“We’ll have to go through the inferno; it’s the only way out,” she said.
“Are you crazy?”
“I'll use a shield. The fire may not be magic, but it’s an element, and the shield should block it out,” she said.
“Should?” I asked. “You want to stake our lives on should? Besides, if I do it, I’ll be completely out of MP.”
“Quit whining. Here,” she said, coughing as a wave of smoke washed over her. She placed a hand on my shoulder and tapped a stone on her gauntlet. A shield popped into place around me. Then she removed her hand and tapped the stone again, initiating a shield of her own. “Let’s go.”
I stood there a moment longer, hesitating, not sure if the shield would work. Then I took a deep breath and rushed through the fire all at once.
Flames licked up all around me, but the shield pushed them aside and kept me safe.
As quickly as we could, we raced through the forest. All around us, the fire raged. Large chunks of burning metal dotted the forest’s floor—pieces of what was left of our Arrow.
“We need to find Claire and the others,” I said.
“There’s no time,” Bella said, shaking her head. “If they haven’t already escaped, there’s nothing we can do to help them, and what if our shields fail while we’re still in here and they’ve been outside the fire’s range this whole time? No, there’s too much ground to cover, and we simply can’t do it.”
“We have to try!” I said. “What if they’re lying somewhere around here unconscious like you were when I found you?”
“If they were sensible and opened their chutes earlier, they probably cleared this area completely,” she countered.
“Are you willing to take the chance that you could be leaving Izaiah stranded here and near death?”
“I’m willing to trust that Izaiah can handle himself,” she said. “Now, come on before I have to drag you out of here myself.”
I grudgingly conceded and let her lead on. But that didn’t mean I was going to stop looking.
We ran through the burning forest, jumping over downed trees, dodging falling branches, and bursting through the flames where necessary. Each time we cut through the fire, I could see the shield diminish slightly.
We were nearly to the edge of the fire’s perimeter when something caught my eye.
“Bella, over there, is that?” I asked.
“It’s nothing. It’s just more debris. We’re almost out, just a little further,” she said.
“I think that’s one of the Arrow’s seats. We have to go check it out,” I insisted.
“Listen to me, we have to leave now,” she said, then she spun around and took off towards the fire’s edge.
I didn’t follow. Instead, I ran with all my might toward the debris.
Just as I reached it, my shield gave out and a rush of senses flooded me all at once. The heat was the first thing I noticed, and the second was the smoke. The shield must have been keeping it out.
I stood in a small clearing where the seat had come down.
Rushing to the other side, I spun around, only to find the seat empty. Whoever had arrived in it was gone now.
Maybe Bella was right. This had been a waste of time.
The fire blazed higher and raced toward me across the clearing as it devoured the high grass around me.
I was about to head back when I heard coughing. My eyes scanned the clearing rapidly, but I couldn’t see anyone.
“Claire! Leon! Izaiah!” I shouted. “Is someone there?”
“Here!” a weak voice said to my left.
I turned in the direction of the voice but still couldn’t see who it was or where they were.
The smoke thickened, and I struggled to breath myself.
Dropping to the ground, I crawled in the direction of the voice.
Someone ahead of me coughed again.
“Hold on! I’m coming!” I shouted.
They coughed again, and the sound was right in front of me. I heard it almost as if they were standing beside me, but it was hard to see anything through the smoke.
I stood once more and crouched low to avoid the majority of the smoke and ran as quickly as I could. I took no more than five steps and tripped on something.
Someone screamed.
I flipped over to see Leon staring back at me. “What are you doing? We need to go!”
“I—I can’t stand,” he said with a shudder. “My leg.”
Looking down, I saw his bloodied leg with a piece of white bone sticking out just below the knee.
“Did I just do that?” I asked, horrified that my carelessness had put him in so much pain.
He shook his head. “It happened on impact. I—”
“Tell me later, I need to get you out of here,” I said. “This is going to hurt. I’m sorry.”
I knelt down and hoisted him up onto my shoulders.
He hissed in pain as his leg collided with my arm.
Standing to my full height, I couldn’t make out the trees through all the smoke, so I ran straight forward in whichever direction that took me.
Black smoke enveloped me, and then it was gone as bright red flames jumped out at us. I pushed through the flames, fire lapping at me from all directions. I could feel the heat as it burned my legs.
Leon cried out in pain.
I didn’t stop but just kept pressing forward. I ran and ran without regard to my direction, so long as I felt like I was heading out of the fire. I didn’t stop to worry about the forest blazing around me, nor did I slow to get my bearings. I just ran.
Then, all at once, it was over, and the glow of the fire fell away as darkness surrounded me, yet the fire’s heat did not leave me. Still I kept running, wanting to put some distance between us and the inferno.
When I could run no more, I collapsed, dropping Leon onto the ground.
Looking down, I saw that fire was burning my legs. I screamed as I rolled, desperately trying to extinguish the flames.
“Over here!” I heard someone shout.
A second later, Claire was throwing herself atop my legs, smothering the flames beneath her armor.
When at last the heat was gone, I settled onto my back and panted, staring up at the dark canopy of leaves and branches above me.
“Are you all right?” Claire asked.
Before I could answer, Bella shouted from a short distance away, “You better be dead, or you’re going to wish you were, Aren Halland!”
“Going to—take a lot more than—fire to kill me,” I wheezed.
Her dark form stood above me as she said, “I leave you for one second and turn around to find you gone. I’m too young to die of heart problems. Don’t you ever do that to me again.”
“Leon—Help Leon,” I said through my panting. I pointed over to where I’d let go of him.
Claire and Bella both turned. “Oh, gods,” they said together.
To her credit, Bella left me in an instant and descended upon the injured boy.
“Oh, that’s a nasty break,” I heard Bella say. “Claire can you give me a hand with this?”
I heard a loud pop, and Leon screamed, then his crying turned into a soft whimper. A blue light briefly lit up the treetops, and Leon sighed in relief.
Knowing that he was going to be okay, I closed my eyes and let myself relax.
"Hey, hey. None of that,” Bella said, returning to my side. “We’re not safe yet. Not from the fire and not from Lucian. Get up.”
I opened my eyes to see her hand extended toward me. I gripped it, and she pulled me up.
“Did you find Izaiah?” I asked.
Bella was shaking her head when a voice cut in, “Over here!”
We both looked in the direction of the sound to see Izaiah jogging toward us.
“How’d you find us?” I asked.
“How could I not?” he retorted. “The king could have heard your wailing from his grave.”
“Not me, it was Leon,” I said, nodding my head
to where Claire was helping Leon stand.
“Is he all right?”
“He’ll be fine. A bit sore, but fine,” Bella answered.
“No thanks to you,” I said. “If I had been a minute later, he would be dead now.”
Bella frowned. “I’m—I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be,” Claire said. “We’re all safe now, and you were only doing your job. Your priority was keeping my brother safe. Keeping a Halland safe. He can’t fault you for that.”
When she put it like that, it was hard to argue. Even so, I wasn’t quite ready to let it go.
I opened my mouth to speak, but Izaiah cut me off. “Can we talk about whose fault is what later? Is everyone all right?”
A few uneasy seconds passed, and we all nodded.
“Good, then let’s go,” he said, waving everyone north. “I could see the testing facility from the sky as I parachuted down. It’s no more than a couple of hours walk north. If we leave now, we should be there by sun up.”
Izaiah turned and started walking, as did the others.
I stood still for another moment, took a deep breath, and then followed after everyone.
Twenty-Four
Alton’s testing facility appeared in the distance just as the sun poked above the horizon.
The journey north had been tiring, but uneventful. Even though we encountered a few wild animals on our journey, it wasn't too bad. Leon used his Repel magika to keep them at bay. Had it been under different circumstances, I might have argued against such a course of action.
But since my magika had been nearly depleted and we were all tired, I held my tongue. I had no idea how long Leon’s magika worked, but, luckily, he only needed to engage the stone twice during our four-hour trek.
Whether it was from exhaustion or shock, I didn’t know, but all of us hardly spoke a word throughout the whole journey.
With the rising of the sun and the discovery of the testing facility, I felt a new surge of energy rush through me.
“What do you think we’ll find inside?” I asked, hoping to break the silence.
“There shouldn’t be any people, that’s for certain,” Izaiah said. “We cleared the place when we recovered you.”
“Hopefully, there’s a clue as to Elsie and Rayf’s whereabouts,” Leon said.
“Who’s Rayf?” asked Bella.
“Another one of our friends captured by Balgyra,” I answered. Turning to Leon, I asked, “What do you think happened to Von?”
Leon shook his head. “I don’t know. Looked like he just took off and left us.”
“Another companion I assume?” Bella asked.
“Our leader,” Leon answered, nodding.
Bella scoffed. “Not much of a leader if he left you to be captured.”
Leon shrugged as if he didn’t care.
Silence fell between us all once more.
I tapped on my neural link to check on my MP. Since it recovered at one point every minute, the journey had been more than enough to fill it.
AREN HALLAND
LEVEL 11
AFFILIATION: ALLYRIA
PROFESSION: GUARDIAN
110/110 MP
4,880/11,000 EXP
2 AP AVAILABLE
-40,000 FAME – TRAITOR
0 RIFKELS
Chet, I thought, looking at my stats. “I forgot to allocate my AP while we were on the cruiser.”
“That’s okay, I wouldn’t worry about it too much. There should be a remote augmentation station at the facility that will allow you to use it,” Izaiah said. “Besides, you probably won’t have much use for it at your current level.”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“Wow, that forbidden magika really did a number on you didn’t it?” Claire asked.
I just rolled my eyes. I’d heard it too many times already. I turned my attention back to Izaiah and stared at him expectantly.
“AP—or augmentation points—are used to level up your magika stones,” Izaiah explained. “Sometimes you get lucky and find higher class stones either in loot or dead drops. You can also buy them, but they cost a lot, and we don’t exactly have a lot of access to merchants out here. The way most people level up their stones is by applying AP.
“It costs one AP to move from Class 1 to Class 2. It costs two AP to move from Class 2 to Class 3, three to move to Class 4, and four to move to Class 5. As you can probably tell, you won’t earn enough AP to do this with absolutely every magika stone you ever acquire. So oftentimes, we won’t waste AP on Class 1 stones. Since Class 2 stones are still relatively affordable, what I’ve done in the past is bought a Class 2 stone and then used my AP to level it up to Class 3.”
“It all sounds very complicated,” I said.
“It’s not really. Once you get the hang of it, you'll have a handle on the strategy,” he answered. “Anyway, based on what I’ve seen, you’ve got several Class 2 magika stones already. You have enough AP to level up one of them, but a Class 3 stone costs you 30 MP when you use it, instead of the Class 2 stone’s cost of 15. It just means whatever stone you upgrade will eat through your magika that much faster.”
I looked over at Claire and asked, “How does all this factor into play with Sovereigns?”
“Sovereigns are still bound to the same leveling mechanics,” Claire said. “Balgyra has only managed to circumvent the need for stones and MP. They use AP to level up their magika the same as you and me.”
“That’s good to know,” I said. “I was worried for a minute that they instantly had access to Class 5 magic without any restrictions to MP limits.”
“I think we’d already be dead if that were the case,” she said.
As we stepped up to the outside of the facility, I found myself stopping in my tracks. Here was the place I was held prisoner—the place I had been turned into a slave for the Balgyran people.
“Don’t look so terrified,” Bella said.
“You would be if you knew what I had endured in there,” I said.
“It’s okay, we’re here with you now,” Claire said, having come up on my other side. She took my hand, and the familiarity was comforting to me.
I gave them both an uneasy smile as we marched forward together.
The hanger doors were still ajar, and much of the inside was as I remembered it. Any fires and smoke had long since dissipated, but the destruction was still evident everywhere.
“Let’s split up into groups and see if we can find anything useful,” Izaiah said.
“Do you mind if I go with Claire?” I asked. “We haven’t had any time together since…”
Izaiah glanced at Bella, unsure.
“Come on, I know you guys are our ‘protectors,’ but seriously now. What can go wrong? You already cleared this place once before,” I said.
“Fair enough,” Izaiah said. “All right, Bella and Leon you’re with me. Let’s go.”
As a group, we stepped into the facility’s main double doors and entered the room where Alton had used me to battle against Lucian and the royal guard.
I froze once again as my mind replayed through the struggle.
“It’s all right, come on, why don’t you tell me what happened here?” Claire asked.
Izaiah and the others turned down the hallway to the left, and Claire and I went to the right.
As we walked through the first door, we came to the hallway just outside of the room where Elsie had been experimented on—the hole in the wall still ominous and foreboding.
“They held people prisoners in rooms like this one,” I explained. “I witnessed one of them being injected. He screamed in pain—unbearable pain.”
Claire nodded. “Balgyra revoked Dr. Alton’s clearance because of her experiments. The president had declared her program a failure and ordered her to put an end to her tests. That’s why she moved it across the borders into Allyria.”
“But I saw her with the ambassador at the palace,” I said in amazement.
“Following
her success with Elsie, the president welcomed her back and sent Alton with the ambassador in hopes of leveraging their breakthrough in the negotiations,” Claire said. “But it never came to that.”
We continued a little further into the facility and passed by the interrogation room.
“Here is where they held me captive. Alton injected me with something, but it wasn’t the same stuff I saw them use on the other prisoners.”
Claire placed her hand on my shoulder. “I’m sorry you had to go through all of this again.”
“It’s not like I remember the first time,” I said, pulling away from her.
“That doesn’t make me regret it any less sending you back to relive it,” she answered. “It’s awful what Balgyra has done to get ahead.”
Most of the rooms we passed had been ransacked. Papers lay strewn about the room, cupboards were tipped over, and doors left ajar. The Balgyrans had grabbed whatever they could and made a hasty retreat before the facility was breached.
A crash at the end of the hall caused me to go rigid. “What was that?”
Claire already had a sword in hand as she brought a finger up to her lips telling me to be quiet.
We inched closer to the room where the sound had likely come from. When we reached the door, Claire placed her back against the wall on the opposite side of the door and mouthed, “Three, two, one.”
Twisting the door’s handle, she pushed it open and flattened against the wall once more.
There was another crash, and I burst into the room with my palm extended, ready to blast whoever it was with my magika.
The room was empty, save for a few dozen green marbles that rolled across the floor. At the opposite end, a door swung open slowly as if someone had just made a hasty retreat from the room.
I stepped into the room, and Claire followed in after me.
“Did you see anything?” she asked when we had determined the room was clear.
I shook my head.
Further examination revealed a bunch of broken glass in front of a storage cabinet. When I opened the cabinet door wider, I discovered an assortment of the glass jars with more marbles colored blue, black, and white. Only they weren’t marbles.
“Magika stones?” I asked. “What are they doing with all of these?”
Sworn Guardian: A LitRPG/GameLit Adventure (Forbidden Magic Book 1) Page 18