CHAPTER 125

The magic attacks hitting their defensive position paused for a moment and then started up.

“They know we’re here and are trying to keep us suppressed.” She eased to her feet her bow in hand once more. Cautiously, she moved closer to the ledge. With a smooth motion, she stood. Took a fraction of a second to aim and then…

Crack.

She flattened herself instantly.

Some form of light attack flashed overhead.

“Half a second.” She muttered with a grimace. “To fast.”

“Are you hitting them?”

Her face lost animation momentarily as she checked in her system room. Half a blink passed and then life flooded back. She glanced at him. “Yeah, I am. Three kills, but I’m using seeker arrow’s so that few is disappointing. They’re tough.”

She frowned and focused on the sounds of spells crashing around them and those flashing over their heads. “We’ve pissed them off.” There was a crash and then a spray of dirt rubble as the top of the hollow they were in crumbled.

Tom wiped some of the grit off his mouth and looked in annoyance at where the spell had hit. A section of the ridge had been pulverised.

Everlyn sighed heavily as more explosions occurred above them. “Definitely got their attention, but that’s probably for the best. It’ll give the others attack teams a chance to reposition. This will not be a fun fight.”

She half stood leveraging the bow above her head so less of her was exposed.

Crack.

Alarm flashed over her face.

Thump!

She tumbled backwards with a scream and her bow vanished in a twinkling of light.

“Evie!”

She landed at the bottom of their protected space near the crack in the earth that was their exit tunnel. He danced across the two steps that separated them and knelt down next to her, his eyes on the bloody mess of her shoulder. Both of his hands reached out to touch the wound. Healing Tranquillity triggered and Tom frowned.

Foreign material filled the injury, a mixture of dangerous energies and stone.

Without him, it would be a lethal wound. His heart caught, but then he pushed that away. He was here and there were multiple ways to approach healing these types of wounds.

First, he needed to limit the ongoing damage. He flexed his mind to pinch off the vessels that were flooding the area with blood and taking contaminants elsewhere in the body. His senses briefly flowed down through the rest of her. She had been poisoned, but her vitality would beat off the small amounts of the poison that had already been carried away from the mangled shoulder.

Mentally, he sighed in relief. One issue at least that he didn’t need to worry about.

Next, he needed to purge the wound of the infectious agents. There were magic solutions, purifying spells, but they were mana inefficient and then there were surgical options. They were bloody, required higher technical skills, and had a greater chance of backfiring.

They were in a war zone and Tom with the help of Healing Tranquility was more than willing to back his technical skills.

Efficiency trumped all else.

Remote Earth Manipulation triggered and his proximity allowed him to seize control of the rock components of what must have been some type of advanced multi affect earth missile. A nasty attack that along with the physical stone contained poison, dark and decay effects. It was a clever spell where the extras did the actual killing once the high-speed rock had broken open the skin and Evie without him being here would have been in trouble.

The missile had worked exactly how it was envisaged.

Tom pushed all thoughts apart from the surgery from his mind. Mentally, he rehearsed what he was going to do. Repurpose the stone in the wound and then hack away the infected tissue. The shards of rock responded immediately to his focused attention. Tiny sharp slivers already there and capable of acting as multiple scalpels ready for his use.

The entire framework of the shoulder was mapped out in his mind by Healing Tranquility. Sections of flesh that had been contaminated they had to go.

His fingers plunged into the wound.

Evie screamed underneath him, and reluctantly he spent the mana to dull the pain. It was better than fighting against a moving patient.

The screams stopped.

The stone moulded around his fingers as he mapped each pool of contamination. They cut through flesh effortlessly and Tom was glad of the pain dulling. This would be so much harder if Everlyn was flinching while he did so.

“Trust me.” he whispered.

He twisted his hand and yanked backward with his arm. Pain dulled or not, she gasped her hand snapping out to grab his wrist.

He held a chunk of flesh and rock the size of a cricket ball. Everlyn’s eyes were wide with fear and before she could do anything in her panic, he flicked his wrist.

Throw Rock.

The chunk of rock, flesh and those terrible energies flew away and cleared the lip of their hollow. It sizzled as it sped away.

“What was that?” Everlyn gasped at him wide eyed.

Tom tugged on his trapped hand. “I need…”

Everlyn hurriedly released his arm. Her shoulder had a large hole in it, missing muscle and broken bones.

His fingers dropped to land on the wound while his mind calculated what to do and assessed the damage. He might have got ninety-five percent of the contaminants, but that wasn’t enough.

“Your butcher’s knife.”

“Take it.”

Tom left his left hand in her and reached with his right. With that and her good arm, they were able to pull the magic knife free. On Earth he would have sterilised it, but here with high vitality everyday germs couldn’t infect a person. Instead, they had to be weaponized like what had been included in whichever missile had hit her.

The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

Knife in hand, he kept focusing on treating her wound and actively ignored the explosions and flashes of light around them. Apparently, their artillery spells did not include ones with a parabolic arc because if one of those things… were dropped in here.

Tom shook his head as if that was a risk Everlyn would already have evacuated them underground.

Healing Tranquillity kept him focused. The infected skin was clear to him. Tom knew he could rely on magic to burn out the infection, but efficiency was everything, and growing new flesh was cheaper than driving out the energies. The dagger bit and a thin slither of muscle was cut off. Dark streaks of decay magic were visible in the strip of meat. He flicked it away from them and the flesh visibly wilted away to nothing on the nearby rock that it had landed on. Decay that should have taken a day occurring in seconds.

Tom put it out of his mind and focused on the next cut.

“Hurry.”

Tom paused for a moment. Her pain was dulled, so she was not asking for herself. The appeal for speed was a strategic request not a personal one. “How long do I have?” He asked evenly.

“Minutes, at most, but I would like to put pressure on them before then.”

Tom assessed his progress. The worst of the corruption had been cut out and if they were in a rush… He let Touch Heal blaze as he relied on the structure of the spell rather than his experience to heal the damage. With missing flesh, it was the most efficient approach. It was not like mending where Tom could beat the defaults by leveraging his experience. With tissue regrowth he didn’t understand the body make up enough to outperform the base Skill.

Twenty seconds later the hollowed out gap was gone, leaving an ugly scar.

Everlyn flexed her shoulder and frowned. “Still poisoned?”

Tom reached out to remove the last of the lingering effects, but she pulled herself clear. “Preserve your mana. I can purge it if it gets worse, and my vitality should take care of it soon enough.”

During the time he had spent healing them, the steady barrage on their defensive spot had reduced somewhat.

Tom looked at Everlyn for confirmation. “Did they get bored?”

“They’re monsters. My guess is one of the other teams got a kill and triggered the main pack to have a secondary target.”

The bow crackled into existence in her hands. She waited and then after two loud sounding explosions she stood up.

Crack.

She stepped to the side with another arrow on the bow.

Crack.

She dropped to her knees to get under cover. Multiple missiles exploded through the space she had been standing.

“Got their attention again.” Everlyn said with a grin as the detonations rapidly intensified back to their peak level. “Which means it’s the perfect time to leave.”

Everlyn led them down a crack that if Tom hadn’t spent the last few days exploring with her, he would have assumed it was a dead end.

The ground in this area was deceptively flat with the obvious upthrusts of rock every couple of hundred metres. Then there were the subtler features, abrupt chasms and ravines only ever three or four metres deep and a couple wide, which allowed smaller animals like the ferrets or humans to travel nearly unimpeded mostly below the skyline and larger creatures to leap across the terrain as if the small broken bits were not there.

Then there were the tunnels.

It was through these that Everlyn led him.

These were part of the aboveground space and each individual tunnel was on average only twenty metres long before they broke through to the surface once more. Often those gaps were not large enough for a human to exit but provided light, fresh air and a connection to the surface world and what was effectively a new underpass would radiate onwards. Tom followed Everlyn, crawling the gaps that would have been far more problematic if either of them had to carry weapons or a backpack. There were sounds of magic above them, so they both kept their mouths shut.

Both of them could easily imagine what would happen if one of those magic barrages were directed down into a tunnel they were using.

Everlyn stopped and twisted to face him and placed her hand on his. “System room.”

There was a shaft of sunlight ahead of them, so it was visible when the animation left her face.

Instantly, he stepped sideways into his system room.

Everlyn Louise Campbell has invited you to her personal system room.

Do you wish to accept the invitation?

Tom accepted and found himself standing in a room he hadn’t seen before. Initially, the walls were an opaque crystal, and then they shifted till the space visually resembled the cave they were physically occupying.

He whistled in appreciation. It was some time of virtual reality set up. “What’s this?”

“Something I purchased,” she said simply, “It’s tier three, and I deemed it necessary.” The view changed and morphed into a completely different area.

“It’s amazing. Great choice.”

Everlyn’s faced blossomed in joy. “Yes. It’s great. We’re going to get a lot of use out of it. Now business.” She waved at the surrounding view. “This tunnel exits into an area that looks like this. It’s a ravine that’s the size of a bus, so larger than most.”

“I remember it.”

“Exit paths,” she continued, highlighting them on the map. “You don’t want to go overland, so if you have to flee, then you use one of these. This is us.” A tunnel was highlighted and a spot in it flashed. “When we exit, I’m going to leave you here and then see if I can lure enemies to you. That gives you at least a couple of minutes to familiarise yourself with the other two exits, and then you need to pick an ambush location and hunker down.”

“Where do–”

“Impatient,” she interrupted him with a gentle admonishment. Six different spots were highlighted. “These are the ambush spots. They’re all large enough to fit you, and I don’t see any real difference between any of them. I’m going to lead a party through the ravine. Hopefully, from the south end of the ravine. If you have an opportunity, then ambush them. If there are too many, then hide.”

“Okay.”

“After your second fight you want to move to the secondary ambush location.” One of the exit paths flashed before the scenery changed to a larger space than previously.

“The escape tunnel exits here.” She continued matter of fact.

“I remember this one too.”

She ignored him. “Escape routes,” they flashed. “Ambush points.” Only two spots were highlighted this time. “After four ambushes or if it gets hot retreat the way you came. If it’s safe otherwise take any other exit and I’ll find you.”

The skill Everlyn had bought was impressive. “This is.”

“Sorry Tom,” she interrupted him again. “We don’t have time. The longjoules are larger than us. They can’t follow us through the ferret tunnels, but be wary of these two tunnels.” They flashed. “We left them open for speed and the enemy might pursue, so be careful.” She stopped and studied him. “What do you want to say?”

“Good Jo–”

He was kicked out of the system room. Everlyn leant forward to give him a semi-hysterical hug and a passionate kiss. “Be safe.”

Then she turned and almost sprinted out of the tunnel before Tom could say anything, but he guessed her approach made sense. They had to kill the monsters to protect those currently weaker than them. Everlyn taking charge was the right play. She was better at memorising the bolt holes than he was and possessed the stealth skills to keep her alive and ranged attacks to ensure the longjoules couldn’t ignore her. He only had his magic and brawn.

With a shake of his head, he crawled out of the tunnel and emerged in an area that was identical to the first scene she had shown him in the system room. The light was not the same, the shadows in different places, but the physical layout was indistinguishable. Tom could imagine future hunts and understood how valuable a skill that let a scout show the terrain she had seen truly was.

“Two minutes,” he reminded himself, and then moved hurriedly to check the exits. One was hidden under a carpet of flowing moss. If he hadn’t known about it, then there was no way he would have noticed it. The second was a hole in the ground both of them in the exact spot she had promised. When they had traversed this area together just two days ago, Everlyn had been focused on taking him to the tunnels that required alterations. They had rushed through this ravine, which meant she must have found and explored these tunnels on a different day.

He eyed the hole in the ground and knew he needed to test it. Simple stuff, like knowing which direction to land could save his life. Immediately, he lowered himself over the hole and dropped.

The fall was almost two metres, and he bent his knees to absorb the impact. He grunted as the force of the drop went through him with his left knee that had landed on a higher rock on the right, twinging in pain. Automatically he healed the damage and his improvement was obvious when he only needed two points of mana to fix the damaged cartilage. His growing vitality was paying dividends. Professionally, he confirmed the angle the tunnel exited at and then climbed out of the hole. His questing hands found hand holds as he flexed Earth Manipulation. More cheats that made life easier. He wasn’t anywhere near where he got in the tutorial, but at least he was closing the gap.

Once back under the sky, he chose the ambush spot with the largest amount of rock around it and then settled down. The chameleon sheet folded over him with its slow working magic kicking in to let him blend in across all the electromagnetic spectrums. It would take a minute to adjust fully to the environment, but he had the time.

Tom went through a checklist of all the spells and skills he had available. Then he set about recharging his mana crystal. His lesser lightning elemental was getting to the end of his contract.

Hide for a hundred metres and then kill. He imagined the longjoules as he gave the instructions.

The creature flashed away. Hopefully, it would get a kill, but this engagement was not one it was suited to.

Now all there was to do was wait.