by Max Jager
"No, Kaden. I will ensure that you don't." Zane stated. "I do know of the location of the revival alter. And I do know you can't open portals inside of it from the outside. It's how I learned to make this trap." He simply replied. "We can see your private messages, remember? We can also see your coordinates when you send them. We already have a blockade ready to prevent anyone from entering the Ninth Ring as soon as this battle ends."
"You seriously think you can stop me from getting in?" Kaden questioned.
"I already stopped you, all of you, and you are at your maximum strength right now. You have all four alphas alive, and your armies are intact. I'm not even using my full power on you, I have a secret weapon I have yet to unleash. I'm fighting you and the elves at the same time and the vast majority of my arsenal still lies in wait. It's over, this battle has been lost and once I give the signal the elves will fall too. So what will prevent me from stopping you after I take one Alpha out, after I've broken your ranks, and after your army has become demoralized from this loss? You seem like good friends, I'd rather not kill any of you and ruin that, so just surrender peacefully."
"You underestimate us, Zane." Estellese growled at him.
"No, I don't. You Alphas aren't as powerful as you think. You're not that much stronger than the rest of us. Not anymore." Zane stated. "I've noticed, there's a limit to how much power us humans can get. You all reached that limit a while ago. Us betas have been catching up to you, and now there isn't much of a difference anymore. One Alpha is about as tough as two betas. You're not gods, you can be struck down."
"It's not just sheer power that sets us apart Zane." Kaden stated. "It's mostly the knowledge we've gained here, the friends we've made, and the bonds we have between each other. I know exactly how Estellese will act, and vice versa. And because of this we can easily play off each other silently."
Suddenly, Estellese switched elements and the entire floor of the prison cell began to rapidly crack. Then with a flick of her wrist Estellese used her control of both earth and metal to shatter the floor they were standing on and drop everyone down to the floor below them. The Spartans, the elves, the Royals, and the prisoners all dropped through the shattered remains of the floor..
"Pex!" Estellese called out, and Pex knew exactly what she needed them to do.
"Got it!" Pex answered and she took a deep breath, then quickly created a powerful upward gust of wind under all of the prisoners, Spartans, and elves. She slowed everyone's falls and helped everyone except the Royals gently land on the floor below.
Kaden was already waiting for them on the floor below. "You also failed to realize that we had a fourth, private channel that wasn't in use." Kaden mocked. "Thanks for taking the reins Mendelen."
Arachnia's spiders scattered all over the floor as they fell and they began quickly rushing to try and reform her body. Sasumi hit the ground hard and landed on his back. The massive metal man seemed to be unable to stand up on his own. But it didn't matter much, he took control of his metal armor to make himself levitate, then tilted himself upright and put himself back on the ground. All of the bots were easily able to get back up.
Seeing Arachnia's spiders scattered across the ground Kaden quickly lunged into the middle of the room and slammed a fist into the ground, sending powerful black flames scattering across the ground in all directions. Most of the spiders were immediately burnt in the flames, and Arachnia, once again, didn't have enough living spiders left to reform her body.
Estellese quickly put up a large, dome-like barrier over everyone to keep them safe from the gunfire while they figured out a new plan. "Alright, we need to take out the gunner-bots as quickly as we can. We also need to hold Sasumi back while we do it."
Emmei left the strategy talk to look for Cora. When he saw her he walked over to her. When she noticed him Cora immediately rushed over to him and the two of them hugged each other tightly. "I thought I had lost you." Emmei took a deep breath. "I am so glad you're alright."
"I wasn't worried, I know you and Alicia would come for me." Cora smiled. The exchanged a brief kiss before the two held hands and returned to Estellese and the group.
Eladienne also immediately spotted her sister, and the two of them rushed at each other. "Lynn! Are you alright? Did they hurt you?" Lynn stopped beside Eladienne, but Eladienne pulled her into a tight hug regardless. Lifting the smaller girl off the ground.
Lynn was shorter then her sister, standing at 4'10." She looked sickly underweight and it would appear like she had been that way even before being captured. The prison rags all of the elves were wearing pretty clearly showed that she was very malnourished, thin and frail. She had blue eyes and long black hair, tied back a loose braid, that stopped just below her waist.
"I'm alright sis, you can put me down." Lynn softly replied, then she resumed speaking once Eladienne put her down and let go. "Who are all these people?"
"Did they hurt you?" Eladienne repeated.
"I'm okay." Lynn uneasily replied.
"But did they hurt you?" Eladienne stared her straight in the eyes.
"Yeah. They ran some experiments or something on all of us. But I'll be okay." Lynn assured her.
Eladienne took in a deep breath and slowly let it out as she activated her signet and regained her red aura again. She then grabbed the metal collar they had put around Lynn's neck with both hands and ripped it in half. The force from the metal snapping and tearing apart over her neck caused Lynn to gasp in pain and it tore up her neck, however with the collar gone she was able to use magic again and, immediately healed her wounds. "I'm sorry!" Eladienne immediately shouted when she saw Lynn get hurt. "I wasn't thinking!"
"No, no! That was a good idea. I can help you fight now. Can you get Cora's off? She's in here too." Lynn asked. As soon as she was healed and free she made a quick gesture with her hands and her prison rags transformed into a tight fitting, pure black shirt and pants, which would have made it much harder to see her in the dark room if her skin wasn't so pale.
"Once the signet recharges, yeah." Eladienne replied, then turned to see that Estellese was herding all of the elven civilians into a small stone room she made inside of the barrier. Cora and Emmei were nearing the group, and when Cora spotted Estellese in the crowd she ran at her, dragging Emmei along behind her.
"Estell!" Cora called out, and she immediately gave the pink haired human a big hug upon seeing her. "You came too? And Pex is also here."
"Of course!" Pex piped up. She only had the time to partially heal Fate's wounds, but Fate was no longer critically wounded. She flew up to Cora's shoulder. "We're all friends after all. Wasn't gonna not come save you, and I wasn't gonna let Estell do it all by herself either. So I worked up the courage to leave my library and come help." She proudly puffed out her chest. "I just wish I could get in on the hug." She jokingly added.
"We'll have a group hug next time we're all in Evean." Estellese laughed lightly. "I'm glad you're alright Cora. And you would've come to help me, so of course I will be here for you." She replied simply. "We're friends, that's how it works."
Cora nodded. "You bet hon." She replied. "Get this collar off me, I want to help." She glanced back at the Royals, who had mostly gotten onto their feet now.
The four swordsman bots, the two axeman bots, and Sasumi were starting to march towards the barrier while the gunner bots continued shooting at the barrier non-stop to keep everyone inside suppressed. If anyone stepped out they would immediately be shot, and if the barrier fell everyone would be right in the line of fire. However upon seeing the incoming bots the small elven girl, Lynn, put a second barrier up to make Estellese's barrier even stronger. Trying to keep them out just a little longer while all the civilians got into safety.
"Looks like you got your hands full." Cora added.
"Cora, you can't fight right now and you know it." Emmei stated.
"Why not? She's a pretty tough fighter." Estellese questioned.
"She didn't tell you?" Emmei questioned. "Y
ou two talk about everything."
"She's been busy." Cora looked up at Emmei as he spoke. "I haven't had a chance the last couple weeks."
Emmei sighed quietly, and sheepishly diverted his attention away from the women. "She's pregnant."
"Congrats!" Pex nearly shouted at them. "I totally saw that coming."
"Ooh! That's great Cora!" Estellese grinned a little. "Don't know why I didn't see that one coming." She said as she smirked at the two of them. "But you shouldn't be fighting if that's the case."
"Estell." Cora raised an eyebrow. "You know me better then that."
"I know, I know. I was just saying it because I have to." Estellese replied and used her control of metal magic to break the collar off Cora. "You're gonna fight no matter what."
"There's no way in hell I'm letting my husband and my best friends fight while I stand by and watch." Cora stated.
Kaden, Fate, Eladienne, and Lynn all moved close to the edge of the barriers. Preparing to spring into action as soon as the barriers fell.
Once all the elves were safely in the little stone room Estellese turned to the rest of her forces. "Alright. Kaden take on the axeman on the left, Pex protect Cora, Emmei keep fighting the one you had been attacking." Although she hesitated a little when she came down to the two elven sisters, she didn't know them well enough to lead them and they looked to her for guidance.
"Estell." Cora stepped in. "Let me lead the elves. Lynn's my student and I know her sister pretty well, I know what the two are capable of."
"They are all yours." Estellese replied.
"Lynn and Eladienne!" Cora called out to them. "Get into the back lines and take down the ones with guns. Emmei hold off one of the axeman alongside Kaden. I will give you both support from back here, and I'll ensure that nothing goes near the civilians.
"Katy and Kathryn, you two do your best against the swordsman bots. Make sure they don't get too close to you." Estellese ordered. "Fate you're coming with me, I'm taking on Sasumi and need you to back me up as best as you can. You're still hurt though, so do not fight him just back me up."
Cora created a few vines to pull herself on top of the little stone hut Estellese had built in the middle of the room, then she created a thick but short wall of wooden vines as an extra layer of protection in front of the hut. She then grew another thick layer of wooden vines that entangled themselves around her, giving herself some basic armor. She created a barrier of her own infront of herself as an extra layer of defense as she watched over the three other elves on the battlefield.
Following Cora's orders, Lynn took her sister's hand and pulled both of them into Lynn's shadow. Making them disappear from sight, leaving nothing but Lynn's shadow behind. The area behind all the bots darkened and then Lynn's shadow sped across the ground and into the darkness behind the bots. They sprang out of the shadow once they were behind the gunner-bots and Eladienne immediately slammed her fist into the leg of the first bot she could reach. Her signet was not yet ready but she still hit it hard enough to dent the metal and knock it over. However Sasumi turned around and used his control over metal magic to undent the leg and stand it back up. Lynn and Eladienne quickly hid within Lynn's shadow again to avoid the gunfire that followed.
Katy and Kathryn spread out, each of them taking on two of the incoming bots. They made sure they were always facing each other, using their linked senses to ensure they both could see the entire room at all times. They both began to take shots at the swordsman bots they were facing, putting a lot of holes in the androids, but they were not living creatures so the damage didn't really do anything.
'Just keep hitting them, eventually we'll break something important on them.' Katy thought.
'Yeah, I'm thinking of a way to speed things up though.' Kathryn thought. She started thinking through a plan to knock them down to make them an easier target. But to do so she'd need to move in closer.
'That's far too dangerous! We should just keep shooting them from a distance.' Katy thought.
'We shouldn't waste so much ammo, we only have so much and who knows what we will need to do after this.' Kathryn countered. 'Plus, if they realize they can't reach us they will eventually start ignoring us and go after our allies.'
'Alright… Just please be careful.' Katy thought as she moved in a little closer to back Kathryn up.
Kathryn moved in on the bots, putting herself dangerously in the middle of all four of them. Since she was so far out of position and close to all four of them, the four swordsman bots turned on her. The first one rushed in and stabbed at her from the front but she effortlessly sidestepped the blade. Then when the second swung at her from behind she used Katy's vision to spot the attack incoming and ducked under the blade. Then she, from her crouching position, jumped forwards and tackled the bot in front of her to the ground. She quickly rolled off the bot to evade another attack, and while the bot was knocked down Katy shot it as many times as she could with her rifle. She hit with every shot, and eventually damaged an important component of the robot and it stopped moving. As the third moved in to slash at Kathryn she attempted to block the blade with her rifle, but the bot struck her much harder then she had expected it to. It knocked her to the ground.
'Are you okay?!' Katy worriedly thought.
Seeing Kathryn fall, one of the two gunner bots took their attention off of Estellese and immediately started shooting at Kathryn. But Lynn quickly put a wall barrier between the bot and Kathryn to protect her.
'Yeah.' Kathryn thought. She panickedly threw a grenade at the three swordsman bots and quickly sprang to her feet. The grenade damaged and knocked down two of them, and Katy immediately shot them both as many times as she needed to to stop them from moving.
'I need to reload!' Katy thought and she started to move away from the battle to reload her gun when suddenly another bot appeared out of nowhere in front of her. The bot had previously been invisible, and had a long but thin blade for an arm.
'Duck!' Kathryn thought.
Katy froze in fear and jumped backwards just a moment too late. But vines sprang out of the ground and grabbed onto the android's blade, preventing it from harming the small girl. Katy jumped backwards to put some distance between them and quickly shot it twice in the chest with a pistol she had on her hip. This android wasn't as tough as the others, the fragile bot was broken by just those two shots. The bot collapsed, and then a sharp metal spike stabbed into Katy's back, striking her so hard it pierced through her spartan shields and partially stabbed into her back. It knocked the small girl to the ground.
The moment the spike struck Katy, Kathryn also screamed out in pain as if she had been hit too and she flinched. Her flinching gave the last swordsman bot she was fighting just enough time to thrust it's sword at her chest. However her spartan shields flared up and blocked the attack. She quickly regained her bearings and kicked the android to the ground, then quickly shot as many holes in it as she could to ensure that it stayed down, only to be struck in the back by a massive scythe.
The scythe shattered her spartan shield and left a deep cut across her back, causing her to cry out in pain. Kathryn was knocked a few feet forward and hit the ground, she looked up at what was behind her to see two people wielding massive scythes. A man and a woman who both looked similar. The first was a shorter guy, standing at 5'6" with messy black hair that was just a little longer than normal for a guy, brown eyes, and a thin but slightly muscular build. He wore black pants with a black shirt that had a couple red stripes.
Beside him was the older of the two siblings. The woman stood at 5'11" with the nearly perfect body of a model. She had black hair that was tied back in a ponytail and just came a little short of reaching her mid-back. She had brown eyes and her fingernails were all painted black. She was wearing a black and red tube top that didn't cover much more than it needed to. And she wore black shorts with a black parted skirt over them that went down almost to her ankles. She was also wearing a black glove on her left hand, the same hand sh
e carried her scythe in, and a black and red forearm guard on her right arm.
It looked like they meant to attack Kathryn in unison, but the woman had been ensnared in vines right before she could hit her. The two of them had been lying in waiting, and with the twins down they no longer needed to worry about getting shot once they entered the battlefield. So they jumped in to end this.
Over by the gunner bots the sisters were struggling. Lynn created a barrier to block the fire from one bot while the two sisters jumped out of Lynn's shadow to attack the other. Her barrier wasn't nearly as strong as Estellese's, it couldn't withstand a shot from the bot's shotgun. But this time Eladienne had her signet up so in the brief moment they had to attack she regained her red aura and slammed her fist into the bot's side. The bot was sent flying across the battlefield, slamming into the wall on the other side of the big room and shattering upon impact.
However before they could get back into the shadow both girls were shot multiple times by the other gunner bot. Lynn was shot once in the leg and once again in the back while Eladienne took a shot to the stomach and two to the chest. Causing both of them to shout out in pain. Lynn hurriedly pulled her sister back into her shadow, and the shadow quickly ran away from the battlefield.