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„Amara Zurie?“

I think I have heard that name somewhere before. Yeah, I do remember, she is that assassin that kills for artifacts on many different planets. What is she doing here?

„Threat Level. Ethan Shield. Medium. Amara Zurie. Medium. Eradication In Progress.“

Why is my threat level higher than the others? And why is Nia‘s high? Because of her artifact?

The two giant machines started aiming towards Nia. I heard their weapons charging.

„Get behind me!“ I yelled and grabbed Nia‘s arm and hid her behind my back.

I expanded my shield energy around me and gave it as much power as I could.

They fired their cannons, it made a loud noise, like it came from a thruster of a space ship, and a laser beam showered me and Nia. It wasn‘t a weapon that shoots bullets per shot, it was shooting a wave of plasma.

I felt the weight of the continuous impact of their weapons, they slowly made me slide backward. Holding the shield with both arms, I could feel the growing heat burning through the only protection I had. I gritted my teeth as I felt the pain around my left arm that I strapped the shield against.

The hot plasma bounced off of the shield and hit the floor, it started melting the floor and sizzled.

Their weapons abruptly stopped firing. I almost lost my balance, stumbling forwards. I noticed arrows on the giant machines, and more came flying over towards them.

One of the robots turned towards Ivona and blocked her attack, protecting his ally. He then started aiming for Ivona while covering for the one that charged up his own weapon again and aimed for me.

There was no cover around here, except for my shield. Ivona might be able to outrun the weapon if it is not accurate enough.

If I would continue to protect Nia like this, then I couldn‘t really do much against the bots.

I noticed Letya moving towards the unconscious Amara. If she was thinking about healing her, then I didn‘t really like the idea, we might be able to handle this ourselves.

Reve started running towards the one aiming for me, his ax at the ready. The reaction of the bot was slow as it stopped charging his weapon and tried to block Reve‘s attack with his metal arm. Reve‘s ax flew towards the hand and cut clean through.

That was good, the bots don‘t seem to do really well against close-quarters combat. If Reve keeps that up, we can easily take down one of them.

„Additional Guardians Needed. Guardian Threat Level. Roderick Reve. High.“ The A.I. said across the room.

Smaller bots came through hidden doorways. They were the same height as Reve, and they came at him. A few also attacked Letya. Letya had her gauntlets against Amara.

Did it really need to send more inn? Goddammit.

The giant bot that lost one of his hands, started aiming once again for me. Even though he lost a hand, it didn‘t hinder him from using the arm as support for the weapon. The weapon started charging again.

„Crap. Nia, take one of my programs,“ I said and moved my shield towards her.

„Erm, heh?“

We wouldn‘t survive if I kept on protecting her, I needed to do something as well to those bots. Though I hated to lose one of my programs, I believed it would be necessary.

„The program called Expanded Shield, take it.“

„Are you sure? It will be gone from your artifact forever.“

„Just do it! Quickly!“ I shouted and glanced towards the bot. It was close at firing his weapon.

Nia hesitated for a mere second, then opened up her holographic screen, scrolling through my list of programs that wasn‘t even that much. Most of them don‘t even work when I try to use them.

Nia selected the program and transferred it to her artifact gauntlets.

„There, I have it.“

„Good, now I don‘t need to protect you anymore.“

„Aw, but I thought you were my guardian angel,“ she said with sarcasm.

„Don‘t joke around right now! First, we need to take down all of the bots!“

„Yeah, yeah,“ she sighed and started darting away from me.

The bot continued his aim towards Nia and then fired his plasma. I quickly called out my Sky Barrier program between the bot and Nia and made the plasma collide with the flying energy barrier. It broke easily due to me being quite far away.

Nia stopped and called to the new program. The gauntlets brought out flow of energy, completely covering her from all sides. The plasma was showering her, but couldn‘t go through the barrier.

I needed to act quickly before it would break. So I started running towards the bot with my sword in hand. I still felt burns on my left arm from the plasma, but it didn‘t stop me.

The bot didn‘t notice me as I was coming in close. I swung my sword to his leg, but only to hear metal hitting metal, and it didn‘t do a thing as it bounced off the robotic leg and vibrated through my arm.

I stumbled as the bot glanced down. It stopped and slowly started aiming towards me.

„Program! Armor Piercing!“ I yelled and immediately thrust my shield to the leg.

The shield quickly changed into spikes and managed to pierce through the tough steel of the bot.

„Take that!“

I saw his arm fly towards me, I took my shield out and moved it between me and his handless-arm.

With a sharp pain going across my body, I was thrown away, landing on my back as I slid through the floor. The spikes returned into the shield.

With a groan, I slowly stood up and saw Ivona dodging the plasma fire easily. And Reve was fighting against tough opponents that were the smaller bots. They were stronger than the last robots we encountered.

I really wished that I had a blaster on me. It would make things much easier.

I heard a groan to my left and saw the infamous assassin, Amara, standing up with what looked like a sniper. Letya was close, fighting of bots with her sword, she was standing her ground well.

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I ran towards Amara.

„Hey, I don‘t know why you are here, but we really need your help right now.“

„Don‘t worry, those metal and bolts are getting what they deserve!“

She didn‘t even turn towards me as she spoke. She took up her sniper that she used as support to lift her up, and aimed at the bot with the missing hand.

I started hearing a high pitch noise from the weapon, and it was just getting louder. Then she fired, a burst of light flew towards the head of the bot, and it pierced right through with a hole that was larger than the sniper‘s barrel.

The line of smoke from the weapon and the head of the bot lingered for a few seconds. The bot stopped its attack towards Nia, and its head suddenly exploded with fragments of zettra stones flying all around the room.

It then fell towards the floor with a loud thud that made the whole room shake.

I had my mouth open with surprise. She took down that bot rather easily, like its metal plates were just made out of paper.

„Huh. . . maybe you could do that again with the other one?“

„Do you really think I could fire off these type of rounds at a rapid pace?“

She motioned towards her sniper, it had opened valves around the barrel, cooling it down from the heat.

„I guess not, just fire off the second round when it‘s ready.“

„I‘m not taking orders from you, shield boy, but I will still rip apart that paper plated machine,“ she scoffed the robot.

The zettra core was inside their heads. Amara just needed to shoot the last, then we should be fine. Except if the A.I. calls for more reinforcement, which it didn‘t do, it didn‘t say anything when the bot fell.

I glanced at Reve. There were quite a lot of bots fighting him, I need to go and help him.

„Letya! Are you okay fighting alone?“

„I‘m fine! Go help Reve!“

She took one down as the finished speaking. I started moving towards Reve.

The bot that fired at Ivona started aiming at Nia. Nia threw a grenade at the bot, it exploded as it bounced off its plate, but after the smoke cleared, it didn‘t seem to do anything to it. They might have some sort of resistance to explosives. The shrapnel didn‘t even scrape it.

Nia activated my program and plasma covered the barrier. Ivona shot a few arrows that actually managed to pierce the hull, but it didn‘t seem to do that much.

I came from behind one of the smaller bots and swung my sword at its arm. It sparked and made a small explosion as the arm fell off.

„Need some help here?“ I asked Reve.

„Of course not! This is just my warm-up!“

Reve took apart one of the bots, and took a hit by another, scraping his barrier that his armor had.

„Uh-huh. Sure, you don‘t need me, but I am still going to stick around.“

Two bots turned towards me and started swinging at me.

„Additional Guardians Needed.“

The A.I. once again called for more bots. Doorways opened and a similar giant bot appeared with few more of the smaller ones. Not only were some the same type, but a new variant also seemed to appear.

Three of the smaller ones now held rifles, similar to Amara‘s, but it might not be as powerful. Though it is likely deadly.

Two of the bots that held rifles aimed towards Nia, while the other one was aiming towards Ivona.

I was about to warn them when Ivona noticed herself and fired quick rounds at them, taking them down after the other just like that.

Those smaller ones seemed not to have armor against her arrows, or she might have used some program to take them down easily.

Spikes protruded out of my shield when I called out the program once again. I bashed my shield at the bots as they swung at me, taking out their zettra core in one hit.

There was a bot behind Reve that was about to attack with his sword, I called out my Sky Barrier program and blocked the attack with the shield‘s energy. Reve noticed and quickly took care of the bot behind him.

As one of the giant bots fired towards Nia, Amara finally fired again, exploding her second target. The last remaining was the one that came in with the smaller ones.

The last giant bot started firing towards Amara. Though the weapon was similar towards the other two, it wasn‘t firing a wave of plasma, it shot singular blasts of it. It didn‘t need to charge its weapon.

Amara ran and escaped the oncoming fire from it. Ivona took its attention towards her as she fired her crossbow.

As it was starting to aim at Ivona, Amara started running towards it with her rifle at her back and something in her hand. At first glance, it was like a handle for a sword, but it didn‘t have a blade.

As I was thinking about why she was holding it, she activated it and came out the blade from the handle, and once it was fully out, it started glowing red.

She held the sword with both hands and sliced through the leg of the giant bot. At first, it didn‘t seem to do anything, then the bot stumbled and fell over. Amara with her sword pierced the head, and as sparks started flying, she walked away from it as it exploded.

She is definitely not the person you want to mess with. I wasn‘t really sure, but that sword of hers is likely not an artifact. How would she even have two artifacts at once? I‘m sure I have heard it wasn‘t possible, except for that gunslinger guy back at Tyrida. Why didn‘t she also use that sword of hers against the other giant bot?

After a minute, we finally finished up the last of the bots in the room. We started charging up our artifacts with our zettra stones. The cores in the bots weren‘t usable as I hoped.

The A.I. that spoke a couple of times didn‘t say anything this time. We might have dealt with all of them, or it just didn‘t want to send out more for some reason.

I glanced at Amara as she threw away a zettra stone.

„Are you „the“ Amara Zurie?“ I asked.

„Yes I am, and yes, I came to this planet just like how you did.“

„Why were you following us?“

I heard a chuckle.

„Is this some sort of interrogation?“

I was sure she was smiling through her helmet.

„Shield boy, I followed you because we could help each other to get off the planet,“ she said simply.

„I don‘t need your help, and I don‘t want help from a person like you. Also, my name is Ethan. Not shield boy.“

„If it wasn‘t for me, those giant machines would have killed you all.“

She might be right about that, but we could‘ve defeated them without her.

I noticed Ivona walking around the room, collecting her arrows from plates of bots. Letya was also collecting arrows for her, then she motioned towards us.

„I think I found the exit!“

She pointed towards the middle of the floor, it was a circular stairway leading down. It wasn‘t there before, it must have appeared as we finished the last bot, and it was behind one of the giant bots, so we didn‘t see it as it was opening.

„I‘m sorry, but I don‘t want to be around you. I have heard of your deeds on many worlds, you are not trustworthy at all.“

I proceeded towards the stairway, the others followed. Amara stood there with her arms crossed.

„Ethan, what were you talking about?“ Nia asked as she was throwing her energyless zettra stone up and caught it.

„It‘s nothing.“

„But I heard you talking about going to other planets and coming to this one. And when the room spoke, it didn‘t say your name. It said something about elder transportation, what‘s that supposed to mean?“

„I am also quite curious,“ Reve came into the conversation.

Yeah, I can‘t hide it anymore.

„What about you, it couldn‘t say your last name.“

„Erm. . . well. . . you tell your story first!“ she said, irritated.

„How about this, when we are out of the vault, and we find a good spot to take a break, I will tell you then.“

„Fine, you promise?“

„Sure, if you also promise to say your story.“

She nodded, hesitantly.

Due to me having the shield, I once again was first to enter the new room.

Walking down the spiral stairs, the lights were slowly lighting up as we went further down. The walls turned from metal to glass, a giant opened room was shown, but once again, due to the darkness, we couldn‘t see a thing.

When I finally took my last step to the floor, the whole room lit up. The lights shone one by one, the room was bigger than any other dungeon or vault I have been in. And it‘s for a good reason.

„Holy shit,“ I muttered.

My eyes were staring at something that likely Reve, Nia, Ivona, and Letya wouldn‘t know about.

It was a spaceship, coated with silver plating all across the hull. Its size was of a small corvette. It had two main thrusters at the back, with two smaller ones on beneath either side of the wings. The plates were smooth, with no noticeable dents. It wasn‘t one of those blocky space ships, it was far from it. It was triangular, the tip at the front, pointing a bit downwards. I could see the bridge from the front windows. I couldn‘t see any weapons attached to the ship. A ramp was leading inside the ship, and the doors were opened.

I was smiling and chuckling a bit. I don‘t need the gem Vincent talked about, I can just fly off right now! And I can‘t wait to fly from this planet!