It turned out that Lily and her two pirate companions were probably going to find out a bit more of what had become of Zoe regardless of whether they wanted to. A full battle was raging just outside the exit of the caverns. It seemed to have started on the ledge above the pit and worked its way backwards down the rocky slope.

As the healer shuddered and Lily prepared herself to fight again, she realized that there was strangely no sign of Zoe. Instead of being a one-versus-everyone-else frenzy, there were roughly equally numerous forces battling on both sides.

Which sides those were, Lily wasn’t quite sure. Well, one of them was the Four Cannons — the pirates — but as for the others…

Lily ducked as a beige-camouflaged body soured overhead, crashing into the boulder just behind her. The rest of the attackers were dressed similarly, clearly being well organized and well prepared for this particular terrain.

“You two might want to go back inside and hide,” she said to the healer and the little man accompanying her. Neither one waited a moment before dashing back into the slit between the rocks. Conjuring a small vortex of ice shards around herself, Lily sighed. This didn’t look like a fight that was going to go well.

Creeping forward, Lily impaled one of the attackers with her spear just as she was about to behead one of the more poorly equipped pirates. Of course, that same pirate was then impaled through the chest from behind — but hey, at least Lily had taken out one of the enemy.

Unfortunately, a pair of the attackers noticed her at that point. Raising their rifles, they took aim. It took them just long enough for her to roll away behind a hastily covered ice wall. That should hold them. Lily hadn’t been quick enough to analyze them, but she doubted they would be strong enough to get through such a barrier.

Her assessment changed when twin beams of shimmering, ionized air carved straight through the ice, narrowly missing her shoulder and striking the ground several paces away. Where the beams did so, the rocks reddened and then cracked.

Each shot only lasted about a second, but it left Lily rattled. As she crawled away to safety behind a low lying boulder nearby, she tried to rationalize what she had just seen.

Those were high energy heat rays. From RIFLES.

She had never seen heat magic that advanced on this world — at least not in the context of artifice. Who the fuck are these people? Lily needed more information, but she was already leaping to the conclusion that they were either offworlders like herself or were being supplied by some.

But that would be a MAJOR breach of protocol. Any group powerful and privy enough to do this would never risk the consequences something like this would cause.

As explosions rang out and shrapnel flew over her head, Lily groaned into her hands. It’s Zoe again, isn’t it. This is getting fucking ridiculous. It was so absurd that Lily actually considered uncloaking again. With the help of the captain and his four lieutenants, she would be able to easily turn the tide of the battle and clean these assholes up neatly. She would even be able to interrogate some of them. Surely doing so in circumstances like this would be justified.

It would certainly hold up in most corporate courts — as Xephra, she knew that well enough. Unfortunately, uncloaking now would ruin the rest of her mission here. This was obviously something incredibly serious, but she also needed to be prepared to do even more work on this world.

Damnit! Why can’t decisions like this be easy?

Resolving to uncloak if things got too bad, Lily rose from her position while conjuring her sword. If I run out of mana I’m fucking doing it.

And with that, she marched out to join the slaughter.

The pirates had been dying in droves. Analyzing the attackers revealed that almost none of them were above level sixty, but they were so much better equipped and trained that it wasn’t even close. Fortunately, they weren’t able to so easily take on the four high level lieutenants.

The archmage and gunsmith were on the left side of the battlefield while the wind dancer and flame brand were on the right side — her side. Each pair was grouped together, working to not only fend off the attackers but to even push them back. A few others had survived, but not many. These lucky few now seemed to be focusing on their own survival rather than helping out.

As for the captain, he was nowhere to be found. Lily doubted that he had died — no, he was probably either fleeing or preparing something.

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As Lily made her way to the flame brand and wind dancer pair, she assassinated two of the attackers on her way. Her colossal, frozen sword cleaved straight through them no matter what the angle of the attack. If they hadn’t both died instantly, a paralyzing chill would have rapidly set in, ensuring a swift death.

Well, Lily couldn’t quite think of it as assassination. She wasn’t exactly trying to be stealthy — both women had just been so focused on the more powerful opponents in front of them that they hadn’t been aware of the ice mage’s approach until it was too late.

With a swipe of her sword, Lily created a shimmering barrier of frost to deflect another head ray. Reflecting off of the magical barrier, it bounced straight into the chest of another one of the attackers, killing him instantly. Lily smirked. That wasn’t an ability that she could ordinarily use, but her powerful sword art allowed many fantastic techniques.

It was a shame it constantly drew so much mana.

The flame brand nodded to her as she joined up with him and the wind dancer. None of them spoke a word, instead focusing on taking out their opponents. The trio instinctively moved forward in a spear point formation. The flame brand took the lead, charging forward with fist and flames while Lily and the other woman flanked him slightly behind, cutting down any and all who came into their path.

Lily was quite pleased that these two were far better trained than the majority of the pirates had been. She was also pleased that she was able to match the output of the wind dancer who was forty levels higher than her. Granted, that was only because of her powerful sword art. While the other woman would pretty much always be this strong, Lily could only sustain this for a few minutes at most.

At least while cloaked, anyway.

Strangely, it seemed that the attackers were now focusing on moving back up the slope. Sure, they were still fighting back against the trio’s advance — but the majority of them were now on the move and only fighting them defensively.

Were they retreating, or something else?

Briefly glancing to the side, Lily’s eyes widened as she saw the archmage rip out a man’s mana and sent it spiraling into the chest of the woman next to him, killing both in an instant. Lily whistled. Even if she were to uncloak, either of those attacks could have done near fatal damage to her.

Better keep on THAT one’s good side, she thought.

Soon, they came to the top of the boulderous slope. A few of the beige attackers were taking the brunt of their fivefold assault, holding them off for now. But the majority were facing the other direction, firing indiscriminately at something ahead of them. Lily grimaced. She was about to be out of the fight — her mana was down to ten percent.

One particular man stood atop the left cliff, aiming what Lily immediately recognized as an annihilation repeater down at whatever they were fighting. Streaks of ghastly white streaked down, pummeling it with raw annihilation.

Lily realized that her mouth was hanging open. One, she was now absolutely certain that these people were being supplied by offworlders — no one here even knew about annihilation.

And two, just what the hell were they trying to put down that a fucking annihilation repeater hadn’t obliterated in one shot?

The gunner’s head exploded.

Whatever it was had thrown a rock so hard and so fast that it had blow the level fifty-nine man’s head clean off.

Lily’s mana ran out.

Cursing, she ducked back behind the other two as she tried to figure out what to do. Her sword evaporated, and she was now pretty much defenseless. At the same time, the beige-uniformed attackers were now being pushed back. Retreating, they found themselves being slaughtered by the captain’s four elite while trying to distance themselves from whatever they had been trying to kill.

At the same time, Lily realized that the airship that had been beating its rotors overhead for some time now was both lowering itself down and rotating into a new position. Placing its broadside facing them, it seemed to take aim.

Lily gulped. There were a lot of nasty looking offworld weapons attached to it.

But it didn’t fire on them. Instead, the now-panicked crowd of former attackers split, and a very angry, very scary looking four-armed, black-scaled monster pushed through, casually eviscerating several people as it did so.

Zoe.

Lily gulped again. Or at least what’s left of her. She still had the same keen, crimson eyes. They shone with a feral intelligence — crazed and hungry, yes, but still showing a shine of cleverness.

Lily began to feel her sweat. She didn’t know how much of Zoe was left — but it was clear that this particular abomination wasn’t just strong… it was smart.

A harpoon erupted through its chest.

The maybe-Zoe screeched, grabbing at the protruding hook with her two lower arms while backing up. Lily blinked. She’s backing up instead of pulling against it. Making the line go slack so that she has more control.

But then the line whipped tight, and the ship began to rise at a frightening rate. The corrupted Zoe thing wailed and writhed in the air, trying desperately to free herself, but she was truly stuck.

Sounds of battle resumed, and Lily collapsed to shaking knees. The airship continued to ascend. Streaking forward at an exceptional pace, it began to disappear into the sky — abomination still dangling — even as the battle continued.

Now it was the attacker’s turn to be slaughtered. Within a minute, dozens had been reduced to none. Lily continued sitting on the ground. There was just too much to process.

A hand caressed her shoulder. Flinching, Lily looked up and saw the archmage — Zora — peering down at her. “Come on,” Zora said, “let’s go find your other friend.” Hauling Lily to her feet, the archmage pushed her forward. “Come on, no use being all pathetic like that.”

“What… then?” Lily managed to choke out. The mana deprivation was really starting to hurt her head.

Zora grinned. “I liked your demon friend — so let’s just say I’m not happy either about her getting poached like that. Unfortunately, I have no idea where they’ll go.” The archmage paused as the pair stumbled back down the rocky slope. “So now? We hunt.”