the winds, I call upon you to grant thi.."


    *Bam* with a loud thud the chant stopped, and the robed man fell over. Seles had stopped the man from chanting by sending a large spike of black energy into his gut.


    "A spell with magic incantations are only good if your a safe distance away from harm, or you have quick cast."


    More, and more robed men began appearing. The pirates were starting to crowd the entrance, Seles clicked her tongue, and dragged Saia with her to a small room, barricading the hallway. There five slavers stared at them in alarm before arming themselves, however Seles already dove in, and slammed her scythe into the floor, five black replicas of the scythe''s blade emerged from the area of impact, and flew directly at the men.


    The shock had caused them only one second of hesitation, but that was more than enough to have four of them cleaved by the blades, the remaining one managed to dodge, but was engulfed in moving wires, and abruptly started to leak blood, before collapsing in agony.


    Saia observed thin threads from her gloves, that seemed to have a life of it''s own, the thread connecting to the man disconnected, and the remainder seemed to reel back into her gloves. Truth be told the majority of the conflicts were solved by Seles herself. As more, and more loud noises, and shouts poured closer, Seles stared at Saia.


    "No choice, I''ll have to teleport us."


    He gave a light whistle, the existence of magic was theorized to have existed by observing the first invasive species, but had no real solid proof. The black spikes, and odd weapons she used were also interesting, but seeing a traditional magic circle, and incantation was another story. He had originally planned to help set her free, and then personally sink the ship, either steal a boat in the process, or swim to shore. He didn''t expect things to escalate to this point.


    Saia then asked why she didn''t do that earlier, Seles explained she needed various requirements for a proper teleport spell, the one she plans on using has no location marker, nor did she have any catalyst to aid her, not only will it drain all her magic, and stamina, the location will likely be random as well. Of course a majority of what she said barely meant anything to Saia, as the terms she used were something far too complicated for a beginner in the foreign language like him.


    Seles slowly formed a magic circle underneath the both of them, Saia slightly paled "Wait, let''s just sink the ship, and swim to shore, I don''t want to be accidentally teleported inside a rock."


    As Saia was about to step out of the magic circle, light encompassed their bodies, and they disappeared from the hall room.


    (Hmm I''m pretty much going to base the magic off of nen at least superficially, although slightly modifying it for my own purposes to not completely plagiarize. This story was posted like what? A year ago? So really I''m only compressing two chapters into one, the only delay is the editing, doing other projects, and adding some stuff. I''m pretty much burnt out, in general, so this story has been on hold at around ch 50 for a few months.)

 Short detour

    Part 1


    White steam was slowly drifting in a small room filled with human sized capsules, a young woman wearing long black dress and flowing blue hair was floating above the steam, the delicate woman stared fixedly at the open capsule.


    "Good morning brother Allegro."


    "Sister Ariel is it? What is with that body?" A handsome man looked to be around his mid twenties slowly got up from the


    capsule, his hair was light orange, and neatly combed back, giving him a slightly slick look. Despite his long slumber, no bed hair was present. He gave the impression of a serious man, with an air of nobility, and confidence.


    The woman gave a light chuckle, "your about the 6th person to ask that, but now that you are awake at least one of the top management of this place is now active."


    Allegro gave a curt nod, "so Maya is still in hibernation huh, what of mister Saia?"


    Ariel put a finger on her cheek, "well he was one of the first to awake, but his situation is a bit complicated, the last recording from the ship I gave him showed him being abducted by what seemed to be pirates."


    He nodded slightly with a serious look,"it is him after all so we shouldn''t worry too much."


    "I think the same, but as soon as Kalithas found out she left to find the ship that abducted him, since we have several sightings of the vessel she should be able to find it."


    Allegro furrowed his brow a bit, "I hope she doesn''t over do it."


    "Allegro you worry too much, it would be a shame to have that kind of face, constantly frowning. Besides we don''t know enough about this world, this is a good opportunity to capture one of those guys, and gain information."


    After looking at Ariel''s floating form quietly, Allegro nodded.


    "Well I am in charge of security unlike the 5 section heads, I have to think about the overall safety of our family, but you''re right, at the very least we should obtain more information."


    Ariel nodded in a satisfied manner, "yep, yep just listen to me."


    After some careful consideration Allegro lightly tapped his forehead in thought, "well please fill me in on what happened while I was asleep, it''s better to form some plans for the future."


    Ariel just smiled, and shook her head. "You just woke up, you should rest a bit more first, and get some nutrients into your body."


    <hr />


    The flames were raging wildly, flashes of red and orange erupted throughout the deck, and mess hall.


    Men all over the place were lying limply on the floor, wood and metal scattered all over the place were chipped and twisted.


    The bodies looked to have been covered by wood and metal, some of the corpses on deck looked completely wet while others looked like their skin had melted, a lone man dressed in flashy clothes was staring at a slim figure in fear.


    A black shadow darted across the flames, occasionally flashes of silver danced across the room sending streams of blood flying in the air, and screaming men falling to the ground.


    Ever since the dark elf, and that man escaped he had run into nothing but trouble. Jacques cursed his luck under his breath, his black hair was long and greasy, and his face grew more sweaty from the anxiety, and heat.


    She had somehow boarded unto the ship like a ghost, and silently murdered a vast majority of the crew, and as soon as she was discovered, a battle in the ship occurred, where his remaining crew was cut down effortlessly. The young woman''s hair was flailing wildly in the wind, silver strands of hair lightly gleaming from the surrounding fire, her illuminated eyes shined like rubies. Her face was devoid of emotion, but looked calm, and cold.


    Even though his life was in danger Jacques could not help but be slightly charmed at the sight and be momentarily lost in a daze, however his life was still in danger, and as he pointed his weapon at her, his body felt incredibly heavy, and his head started to ache, eventually his consciousness sunk into a sea of darkness. All around him a slight static danced in the air, around his body.


    Kalithas looked at his limp form, "I hope the brain Hypoxia wasn''t too severe, I still need to bring him back for interrogation after all."


    <hr />


    Saia was currently staring over the side of the island, all he could see was mist, and clouds enveloping his entire view. It was a strange sight looking at flocks of birds flying below him rather then above. The sun was dimming behind the clouds, and night was about to fall.


    Nearby a woman with tanned skin, pointy ears, and light purple hair was slowly roasting something over a crackling fire. The woman waved her hands a bit distorting her leather clothes against her body.


    "Saia, the birds should be ready in a few minutes."


    Saia dusted off the dirt, and began to walk back to the camping site, "coming Seles."


    It had been 3 days since the forced teleport, Seles had consumed an enormous amount of stamina, so had to rest. Saia had hunted nearby animals, and plants he found edible through trial, and error, to help her regain energy. Occasionally he would see a strange insignia glowing around her body causing her to rapidly turn feverish, and her breathing to to turn shallow. But moments later it would disappear, and her breathing would calm down.


    Saia had contemplated on trying to examine her, but due to his lack of understanding on elven physiology, he took a wait and see approach, eventually she was up on the third day, without signs of weariness. At first he observed her movements, gestures, and external heat signature, but no anomaly showed up anymore. Eventually he let the issue pass, and decided to act when necessary.


    As Saia calmly chewed on the roasted bird, savoring the crispy skin, and gamey meat he began to organize his thoughts.


    "Well Seles, can you first tell me where we are right now?"


    Seles slowly finished chewing on a bird leg, after plucking a large leaf she wiped her mouth, and washed her hand on a nearby pond.


    "Well first of all, as you can see, we''re on an floating island sky port, since the minor teleportation wouldn''t send us very far, it should be around 10 to 50 Kilometers from the slave ship, since the ship was near the Galian borders, I''m pretty sure we should be somewhere inside that country."


    Saia nodded a bit and collected his thoughts, "I''m actually fairly new to this area so I really have no idea where the location of Galian country is, or what a sky port would be."


    Seles couldn''t help but give a sarcastic reply, "were you living as a hermit or something?"


    After remaining silent for a bit, he stared entire her eyes, and gave a joking smile, Sorry I have a few things I''d like to remain quiet about, I hope you understand."


    "It''s ok, everyone has their own secrets, and things they would rather not talk about, since I do owe you for a few things I''ll help you as best as I can, as for the contract I can set one up for you now that I recovered."


    After taking a another bite of the bird meat Saia lightly smiled at Seles, "sorry, anyways the contract isn''t needed, I trust you enough for that."


    "Well from the description you gave me before, you were around the Avarian ocean, and should be near 3 continents."


    "The continent to the south where we are currently, would be Gressian continent."


    With a light cough she continued, "the Gressian continent is home to various human empires, and the famous dragon kingdom, the continent in the east is called the Certamen continent, home to the Holy Anglin Empire ruled by immortal emperor, and the beastmen tribes that share borders with them."


    With a raised finger she pointed North, "finally to the Northern continent which is the largest one in that region is called the dark lands, while it isn''t really dark or desolate, the humans just labeled it as such.


    That area is home to the majority of the demon races, and some beastmen tribes, while there are various countries, and tribes located in that continent, the largest power there, is lead by the demon empress Ralashantra."


    Saia calmly thought for a bit,"...and these Islands?"


    "The floating Islands exist all around the world, some prefer to call them sky islands, some of the islands hold strategic importance and had been converted into sky fortresses. Others were used as commercial towns, or for mining purposes, those ones in the outskirts hold no value, and are left alone. It''s a common place to find drifters, pirates, or unsavory character around them."


    "That''s not all is it?"


    "You''re right, the sky islands led to the founding of sky ports, you saw those giant crystals on the slave ship those pirates were using right?"


    Saia recalled those huge crystals strapped upon the wooden ship.


    "Those crystal orbs allow for flight, there''s a network between many countries that regulate the sky transports, trading goods, and sky routes, since many sky islands are right above some cities, you can expect those ones to be heavily guarded."


    Seles concentrated on her thoughts, and continued.


    "Incidentally there exists a floating continent called Alanoa, it''s hypothesized the islands were off shoots from that continent, there is no set location for that continent because it travels around the world."


    Afterwards, she gave a light sigh, "let us stop, It''s also getting dark, sleep here for now, and find a nearby sky port in the morning."


    "We''re sorta broke you know?" Saia lightly chimed in.


    "Well we can either find a job, or become stowaways. The sky ports usually attract a lot of people, so their quite beautiful as well."


    Saia just smiled, either way was fine with him.


    A bright place filled with flowers, a landscape filled with mud, and decay. A place filled with luxurious furniture, and gold furnishings, a place filled with rotten stench, and dirty stains. A face filled with warmth, and love, and a face distorted by anger, vengeance, and grief.


    "Really, everything has their own charm." Saia muttered to himself, as he wore ironic smile.


    <hr />


    The travel through the wilderness only lasted for a few days, as bright lights in the distance easily signaled where the port lay. During the small hike there wasn''t any encounter with any hostile creatures, they eventually reached a bustling town located near the edge of the sky island. Massive towers of marble, and individually sized square shaped homes covered a large portion of the view.


    Massive piers, and docks stretched out from the islands to support gigantic ships floating around the docks, and was covered by clouds. Some of the floating ships looked to be made of wood, some of them iron, and some of them made of marble, the shapes and sizes were innumerable.


    There were even gigantic creatures hanging around the docks, with small buildings nestled on their backs, one of them looked like a whale floating in the clouds lazily, with hundreds of armed soldier walking around its back. Saia couldn''t help but wonder what makes a massive creature of that size float in the sky.


    The streets were teeming with people, a majority of them were human, but a few looked to be of different races, each were selling their wares, and vending food, the sky port looked to be teeming with life.


    Seles had went inside a large building that offered employment, from what she had said there were various guild, citizen, and government sponsored jobs that dealt with various tasks, and offered rewards for them.


    The tasks ranged from material collecting, monster hunting, exploring ruins, general labor, to recruitment ads by merchants, nobles, and even local governments.


    Some of the more dangerous occupations involving joining military campaigns, armed conflicts, and monster subjugation had much stricter requirements from the clients. Incidentally mercenary groups must register with the guilds in order to accept mercenary contracts provided by the guilds.


    The guilds are mostly impartial, and run on an international scale, they accept jobs from all countries, so the political power, and financial leverage they have is not to be underestimated.


    <hr />


    Saia had followed the dark elf from behind, and entered a white wooden door, the inside looked like a small bar with a receptionist desk. Men, and women just sat around in the nearby tables drinking calmly.


    Saia had half expected that mean looking men glaring at everyone, were itching to start a fight the moment some weak looking guy entered. In short, he had probably read too many books, and developed a habit of imagining a common scenario in his head. He shook his head at the stupid thoughts, and moved onward.


    As soon as he thought that, a large man with various scars covering his face, and wearing metallic gloves, stopped Saia, and glared at him.


    "Hey bro, is that dark elf with you?"


    Saia looked at the man slightly smiling, "yes, it would seem so."


    The man with shoulder length shaggy brown hair gave a light sneer to Saia "how about you take a break, and let me escort her, weak little shits like you can''t protect fine women."


    Saia tried to swallow his laughter, honestly it''s been such a stereotypical scenario in stories, but for it to actually happen to him, he couldn''t help but find it refreshing. The world was already starting to be amusing.


    "She probably doesn''t need any protection though."


    The large man frowned, "I don''t need your opinion punk."


    As the man was about to grab Saia, thin black threads shot out, and wrapped around the hulking man.


    A woman''s voice talked calmly, "the threads are made from Farian Tyrant Spider''s silk, struggle anymore, and you''ll be ripped to shreds."


    The owner of the voice was Seles, thin black strands of thread could be see coming from her sleeves, and gloves.


    "Violence is prohibited in the guild you know," after a light warning the threads receded, and the man was set free.


    The man looked at Seles, and blushed slightly, "sorry, it was my bad, I was just a little drunk," after smiling at Seles he started to back off.


    As the man left he gave a light glare to Saia before leaving, to Saia it looked like a little boy trying to show off to a girl, in a way Saia found the actions slightly funny, and misguided.


    "Do you know that man, your ex-boyfriend?"


    With a light dismissive wave of her hand, she glared at at Saia, "don''t know him."


    Staring at the gloves Seles was wearing, more and more question popped into Saia''s head, "those gloves, seem to have a lot of functions..."


    The dark elf dangled a thin thread from her gloved fingers, "the threads are hidden inside my gloves, and jacket, I use animation to control it''s movement, and reinforcement to control it''s power, the gloves act like a catalyst that manifest the composition of energy spikes, and..."


    Saia looked slightly confused, Seles seemed to be able guess what Saia was thinking about.


    "Incantations are used when the magic being formed is too complex, or the caster lacks the necessary talent, or lack items to cast the spell without incantations."


    Back in the olden days, humans from a gate world had invaded our people in this world, their machines, and weapons killed many magicians who were too slow to cast magic, and mighty warriors were killed instantly despite their heavy armor."


    "So conflict, led to rapid advancement, and change?"


    Seles nodded.


    "The conflict had forced us to advance our magic technology, the various advancements eventually led us to topple the humans, and force them back to the gate. Incantations have been replaced with items with pre-recorded magic formations, magic attributes used to enhance physical abilities have been improved over many years, and casting magic can now come from a simple key words, or gestures. Naturally mana, and stamina will be taken from the user."


    Seles used her index finger, and drew a small pattern in the air, immediately spikes of black energy floated in front of her fingers, she combined them to form a spear, she shrunk them unto her palm, and it flew around her hand slowly, and the energy eventually dissipated.


    "I can cast an incantation to create black energy spikes, and the magic formation in my gloves will absorb the process, if another person can''t cast the magic to begin with, the gloves will not work for them."


    "Naturally things like runes, magic territory, mana pools, mana cultivation, mana purity, and catalysts would help the process, as well as the persons talent with the 5 magical attributes."


    The terms meant absolutely nothing to Saia, in fact his grasp of the language was slightly passable, the words coming out of her mouth, would be no different than gibberish, and an information dump, to which their would be no references.


    "The down side is that the variety of spells is limited to the amount of magi-tech items, if the materials for that items are high class, the spell itself becomes more potent, so these things are fairly expensive, some people use a mix of items, and incantations for their spells."


    Saia''s face kept wearing a permanent grin, but his mind was trying to understand the terms.


    Seles stared at Saia with a slightly amused face, but had a piercing stare.


    "But, everyone should already know something like that, right?"


    He merely smiled, and nodded.


    The answers she provided gave birth to even more questions, she had used too many terms he could not understand, he had to put them aside, they still needed funds to enter a sky transport, "so what kind of job did you get from the guild?


    With a dead pan expression she said, "well first of all you''ll have to sign up with the guild."


    Saia went up to the receptionist desk, a young man with black hair, and red rimmed glasses gave a light smile, "welcome, I hear from miss Seles that you wanted to sign up for the guild, please include you name, race, and specialties."


    The man handed out a paper form and a pen, Saia couldn''t really call himself a regular human, and had no idea what he could list as a specialty, so he merely made up a race with the word human in it and included some of his hobbies. The written words were a unique mix of latin, and sub languages. With a lot of help from Seles, he managed to complete his form.


    He never really cared about the form, and wrote what he felt like, after a few minutes the receptionist received the form, and glanced over it, with a slightly puzzled look, the man read it.


    "Saia Peregrinus, race is... High human...?, specialties include, botany, painting, medicine, biology, psychology, self defense, investigative study, fishing, hiking, baby sitting, poetry..."


    The man was slightly puzzled, and a bit disturbed. He could not tell if it was a joke or not, the race was unheard of, and the list of specialties held no pattern whatsoever, and seemed like a jumble of random hobbies, he eventually gave a light sigh, and handed over a bronze colored card with a spell insignia grafted on it.


    "Normally we would have had to do a light back ground check on you, and given you examinations, but since miss Seles who is a gold ranking member is vouching for you, then we have nothing more to say in that regard."


    "Please use this card to conduct future business with the guild, the card will contain your rank, and information. At the moment you are the lowest ranking at C Class, bronze rank, you may only receive requests suitable to your rank."


    Saia gave a light nod and took the card, Seles grabbed his card, and talked to the receptionist, after a few minutes she came back, "we''re going to join a subjugation request in a nearby village."


    He was surprised and looked at Seles, waiting for an explanation.


    Seles gave a nasty smile, "I listed you as being under apprenticeship with me on this job, so you get a free pass by coming with me."


    <hr />


    A large campfire was crackling as metal canteens were being slowly cooked over the fire, various meats, and vegetables were slowly being heated up, creating an aromatic smell drifting in the camp.


    Around the blazing fire was a rough looking man with a heavy orange beard, and shaved head, his name was Garan, strange magic tattoos were carefully arranged across his face, and across his exposed muscular upper body.


    Next to him was the man Saia had encountered before name Alan, ironically his shaggy brown hair is now neat and combed, if it weren''t for all those scars he could be considered fairly handsome in a rugged way, he occasionally drifted from glaring at Saia to sneaking a few looks at Seles. Saia couldn''t help but smile at such a scene, was it naivety, or simplicity?


    A little farther back was a woman wearing a blue hood, and robe, she looked to be around 30 years old, she had light brown hair tied in a ponytail, her features were fairly mature yet quite beautiful. In her hand was a long metallic rod, with carvings on the edges, her name was Alanda.


    Finally the person tending the fire was a youthful young man with long blond hair tied in a ponytail, he was wearing slim fitting silver armor that glowed a dull blue. Carefully crafted runes spread all across his armor. On his sides sat two scabbards, and a small pouch on his back. He was called Aztlan.


    The six people here were part of the subjugation group to investigate strange noises around a nearby village on sky island.


    Aztlan was over viewing the particulars of the mission.


    "Around 15 days ago, loud screeching noises were heard by the villagers , every night the sounds grew louder, and closer, the villagers investigated a bit, and found a tunnel carved deep into the Islands."


    "13 day ago, people in the village started disappearing, at first it was just a little boy, then a woman, then an entire family went missing."


    "A request for some people to investigate the matter was posted 9 days ago at the guild, two B-class, silver ranked members had investigated the issue, but they never returned to report to the guild."


    Alanda walked up the the campfire and sat down, "I know one of them, it was a battle mage I was acquainted with before, she specialized in close quarters magic combat, with a variety of fire spell. It''s hard to imagine she was done in..."


    She let out a long depressing sigh, with a cloudy expression wrapped across her face, Aztlan patted her on the back, "we have 4 silver, and 1 gold ranker, we will definitely get to the bottom of this... plus, we have a new guy to help us out."


    Aztlan lightly smiled at Saia to show he wasn''t being left out, Saia didn''t particularly mind, but did think it was nice of Aztlan albeit unnecessary worry.


    "The tunnel from what the villagers have said, seemed to go very deep, we have no idea how far the tunnels will reach, or how stable it is either so preparation will be necessary. Anyways we''re about 2 days away from the village, lets finish eating, and have a good night''s rest."


    With a light smile Aztlan handed each person a portion of the cooked stew.


    <hr />


    drag* drag* drag* a tall figure spanning 2 meters tall was dragging a body across the soil, red liquid can be seen smeared across the ground.


    "Painful! Unbearable! It hurts! It hurts!" A loud, and deep voice kept repeating the same words over, and over.


    The figure slashed, and clawed at its own throat, it threw away the limp body, and continued to claw away, eventually loud screeching sounds echoed throughout the night sky.


    The figure stopped, and reached for the limp body, mounds of dirt kept falling away from it''s long brown arms, and continued to drag the body into the long winding tunnels, a small voice could be heard at a distance from the entrance.


    "Painful! Unbearable! It hurts! It hurts!" Eventually the voice disappeared, and a long eerie silence followed.


    That night the stars grew even more beautiful, and the village grew even more deathly quiet, as if waiting for the next tragedy to follow.


    Notes:brain Hypoxia occurs when lack of oxygen reaches the brain, causing the brain cells and the body to not function properly.


    I prefer some slight balance so, had to up the tech levels of this world via magic.


    Part 2


    The wind was blowing wildly, and the rain was pouring down constantly. In the distance a small village could be seen, surrounded by small hills. The warm light from the houses in the village were a welcoming sight to the weary travelers.


    A person with blonde hair tied in a ponytail, that looked in their late teens was knocking on a door. The house was the mayor''s residence, and the person who posted the Job listing for the guild.


    The six travelers were supposed to have met with the mayor prior to starting the subjugation request.


    The blonde haired youth named Aztlan turned around to face his companions, they were wearing hoods, and cloaks to shelter from the rain. "There''s no response, let''s just rest at the nearby church to take shelter from the rain, and we''ll try again in the morning."


    This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.


    In the distance right beside the hill lay a large wooden church, these buildings allowed travelers to spend the night to hide themselves from the weather.


    "Hah," a tanned woman with light purple hair seated herself near the altar, "that damn mayor, he posted a job request but won''t meet the people he asked for." Seles placed down a large leather case on the tiled floor, and leaned on the benches.


    "Well we don''t know his circumstances, let me dry your bodies first," a woman with brown hair tied in a pony tail with a calm, and mature look started to recite a spell with her metal staff.


    "Water of life, surrounding bliss, encompassing night, heed my words, gather unto my will, Aqua ball!"


    From the surrounding room, droplets of water slowly gathered unto her hand, light drops of soft liquid slowly trailed away from the wet, and damp clothes, eventually leaving everything dry.


    Seles walked over, and sat near Saia, "currently it''s raining, which means using water based spells would not take too much effort or stamina as there is already sources of water, this is called magic territory, the incantation she used right now basically describes our surroundings, the incantations are adjusted usually to match where we are, what she feels, and what she needs, it''s more an issue of imagery, and feelings."


    "Thanks for the explanation Seles," Saia gave a warm smile and continued to stare at a stone statue in the center of the altar. The statue depicted an androgynous form, holding unto a dead flower, crushed in it''s hands.


    "If you don''t mind me asking, what is that statue doing? Saia stared fixedly at the statue asking no one in particular.


    A large balding man with an orange beard was standing around doing stretches, "that''s the god of the new world, it really has no official name, it''s spread pretty widely among the human nations recently, the flower represents the old world, I myself am not all that religious so that''s all I know."


    With a light wave Saia gave his thanks, after staring at the statue for a few minutes Saia slowly closed his eyes.


    <hr />


    "Empty, empty, empty!" A large man with rugged features, and scars all over his face, burst open the door of a house, "empty again!"


    Alan had found nobody located at the mayor''s house, everyone eventually decided to search the other houses, they were all completely empty of people.


    Saia entered the small house, the furniture was tidy, and some of the houses even had food set on the table, "judging by how neat everything is, it seems as if they all stopped what they were doing, and left, no signs of struggle at all."


    Saia''s eye was now glowing red, the people around him were listening to him calmly, while showing a deep interest in why his right eye was glowing.


    He continued, "four different finger prints on the door, it matches the amount of people in the bed rooms, but the plates in the dining room shows it''s for 5 people."


    "The foot prints are useless to track as they would have been washed away by the rain, the valuables are still in the house as well, only strange point is there''s pollen all over the place, but then again there is also flowers all over this area."


    With her hands folded Seles added, "an accomplice, or maybe a spell to lure everyone away?"


    Alan groaned, "it''s been like that with all the houses here!"


    Saia slowly walked to the dining room, and sat on the table, and slowly began eating the cold food. Everyone stared at him with surprise on their faces, with a light motion Saia indicated for everyone to eat, "look''s like there is no poison, and I don''t detect anything odd either, it''s best to regain our energy as the tunnels will most likely give us our answer."


    Aztlan gave a bright smile, and sat next to Saia, "let''s eat, I know the location of the tunnels so the distance shouldn''t be very far."


    As everyone started to eat Saia wrinkled his nose while sitting next to Aztlan, "this smell is...?"


    Alan snuck around the house, pocketing some of the valuables.


    <hr />


    A gigantic tunnel was now in view digging deep into the hills, the rain had caused the soil to become muddy, so walking became a chore.


    "The tunnel is much bigger than previous descriptions," Aztlan looked a bit confused.


    "Was it enlarged?" Alanda chimed in, Saia walked past everyone and continued, "well doesn''t matter, lets go".


    Alan with an annoyed expression muttered under his breath "damn rookie, acting like the leader."


    The deeper they traveled, the larger the tunnel expanded, they have been walking for nearly an hour. Alanda had summoned forth orbs of light to provide vision, Saia looked at the floor, and his eye turned red, "looks like foot prints, many of them, some them them don''t seem human.


    As the group walked farther, they noticed the tunnel split into 3 paths, "judging by the foot prints, they went into 2 paths, the left, and right."


    Aztlan pointed out, "well since there are 6 of us, should we go 2 paths each?"


    "We don''t know how many forked paths exist the deeper we go, splitting up might make us isolated," Seles pointed out.


    Saia glanced at the tunnels, "some of the forked paths might even be dead ends, or traps."


    Eventually they decided to send 3 people to the right and 3 to the left in order to follow the foot prints. Group 1 was Seles, Alan, and Garan on the left path, Group 2 was Saia, Alanda and Aztlan on the right path.


    Originally Saia was to follow Seles, Seles had the highest combat potential and Saia was a rookie, Seles assured everyone on Saia''s ability, and eventually the groups were formed.


    In his mind Saia was worried less about Seles, and more about the people not grouped with Seles. In order to assure group survival, it was better for Saia, and Seles to split up.


    Group 1 had continued moving deeper, and deeper, eventually they spotted a large opening inside the tunnels. The balls of light floated around eventually revealed tons of vines covering the vast chamber, hundreds of giant white flower bulbs were pulsating around the room, the petals formed into a giant container.


    Seles smelled something, with a light frown, she formed black energy spikes on her fingers, and fired them at one of the bulbs.


    The bulb instantly collapsed, and the giant petals opened, green liquid poured out and one small body could be seen, it was the body of a little girl.


    Before anything else, she shot her wires into the ceiling.


    "Just in case."


    <hr />


    Group 2 had entered what seemed to be a grand hallway, Aztlan lightly touched one of the statues lined up in the underground hallway, they were old, and many were broken, and cracked. The statue was of a woman with blooming flowers decorated all over her body.


    "Do you recognize this statue Aztlan?" Saia asked curiously. Aztlan shook his head, "I''ve never seen this statue before, it doesn''t remind me of any of the gods I''ve seen."


    As they walked along the hallway, they noticed a dramatic rise in the temperature of the room, Saia''s right eye was glowing red, "above!"


    Dirt and soil fell down from the ceiling, a gigantic vine crashed into the floor, and immediately bloomed gigantic blossoming flowers, and released tons of spores.


    Saia took out two metal canisters from his long black coat, after pouring both of them into his mouth he spat out a large flame that exploded on contact with the the spores, creating flashes of fire, and a burst of ashes.


    After seeing the fire Saia made, Alanda threw a small orb unto the ground, she then smashed her staff unto the orb which released 5 small red magic circles, it spread out from the point of impact. The bracelet on her wrists started to glow red, "innocence of Flame, realm of fire, under this dark cold tunnel, embrace my warmth, and heed my contract, I sum.."


    Before Alanda was about to finish her words, vines started to sprout from the walls, the floors and the ceiling. All of it rushed towards her body, a blur of blue light rushed into the vines, and the vines turned into scattered chunks of green, Aztlan had used reinforcement magic on his legs to increase his speed, and rush into the vines to protect Alanda, his two swords were glowing blue, and red.


    Alanda continued the spell without even looking at the scene, "...summon thee Pyro Fairies."


    After Alanda finished her summon, 4 more vines surged out from under her feet, Aztlan shouted, "sword wave." After activating the keyword, Aztlan mightily swung down the sword, an arc of chilling air rushed to the vines, and froze them instantly.


    The remaining vines spat out thorns, aiming at Saia''s back while he was burning down the large vine.


    Alanda pointed her fingers at Saia''s back, as if using telepathy, 5 small figures guarded Saia''s back emitting an aura of intense heat, the thorns were turned to ashes.


    Saia looked at the creatures, tiny little figures of androgynous humans glowing red with fiery butterfly wings, they were flying around Saia in a playful manner, "cute, I''m pretty sure Anastasia would love these."


    "Aren''t they cute, the room was too small to summon anything bigger," Alanda smiled as she stroked a fairy with her finger, and the fairy hugged her fingers.


    Aztlan walked past Saia, and headed deeper into the tunnels, "well whatever tried to attack us probably didn''t want us to get closer, let''s keep pushing."


    <hr />


    From the looks of it, the little girl was still breathing. Alan, and Garan had been busy freeing the unconscious people, as Seles was seeing to the girl her ears perked up. She stared directly at the completely dark entrance; brought her scythe up with 1 hand, and she slashed the air. Green globs had shot out directly from the darkness, and was absorbed by the small black ripple of energy left in the air by the slash.


    Garan''s magic tattoos glowed, and he rushed directly into the the darkness, using his fingers he swatted away green liquid flying at him, the moment it touched the floor a small sizzling sound could be heard.


    As he approached the figure, he performed a palm strike into it''s chest, the figure shot out thorns from underneath its body, piercing into Garan, Garan raged "to think it could so easily pierce through my body strengthening magic!"


    With a wild howl Garan sent the giant figure flying backwards with a double palm strike.


    The giant figure let out a loud screech, stunning Garan for a few seconds, gigantic thorns shot out form the giant''s body aiming at Garan, black flashes of light exploded in front of Garan''s head, Garan shouted, "thanks" and continued the charge.


    Seles used reinforcement mana to strengthen her body, and immediately kicked a wall, shooting her body like a bullet into the fight.


    As Alan ran in to join Seles, a loud crash exploded next to him, throwing him crashing into the floor. Two more figures had broken down a layer of the tunnel walls, and rushed at Alan. The figures looked like two hulking humanoids with pieces of soil, and wooden flesh, with green plants growing out from their bodies, their hollow eyes glowed a deep green.


    As their gigantic hands were about to reach his body, he screamed, "impact!" Using his 2 metal gloves he pumped both his fists together creating a loud energy wave, the energy wave enveloped around his body, and forced the attackers back.


    Alan jumped up to regain his posture, but as soon as he jumped up, Vines crashed from behind him, and restricted one of his legs, causing him to trip, and smash his head into the dirt floor.


    Seles being a dark elf had excellent hearing, and night vision, she immediately heard the disturbance near where Alan was, the amount of noise in the other room meant he was in trouble.


    Garan body slammed the giant figure into the wall eventually crushing it''s body, the creature screamed, "Painful! Inbearable! It hurts! It hurts!" Garan focused reinforcement mana into his fingers, and dug his hands into the creatures head.


    After a loud crunch the figure ceased movement, Garan let out a loud laugh, "hahaha not bad buddy, but you''re still green."


    Seles had rushed into the room where Alan was, Alan was unconscious, and lying on the ground, with a bloody gash on his head. She immediately threw 5 spikes into the back of one of the giant figures, the gigantic creature screamed in pain, and focused on her.


    The 2 creatures lumbered forward, one shot thorns at her, while the others made a gesture, and vines from the walls started to lunge towards her.


    As soon as the vines approached her they were cut into pieces, green liquid was dripping around the dark elf, she created a barrier of wires like a spider web around her.


    Immediately Seles jumped back and started to recite a spell, "lord of confinement, judgment of the void, in this dark world show your dominance, unholy binding, initiate!"


    All of a sudden, loud metallic jingling sounds could be heard, black chains started to sprout from the back of one of the creatures, the chains wrapped around it''s body, eventually causing the creature to tumble forward unto the ground. On the back of the creature, 5 black spikes melted into a pentagram, eventually forming a magic circle.


    Seles had used the energy spikes to form a pentagram on it''s back, she used her formation mana to mold, and change the shape of the spikes into a magic circle, and used an incantation to activate it.


    The other creature spat out globs of acid from it''s mouth to melt the thread, and hopefully hit her.


    With a light smile she twirled her scythe around her, creating a barrier of black energy that absorbed the acid. She then started another incantation, "light of darkness, lonely night, pierce the untold depths, disdain the greed of the living, pierce the unforgiven, twilight pillar!" The scythe started glowing, acting as a support for the spell.


    The massive creature could see black light even darker than the shadows forming all around the room, giant beams of black light shot towards it''s body in multiple directions. The light caused decay, and weakened it''s body, eventually after being hit by multiple bursts of dark light, it''s body decayed, and withered away.


    Seles grinned lightly, and stared around the room, "guess it didn''t notice huh."


    The thread she created around the room did indeed form a barrier, but some of the threads have been used to form a simple pattern that resembled magic circles. Seles had used the magic circles as an neutral outlet for her spells, and used the scythe to empower her spell for using dark magic.


    Due to how simply designed the magic circles were, the potency of the spell was lower, but multiple attacks had been more then enough to kill the creature.


    Seles began to walk over and check on Alan.


    <hr />


    Group 2 had encountered nothing but hostile vines as they approached a large room, a gigantic flower instantly blossomed. A beautiful woman stepped out from the flower, her skin was a deep green, and flowers sprouted all across her body, emitting pollen into the air.


    "Humans again! Damn you, and your god for causing us all this grief!"


    With a loud shriek, the woman flew through the air aiming at Saia. Aztlan jumped into the air to meet her dead on, using his sword to form two slashes aiming for her neck. The woman brought out a glowing green whip, and tried to entangle his swords. They eventually collided, and struggled on the ground.


    The whip that was latched unto his red sword like an anaconda, immediately blossomed flowers, and pollen shot out.


    Aztlan clicked his tongue, and let go of his weapon, he kneed her in the stomach in order to move out of the way. Saia sprang forward, and threw 3 small canisters at her, the green woman used the whip, and threw the blade at Saia.


    Saia jumped back, and grabbed the sword hilt, then tossed it into the air, Aztlan was already in the air grabbed the other sword, and was already pouncing on the woman.


    The green woman shot thorns from her hand at the canisters, the canisters instantly froze the vines and let out a large cold explosion of ice. The other 2 canisters let out some gas that melted the pollen in the air.


    As Aztlan approached the green woman, leaves sprouted from her back like wings and started to shoot towards him like razor blades. The leaf blades were torched by the small fairies, guarding him.


    Aztlan shouted, "cross thunder!" The blades edges started to collect energy eventually turning into electricity, they shot out towards her.


    The green woman enveloped herself in large flower petals, the cross shaped slash penetrated the petals, and flung her to the ground.


    The woman cried as tears streamed down her face. "Not again!"


    The woman flung seeds all around her, the seeds instantly formed into flowers, the flower shot out acid at the group.


    Two large white snakes gave out a loud hiss, and started to breathe cold mist unto the flowers quickly freezing each one. Alanda had summoned them during the course of the fight.


    The woman realized she was slowly being cornered, with a loud angry shriek, she used the vine''s thorns to cut scars all across her body, the green liquid splashed unto the floor creating a sizzling sound.


    The woman made a light gesture, and the acid on the floor formed into a miniature whirl wind, and started to scatter the acid in all directions. Saia shot an orb from his left arm, the orb resembled a ball of black light, the ball ran into the tornado, with a loud rumble the tornado dwindled, and the acid started to condense around the black orb.


    Saia walked up the the woman slowly and said, "guess it''s over huh?"


    The green woman slumped unto the floor, closed her eyes, and nodded.


    "You damn humans, if it weren''t for your god..."


    Saia''s interest started to peak at these key words, he walked up to her, and with a light whisper he talked into her ears, "I''m not a human of this world, and don''t follow this god, maybe we can help each other?"


    The green woman calmed down as if tired, and silently listened to what Saia was saying. Acting as if she had given up she spoke, "speak, what is it you want?"


    Aztlan, and Alanda lowered their guard, and also interested in what she was, as she does not resemble a dryad so her existence is something new to them.


    Saia spread his arms and asked, "what is this place for and what are you trying to do?"


    The woman called herself Edea, "I was capturing the filthy humans worshiping the god of the new world, implanting their bodies with plants to control their movement, and protect the tunnel.


    Saia pondered, "Heh.. so this is like an similar form of a Dinocampus coccinellae "(1)


    Edea''s face was growing more and more pale,"..you see, the original inhabitants of this world were my people, governed by our god Celesta."


    "Gods...eh," the word held different meanings for different people, but Saia was only growing more interested in what she considers a god.


    Edea slowly smiled as she thought about the past, "many tens of thousands of years ago, before this planet was populated by the other races, we were the ones that flourished in these lands, it was joyous, and the world was bountiful, our kind had spread around the world."


    With a light frown she continued, "eventually the tranquility didn''t last, rifts started to appear around our world, strange beings from other worlds had constantly invaded, and slowly made gains in our world, after thousands of years of conflict we began weakening."


    "Other worlds..you mean gate worlds right?" Saia wanted to clarify the information.


    Edea slowly nodded her head, "Is that what you call them now? Anyways the beings eventually constructed a giant altar, that brought forth a powerful god into our world, the god, and his army eventually invaded into our holy palace where our goddess protected the core of the world. After many days, and nights our goddess was eventually slain, and the core was stolen."


    "Overtime our kinds ability to reproduce grew lower, and lower, and eventually we were wiped out by the invaders. New races slowly traveled into our world, and settled down." I being the last of my kind hid myself away in this island."


    "While venturing outside, I saw that hateful statue, I don''t know how the human''s came to worship that being, but I was already fed up, and decided to use those humans for myself, part in anger, and apart in necessity."


    Edea face grew more and more pale, "you, you are called Saia right? I did as promised, come here."


    With an expectant expression, Saia placed his ear next to Edea, after whispering something into his ear, she gave Saia a small green crystal, Edea whispered some more, and Saia paused for a few seconds after a little thought he nodded.


    Edea gave a sad smile, and said, "Sorry for the trouble, and...thank you..."


    Saia looked at her lifeless eyes, he stretched out his finger, and closed them. Then whispered silently to her, "How interesting, leave it to me."


    Aztlan looked at the crystal in his hands, "What is that, what did she tell you?"


    "Sorry it''s a secret between us, I hope you understand," Saia gave a small apologetic expression.


    With a loud sigh Aztlan got back up and walked towards where they had come, "time to go back, lets find the others."


    <hr />


    Outside the tunnel a line of people could be seen slowly walking out into the light, the captured villagers had regained consciousness, Alan was laying on the side of the road unconscious, while his life was not in danger, Saia judged he would be out for awhile longer.


    Eventually the mayor had given the reward, after splitting the reward into 6 ways, the reward was 5000 silver Bank notes per person.


    A large feast was held during the night, large fire lanterns littered the village center, loud sounds of laughter, and music could be heard. Roasted pig, mounds of grilled vegetables, and bird meat, created a wonderful aroma throughout the village.


    Alanda had dragged an awkward Aztlan into a dance with her, Alanda''s eyes were glistening under the moonlight. Saia glanced at the two, "guess she''s having fun," everyone''s wearing casual clothes except Aztlan who''s wearing armor completely covering him, "what a stiff guy."


    Alan was still unconscious in bed, Garan was laughing loudly while taking in barrels of alcohol, Saia lightly drank some wine in his cup, "a hint of fruit, some mild spices, and little acidity.. Not bad."


    Seles clapped him on his back and started to lean on him, he could hear random gibberish coming from Seles, and could feel something large and soft poking his back, "Oi, you''re already drunk?" With a light sigh, he put her on a bench to rest.


    Saia stared back at the direction of the tunnel, a large rumbling could be heard, later that day they would find the tunnel had collapsed.


    <hr />


    Next morning, Alan and Garan had said their goodbyes, and left. Alanda had recovered her missing friends, she also tried to interrogate Saia lightly but to no avail, eventually she gave up, and gave her goodbyes.


    Aztlan had also tried to get information from Saia, but eventually gave up with a wry smile, "If we meet again i''ll definitely ask you again, next time I hope for a better answer."


    With a light wave Saia stared at Aztlan disappearing in the distance.


    Saia, and Seles walked to the the blocked entrance, to give the tunnel one last glance before they left. She turned towards him, and asked, "do you believe what that woman said?"


    With a light shrug Saia changed the topic, "in the end, what were those giant creatures you encountered?" Saia had remembered her story, and was slightly confused on the existence of those things.


    "No idea, but those creatures looked to have been under a curse, almost like a punishment, why did you ask?"


    With a small smile Saia didn''t answer, as they walked away from the tunnel Saia whispered gently, "grow well," he spoke these words to no one in particular.


    As Saia, and Seles walked slowly towards the sky port, he suddenly remembered something, "hey Seles, I have a question"


    "Hmm?"


    "Seles, do guys wear perfume?"


    Seles gave Saia a weird look, "no, generally males rub an odorless material that absorbs odor."


    Saia thought for a bit, as he stared at the starry skies, with a light smile he said, "is that right..."


    <hr />


    Notes: Dinocampus coccinellae basically a wasp that injects it eggs and chemicals into a ladybug, the lady bug acts like normal, as its insides are being devoured by the larvae from the eggs. Once the larvae goes out of the ladybugs body it makes a cocoon, the ladybug remains a mindless zombie that will protect the cocoon. -that''s roughly how I interpret it.

 The form of your desires.

    The flames were raging wildly, strewn bodies of twisted metal, human flesh, and thick blood lay scattered all over the the office. A man in a long black coat, looked down on a body covered in blood, covered in massive scars that would have instantly killed a normal human, and two bloody stumps that were once his arms. His hair was covered in blood, and his bangs dyed a shadow over his disfigured face.


    "... So it''s you, Saia," the bloodied man coughed slowly. "... To think the last person I''ll ever see, would be you."


    "Hehe, are you disappointed?" Saia said in a clear, and calm voice, as he stared at the man silently, and patiently.


    "... I don''t have much time left... Please, listen to my request."


    "You want your ''enemy'' to help you? You, and your group did try to kill me quite a few times."


    "I have no one else..." The man coughed violently, and spat out a mouthful of blood that ran down his chin, dyeing his already burnt clothes a deep red.


    "Well I have known you for a long time..." Saia chuckled lightly to himself.


    The man''s voice grew stronger, and more powerful, as he squeezed out his last words.


    "My family... Please, save..."


    A small sigh escaped Saia''s lips, as he watched the man turn still, and silent. He reached out his fingers, and gently closed the man''s lifeless, glassy eyes.


    "Goodbye Rain, it''s been fun."


    <hr />


    "Warning! Warning! External structure breached, cancelling hibernation mode." A dull mechanical voice repeated the same line over and over.


    A small crater several meters wide, was located deep inside a small forest. A woman with a long black dress could be seen slowly walking away from the capsule, and into the forest. Her long blue hair was a bit messy, but nothing unusual.


    The woman had a slim figure, and a youthful gentle face, she was gazing at the sky with a lonely expression. Her eye narrowed as she slowly scrutinized her surroundings, and tried to memorize the position of the stars.


    "Well, judging from the data on the capsule, it seems a duplicate of my consciousness was abruptly downloaded into the system before I was pulled out by that distortion, hopefully they can find, and pick me up, but who knows how long that would take..."


    The night breeze was cool, and refreshing, the trees were large, and the leaves shimmered from the moon light. Ariel wondered how long it has been since she saw such a beautiful looking environment.


    She could only gaze in wonder taking in the scenery, the large mountains in the distance further emphasized the grandeur of the forest.


    "Now what to do from here...," with a light whisper she slowly walked around the forest to survey her surroundings.


    From her memories the first priority when surviving is to move away from immediate danger, check for injuries, then check for any external threats, and finally find shelter, fire, water, and food.


    The only real injury she suffered was the fact she couldn''t fix her hair properly without a comb, she was confident she could handle any creature that even dared try to attack her, so the problem lay in physical needs.


    After wandering for about about 10 minutes, she had come across a stream cutting right into the dark forest, the stream was clear, and the sounds of water moving freely was oddly energizing. She scooped a small amount of water, and took a tiny sip.


    "I better hurry, a water source means animals will definitely come by, I don''t want to run into trouble I can easily avoid," Ariel quickly scooped up some water, and drank her fill, the water was fresh, and cool. With a light sigh of satisfaction she looked for an area to spend the night.


    With her excellent vision she spotted a small cave hidden behind a mass of dead leaves. Large spiderwebs covered the cave entrance, it wasn''t very deep, and was completely void of creatures or vegetation, merely a place of dirt and rock. For now she would wait until morning before she traveled out of the forest.


    She stared at where she landed, and sighed. At the moment, only a vague cold feeling gripped her heart, as she wondered where her everyone else was.


    "Saia, Saia, read me a book!" A small little girl with blue hair was hugging a book the size of her body, her deep blue eyes peeking over the book cover.


    "Hoh, you really like stories about angels don''t you," a man in a long white lab coat gently patted her on the head.


    The little girl smiled widely with dimples on her cheeks, "yeah!" She walked over to a nearby chair carrying the giant picture book with her. She could easily read the book herself, but she wanted to read it together with him.


    A little blond haired girl with ringlet curls hugged the man''s leg as he was walking, she puffed her red cheeks, and her blue, and green eyes gave a sharp look, "no, Saia''s going to play dolls with me!"


    The little blue haired girl hugged her book tightly, and glared, "no fair, he already promised me!"


    The man could only watch, and laugh. A little boy with short black hair, that was neatly parted in the middle, and had green eyes, grabbed the blond haired girl, and dragged her away, "that''s enough out of you, you already got your time."


    The little blond girl screamed "waah, noo! Stupid Aeon," they eventually disappeared out of the room.


    After reading her the story the man asked her, "why do you like angels?"


    "Their pretty," the little girl gave a big smile.


    "Is that all?" The man replied.


    "They also help people, and protect them!" The little girl grew more enthusiastic as she continued talking.


    The man could only grin wryly, and shake his head slightly, "do you want to be like that?"


    "Yeah! I love everyone, I want to protect them just like those stories!" The little girl spread out her arms in a meaningful manner.


    The man''s right eye slowly glowed red, and the atmosphere felt heavier, he stared at the little girl calmly. He motioned for the girl to sick back down next to him, after a momentary pause he began to speak.


    "Ariel, I have another story I want to tell you."


    "Yay!" The little girl quickly sat next to him, in an excited manner.


    "There once was a man, who lived a good life, with a caring wife, and a healthy daughter. He was a simple man, with simple desires, that man only wanted to continue living his peaceful, and carefree life. That man thought his world would never change, and be able to silently watch over his family.


    But fate was not kind, hatred ignited, conflict arose, and wild ambitions started to blossom in the hearts of many. The amalgamation of these feelings, and certain events sparked a massive war, that eventually created two opposing factions. Sadly the man belonged to one of those, and was dragged off into the depths of war.


    That man saw many things over the years being involved in that war, depressing things, dark things, and scary things. The man cried, grew depressed, and was always frightened. However despite all of those things, he managed to help play a significant part in ending that war, and he manged to survive many dangers, all because of his thoughts of returning to his family. During the wars, he actually received a major injury, it was actually a chance for him to return home, but he rejected it."


    "Why?"


    "Because those he wanted to protect grew. So he fought on, and on."


    The little girl tugged on his pant leg, and asked in a hushed tone.


    "Did he manage to return to his family?"


    "No. His contributions were significant, and so was his reputation, he was called a hero, and brought to fight more wars. Every place he visited he saw tragedy, he met more, and more people that he cared about. His love for his family, and the people he met drove him to greater heights. However the one thing he desired he was never allowed to do."


    "What was that?"


    "He was not allowed to visit his family."


    The little girl pouted, "why? That''s so unfair!"


    "Because that hero grew too important, and too powerful. They used that family to force the hero to continue fighting. Even with all his power, in the end he was still a very simple man. So all he could do was continue fighting. He sincerely believed that as long as he kept fighting, then it will eventually end, and he could return. When the war came to a temporary end, something different came up.


    One day the hero was given a task to take back, a precious artifact his country needed, their he met another person standing in his way.


    "A villain?" the girl asked in excitement.


    An ironic smile spread out on Saia''s lips, "a villain? Hmm, in a certain view point you could say that."


    The little girl looked confused on the way he answered it. But Saia was already continuing with the story.


    "The hero, and villain fought over this precious item, eventually due to some circumstances, the villain escaped with the item. During this process the hero chased, and fought the villain several times. Many times the fights never came to a conclusion. On one strange twist of fate, they actually talked, and drank together."


    The little girl stared at Saia with an exasperated expressions, "why?"


    "They did not always meet each other in conflict, once they accidentally met at a bar, and to not cause problems for the town decided on a cease fire. There they talked peacefully, but still remained enemies. It was an unusual relationships to be honest, and they often times met each other under weird circumstances.


    Anyways, eventually the object the hero was after was decided to be not worth the trouble, and the hero was ordered for another mission, and that he would be allowed to be with his family after that mission was over. In that final mission, in a distant land, he found something he shouldn''t have seen. Unfortunately because of that, he was betrayed by the people he sought to protect, the people he trusted, the people he cared for, and the People he fought with. "


    "Whaat! Nooo."


    "Let me finish. In the place where the hero was betrayed, the villain eventually visited, it was ironic that of all the possible people, the last person he would meet was the villain. The hero begged the villain to help his family in his last moments."


    The little girl with a teary face, stared at Saia sadly.


    "Did.. The villain... Help?"


    "Many months later, despite the many dangers, the villain managed to save the heroes family, and moved them somewhere safe."


    As the little girl wiped away tears she stared at Saia in confusion.


    "But why would the villain help the hero despite all the dangers, were they friends?"


    Saia lightly stroked his right eye in contemplation.


    "Hmm it was indeed dangerous for him... and it was true objectively he had nothing to gain, but they could not be called friends."


    "Then why?"


    "Hmm, I guess he found it interesting?"


    "What!"


    "Ahaha let''s ignore that for now, do you know why I told you that story?"


    "No..."


    "You remind me of someone in that story."


    "Huh?"


    Saia ignored her confusion, and his face grew slightly more serious, and darker.


    "Ariel."


    "Yes?"


    "Do you want to be a hero, a villain, or something else?"


    She scratched her head, and looked confused, in the end she couldn''t answer.


    "The world is filled with many desires, many times these desires will conflict with others. Money, power, love, dark, twisted, and scary desires. If you help one group of people obtain their desires you may seem like a hero, but to the other group of people who could not fulfill those desires, because you helped those others, you become a villain in their eyes.


    A hero, and villain are merely people who pursue their own desires, if you help someone, it hurts someone else, and vice versa. Every action may seem minor, but will become something much larger."


    A frown appeared on Ariel''s face. "That''s so confusing!"


    "It is, isn''t it? Just know one thing, your life is your own, you power is your own, and your actions are your own."


    A deep mechanical glow on his right eye stared deeply into Ariel.


    "Ariel, your desires could also be quite dangerous for you. Do you have what it takes to carry that burden?"


    The little girl look frightened but she quickly stared at the man defiantly. The man just chuckled, "your sister probably feels lonely, why don''t you see to her?"


    Later on she left the room in a hurry.


    The man slowly walked and followed, the little blue haired girl was hugging the little blond hair girl in the other room.


    "Hey I can''t breathe, stop it!" Eventually the two little girls grew exhausted, and ended up sleeping together, the blue haired girl


    kept hugging the other girl to the very end, with her eyes closed, and a large smile on her face.


    The man watched this scene, and gave a light smile.


    "All I can do is give you the potential... O, lion of god..."


    Saia sighed as he turned back.


    "Just don''t have any regrets."


    <hr />


    Ariel had just woken up, her eyes slowly adjusting to the shallow cave, and gave a bitter smile, "a dream huh...," the warmth from that hug in her dreams still lingered on her body.


    Surprisingly enough she noticed a large leaf in the center of the cave, on the leaf were various fruits.


    Apparently someone had entered the cave while she was asleep, if her body had sensed hostile intent she would have awoken immediately.


    In the distance farther away, she saw a small head peeking inside from the cave entrance. The head resembled that of a little girl of about 6 years old, the hair was short, and dark, but what was really noticeable was the lower half of her body, which resembled that of a spiders.


    Ariel could only stare at the little spider girl in interest, back in the old world, she had run into orcs, trolls and mermen that drifted past the rifts, and wandered into her world. Seeing a half spider, half human creature really was on a whole other level.


    It reminded her of the time Saia had tracked down a mysterious bird at the southern continent of ice and snow. From Saia''s description, the bird was over 10 meters long, and looked to have a body made of crystals, and ice. Saia had searched for it, but in the end failed at ever seeing it again. The reason Advantis was parked in the southern continent was to continue searching for that legendary creature. Ariel was sure the reason some of her family had stayed behind was to find that bird, or lingering


    attachments.


    Ariel could understand why Saia was so driven for the bird, she also had an intense curiosity for this girl. From what she read of previous fantasy books, creatures like this would be called Arachne.


    On closer inspection the little girls black hair hid away 4 smaller red eyes on her forehead, while the the main 2 looked to have belonged to a humans. The lower legs, and body looked like black armour, the spider legs on the girl were fidgety, and seemed constantly to be brushing on the floor.


    Eventually after seeing how fidgety the arachne girl was, Ariel came to the conclusion she was nervous. With a light smile she waved at the arachne, the arachne ran behind the cave entrance, and popped out her head to peep again.


    The same routine continued for many days, where the girl would offer food, and Ariel would just smile at her. Over the few days, the girl would inch closer, and closer, eventually the arachne girl warmed up to Ariel, and was now lying her head on Ariel''s lap.


    Ariel still did not understand the little girl''s language so in the end they could only gesture at each other.


    From a casual observation it seemed the little girl was alone, every time Ariel had left to survey the forest, the little girl would immediately walk by her side, as if afraid of being abandoned. Apparently the fruits she gathered was the child''s way of bribing Ariel to stay with her.


    Every time the arachne found the cave empty, she would panic, and whine, and when Ariel showed up the arachne would quickly reveal a smile, completely wiping away the sad expression from before.


    <hr />


    After a few days of scouting, Ariel had already located a small village near the clearing. The houses were made of some odd material that looked like black marble shaped into a cone, the inhabitants were surprisingly varied, some were beautiful humanoids with horns, and wings, others looked to have been a mix of snakes, lizards, and goats.


    Rain was slowly falling from the sky, and the clouds were already darkening. The little girl was using her hands to grab some large leaves, and try to cover Ariel''s head, but due to her short stature the little girl was jumping constantly to try, and shield her.


    Looking at the sky Ariel wondered whether she should find shelter or try to communicate with the villagers, as she was considering what to do, a loud horn blew in the distance.


    Despite the heavy rain, and dark clouds the sky was illuminated. Giant boulders of flame poured from the sky dispersing the dark clouds, the meteor shower smashed into the villagers, and crushed the houses.


    In the distance a swarm of shadows covered the landscape, thousands of armored men, that were rapidly multiplying slowly poured into view, and the skies were teeming with odd giant ships. Ariel could only stare in shock at the at the unexpected development.


    She could easily guess what was happening, the problem is how she would react to it. Even though she was a member of the security team, she had rarely fought as actively as the other members of the same team. At most she would only fight Orcs, some robots, and some species that wandered through the rift. She had never in her life killed another human being.


    Rather than say she couldn''t, it was more accurate to say she was scared to. By taking a human life she risked creating tragedy for the victims family, and friends. She could only freeze in hesitation, she did not know the circumstances for this invasion, and did not know if interfering was even the right thing to do.


    Her feet were frozen stiff, and she could only shiver in panic as the village was consumed by fire, and the shadows of armed men. The little spider girl could only hug Ariel''s leg in panic at the spectacle.


    "Moments of hesitation, can lead to an eternity of regrets," a handsome, and stern face flashed in her mind, "Allegro".


    A man with a glowing red eye had lectured her before, "Ariel, your desires could also be quite dangerous for you. Do you have what it takes to carry that burden?"


    "Saia..."


    An indescribable loneliness wrapped around her body, she really wanted to see them again. She loved her family, and wanted the warmth she felt around them. She did not know these people but knew what would happen to them. Ariel did not want to see such a tragedy, and the fastest way to prevent it was to stop those armed men.


    A indescribable chill spread in her body, as she shivered lightly, she was about to take the life of another person. It was hard to see an orc, or predatory mermen as fellow beings, but the terrified villagers, and incoming humans were painting a picture she recognized.


    In situations like this, there could only be one answer. Through her own selfish desires she would protect these people, and hurt others. She did not base her actions on justice or righteous anger, she based it on her own selfish wishes.


    There was no point in labelling her goals, and actions as something grandiose, she would never permit it, because what she was about to do was only going to create more tragedy for someone else.


    In the distance the demi-humans were running for their lives, the men were killed on sight and the beautiful demi-human women were forced to the ground, being dragged off into the distance.


    Ariel watched calmly, memorizing the scene, and analyzing the location of all the conflicts.


    A small ring inside her head sounded with a mechanical voice, "safety mode off. Executing program: Artificial angel 03."


    Silver outlines quickly drifted to her back, the outlines shimmered, and formed 4 silver transparent wings, wind slowly gathered into her wings, Ariel''s hair glowed a snowy white, and the little spider girl''s eyes stared in shock. Ariel smiled and patted the girl on the head, she slowly started to fly up, the little girl desperately tried to cling unto her leg but fell to the ground.


    The spider girl shot out a thin spray of silk to latch unto Ariel''s legs, but was warded off by a layer of wind surrounding Ariel. The arachne could only struggle on the muddy ground trying to catch up to Ariel, as she flew into the Village.


    <hr />


    A blur of silver light charged into the inferno, Ariel''s wings absorbed the rain, and shot jets of water at five armored men on horses, knocking them out, and slamming them into the ground. A nearby lizardman could only stare at Ariel in shock at being saved so suddenly. Ariel pointed at a small spider girl running, and stumbling along the muddy soil. The lizardman gave a nod of understanding, and ran her way.


    Stolen story; please report.


    Ariel''s hair was now flashing between white, and blue, as her wings shot forth bullets of water, and blades of air, slamming armored men into the walls, and sending some flying into the air. The wind and water that entered her wings were filtered, restructured, and sent out in varying degrees of force, composition, and shapes.


    She burst into a room to see three men clawing away at a woman''s clothes, she sent bullets of air slamming into 2 people knocking them unconscious. The last man which was on top of the woman drew his sword, but a stream of acidic water burned his eyes, causing him to stumble. Ariel used the wind to create a suction vacuum that dragged the man towards her, where she rammed a condensed air cannonball into him.


    The horned woman in tears bowed in thanks, and desperately escaped.


    A dark blur darted in, and out across the small village in fury. Men were thrown out, some were blasted into the distance, while other collapsed all over the place.


    Eventually all the villagers were running into the distance. Ariel remembered some women were captured, and dragged on horseback, their loud shrieks, and wails were drowned out by the heavy rain, and powerful winds. Ariel had already memorized them from the data stored into her brain, so she already had a good idea who was taken.


    The transparent wings gathered a large quantity of wind, and created a loud sonic boom, propelling Ariel forward at high speed. A stream of arrows covered the sky, and slammed into her. The wall of wind deflected the barrage, her wings absorbed the wood, and metal turning the wood into spikes, and metal into bullets, flinging them back at the dark swarm in the distance.


    This action caused many men to stumble, and fall on the ground, only to be overrun by the incoming horde. A slightly sad expression could be see in her eyes, as she bit her lips, and trembled slightly.


    Her wings were now a meter in length to deal with the increased workload of converting the elements, her mind was focused on calculating the structure, temperature, atomic structure, and force of the elements. The horseman that had abducted the villagers were already within her reach. Ariel created a gigantic Vortex of air that sucked the men, and woman to her, she stopped the vortex, and sent air bullets slamming into the men, while cushioning the women with a light wind. The women were dizzy, and tired, and one of them lost control of her legs.


    The women eventually regained their composure, and started fleeing. The rain was getting more intense, and the soil was getting harder, and harder to walk on, and the ground turned muddy.


    In the distance more ships started to fill the skies, and the large mass of shadows grew darker, and more pronounced as they neared.


    To her right a small detachment of mounted soldiers had started moving past the forest, and would reach the fleeing people.


    The winds howled, and screamed as powerful gusts of wind gathered into a large space in front of her. By converting the moisture of the winds, from high to low and creating a large instability, she slowly formed something. Ariel used her brain to calculate the minor details, eventually forming a massive tornado that tore through the night sky in front of her. She released the tornado surging towards the dark mass of men. The soldiers who couldn''t get out of the way were sucked up by the massive winds, torn up by the wind pressure, and flung into the distance. The air ship''s magical barriers absorbed the force for a few seconds before collapsing entirely, and being turned into scrap wood.


    By changing the moisture of the water, and moving it against the cold ground, she created a large mist that slowly enveloped her surroundings. By blinding the enemies sight, she wouldn''t worry about accurate attacks against her. Arrows, and canon fire swarmed all around her narrowly missing it''s target. She took down the wind barrier to increase her flight speed, and moved to intercept the detached horseman in the distance.


    She flew 20 meters ahead of them, and landed on the muddy ground. The transparent wings on her back started to dig into the muddy soil, her hair now flashed blue, white, and brown. The thick sludge of mud grew more, and more soft, and started to slowly spread in front of her.


    The horseman who saw her instantly charged, a man in silver armor with a decorated helmet, grinned as his sword was within several meters length of her head. But his vision suddenly plummeted downward staring at her feet, the muddy soil was slowly swallowing the horse, and the knight, the momentum from the charge caused all the mounted soldier to crash into each other, and slowly sink into the muddy abyss.


    Ariel was panting heavily now, she had used up far too much energy, and she was not wearing a mech suit to help with the intense calculations. Above her a rain of arrows, and cannon fire crashed into her location, she immediately put up a wall of wind, but it could not absorb all the impact, eventually her body was smashed into the muddy ground, and crushed by the explosions.


    Her dress was torn all over, red splatters of blood poured from her body, and brown patches of mud covered her once beautiful dress and clean face. The ships in the sky were now getting closer, the dark shadows looming overhead, covered the night sky.


    "This is bad, I can''t stop them anymore," with an exhausted groan Ariel dashed into the Forest.


    <hr />


    Jacques was now held captive in a dark room, it had been several days since he was captured by that silver haired witch. He could see a handsome man in front of him, the man felt noble, and commanding. In Jacques impression he seemed to be a person in power, therefore someone he could negotiate with.


    "I think it''s best you let me go, do you know who my backers are?" Jacques grinned in an overbearing manner.


    Allegro merely looked at the man without showing a hint of emotion.


    Sweat poured over his hairy, and worn out face. Jacques decided to push further, "I have powerful connections with the local authority in port city Aprego! Do you see this tattoo on my chest? Do you understand what organization I belong to!"


    Allegro merely stared at the man''s brown pupils, which were starting to contract. The unwavering stare set the man called Jacques into a nervous frenzy.


    Jacques screamed in anxiety, "are you willing to make enemies of the Avarian syndicate, part of the Dark claw alliance? We who


    control half of the underground dark guilds, and black markets of Galia!"


    A woman was watching this scene in the shadows, her short wavy red hair was now entangled with her own fingers. Her name was Eliza, she had been staring in disgust as the man constantly shouting about the tattoo in his bosom. The flab of meat wobbling up, and down truly disgusted her. The fact the man constantly wanted them to stare at his tattoo or bosom could not help but give the impression the disorderly man was some sort of pervert.


    While the man was an unruly mess, he did give plenty of information. The language was slowly adopted, the writing was analyzed, and the Island Advantis had been occupying was discovered as uncontested land.


    The current Country where Saia had tried to visit was called Galia, it''s system of government was similar to a representative monarchy, that shared power with the magic association. The King was old, greying, and sick due to certain events. The next heir to the throne has not been chosen yet, but the nobles of the country have already formed factions backing 2 imperial princes. The culture followed a patriarchy system, so the youngest princess was not eligible for the throne.


    The economy of the country was considered stable but declining, however the spread of wealth was not even, and the distance between the social classes was only spreading. Slavery was legal, and drugs were slowly circulating among the poor. The fringes of the country have declining security, and skirmishes have been happening throughout Galia''s western borders.


    The term decadence aptly described the country, and it''s political climate.


    Guilds sent out job contracts, and local members can sell their talents, if Saia were to leave messages, or give information about his location, and physical state, joining the public guild member list would be an ideal signal.


    Dark guilds performed illegal or underground activities that dealt with assassinations, illegal armies, drugs trades, arms trades, smuggling, and turf wars between rival dark guilds. They were in short a mixture of mafias, illegal armies, and gangs in modern terms.


    The regional power in the east seems to be in conflict between the Holy Anglin Empire, and the demon empire that have dated back to centuries of conflict. The Gressian continent is basically a mixture of mostly human alliances and unions, with political intrigue nestled in the back ground.


    Finally, Magic exists in this world.


    Jacques continued to brag about his dark guild, then talked about how the local governor was supporting them, then continually thrust his flabby chest, and tattoo at Allegro.


    Allegro gave a meaningful look to Eliza, "send him back please."


    <hr />


    A well of relief washed away as Jacques approached the port city of Aprego, the attractive woman with a blue star tattoo under her eye had escorted him back to the port city. There was no doubt that the powers backing him had scared them off. Jacques couldn''t help but give a big greasy smile, once he returned to headquarters he would expose the location of the enemy city, and he would make that silver haired whore, and this red haired bitch wish they were never born.


    He couldn''t help but imagine the torture he would inflict on them for the humiliations he received, as Jacques stepped unto the docks he felt a sharp pain on both of his hands, when he looked back he saw nothing, and the woman had disappeared. The abrupt pain itself strangely disappeared the moment it was felt.


    As he slowly walked to a public market he noticed a small knife in his pockets. "Huh, how did that get there?" For some reason his hands grabbed the knife, and slowly approached his neck.


    Jacques'' eyes were wide with terror, his hands won''t respond to him! "That woman, what did she do!"


    In the middle of the market square a man screamed for help, as he quickly slashed his own throat, screams of shock, and terror surrounded the market place, a lone woman with red hair gave a light smile as she left the scene.


    <hr />


    "Hey Saia, ever considered going to magic school, asking me all these questions is fine and all, but I''m not a qualified magic teacher you know?" Seles was sitting on a sofa staring out a window, as the large sky transport slowly flew to it''s destination. Swarms of children were running around, and parents were busy putting the kids back into their seats.


    "And how much would that cost exactly?" Saia was now reading a book, constantly flipping through the pages.


    Seles stared fixedly at Saia, "20,000 silver bank notes."


    Saia completely ignored the amount and moved on to the next topic, "so judging from the plant woman we encountered at sky island, what exactly is a world core?"


    The dark elf stared at the passing clouds without answering the question, after a few minutes of silence she mumbled, "I''m not sure either, although the thing about the world gates are correct, everything from the world core to the gods is a mystery to me, you should visit the Imperial Library."


    "And how much would that cost?" Saia started to grumble again.


    "The basic books are free, but information about worldly things that the general public won''t know about would need a library permit, granted by the government to access."


    "And how much would that cost?" Saia was slowly growing slightly depressed at the fact he was broke.


    Seles stared lazily at a passing cloud, "10,000 gold bn, which is roughly 100,000 silver bn."


    "Hey Seles, how did you get captured by the pirates anyway, looking at your abilities you could have fought your way to freedom, before getting captured."


    "I was on the run, I was already injured by the time I ran into those pirates."


    Saia''s ears perked up, "who were you running from."


    "Sorry, that would be 30,000 silver bn."


    "Hey Seles, want to rob a bank?"


    She completely ignored Saia, and starred lazily at a poster, on the poster was a bounty of 12,000 silver bn for the capture of a fugitive necromancer.


    <hr />


    A shadow was running in the forest, leaving deep footprints in the muddy soil. The rain was hammering down on the slim figure, in the trees shadows darted left, and right gaining on the lone shadow.


    hah* hah* "I should have expected this, after causing so much damage the specialists are now marking me." Ariel''s hair was disheveled, and her breathing was growing more hoarse. She had been running for more than an hour, but the more she ran the more pursuers showed up.


    If she continued she would eventually run out of energy, and stamina. She had already killed many of them, but now a lot more were on to her. The pursuers looked skilled, and their movements were sharp and fast.


    Ariel had the least amount of battle experience compared to the other family members in combat duty, while her physical abilities were fast for a human she was still far behind her peers. She could not outrun the shadows forever, she had to finish them all here, and now, before her stamina runs out.


    Ariel dug her wings into the soil, the mud slowly enveloped the trees, and her surroundings; eventually creating a wide clearing, as everything sunk into the mud. Dark figures started to appear one after another surrounding her.


    Ariel gathered the wind into her wings, and let loose blades of condensed air flying 360 degrees, several men in black were sliced into ribbons letting loose a spray of blood into the chilly night air.


    Numerous blades pierced through the shadows aiming at Ariel''s heart, neck, back, legs, and arms. Ariel could not afford to create wind barriers anymore, she needed to conserve her energy in order to make decisive blows, therefore she had to minimize injuries, while seeking opportunities to kill her pursuers.


    She manged to roll on the mud to dodge the flying daggers, but they had manged to pierce her left leg, and right arm. Fresh blood was now dyeing the soil. Her wings had continuously absorbed the wind without sending out a counter attack.


    Ariel ran behind a tree, but a silver flash flew across the shadows, almost reaching her neck. She grabbed the dagger in mid air, causing the blood to drip from her palms. All of a sudden 4 men in black dropped down with loud groans, while the rest stared in surprise.


    She had stolen oxygen from the air suffocating some of them to death, usually once the area has less than 10% oxygen, even taking in a single breath will do harm, various symptoms will follow including death. Naturally since the area was an open space, more oxygen will fill in immediately, but transparent feathers were floating along the area forming a small enclosed space, preventing that from happening.


    Small glowing red circles started to illuminate around her, tendrils of flame floated out from the magic circles to devour her. Ariel stomped on the muddy ground, sending her flying into the air. The wind was cold, the rain was still pouring, and the weather was freezing, all Ariel needed to do was to increase the cold.


    Using her wings she adjusted the temperature of the atmosphere, and started to cool her surroundings. Making the temperature in the forest drop dangerously low. The pursuers likely did not have insulation, as Ariel could sense the body temperature of her targets.


    Normally having her opponents constantly exposed for over an hour of rapid temperature loss was impossible, but since she allowed them to follow and corner her, they were keen on the chase thinking she would collapse soon. Eventually having there body temperature drop lower in the high wind chills, freezing rain, and their damp clothes..


    As she started to rapidly chill the environment, a large chain wrapped around her leg, and forced her slamming into the ground. Ariel pulled the chain with all her strength causing the man flying towards her. She gathered an orb of transparent feathers floating around her palm and slammed those feathers into the mans face, freezing his head instantly.


    She had been gathering nitrogen into her wings for a while now, through a process of constant refinement she had made the nitrogen into a liquid state turning each feather into a capsule, and slightly altering the construct of the chemicals for a more deadly form of liquid nitrogen.


    A sword pierced through the back of a tree stabbing Ariel in the stomach. She threw the orb of liquid nitrogen at the assailant, the contents spilled forth, freezing parts of the mans face, the man''s loud screams echoed into the night sky.


    Ariel dragged more air into her wings and created more mist by pushing it against the cool ground, eventually allowing her escape. The body temperature of her enemies were dropping dangerously low, they would either suffer hypothermia or retreat by now.


    After running for several minutes Ariel leaned against a tree, blood was seeping out from her stomach, arms, and legs. As she was about to stand up again she noticed something odd, "huh that''s funny, I feel dizzy?" She couldn''t get up, her eyes were growing heavy, and her limbs were starting to grow stiff.


    As she tried to lift herself up she fell down again, lying against a nearby tree. Finally Ariel''s mind came to a slow realization, the damage in her body was more than her nanites could repair, the amount of energy she had spent could no longer support her injured body. The rain was still hammering down on her, and the wind was freezing, her once elegant black dress was now in tatters, frozen blood, and dirt now made up her dress.


    Ariel''s eyes were slowly dimming, she could only see black, and red. Her cold shivering body and frozen limbs all felt numb now. Her heart ached at the fact she could no longer stand up, and meet those she loved.


    In the distance she could hear rumbling noises, but she no longer cared, she could only show a bitter smile as she stared idly at nothing. Her mind dazedly recalled the people she killed, and a hollow sadness ate away at her.


    Did I kill someone''s lover? Son? Dad? Or Brother?


    As her body slowly calmed down, and a heavy drowsiness started to set in, she made one last selfish wish, she hoped she would have a nice dream.


    A lone woman was now lying against a large tree, the winds drowned out the surrounding noise, and rain slowly cleansed the woman''s face of dirt and blood. The deathly pale face was young, and beautiful, her eyes were closed and a lonely smile was frozen on her face.


    In that dream she saw a cute little spider girl clinging to her, a tall man with red hair scolding her, a blond haired woman knocking on her head, a cute little girl with curly blonde hair laughing, and playing with her.


    She saw many places, scenes, and many people from her family, She saw a tall man in a white lab coat, always within arms reach, but every time she stretched out her hands he would be a few inches away, he was a man who was a mass of contradictions.


    "I miss it so much."


    The dream would last days, months, and years, she hoped the dreams would continue for eternity.


    <hr />


    Barren, and lonely


    a distant dream gives you warmth,


    but you turn away.


    The world is cold, and dark,


    but the sun will always rise.


    Seles looked a the book Saia was writing on, "you''re not very good"


    "For some reason I just had the urge to write one," Saia murmured, as he stared at the compass silently for a very long time.


    ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


    Note:Meh I did warn you I''m going to insert BS science. Well the issue would be to try and separate it from magic, so they don''t become intertwined.


    Also bank notes have a different meaning in this world. I just don''t want to say cash, gold, or silver or rupies.


    So bn instead of $.