Chapter 161

Fifth Floor

Saturday (Early Morning)

The office worker moved forward, and Alexa easily followed suit, keeping her movements inline with the awkward office worker. After a moment of watching, it was clear that the office worker’s movements were not truly clumsy, but compared to the movements that Alexa and now most of her pack could perform, the clearly human office worker was much slower and less refined. There were a lot of awkward and clunky movements.

By comparison, the vampire guards who stood still like statues along the long hallway, when they moved their movements were graceful, with little wasted movement. Judging by the staffing of this office, where the guards all seemed to be within the level 50 to level 75 range, Alexa felt that this field office, while being listed as the Browning Corporation’s headquarters, was just a front. Maybe Alexa was just being paranoid, or overthinking things, but this all seemed to be way too convenient of a place with staff and workers that were clearly under-strengthened to be truly effective against an assault. If Alexa had to guess, this facility stood as mostly a known central hub, with facilities that required more attention hidden off the company’s books. Or offices that were at the very least hidden far away from the beaten track.

Slide-shuffle.

The office worker was clearly nearing his physical and mental end. While he had seemed to wake up a bit from walking around, what energy he had managed to awaken within himself seemed to be failing him now as he made his way back to his office.

As Alexa continued to follow the guard with her Illusionary shield up, she noticed that the guards here all seemed to be at the upper ends of the level 75 rating that Alexa felt would be the highest for this facility.

Erica Nunez: Class: Vampire Adept. Level: 74. Condition: Injured. Status: Embarrassed.

Seeing the description, it became clear that the charred skin marks on the vampire were not some type of mutation, but were rather burn marks that were in the process of healing slowly. At first glance it appeared that the Vampire Adept was burnt, but the damage was too uniform to the left side of her body. The char marks also didn’t seem consistent with burn patterns. Another thing of note was that vampires could generally heal from fire faster. At least a vampire of her level should be able to heal from the minor wounds she was showing at a faster rate than she currently was. The wounds all appeared to be superficial, going skin deep, had Alexa wanted to, she could do a quick check with her Healing magic, but did not want to trigger any alarms. Still, she was curious as to what would cause such damage to a vampire.

Interesting. Alexa thought to herself as she got closer and watched as the office worker visibly seemed to tense up.

“Hi Erica, I hope you are feeling better?” The office worker asked with a weaker tone, one that Alexa had started to understand meant he was sorry. That was confirmed when she read his status.

Martin Glassner: Class: Artificer. Level: 75. Condition: Healthy. Status: Concerned.

If Alexa had to guess, she would figure that this Martin person had feelings for the vampire.

At his words, the vampire, Erica, became quickly Flustered, before turning to Feigned Indignation. “It’s okay. Just know that whatever happens in there I will not be able to save you.”

“I kind of figured. Thank you though. I know you got scolded for going in against protocol to try to save me, and well that meant a lot.” Martin said Apologetically.

Again, Alexa wondered where she would be without the aid of the system, people were still confusing, but with the information she was able to gain from a simple glance, let her understand that these two had feelings for each other and that their awkward tension was due to a botched rescue attempt. Now, rather than the female having something to talk about that gave her leverage in a conversation, that same incident was now being used to distance the two. Honestly, Alexa didn’t know why that was the case, clearly the female charged into the room to rescue Martin going against protocol to do so. The fact that she got injured by the process was likely secondary, or another topic the two could use to cause an interaction.

Shaking her head, Alexa just waited for the two to end this conversation, where no one wanted the conversation to end, but neither knew how to talk to the other. Sadly, this was something that Alexa could easily understand and wondered if her own conversations were often this way.

“It was just part of the job, but just remember to stay safe in there.” Erica said.

“Thank you, you as well.” Martin said, and then with that, he awkwardly tried to use his badge to scan the door, but his hands were firmly working to hold up his tray of caffeinated beverages. Seeing his awkward movement, Erica reached out to help him.

“Hold on there tiger.” Erica said, as she reached down and grabbed the lanyard and swiped it by the door.

“Th,thanks.” Martin stammered, realizing how close Erica was to him at this very moment.

There was a moment of recognition, where Erica’s eyes went wide with shock at the suddenly registered closeness of the action and then with her cheeks reddening, she quickly recoiled back to her guard position by the door.

“Yeah, sure, no problem.” Erica added before staring down the hallway to the elevator as if monsters were going to come from that elevator at any moment.

Then just like that, Martin, followed closely by Alexa entered the sealed office. The first thing that Alexa learned by entering the sealed chamber was that there was something very powerful on the other side of the wall, something that called out to her energy focused senses and all but demanded that she try to Absorb the new form of energy. Once again, this energy reminded her of the strange alien form of energy she felt reverberating from the glowing orb.

“Hey Martin.” A voice chimed into the entry room. “Conducting security scans.”

At that Martin just nodded his head, he was still tired, though seemingly more awake and aware of his surroundings after having spoken to Erica the vampire guard. At this point Alexa began to wonder exactly what the strangely powerful energy source was, with minor leaps of logic Alexa figured that this strange energy source, or one that they were likely working with behind these walls was what had caused such pronounced, but ultimately superficial burns to occur.

Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

A pulse of energy shot over Alexa and Martin, one that was not on the same level of potency as the orb from the safehouse had been, but still powerful enough to be taken and Absorbed.

“Huh, that’s odd.” The speaker said.

“What is?” Marin asked, suddenly awake and staring straight forward to the camera on the wall.

“The reading came back as degraded, but you still pass.” The security monitor said.

Lots of layers of protection in this building all made it so someone like Alexa had an easier time slipping in. Alexa felt that this was the problem with multiple repetitive scans, where the deeper you went, the more people tended to avoid looking into anomalies, as they should have been noted earlier in the process. A good use case would be here, where despite there being multiple layers of security, Alexa had managed to work her way here, to what amounted to be the inner sanctum for this operations branch. Had she wanted to, Alexa was certain that she could force her way past the level 75 Analyst and go into the office before her. Of course, she didn’t think such actions were unnecessary. Granted going out might require a bit faster of a response, but an escape plan was already forming in her mind. Namely she would get the orb, find the source of power, and find the item that caused such severe burns to the vampire outside.

Alexa figured that the three items could all be one and the same, but for now it was best to assume that all three items of interest were different items, or at least different components to the same item.

Woosh!

The final set of metal doors opened, revealing a giant open lab environment. The initial entry way seemed to be a somewhat typical office setting with multiple desks and computer terminals set up, each recording and analyzing data in a slightly different way.

Martin for his part began going out and handing cups of coffee to the different people who were sitting at their desks.

“Oh, thank God. You are a lifesaver, Martin.” A female scientist in a white lab coat stated.

Martin just nodded, as he handed two more cups of coffee to the other Analysts that were also on hand.

“So any luck with the decoupling? Gah!” Martin asked, as he took his cup of coffee from the tray and splashed a little of the liquid onto his hand, causing him to wince slightly.

“Not really, we have made some headway on finding the frequency being used. We think it is the Eclipsion tribes.” The female researcher stated.

Spit take.

Hearing that Martin, who had been drinking a sip from his cup of coffee, suddenly choked, as his mind processed the words being said. This in turn caused him to choke on his coffee and to get some coffee on his desk. Moving quickly, he began grabbing a few napkins and wiping away at his desk. “The Eclipsion?” He asked, finally gaining control of his reflexes, while also cleaning up the last bit of his coffee.

“Yes.”

“You’re sure?”

“Yes.” The female Analyst said.

At that Martin paused, then after a second asked, “so what do we do now?”

“We continue the decoupling.” The female analyst said. While she was a slightly lower level, being only level 74, Alexa pegged this person to be the leader of this group of scientists.

“We do?” Martin asked incredulously.

“Yes, by now they have already noticed the attempts to their network. We cannot leave it coupled to Eclipsion infrastructure while being in our lab environment.”

“But what about leadership?” Martin asked, a note of concern in his voice.

“They have already been informed. They told us to treat it as if it was salvaged, stating that if the Eclipsions truly cared about this, then they would have taken better care of it. As it is, for now this is the safest place for the orb, it is currently in our lab where it is cut off from being able to communicate with the outside world, and to make matters worse, management has already set up a new location for it.” The female analyst said.

“They have?”

“Yes.”

“Where?”

“At the very place they got it from apparently. It seems that the group would like to have better protections in place.” The female analyst continued.

Hearing that Martin paused, “wasn’t this taken from a school?”

“Indeed it was.”

“And we are going to use it to spy on children?”

Shaking her head, the female analyst just sighed. “It is not our place to question our orders. Also, that school is apparently a place that is very interesting. The Healer is there.”

“The Healer?” Martin asked, gulping slightly. “The tall Amazonian goddess of a healer?”

“The underage one that would is and likely will get a lot of people, in trouble if they keep making bad internet searches, yes.” The female Analyst said, as she locked gazes with Martin, who just looked somewhat sheepish.

Alexa knew they were talking about her, or at least figured that to be the case. However, rather than focusing on the alleged search history of the Analyst, she instead turned her attentions to what she felt was more important. Namely, who gave up the orb to these people. Well, there was also a second question that came to mind as well, which faction of elves were these then? Clearly, they weren’t part of the Eclipsion, which Yolandara was a part of. That of course just narrowed it down to about a dozen or more tribes. There was Wilken from the Tulpa tribe, he had been on hand to give a briefing at the same time as Yolandara had. The only reason why two people from rival tribes would meet like that was to split the resources, at least that was what Alexa thought. This couldn’t be the Dragonslayer tribe as Alexa had eradicated those members and made it so all remaining members, along with their four bases of operation were under her control. That reminded her that at one point she would need to handle the resources that she gained from her duel and eliminate the remaining members of the Dragonslayer tribe from this world, but that was for a later point. Right now, she realized that her investigation had expanded. No longer was she okay with just finding out about the orb, the power source that could burn vampires, and what the strange energy was that still called to her from a distance. Now, in addition to all of that, she wanted to find out which tribe these people worked for, and most importantly who their mole was on her campus. The orb had been in control of the campus officials for less than a day.

While her leaving the orb in the control of Dawning Light leadership had been a calculated risk, she was now glad she had done so. At the very least she found a major elven facility, one that looked to either be setting up a base of operations on her campus or wished to be expanding their capabilities on the campus. Given the fact that this orb, once set up, would likely cause issues to the runic structures of the campus. Unless that is what this whole decoupling process was, somehow getting the orb to notice one set of runes and magical energies as being cast by friendly forces and thus not having a direct reaction to it. There was just so much going on right here and now that her mind was alight with possibilities.

Curiosity killed the cat, by getting it trapped within Schrodinger’s box, Alexa thought to herself as she mentally worked through this conundrum. It was already getting late or was it early now. It was now at the very least Saturday, and within twelve hours Alexa would need to be in her Aru’ka outfit ready to stand guard against a possible attack that would target not only her, but other Earth leadership. But before she let her mind wander to that part, she was now fully invested with finding out what would happen here and now.

Alexa’s heightened senses screamed to her that the new form of energy was being used just up ahead in a room that was separated from this one by lead walls and an oddly transparent material that seemed to prevent the now familiar golden glow from the elven orb to shine through.

“How much longer do you think it will take to decouple the orb from the Elcipsion network?” Martin asked.

“It should be done within the next twenty minutes. We are already in the process of draining it of all current energy. From there, it is just a matter of recharging it with our own unique energy, that will tell it to connect to the Tulpa network, and then we are done.” The female scientist said.

With that, Alexa nodded to herself, knowing that Wilkin was somehow related to this whole operation. At the very least Wilkin the elf would be a point of contact to further her investigation. All that was left was to retrieve the orb, once it had been fully drained of energy, and steal it before it could be tainted with Tulpa energy. Again, all this was hard to fully grasp currently. The only thing that she was certain of was that she saw the power of the orb in question, and she wanted to use that power for herself. At the very least, she learned a few things. First the energy of the glowing golden orb was not infinite, that it did run out eventually, and most importantly once it ran out of energy it could then be reassimilated with other energy.

With this knowledge, Alexa watched on as the four nighttime scientists all watched on a live stream that showed the orb she had stolen, and then had stolen from her up on a large seventy-inch screen. Alexa watched as the room the orb was in was filled with different runic patterns that were lit up randomly with magical energy. As soon as the runes had energy, the orb that was placed at the center of the room lit up and fired out bolts of blinding light. Each burst let Alexa feel the strange jolt of energy she had been feeling since she got here. The same energy that her body all but demanded that she somehow Absorb. Even now, protected by a wall of lead, she could feel the uniquely alien energy radiating through the walls and calling out to her.

As time went on, the pulses of light began to slow. Then the time it took for each burst of light to burn through the offending rune began to take longer and longer. Alexa could almost see the pulses of energy slowly fading away.

“Looks like it is getting close.” The lead female analyst said, as she looked at her screen and read the numbers that were proving what Alexa was able to monitor with her eyes.

“It is?” Another male asked.

“Yeah, look the intervals between each burst is slowing down.” The female lead analyst said, pointing to her screen. The others all turned to their own monitors, to watch their own readouts. At this, Alexa began moving forward, past the four-seated scientists, and waited.

And waited.

Finally, after a long time, the bursts of energy coming from the room in front of her ended. The display overhead showed a now lifeless silver ball resting on a pedestal.

Whoosh!

The lead lined doors opened. There was now just one set of translucent doors that stood between Alexa and the orb that she had already stolen once.

“Wait for it. Let’s make sure radiation levels are minimal.” The lead analyst said, taking her coffee and drinking the last sips of it.

Slurp.

That was her cue. With all eyes on the lead scientist, Alexa used that moment of distraction to make her move.