“Make time for it!” berated my instructor as she pummeled me under an endless barrage. “You need to survive long enough to hit back— if you don’t have an opening, then create the time for one dammit!”
“Easier said than done!” I yelled, barely managing to block her swings. In an instant she pulled back, spinning the blade in a circle around her body with increasing speed. In a wild attempt at defense I twisted my weapon vertically before me, unsure of where she was going to strike from. That’s when I was able to notice it— for less than a second her blade held still on her right, long enough for me to notice. But she was one step ahead.
At that moment the twirling blade formed into a deadly lunge aimed straight for center mass, and as I went to block the incoming attack just a few inches from my chest, her bladework shifted a second time.
“A feint!?”
Before I knew it, Hanna’s whole body was low to the ground, one heel plowed into the sand while the other shot a kick right against my shoulder, launching me into the air and my sword onto the shore some hundred feet to my right. It seemed that I— like my weapon— had a habit of always finishing on the ground.
“Can you pull your punches please?” I asked, massaging the heavily bruised shoulder. Hanna propped the blade across the back of her neck, her eyebrows furrowing in a mix of annoyance and recognition. It didn’t last long, however, as the feelings left alongside a deep, deep sigh.
“I told you, real combat doesn't have any breaks.” she reiterated, “and considering your fighting style you won’t last long enough in battle to be useful if you don’t survive in the first place.” I stood up, walking to the edge of the shore to retrieve my weapon as Hanna followed close. “To any Resonators you deploy with, you’ll be more helpful as a fighter. Not a martyr.”
The brightness of the white night sky made it difficult to find the steel forged weapon amongst the silver sand. Though I’d only just begun seeing the moon of this world, I was absolutely breath-taken at how radiant its light was. Like snow beneath a clear winter sky, but unlike any I ever saw before.
Because the reflected light had a very real argent tint.
“Do you see it?”
Hanna swept her gaze across the shore before snapping her fingers. At her call, a small burst of vermillion flame illuminated the coast, briefly returning color to the world before fading away as if it never existed at all.
She bent down just a few feet to our left, handing me the glimmering blade.
“Thanks.” I said, sweeping off bits of sand off of the cloth-wrapped grip.
“That’s why you need to focus on consistency.” she said, ignoring my comment. “We found your specialization, but it’s up to you to exploit it. It’s a good thing I brought a spare sword otherwise we’d have been back in the Redoubt by now.”
I looked back to the sandy dunes, knowing they held the remains of a sword splintered in two. No, that wasn’t right; it was more like it fragmented into pieces as fine as the sand itself.
I squinted as faint rays of blue light broke through the clouds, hitting me in the eyes and interrupting my train of thought.
“Ah, damn!” she said, shielding her eyes. “Have we really been out here all night?”
“You sound surprised. I’m thankful for the training, but you’re pretty merciless when it comes to it.”
“You’re welcome for that, and of course I’d be surprised! I can’t remember the last time…haaah, whatever.”
She crouched down, collecting the last of the equipment we came with as I watched as the early morning sun illuminate her back, gradually dispelling the silver world in faint hues of blue and gold.
“Come on,” she said, climbing over the dunes. “We need to head back.”
I followed without a word, climbing behind her before a splash of color flashed across my eye. In the distance, revealed by the rising sun, I could finally make out the scattered remains of a steel sword. Dark, jagged lines of dry red streaked the metal and sand, and guilt washed over me all over again as I recognized it as being Hanna’s— from when I broke through her defense.
I sighed, remembering her taunts at my being worried. Even if she was relieved at being right about my ability, I’d like to find some way to make it up to her.
Assuming, with this newfound ability, I live long enough to do so.
* * * * *
My sagging eyes scanned the entirety of the well-furnished Commons— my worries had shifted from finding the dining hall, to now finding a place where I’d be able to eat in relative peace. I stopped at seeing a small table partitioned off in the corner— one with a lone redheaded girl nibbling on her fork in silence. I smiled at my grievance— pulling an all-nighter is still a bad idea even in another world, but small mercies like this made it bearable.
“Good morning.” I slurred.
“Oh, Anon! Good…morning?” The lively greeting turned into soft as Lia looked at her wrist, lifting her eyes in sympathy. “Anon……it’s late afternoon.”
I straightened my posture, trying to rub the fatigue out my eyes.
“Right, I guess I lost track of the time……hah, sorry about that.”
Lia stared at me in surprise before an impish laugh escaped the smile she politely tried to hide behind a bandaged hand. “There are bags under your eyes.”
“I was half hoping the nanobots would be able to fix them.” I wearily smiled back.
“They will. But I take it you didn’t listen to my advice and trained with Hanna until late?”
“That’s exactly what happened,” said a young girl with dark brown hair as she slammed her tray of food down beside me. She had a satisfied smile on her face— one full of energy despite the fact her eyes looked equally as tired. I thought it looked as if she was already used to it.
Despite her tone, she was used to sleepless nights.
“You seem awfully chipper for someone who trained for an entire night.”
I was about to ask how she knew we had been training in the first place, but Hanna was faster. “Because I’ll be damned if I still don’t got it as a trainer,” she huffed, crossing her arms with a proud look.
“Got…it?”
“I figured out the last piece of the puzzle I was missing thanks to Hanna. My own fighting style, the one I focus on honing.”
“That’s wonderful!”
“Don’t get ahead of yourself, kid.” she said, looking at Lia despite her words being directed towards me. “You need to focus on fighting as a whole. Specialization won’t do you any good if you can’t hold your own in the first place.”
“But it’s a step in the right direction.” Lia said, bringing her palms together. “You’ll get there Anon; it’s a difficult thing but Hanna is a wonderful teacher.”
“I just did it cause I thought the newbie clearly needs the help, don’t go giving him ideas I’m a saint or something!”
Lia put a finger to her chin. “But you said so yourself, no? If I recall during our fight with the Rogue, Anon mentioned you said something about being the ‘second best Resonator’ to guide him into—”
“—that happened ages ago! Why do you even remember stuff like that!?”
“Did you expect me to forget it?”
As I finally dug into the food in front of me, a bleak looking mush of nutrients and hard crackers, I couldn’t help but stifle a laugh from their banter. It wouldn’t get any of us any closer to a world without Outsiders, but it was a comforting reminder— this place was a home as well.
“Anon was that…a prayer?” Lia asked, noting my unclasping hands.
“Mmm…I guess it was.”
“Hoh? I didn’t know you were religious.” Hanna said, letting go of Lia’s shirt from across the table and sitting properly.
“I wasn’t always but…I guess I found my way back to it.”
“That makes three of you in this Redoubt, whatever helps you sleep at night I guess but……out of curiosity, I want to ask you something.”
“If it’s about the robes the other two have, I wouldn’t be against wearing some.”
She ignored my comment, resting her hand against her temple.
“Would God send you to a place like this?”
“Hanna, that’s…”
I closed my eyes, noting that while Lia might have found the question rude, she was also interested in an answer; I was painfully aware of their eyes boring through me, making sure I didn’t accidentally falter in my sleep deprived state. It was only after a few long moments that I opened my eyes, deciding on the honest truth.
“I’m not sure.” I admitted. “The only thing I can say is that it’s more meaningful than anything I was doing with my old life; back then I didn’t do much that had an impact. So whether it’s better to live a meaningful life forced on me, or die an unfulfilled one of my own choosing…I don’t know which is better.”
“A meaningful life……”
“Hmmmm…” said Hanna, her pupils narrowing alongside the hum of her voice. “I feel like you weaseled your way out of that one.”
“Ahaha, well either way I…I don’t think it was a mistake I ended up here.” I said, trying to navigate the subject I never spoke of aloud, though I could feel my brows furrow at a sudden realization. “Actually……doesn't the Resonance prove that souls exist, since our abilities are based on them?”
“Yup, like a Lasher through a net.”
“I know what you mean!”
We both turned to Lia, whose eyes went wide at the fact she spoke louder than intended. We stared as she took a deep breath to steady herself— still eager to continue.
“Sorry it’s just, I know what you mean. About being here. It’s true that we never did and won’t have it easy but…I take pride in the fact it’s something only we can do— need to do. It couldn’t be anyone else, if not us.”
“Lia…” Hanna said in almost a whisper.
“It reminded me of when I first arrived. When I first became a Resonator.”
Hanna stared unblinkingly for moments that felt like hours before speaking.
“Is that—”
“—aah, ‘scuse me is…is anyone sitting here?”
We turned at the sudden yawning voice, mumbling through every word she spoke— a voice belonging to a girl with an almost frightening appearance, stunning the three of us.
“A-Annika!” stammered Lia as the girl took our silence for confirmation, sliding into the seat next to Hanna. “Are you alright? What happened?”
The only member of Skull Beach’s Engineering Corps was, to put it lightly, disheveled. One of her signature low-hanging twintails was tied up with a thin strand of copper wire, though that mattered little since her hair had scattered in every direction anyway. The frizz and split ends did a good job at hiding the soot and oil staining her skin and clothes, most of which had some kind of hole in them. Either she didn’t seem to mind, or was too tired to notice; the latter seemingly more likely given her eyes were like a raccoon, and she’d yawned four times within the brief minute of joining us.
“Iyaah,” she said, awkwardly scratching the back of her head. “I like being in the Engineering Corps, but the thing is we’re super shorthanded right now and my bro-bots can only automate so much. Oh not that I’m not grateful for them! Without their help I’d probably already be dead hahaha.”
The silence following her half-serious joke was deafening.
“What’s going on that you have so much work?”
“Ohh, Anon, good morning there! Quite a bit if I do say so myself.” she said, unaware it was far past morning. I suddenly understood Lia’s sympathetic gaze towards me from earlier. “There’ve been a lot more projects, but lately the ESDF has really clamped down on how to reverse engineer the warp drive from Rebekah’s home world. That, or how to reverse the transferral process in order to go to her original planet— High Command figures the humans there could really lend us a hand.”
“Damn, they’ve been at that for a while. No luck huh?”
“I-I don’t think ESDF understands my forte…” she said, depressingly putting down a glass of dark orange liquid. Her wobbling balance caused more than a few splashes to run down the sides before suddenly— “Does High Command get that I’m an engineer and not a researcher!?”
“Annika, your voice is a little—”
“I build Slayers, enhance their weapons! I constructed turrets with precise biological detection fields and even contributed to the serum that acts on the Resonators’ autonomic nervous system by means of the nanobots!”
“Doesn't that last part qualify as research?”
“Do you know how long it took me to do that?! Yet, and yet, the ESDF doesn't seem to know the difference between any of them! Do they know how difficult it is to reverse engineer a device without any leads? Without blueprints? I even tried tracking Rebekah’s Resonance thinking it could lead somewhere, but nothing! Squat! And their designated R and D department isn’t doing much better— why even put me on the job if they have an R and D department!?”
“Annika, let’s not get too worked up. You must be tired after all, and I’m sure they appreciate all your hard work, as we do.”
“Haaah, Lia thank you~!” she said, slumping across the table. She reminded me of a puppy in the middle of summer, stretched out across the table like a melted puddle.
This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.
“By the way Anon,” she said, somewhat calmer now that she had properly vented. “I’ve been needing to tell you— something weird happened to Even during your last deployment. Well, ESDF didn’t seem to think it was important, but I’ve been working on a side project cause of it! Well, it also helps relieve my stress ehehe~.”
Those unexpected words caused me to sit up. A side project?
“What happened?”
“Well, when it came back from battle, the conn…ec…tion……”
The shade in our isolated corner of the room suddenly turned a deep shade of plum purple, the lights emanating from Hanna’s bracelet, as well as—
“—A-Annika, calm down! Please don’t cry, I’m sure you’ll get another break so— y-you’re tears are spreading the soot across your face!”
As Lia comforted the engineer whose defeated smile matched her tears-turned-sludge, I listened intently to Hanna’s muttering as she got up, biting chunks off what looked like a fruit as she marched towards the hangar.
“Hanna!” I said, managing to walk beside her. “What’s going on? You look near as bad as when you went off to help Lia.”
“They found it.”
“Found what?!”
She didn’t respond as she stood to one side of Annika’s workstation, the girl in question stumbling into place as she instantly pulled up holographic files, making quick work of absorbing all the information. I didn’t see Lia anywhere.
“The trail is…back?”
“Where? Who else is deploying?”
“It looks like…Machina and Meridia are going too. ESDF seems to have created an alternate entrance just outside the Redoubt, based on initial speleological readings.”
“Annika, what trail, what’s going on? Is it an Endbringer?”
“It’s the trail from Fiametta’s group.” she explained, biting her bottom lip. “Most of the data they sent back was too corrupted to read, but Ildefons managed to record part of it manually on his bracelet before his injuries made him shift his focus to retreat.”
“His…injuries…?”
Now that I thought about it…wasn’t Ildefons’ name missing from the living quarters? And I hadn’t heard anything about how their mission went either.
Come to think of it…I haven’t seen or heard of any of them since waking up.
“What…happened?”
“We can’t make out a whole lot, but there seem to have been small ‘paths’ of Resonance underground that led into congregated quantities. What’s interesting is, when mapped out, the large portions corresponded to—”
“I mean with the group! What happened to Fiametta, Juan, Ildefons?”
“Oh I…” she said, taking her hands off the table and looking nervously to Hanna, “I thought you heard already so I…”
“Heard about wh—”
“Kid, I told you this would happen. He’s gone. Don’t dwell on it.” Hanna interrupted before turning her attention back to the displayed files. “This is mainly a recon mission. I’ll get the other two, we should move fast so we don’t miss anything.”
The way she dismissed his death so easily…of course she told me this would happen. Of course I was told from the first day this would happen.
But hearing it was…scary. I felt I was hallucinating her words. By the time I registered her words, she had already begun making her way towards the Slayer bays.
“Hanna,” I called out, “I……………come back okay.”
She didn’t turn towards me, but I could feel her hesitation. Whether the exhale I heard was hers, or a distant machine’s, I didn’t know. But in a confident tone, or perhaps a mocking one, she huffed.
“Of course. I still owe you for Lia and need to teach you how to land after all.”
With that, her petite figure disappeared among the machinery. But I didn’t dwell on it. Instead, I felt my feet pull me towards the medical bay. I couldn’t say whether I ran or walked there. Time seemed to have a method of melting away, preventing me from controlling my muscles as they slammed open each door of the recovery ward until finding the one I needed.
“May I help you?”
My breathing was heavy— I guess I ran here after all.
A woman in a pale blue outfit was the first and only one to greet me. I wasn’t surprised, considering the only other people in the room were in their respective beds, eyes closed shut, without so much as a blink.
“How……are they okay?”
She gave me a curious look; I couldn’t tell if it was disapproval or simple befuddlement, but she stopped writing on her clipboard. Maybe my emotions were leaking out more than I thought, but I felt she sensed my unease, and finally relented.
“They’re still unconscious, however the man has shown signs of elevated brain activity. As for the woman…it’s difficult to say. Nanobots are a life-saving technology, but they can’t heal brain death. Quite ironic I suppose.”
“I see…and the other man? Ildefons?”
She frowned, but relented with a soft exhalation. With a quick glance through her notes, she met my eyes. “He was pronounced dead shortly after arriving from his mission. I’m told his injuries were too severe to be stabilized, that these two were the lucky ones. I believe it was the Resonator Chelsea that acted quick enough to save them both…well, to keep them alive at least.”
“Is that so……thank you.”
The woman nodded, scooting past me and leaving the simple sound of heartbeat monitors to fill in the silence. I clenched my fist.
Had I gone instead of Ildefons, I…I……!
……………………………
……would it really have been any different?
My fist began unwinding— my anger subsiding as my frustration grew.
Yes, it would have been different. Had I gone instead, maybe both Fiametta and Juans would have died in that unknown tunnel. No, that’s definitely what would’ve happened. Maybe the only reason they survived is because it was Ildefons that went.
Maybe it was that, had it been anyone else, the worst possible result would have occurred.
I walked towards the unconscious duo, watching the steady rise and fall of their gaunt chests. Even Fiametta’s little trail of flame was dimly wrapped around her neck, barely noticeable. I bit the inside of my cheek.
Just how unavoidable was misfortune? To make someone immortal, only to replace that certainty of death by old age with death by combat. Hanna never even mentioned Ildefons’ name, and neither did the nurse, in referring to Fiametta and Juans.
I began marching out of the room, briefly glancing back after thinking I heard someone speak but…they were my own thoughts, more than likely. My desire to see either of them not just alive, but well. Navigating the hallways, I knew exactly where I was going this time.
I surprised myself by reaching the spacious training room in record time, quickly grabbing a sword off of a rack dispensing them and marching straight for the door Hanna utilized last night. I put my pupil before the same narrow hole, flinching in brief pain as the purple light shot into my cornea. And following through to the end of the hexagonal hallway, I covered my eyes as I found myself in the outside world once more.
It was daylight now, but the sky remained thick with broken clouds like shards of ceramic; I paid it little mind as I made my way across the wind-swept dunes, lost in thought, collecting and tossing away stones as I headed for the shore. To my own surprise, it only took a handful of minutes to reach it…that or my mind had wandered so much to the point time was irrelevant. My aim, thankfully, wasn’t the lengthy and beautiful shore that emerged as I climbed over the final dune, but the enormous structure that caught my attention earlier in the day.
Loose earth gradually became solid beneath my boots— stone was easier to climb than sand after all, and only became easier as the incline lessened, finally ending at a sharp, jagged point. I couldn’t help but feel the drop was every cliff-diver’s dream— both because of the water below, and the view before me.
The ocean, touching past the horizon, the color an unnerving shade of deep gray and navy. Its waves crashed against the notch beneath me, eroding the stone and spreading mist into the air.
“Hm…it’s not saltwater.” I said, licking the moisture off my lips. I had never heard of an ocean made entirely of freshwater, I didn’t even know that was possible. A smile spread across my face before I knew it. The unthinkable seemed to be a common thing here, and I still wasn’t used to it despite it being nearly a week.
Droplets from a large wave brought me back to my senses, and with sword in hand I began carving out a small hole near the side of the cliff, just deep enough to fit a stone barely larger than my hand. The letters etched by the unwieldy blade were far from perfect, but in time there was a legible name just beneath the stone.
I stepped back, taking a look at the imperfect headstone; I didn’t feel satisfied with it in the slightest. Not because the work was defective as a monument, nor because no one would remember Ildefons, but…simply because there was nothing to feel accomplished of. This was just something that had to be done.
“It’s the very least you’ve earned…to be remembered here, if nowhere else.”
“Here.” I thought to myself.
And where was here exactly? The ocean bearing witness to the name carved atop this cliff? In time it would erode the name away, as it does to the rocks below. So what does it mean to be remembered ‘here’? The dead are…
“This doesn't look like another prayer.” startled a familiar voice behind me. To my own gratitude, I didn’t flinch even though I was surprised. Maybe I was starting to get used to life as a Resonator after all.
“It isn’t. The dead are gone, their souls somewhere far away.” I said. “You can’t pray for the dead…but you can remember them.”
“Anon…”
I turned to the girl in question. Gusts of damp wind swept her salmon colored hair to the left, long strands plastered across her eyes and cheeks. But she made no effort to remove them. She walked closer, taking in the pitiful excuse of a memorial.
“Were you close with Ildefons? I don’t recall you ever speaking with him…”
“No, I never did, and I wasn’t really close to him either. It’s just……I can’t stand the thought of someone being forgotten.”
“What do you mean?”
I took a deep breath, weighing if I really wanted to burden Lia with my thoughts. What finally made me decide wasn’t the fact she asked, but the way she viewed the headstone…with genuine feeling. I thought back to my first day here, when she didn’t tell Hanna or myself about the Rogue; if I wanted to know her thoughts as well, it was only right that I start by letting her know my own.
“In my world, there’s a saying that people die twice. The first time is when their heart and body cease to function…and the second is when nobody speaks their name anymore. For me, I can’t stand the thought of someone being forgotten…because it’s just too sad.”
She stood next to me, grabbing the upper part of her arm. Maybe it was an attempt to fight the chill brought by the waves. Maybe it was for comfort.
“Did you have someone close to you…who was forgotten?”
“That’s the thing, Lia. I didn’t.” She looked at me like I’d spoken a foreign language, but I continued. “In my old world I wasn’t close to anyone, but I wasn’t an outcast either. I was outside everyone’s view, but never far enough to where I’d be isolated. I was with those who were normal and the ones considered outcasts, but with neither could I be called a brother. So when I constantly failed in my goals and tried looking behind me…”
I sighed. “Well, it’d be unfair to say I didn’t have my mother and father, thankfully, but it’d be wrong to rely on them forever.”
“So you made a memorial for Ildefons because you didn’t want to be forgotten?”
“It’s the opposite.” I said, stepping back from the headstone. “It’s fine if it’s me, but seeing it happen to someone, anyone, else…it’s too sad to watch them slip away from memory.”
We waited in silence for what seemed like a few minutes. I looked to the girl beside me, her white and pink uniform was wet from the mist and constant crashing of the waves, but none of it seemed to penetrate the fabric. If Resonators were to have a uniform, it’d make sense for them to withstand every type of environment.
“There’s a saying in this world when it comes to Resonators. ‘The flower does not demand the cloud, only its rain.’”
“I haven’t seen any flowers in this world.”
She smiled. “Only the fruits of protection our lives produce are important. While that sounds bad, it’s the undeniable truth, and it’s because of that truth that most Resonators really do forget.”
“It feels like you haven’t.”
“You’re right.”
All of a sudden, Lia’s face became shrouded in shadow as she turned away, beckoning me to follow as she slowly descended the rocky incline. Even when our feet touched the sand, following along the shoreline, she didn’t meet my eyes.
“I have to live in the present if I have any hope of saving anyone. But I’ve never forgotten the people that have brought me here.” Lia said, stopping her feet. “Hanna tries, and I’m afraid one day she will. Ever since that day. Ever since Akane.”
I stopped right behind her. Strewn across the beach were various swords, weights, pieces of equipment and some of the sand was even charred black for some reason. I didn’t pay any of it any mind, given the words she just spoke.
No. Because of the name.
“The Resonator that arrived around when you did, three years ago. The other Empathetic Connect holder, that was her name?”
She simply nodded. “Do you know what I was doing here?”
I remained focused on Lia, but looked around us, figuring that her question must have something to do with what she was saying.
“It’s all training equipment…like the ones Hanna and I found.”
Lia bent down, picking up a single edged blade while turning to face me.
“The reason I went to fight that Rogue alone, you see, is because I’m weak in close quarters combat. I went to test how far I’d come along, and clearly it wasn’t far enough.” she swung the blade in a beautiful arc above her head, air blowing the sand in a circle as she stopped inches above it. But she was right. After having seen Hanna and even Chelsea’s swordplay, it was obvious to even an amaeteur like me that Lia was leagues below them.
“But your speciality is in long-distance combat. What does that have to do with Akane?”
“Because she was the type to sacrifice everything for the people close to her. In the end she…” Lia bit the bottom of her lip, her knuckles turning white from her grip on the sword. “…her burden was too much. If I had been a little better at fighting, a little stronger when they needed me to be, a little more skilled with a sword to stand beside them, then she wouldn’t have needed to face so much alone. She—”
‘She might still be alive.’ Those were the unsung words hanging from her guilt.
“I’ve never before or since seen someone smile like she did when she saw her Slayer for the first time, and knew she could fight for this world. Like she was just…really proud to be here.”
Lia’s guilt as a friend, colliding with her pride as a Resonator. A protector.
She…was one of the few to remember. I couldn’t help but smile.
What a bona fide hero.
“Lia, I think—”
“Forgive me Anon, but I selfishly knew you’d be out here today.” she interrupted. “I came on purpose, because I knew you’d be here. I saw you as well…and wanted to ask for your help.”
“Saw me?”
She pointed at the ocean. I squinted my eyes in disbelief, and tried rubbing them when the small approaching obstacle came closer to the shore.
“Is that…a raft?”
“Miss Liiiiaa!” waved a young, pale girl with dull red hair and freckles. Lia walked closer to the shore as I followed, and upon reaching shallow water the young girl lobbed herself out— water splashing around her hole-ridden pants as she collapsed into Lia’s arms.
“M-Miss Lia thankoodness you’re here! We needyour help-!cause it hasn’t stopped chasingusand the chiefand tribe and—!”
“Faylin, calm down, I know. I saw it. Let’s get away from the shore for now and you can tell me what you mean by ‘chasing’ you.”
“Lia, what’s going on? Who is this person?”
“I’ll explain later, but right now on your…Anon, where’s your vest?!”
“What vest?”
“The one you put on before leaving the Redoubt! No, it’s too late, grab on—!”
———————————————————————————————————————
“Machina, what do you mean it’s congregating?!”
“It’s exactly what it sounds like, the readings on my Slayer can’t be wrong. It’s flowing behind us, collecting into a single spot.”
“Likewise, mine says the same thing.” agreed the third Resonator, standing in a rather spacious cavern. It was unlike anywhere any of them had ever been, appearing nothing like a normal cave.
But that mattered little to Hanna.
“Gch. I thought the models we got from Annika were an accurate prediction of the trail’s movement.”
“If I can voice my own thoughts here…” said the boy inside the Slayer Module, “I took a look at some of Annika’s data from the attack, and these readings look remarkably similar to the state of the Redoubt before all hell broke loose.”
“The Resonance trails moving and collecting? Wait, don’t tell me…!”
“Given our own distance from the Redoubt and the speed of the Resonance’s movement, we can correlate the collecting mass of it in the caverns to the area above ground.”
“Where—!?” yelled the pink Slayer through the radio. “What’s the area above where the Resonance is collecting?!”
———————————————————————————————————————
Lia grabbed myself and the girl, hitting a button on her vest that suddenly yanked us in the direction of the Redoubt. But a sudden eruption of light blew us right into a dune, the force of it great enough that Faylin and I were knocked out of her grip, Lia’s cries quickly becoming faint as the vest forced her to retreat into Skull Beach.
Heat was the first thing I felt as I spit sand out of my mouth. Even with the dunes blocking much of the light, I had to squint and cover my eyes as a hand grasped the back of my suit.
“It’s here…” whimpered the girl. My eyes adjusted enough to finally make out the shape on the beach’s shore— a colossal, humanoid figure, its entire being made of scorching flame. “The fire demon…Ifnielis.”