“God damn it! What the hell is this place, monster central? Can we go any faster?” Sam shouted at the ship controller.
“My functions were automatically slowed in order to better prepare for attack. We can return to full speed now, but a single hit from any of these monsters would threaten the structural integrity of the ship,” it said.
Sam peered down at the writhing cloud of monsters below them.
“Never mind that. Do it!”
Sam and the others were thrown against the wall as the ship suddenly accelerated to an enormous degree. They were plastered there by the acceleration for a good few seconds before they were able to push themselves off. The hatch started to slide close, allowing Sam to look at their pursuers one last time. The monsters were following them, but they could not hope to catch up with the speed of the craft. Sam was glad for that. He could scarcely imagine a monster powerful enough to fly at the speed of this ship, at least a monster that he could readily defeat. It would be the equivalent of him moving at speeds greater than Mach 1 while only using his arms to propel himself. Perhaps he could do that after passing his second threshold, but certainly not now.
Sam sighed as he came to term with the close encounter that they had just lived through. One of those monsters had been easy enough to defeat, but Sam did not fancy their chances against a dozen, let alone that cloud that he had seen near the volcano. About the volcano…
“I don’t remember there being any active volcanoes that were visible from the sky in this area. I have a bad feeling about this,” Lao said. “I would guess that this has something to do with the expansion of Earth, but perhaps I am wrong. That monster did profess to be a follower of Gaea after all.”
‘Well, there’s an easy way to check,” Eduardo replied. “Hey, ship controller. When we were going to claim Mjolnir, did you remember any volcanoes in the Atlantic that were visible from the air?”
“I have to say that I cannot. They were not marked on my planetary charts either.”
“Well, I guess the Titans are beginning to make their presence known. We’re still knee deep in shit from all the Legion stuff and the invaders, let alone the Seals, and now we are already having to deal with the eventual emergence of E Rank threats. Things really can’t get better, huh?” Sam said, throwing his hands up in the air. Everything had been well and good at the beginning of the initialization, from the thrill of leveling for the first time, the pleasure of connecting to a Dao, even winning the tournament. The kid gloves were coming off now however, and seeing as those same gloves were responsible for the deaths of billions, Sam did not fancy their chances.
"We can’t do anything about it now,” Lao responded, ever the pragmatist. “Let’s focus on the reason that we came here in the first place. Namely to rescue Jane.”
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“Do we even have the faintest idea of what we are going to do to save here? We cannot give up our weapons, and even if we do, the Legion will probably just kill us as we go,” Eduardo said.
“There aren't really many variables here to exploit. I have no idea about the layout of Paris, and we do not know how many of the Legion members will be there. I think that we’re just going to have to wing it. If we had been given more time, we could have come up with a proper plan, but we were only given a day’s notice,” Sam replied.
“What I’m wondering is, how did the Legion know that we would receive that message at the right time? Was that infiltrator programmed to reveal itself at a certain time? Could we have hundreds of sleeper agents lurking within our city?” Lao asked.
“God, I hope not. Seeing as they are revealed by mirrors though, I doubt that they would have gone unnoticed for long. I think that tactic was a once off,” Sam answered. Remembering something, he continued. “Hey, you two know how to enter a party link? I think it would be useful for what we’re about to do.”
“A what?” Both men said in unison. Happy to finally have a one up on Lao’s general wisdom, Sam explained to the two men how to join his party. As they did so, Sam was met with a notification.
As the leader of an F Rank party, you are now able to see more information about your party members.
Curious, he opened the party interface.
Party:2
Eduardo Venzetti:Level 53. Health 1520/1520. Mana 740/740. Lesser Sunlight Avenger:Epic
Lao:Level 52. Health 950/950. Mana 1720/1720.Cyclical Magus:Epic.
In addition to adding a new bar for mana, Sam could now see the classes of the others.
“What in the name of the holy host is a Greater Dao-” Eduardo was cut off as Sam put his hand over the man’s mouth.
“Shh! Not here. There could be people listening. I’ll explain later.”
“How the hell did you get a Mythical class though? You never told us about this,” Lao asked. “I thought my class was powerful. You have one that is two steps above it though!”
Sam agonized whether to tell them about his Dao Heritage and all of the other things that entailed, but he decided to regale them with a more down to Earth version. He might have seen the two men as some of his closest allies, but spreading a secret only made it more likely to be discovered.
“Look. It was because I was the first person in this universe to form a Dao. It allowed me to start off with a Legendary class, which then upgraded to Mythical at F Rank. It isn't that complicated,” Sam said through the party link. Eduardo jumped as he heard the voice within his head.
“How are you doing that?” He asked in surprise.
“Just focus on projecting your voice through your mind instead.”
“Like this?” Lao’s voice said.
“Exactly like that. Good job, Lao.”
“Why is this so hard? It feels like I’m trying to push something into too small of a space,” Eduardo complained as he struggled to send his voice across the party link.
“Ok, I might have misled you a bit with my instructions,” Sam said in his regular voice. “Perhaps try not to force it. Just let the idea of projecting your voice be at the back of your mind as you begin to speak.”
“It won’t work… Oh, there we go! I figured it out! Damn, this feels uncanny.”
“It’s only useful if we are in a situation where we cannot speak openly. For the most part, we can just talk,” Sam explained. “Now that we got that down, I suppose it’s time to do some more meditation. Hey, ship controller! How far are we?”
“We are approximately 5 hours and 35 minutes away from our destination.”
“See? Plenty of time. Let’s get back at it.”