As Axel charged into combat with the axe wielder, he slammed the spear tip of his halberd into the chest, but it was blocked by the axe user's shield. The axe wielder’s weapon glowed softly and chopped at Axel's weapon. Seeing this, Axel shifted his center of balance and yanked his weapon to the right, using his strength and anchoring his feet with gravity to throw his opponent to the side, ruining the attack. Even with this, Axel felt his halberd vibrate painfully in his hand, making it hard to hold.

The axe user tumbled with the momentum, dislodging the spear tip from his shield. The shield was cracked and didn't look like it would take many more attacks, but Axel noticed a gouge in the shaft of his halberd from that glancing blow.

Behind Axel’s now tumbling opponent, he saw that Lyra and Sky were struggling to keep up with the spear user, who kept trying to bypass Lyra to attack Sky with fast and quick strikes. Lyra must have been pushing her core as her sword parried attack after attack to give Sky time to attack with small spikes that didn't seem to hit. Then, out of the corner of Axel’s eye, he saw white and locked his feet with gravity as a blast hit him, trying to fling him across the room. Seeing his opponent flung to a wall as he was just returning to his feet, Axel looked over to Aria’s fight to see the fireball dissipating against a shield of blue flames. Aria was looking winded after such a short fight, likely not having a full core when the fight started.

Axel could do the math, but it did not look good. His opponent still looked fresh even after being thrown from that blast and taking Sky's metal wall at the start of the battle. Lyra and Sky did not seem to be making any headway with the spear user, and Aria was burning through her core power quickly. Their enemies were likely at Cycle three or four with a deeper pool of reserve power and more practiced powers. Axel needed to shake this up, or his group would lose even after the two quick kills at the start of this engagement.

Axel then saw something that gave him an idea. He looked to Aria and pointed at the axe user yelling, “Pull.”

Axel then linked the man and the wall on the other side of the thalaxian in line to collide together at an angle, launching the axe user again.

Aria noticed this right away and flung a fireball at him with a scream of “FIREBALL!!”

The fireball launched with speed but began to deviate right away as the thalaxian was trying to manipulate her fire. This was not cool, so Axel threw his halberd to distract, causing the thalaxian to then make a shield of flame to deflect the halberd. This broke its hold on the fireball, and Aria manipulated the air around it, causing the ball of white fireball to slam into the axe user right in front of the hallway.

Sky and Lyra, hearing the yell from Aria braced for impact, much to the spear user’s surprise. Then the blast happened and caused the axe user to scream in pain for the first time in the fight. When the spots in his vision cleared, Axel saw that the spear user had a metal spike in her knee, and Lyra was swinging her now glowing sword that held the power of shatter. Lyra’s sword made contact it shattered on impact, but a gaping wound in the spear user's neck was left and the metal shrapnel covered the entire left side of her body.

Lyra did not look great either but was still in fighting shape from the way she was standing. Sky was lying on the ground in exhaustion, seeming to be spent completely. Axel then heard, with his recovering hearing, a sizzling sound and a meaty thud. The axe user, who was still being carried by Axel’s power after being knocked off course for a time by the fireball had now hit the shield of the thalaxian, dealing more damage and sending both into a wall.

Axel then felt very tired suddenly and could not support himself dropping to a knee. Axel saw that his energy meter in his vision was nearly empty, with his core down to only three percent. Axel slowly returned to his feet as he did not know if this fight was over but the effort felt difficult but his fear was soon confirmed when both the thalaxian and the axe user slowly rose from the wall Axel sent them into. The axe user was burned badly from head to toe with heavy damage to his gear.

The thalaxian was staggering and bleeding from cracks all over its carapace. Small flickers of flames appeared but vanished almost immediately as it seemed to be having an issue with either control or low on power. As Axel saw this he reached for his throwing knives, trying to ready a throw, but his hand was still shaking from earlier, and each blade went wide after release, only hitting the wall as there was nowhere else to go.

Each of the remaining enemies turned to look at Axel after the failed throws, but the next moment, an arrow landed in the eye of the axe user followed by several into the nerve clusters of the thalaxian. Each enemy dropped right after. Axel was breathing heavily when the axe user fell to the ground and did not move anymore. Axel then checked the time and saw there were only five minutes left on the clock.

“Guys, keep moving! We have less than five minutes to get in,” Axel called to his team. “Retrieve gear, loot, and Lyra, if you can, retrieve their journals.”

This got everyone staggering into motion. Lyra took a knife to the base of the spear user's neck, Aria retrieved arrows for her now empty quiver while looting bags, and Sky moved at a slow pace to get to the elevator as she was unlikely to help in a quick search but was carrying everyone else’s bag. Axel grabbed his halberd but didn’t even try to find the missing knives. He searched the archer and heavy sword user, grabbing their burned bags and quickly opening the back of their skulls with a knife to retrieve a small square journal from each.

As Axel wiped his knife, he received a warning.

Quest:

* Leave Trial before the shift starts. Countdown 59s

“Time's up, MOVE!” Axel said while holding a pair of packs and dashed to the elevator. Aria and Lyra were on his heels, and all of them entered with twelve seconds to spare. As everyone slumped against a wall, the doors closed, and the lobby button lit up.

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“Roll call,” Axel managed to say. “Anyone too badly off?”

“Aria is just out of power and low on arrows,” Aria said and slid a pair of damaged knives to Axel. “Also, you lost these.”

“I have some minor shrapnel, but my armor and shield caught most of it,” Lyra added from her seat on the floor. “I think we will have to look into new armor after this.”

‘I am just tired,’ Sky’s mental voice said at a barely audible level. ‘We likely have a while for the trip up as I hear decontamination always takes time. Let’s check what we got so we can declare when we make it to the preparation room.’

As the elevator moved and strange green lines went over the group repeatedly, Axel, Aria, and Lyra all opened a pack. Aria threw the other thalaxian’s pack to Sky so she had something to go through. Axel found that the archer had a small pouch of money, a bounty notice, and three gems. This did not count clothing and other necessities. The gems were elemental wind, gravity, and elemental fire.

Aria found in the axe user's heavily burned bag a pouch of melted coins and several destroyed gems. Everything else in the bag was heavily damaged much to her disappointment, so Axel threw her the heavy sword user’s bag. In that bag was a large pouch of coins, several books on herbs, a book on rare metals, and six gems. The gems included elemental earth, water, three wind, and a healing. These could sell for a fair amount for the elements to a large amount for the healing.

Lyra sorted out a book on spear moves, a bounty hunter’s badge, a bank key, and a small pouch of money from the spear user's bag. She then pulled out ten gems which included four shatters, three fires, two lights, and a healing gem. The haul seemed great to replace or repair their gear. Sky was pulling out many tools, and supplies. There were about eight gems that were all metal control gems from her pack. There was other clothing and gear carried in that pack that seemed to be most of that group’s food and survival supplies.

When everything was repacked into their bags, Aria put the things they didn’t want in the bags they did not want. The ride lasted well over an hour, and Aria had moved over falling asleep on Axel’s shoulder while waiting for them to reach the exit. Lyra removed shrapnel that her blessing moved to the surface and healed the wounds shut. Sky just rested with her eyes closed, still exhausted from the day’s events.

When the door opened, they were greeted by Rex standing in the room with crossed arms. Rex looked over the battered smaller group with a grim expression.

“Salmar not make it?” It was a simple question that was met with sad shakes from everyone at the same time.

“Come out and let’s get the necessary tasks completed, then you can debrief me on everything that happened.” Rex then led the group to a woman holding a truth orb and two other staff members in guard gear.

Everyone then declared the power gained to be added to their Vanguard profile, with Lyra stating that she gained shatter which was true while holding the orb. They each then stated which gems they came out with and sold all but the energy fiend one and the two healing gems for a large payout. After this was done, the group was told through the tone of voice of someone who made this statement hundreds of times.

“You are required to stay in this room for three hours to make sure that you did not bring anything out of the Trial or missed the scans.” With that, the worker left with the gems, and the door closed and locked behind her.

“Well want to tell me what happened down there?” Rex asked in a stony tone.

“It all started with everyone working with Salmar on where to find their powers,” Aria started for the group and began to tell what happened in the trial. Axel, Lyra, and Sky fixed the parts where she exaggerated and added details.

“Then we made a run after the ambush.” Aria finished the tale and fluttered her wings. “We did retrieve their journals, but we are wiped. Can Aria pull out one of the beds and nap now?”

Rex just nodded and asked for the Journals so that he could take care of them. Lyra handed over all of the Journals as she was given all from the ambush party. Rex thanked her and then left the room after a dozen lines of red light from a small lens above the door swept over him.

Axel went to the showers attached to the room and cleaned up. He then got into clean clothing and poked Aria awake to make her go clean up. This then caused Sky and Lyra to go clean and change before relaxing on benches and beds to rest. As Axel leaned back in his chair, he must have dozed off as he was awakened by a loud beep as doors opened to let them out.

With this abrupt awakening, they left to decompress and likely go to bed; while it had only been about four hours here each of them had just run around in trial for over sixteen hours. Before heading to bed Axel sent a message to Jareth. The message only told Jareth that things were on schedule and to contact Axel if anything on his end went wrong. Lyra and Aria left together with Sky heading to her forge with most of their weapons for repairs, her idea and she would not listen to anyone’s protest on this as she stated it was her relaxation. After this Axel took an elevator to a training room and started working out as he was still feeling adrenaline running through him even though his medical stated otherwise when he checked it in full mode. This did help Axel as he beat his body into a sweaty mess while processing that he had taken yet more lives.

The thing that bothered him most was that this just felt easier to him. After a few hours, he came to the conclusion that it was more about the situation than people as he knew they were there to kill him. After working out Axel noticed it was well into the night now. Wanting to still keep a good sleep cycle Axel left to get cleaned up again before bed. After showering then lay down in his dark room, lit only by moonlight trailing across the floor and ending halfway up the door.

Axel after laying there trying to sleep heard his door quietly open. Aria, her damp hair glistening in the moonlight silently moved into the room. Axel shifted in the bed allowing her onto it as she smelled herbs he associated with Lyra causing a raised brow at an innocent look from Aria.

“Aria’s flock is likely growing soon,” Aria said in a soft voice “Lyra was having issues after killing her first person and Aria spent the afternoon helping her process it, which led to some light play but nothing more as Aria has a promise where Axel's permission is needed before adding to the flock.”

“Aria, I told you when I became your mate that I knew what being with your kind meant,” Axel said while trying to quell the feelings welling up. “If this is what you need, it's what you need. I will not say from my perspective it does not suck, but you are not human.”

“Aria is still struggling with why your people see relationships so linearly, but thank you,” Aria said in a gentle voice. “Aria does see that Lyra needs someone to help comfort her and give her an anchor after what has happened.”

“Leave it at this please,” Axel replied still fighting the jealousy burning through his chest that refused to go away with how he recently told Lyra he was interested in her only to be turned down.

“Aria feels that there is something wrong with your statement and needs to be fixed,” Aria then began lightly kissing Axel while whispering in his ear. “Axel is Aria’s mate. As much as Aria is interested in Lyra, Axel will always hold Aria’s soul.”

Axel did not get anywhere near the sleep he planned that night and learned a few more tricks from Aria while the moon's light glowed off of flared wings.