Samantha said.

Samantha sounded calm and composed as always, despite the fact that we were suspended telekinetically twenty feet the air, floating out in the open air with an immensely powerful magician levitating about twenty yards away from me, holding me in place and hundreds of soldiers training their weapons on us.

Suddenly, I felt my sense of self leaving my body. The world blurred for a millisecond, and then my soul was right next to the bald magician in the red robe.

Then my soul exploded. Once, and then immediately after, and then a third time. The pain felt muted, this time—still painful, but more distant.

I didn’t have time to see the effects of my Soul Explosion on the magician.

My soul reappeared in my body, which was falling to the ground.

Even as my body fell, several bursts of spells and weapons flew towards me.

But Soul Explosion was a near instantaneous skill, and Spiritual Traveler was capable of transporting my soul at incredible speeds, and Samantha was pushing my soul to its peak speed.

Just a fraction of a second after my soul left, I was back in my body, and Samantha immediately activated a Personal Mana Shield that I hadn’t realized we had on our body. From the density of the mana surrounding us, I could tell it was a C-rank Personal Mana Shield.

Even as we fell, Samantha readied an Air-attuned Compressed Mana Crystal in our left hand, contorting our body as much as possible to avoid the dozens of ranged attacks flying our direction.

I could see the Personal Mana Shield flickering just from the billowing explosions as ranged artillery pummeled the ground below us.

But before we reached the ground, Samantha placed our left hand behind our back, and fired the Air-attuned Compressed Mana Crystal.

Rather than convert the mana into a wind blade, or tornado, Samantha turned the air into a gust of wind that pushed against our body, sending us soaring through the air at incredible speeds.

Except, our trajectory just happened to perfectly match the trajectory of the magician in the red robe.

We collided heavily with the man’s limp corpse, and our right arm wrapped around his stomach and chest as our left continued propelling us away from the many soldiers around us.

Our flight was jerky, awkward, and viciously fast. This was nothing like the fine-tuned flying that Samantha had shown she was capable of in the flying cars.

It was like if Iron Man was trying to stabilize a flight pattern with only one thruster, without any stabilizing fins or previous preparations regarding aerodynamics, while carrying a corpse at the same time.

Somehow, Samantha did it.

I could barely make sense of anything, except that we were moving incredibly fast, judging by the blurred buildings around us.

The one thing I did notice was that Samantha was rapidly collecting the loot that the dead magician had on him.

I noticed this when the red cloak vanished, and after the cloak vanished, I quickly realized the soldier had been stripped of everything of value.

Samantha placed the corpse inside our Interdimensional Pouch, and without missing a beat lifted the hood of our invisibility cloak, and we were soon flying through the air, invisible.

I could feel, through all this, that the cost on my body of using the Mana Cannon had increased. It felt like my body was being shredded alive as Samantha continually powered our flight with the Air-attuned Mana Crystal.

After a few more awkward twists and turns, I soon found myself stumbling through a deserted alleyway in the outskirts of this Metan city, without a soldier in sight.

Then my body froze.

Samantha said. Her voice sounded almost agonized, haggard.

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As Samantha spoke, I felt the pain, which had been muted before, assault me full force.

The pain from three Soul Explosions in a row, the pain from the internal damage of magic running rampant through my body, made me stumble to my knees.

Samantha said, sounding somewhat despondent and resigned.

I felt my body rise up, and I quickly downed a health potion.

With a moment of respite, I finally had the chance to see where I was. The street underneath me seemed like some kind of concrete, and the buildings on either side were old buildings that seemed to be falling apart.

At the same time, these were not the log cabins that I had seen back on Earth. These buildings were made with more advanced materials, standing several stories tall, with blue Glowstones providing most of the light.

Justin’s words appeared in my mind. I think you missed the genre memo. This isn’t steampunk.

From the crazy technology I had seen today, maybe Justin was wrong. The potential for advancement—and the technology that we would likely soon have to fight against—was terrifying. Flying artillery, weapons that could level city blocks, and even the fact that there had been civilians flying around in this city, pointed to the fact that nobody on Earth really knew what the rest of life in the Schema looked like. Assuming, of course, that everything I was seeing was an accurate rendition of a Metan city.

As I was lost in thought, Samantha entered a code at a panel by the doorway of a nearby apartment, and we entered an apartment through a narrow hallway.

What are you doing? I asked.

I clicked on the alpha symbol mentally, somewhat surprised that I could, with Samantha in charge of my body.

Rise of the Human Empire Mission Update: Follow the mini-map to an Imperial Shadow Safe House, which is connected to a tunnel that will allow you to leave the city.

I frowned. So, you knew you had a way out this whole time…why did you lead everyone around the city in that plane?

Samantha said, sounding a little embarrassed.

I had a quick flash back to Samantha’s tight grin while she flew that plane in circles, evading all the soldiers with ease.

So, you risked our future in the Infinite Tower, costing us sixty more Stat Points, and almost got us killed, for fun?

As Samantha talked, there was still a tightness to her voice, a tenseness that hid the pain that I knew she must be feeling. She walked us towards a closet, lifted up some floor boards, revealing a hole in the floor that led to an underground tunnel.

She jumped down into the tunnel and set off at a steady run, which, to my surprise, was much slower than I was accustomed to.

I opened up my Status Window, dreading to see the costs of using Soul Explosion five times in one day.

Strength, Dexterity, Perception, Luck, Agility, and Mental Power had all been reduced to 10, and Mana Pool and Mana Regeneration had also dropped considerably.

Only Physical Defense and HP had been untouched, but that made sense, considering Samantha had made this decision while floating in the air with dozens if not hundreds of weapons trained on her.

Samantha said.

Samantha sounded smug, like she was preening and excited to show off.

As we rushed through the underground tunnel, Samantha took out the Information Crystal that we had stolen from the lab, and also took out a separate Information Crystal from a separate Interdimensional Pouch—the one we had stolen from the magician in the red robe.

Samantha said.

The Personal Identification Crystal had a few knobby bumps on it, which fitted snugly into a series of notches on the Information Crystal.

Once Samantha attached the two crystals, she took out a third crystal, which she attached to the two in front of her using similar bumps and notches.

Samantha said.

We ran along the underground tunnel for a few more minutes. I couldn’t detect anybody chasing us, which was somehow incredible. How could Samantha have shaken all of our pursuers so quickly?

I could tell that we were quickly approaching the city’s Mana Shield.

The Mana Shield was glowing with vibrant mana, completely sealing off the city, ranging from a sphere that reached hundreds of feet into the sky, and also sealing off underground, about a dozen feet below the deepest foundations of any of the buildings. I couldn’t help but cringe when I saw that the tunnel we were in was blocked off by the glowing Mana Shield.

Samantha said, just as we ran directly through it.

We continued for a few more minutes past the walls, before the tunnel ended at the roots of a very large tree in a small forest.

Ahead of us, I could see two large, highly organized armies, with tents, banners, tanks, aircraft, glowing Mana Shields, and dense fortifications formed out of the earth.

Rise of the Human Empire Mission Update: Follow the mini-map to find the commanding Imperial General, and hand the Information Crystal to her.