Narati peered out of the room, looking around to see if anyone’s waiting to ambush them. He did not wish to say it, but he was concerned that N’Dari’s earlier burst of anger was loud enough to alert more of Asran's lackeys to the prison cell, blocking them off. He may know how to fend for himself, but with his axe being heavier than what he used to, it came into question.

He checked his satchel in case he must fight. He had several grenades. Five high explosives, five flashes, and five smokes. He couldn’t carry more, so he would only use them strategically. He had his axe, his dagger, and….

His right hand reached the butt of a revolver, causing him to realize that he was carrying a gun. He pulled out the revolver. It had a metallic silver finish with a wooden grip, made from a tree that was not native in either the Emerald Valley or the pockets of life in the Desert Wasteland. It was rather big for a Fa'ar, given that it was designed for a Loup-garou in mind. It was also heavy and packed quite a punch. For Narati, it felt like handling a handheld cannon that could threw him back just by firing a shot. He never had a chance to shoot with it, though Raine demonstrated it. The recoil from the revolver was enough to prevent continuous shots.

“Jacques’s gun,” he remarked. “I suppose I can use this in case all else fails.”

He opened the chamber, following Raine’s instructions. It was full, with six shots in total. No room for error. His poor accuracy, however, would make the gun useless in his hands. He could give it to N’Dari so he had something to use to defend himself, but the gun was the one thing Narati was reluctant to part with, even temporarily.

N’dari was far from being unarmed, however. The Fa’ar Narati knocked out carried a club. If that was not effective enough, his claws would compensate for it. Being a lion man, he also had strong, bone-cracking jaws and sharp teeth, but he was reluctant to attack with his bites. Yet, he had no choice.

“It looks like we’re clear,” said Narati. “Come on.”

N’Dari nodded, and both slowly walked out of the room and crossed the corridor to the other side. Like the door where N’Dari was held captive, the other doors were featureless metal doors with no gaps to look through, or so they thought.

Due to his height, Narati did not notice the latch that opened a small window at first, but soon noticed it after thorough examination on the metal door. Narati pointed this out, so the Leonian opened the small window, evidently to check on the prisoners held within.

“Someone’s in there,” said N’Dari, though his tone was not optimistic.

“Are they alive?” asked Narati.

“Too dark to tell.”

“Open the door. Let me have a look.”

There was nothing securing the latch, so N’Dari simply lifted the latch and opened the door. It let out a creaking noise. Soon, the dark room within was open for Narati to see.

With his natural night vision, the room looked bright. He could easily identify the figure that was on the corner of the room, though he wasn’t sure about their race. One quick glance, however, was enough to tell Narati that the figure was humanoid. However, there was something peculiar about the person, if he could call it a 'person' at all.

“What do you see, rat?” asked N’Dari.

“I’m not sure,” said Narati, examining the semi-conscious figure. “It’s not like anything I’ve seen before. It’s…covered in something hard. It’s not reptilian scales. It's fur is...I don't know. It's rough. And the face. By the Maker, it’s like a giant ant!”

“Then don’t get too close,” said N’Dari, preparing to fight.

Narati agreed, but before he could react, the unusual-looking figure stirred and opened its eyes. All eight of them, in varying sizes. It let out clicking noises, then a yelp. Narati managed to dodge it when something shot out of its wrist, hitting the wall behind him. It stuck to the wall, forming something similar to a cobweb.

“Stay back, Fa’ar!” she warned. Her voice sounded gravely and rough, followed by a menacing hiss.

“Whoa, wait!” said Narati. “Calm down. I’m here to rescue you.”

“Rescue?! After what your brethren did to me?! I shouldn’t have trusted him. Fellow Dark Races? Bah!”

She scoffed, but was too weak to do anything. She couldn’t even stand on her feet.

“I don’t have anything to drink, but—”

“Save your sympathy for someone else!”

“Okay, okay,” said Narati, backing off. “You don’t like rats. Hey, uh, I think that’s your cue, N’Dari.”

When N’Dari came into view, the person in the shadow immediately shot another web. Just like before, it missed N’Dari without him ever needing to properly dodge.

“Damn it!” exclaimed the unusual-looking woman. She then turned her gaze towards Fa’ar. “Is this your way to trick me? He is not going to trust me. Even if I can talk, his fear will take over. In the eyes of many, I am a hideous creature."

“We can talk about appearances later. Right now, you need help,” insisted Narati. “I am not with them. I swear.”

“I am not falling for that again!” said the lady stubbornly.

“We don’t have time for this! Sooner or later, someone’s going to hear us!” insisted N'Dari.

“Then leave me here to die!”

“Oh, you stubborn….”

N’Dari walked in and, without hesitating, grabbed the person in the darkness using only her hissing voice as an indicator. The lady was trying to fight back, but she was weakened severely. The Leonian hoisted her up his shoulder effortlessly. In fact, she was lighter than he thought.

As they walked out of the room, Narati saw more appendages on the person’s back. They were as big as her arms and were covered in the same chitinous material and the rough fur similar to parts of her body. They twitched about creepily, almost like an insect.

Or in this case, a spider.

“Put me down!” demanded the spider lady.

“Not until you stop being so stubborn! Goddamn it, what the hell are those? It feels like something’s crawling on my back!”

“Calm down, please!” said Narati. “If this continues, we’re going to—”

“(There! I heard noises!)”

The Fa’ari call was enough to warn them that stealth was no longer an option. Thinking quickly, Narati stood in front of the two as one of the Fa’ars carrying a sword appeared from the left. He was soon joined by several others.

“(What’s the meaning of this?!)” demanded the first Fa’ar. “(Explain yourself!)”

“(I, uh…taking them to the contraption),” said Narati, while his right hand rummaged through his satchel.

“(Bullshit! I don’t even know you! Hey! Tell the boss we got an intruder down here!)”

The momentary distraction was enough for Narati to pull a grenade out and armed it. He cooked it a little in his palms before throwing it towards the Fa’ar. There was almost no delay when the explosion happened; all the Fa’ars were blown to bits, spraying the dimly lit corridor with blood and gore.

Taken aback by the violence, N’Dari exclaimed, “That’s excessive! You could've just ax them!”

“I’m not that good of a fighter and I prefer to blow things up, anyway. Okay, then. Since that’s out of the way….”

Narati walked to the next metal door and opened it, this time doing it himself. He found a shriveled man, drained of blood. He was dead.

Without stopping, he moved to the next door. It was empty. The next one was also empty. It was only after he reached the sixth door did the spider lady said, “Stop. You won’t find any more people to rescue in this corridor. If you have to, get to the end of the corridor and find a pair of doors. That’s where you’ll find them.”

“Finally changed your mind?” asked N’Dari.

“He convinced me with that grenade. Asran’s own Fa’ars would not blow each other up. But know this. If you turn on me, I won't hesitate to kill both of you.”

“I want to see you try,” taunted N’Dari, before she grabbed the Leonian's throat and held it in an armlock.

A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

“I can still break your neck if you want to try,” retorted the spider lady, increasing the pressure. “One rule fighting against Mygalean. You do not let her on your back. I can dislocate your shoulder and proceed to twist your ankle while keeping your neck locked. All while you’re standing. The benefits of having four extra limbs."

“Okay, okay! I got it!” said N’Dari, patting the Mygalean’s arm. She released the pressure and stood on her own. She wobbled a bit, almost falling, until the appendages behind her back supported her. Narati observed that her body, despite the chitinous plates, was humanoid like him and N’dari. She differed from them with four additional appendages on her back, which were as big as her arms, and her head. Her head was chitinous and insect-like, with her lower jaw splitting as she spoke. She had more teeth than any beast races Narati knew, which made her rather intimidating, especially with her eyes. She had four bigger eyes and four smaller eyes, with the bigger ones looking relatively normal and expressive, while the smaller ones were like black beads.

“Do you need something to drink?” asked Narati.

“Save that for later,” insisted the Mygalean. “I can show you where those people are.”

“How do we know you’re not going to turn us in?” asked N’Dari after catching his breath.

“You have no way to tell, but you can’t be sure, either,” said the spider lady with a chittering noise, as if chuckling.

“This isn’t a game, Mygalean.”

“Look. All I’m saying is, I can’t prove it to you. I’ll show you where to go. Then, you’ll decide if I’m on your side or not. Honestly, I’m on nobody’s side but my own. I could say my sisters, but they’re not here, as far as I can tell.”

The other two were skeptical of the spider person’s claim, but N’Dari could appreciate her honesty, despite looking monstrous. It was something he would not expect coming from a Dark Race, even though both N’Dari and Narati was not aware about her kind and her claim to be a fellow Dark Race. As far as Narati was concerned, Fa’ars were the only known Dark Race.

After Narati asked, the Mygalean introduced herself as Tulis. Knowing that they were pressed on time (especially Narati, who was trying to reunite with Karkas by finding a way upstairs) and that they were still not out of the danger yet, Tulis quickly led them towards where she knew where the other captives were. She moved much faster than the rest of them despite of not using the appendages on her back. Narati could keep up by running on all four, while N’Dari followed them closely. Tulis directed them to the next corridor where there was nothing but a metal door.

“They’re in here,” said Tulis. “When they have determined that their captives are viable, they went into this room, while those that aren’t were sold as slaves. There haven’t been any viable ones lately.”

“Given that you know all of this, I think it’s safe to say you were one of them,” surmised N’Dari. “But you lost their favor sometime in the past.”

“Yeah, and now I get to undermine their project for betraying me,” said the Mygalean. “Which serves your purpose too.”

“Is there a way up once we free them?”

“There are stairs leading to the ground floor. But between here and there, we have to get through the Fa’ars operating the contraptions.”

“What is this contraption are we talking about?” asked N’Dari.

“I’ll show you.”

Tulis opened the metal doors. Light filled the room immediately, momentarily blinding Narati. He blinked a couple of times to return color to his vision.

It, however, did not prepare him for what was behind the door.

In the brightly lit room, Narati saw upright tanks, all of which occupied by people. They belonged to different races, ranging from humans to elves and beast people. All of them were kept suspended in the tanks, floating in the green-colored liquid. The tank and the general appearance of the room were different from what Narati was used to. The technology in the room was far more advanced than anything the Fa’ar had ever encountered. If it was pre-war technology, it was very well-maintained to be able to survive for a thousand years or so.

His amazement soon turned to horror when one of the suspended captives writhed in pain. He was clearly screaming from the bubble that he produced. The liquid he was suspended in shone brightly.

Before they could react, the Fa’ars in the room noticed them and scrambled around them, some of which climbed on the stairs to possibly warn others. Narati readied his axe then looked around. They were outnumbered, but they should be fine.

As his explosives could cause unnecessary damage, Narati opted to rely on the combat skills he learned from Raine and Sakiri, namely weapon combat. The two taught him different styles, with Raine focusing on defensive skills and Sakiri the offensive one. He chose the axe because it was closer to the circular saw axe he had been using. In just several months, he learned how to use it, though not to the level of expertise as the two Felinars (Raine's cat ears and tail were enough to consider him a Felinar, even if he identified as a human).

He put it to test by quickly running towards one of the unsuspecting Fa’ars. Using both his hands, he swing the axe with all his might. Given the increased weight, his attack was not as effective, but it managed to slice through his shoulder, rendering his arm useless. He fell, clutching his barely hanging shoulder in pain, while Narati faced several more Fa’ars who better weapons. One of them had a rifle and had started aiming at the Fa’ar, forcing him to move around to confuse the one with the rifle.

Before the rifleman was able to take a shot, a sticky substance hit the rifle, yanking it off his hands. He was left vulnerable to Narati, who split his skull with a well-place vertical slice to his head. Narati pulled out his axe and kicked the dead Fa’ar away, twisting it to clean the brain matter, just as another Fa'ar jumped on him with a rusty sword.

Only he failed to do so. Tulis shot a strand of her silk from her wrists and used them as a swing. She reached Narati in almost no time at all, kicking two of them away with both her legs. Narati turned at her, holding up a thumb. She looked at him curiously, but did not heed him further before she continued her assault against the rest of the Fa’ars.

Tulis expertly moved around the Fa’ars, utilizing the spider silk she shot out of her wrists. Sometimes, she continuously shot and weaved her silk into balls, throwing it to knock someone out, showing its surprisingly dense spherical form. When it did not, she immediately scrambled towards her target using her other limbs. Narati was unnerved by how disturbing it looked; he had never seen someone with more than five limbs (he counted tails) move or fought. Her lithe form, combined with her appendage-assisted agility, helped her unusual fighting style in which she used her top appendages to hold a Fa'ar and used her own hands to twist their necks. She used her four extra appendages to assist her brutal, bone-breaking style.

“Maker’s Mercy, you’re brutal,” commented Narati, just after he ripped open a Fa'ar's throat with his axe with blood spraying on his fur. The irony did not escape Tulis.

“I can say the same to you,” said Tulis. “Don’t waste your time dealing with them. You want to save these people, you go save these people. Let me deal with them.”

Narati nodded and ran towards one of the machines. The person inside, due to the commotion was awake and struggling in his tank while Narati examined the unfamiliar machine. He couldn’t understand the shutdown sequence for the machine; he had enough experience not to try and do what he thought was right. A proper machine was far more complicated than the ones he made from scraps. He may had a quick understanding of how things operate, but not something from a distant past.

The Fa’ar quickly heard a faint whimper. He leaned over to find a terrified Fa’ar backed to a corner. He was wearing a dirty coat and a loincloth, but nothing else. Narati’s quick thinking was enough to tell that he, unlike the Fa’ars that engaged the three of them, was somehow different. He scampered towards the terrified, somehow bespectacled ratfolk, and grabbed him by the collar of his coat.

“(How do you shut this thing off?)” said Narati, while lifting his axe.

“(I-I need to shut it down in sequence. This thing’s complicated!)”

“(Yeah. I can tell).”

“(L-look, Fa’ar. I d-don’t work for Asran, alright? He forced me into doing this!)”

“(Not buying it. Whatever the case, you are going to shut this thing down. I don’t care if he’s angry at you. He is not here. I am).”

The disheartened Fa’ar vigorously nodded, evidently terrified by Narati’s blood-caked fur and glare. While holding his coat, Narati forcefully put him in front of the nearest console where he immediately worked on pressing several buttons. While he was doing it, Narati looked at the sequence closely.

Soon, there was a loud, repeating alarm noise as the tank was drained. Some of the Fa’ars heard this and quickly turned their attention towards Narati.

“(O-okay, I got it! P-please just let me go)!”

“(Not until you get the rest of them out of those tanks).”

“(You don’t understand! Asran does not tolerate traitors! He won’t take coercion for the reason! He’ll blow my head off with his…thing, after he’s done with you!)”

“(How can you be so sure about that?)”

“(He’s insane! These tanks are here to fuel his…thing! Somehow, he could use--)”

His explanation was cut short by a knife lodged in his back. Narati was not able to get to the Fa’ar before N’Dari cut his head off with a sword he snatched from one of the Fa’ars. The situation started to turn chaotic, but leaning towards their side. Tulis, more than N’Dari, was a very capable fighter, and she single-handedly dealt with every Fa’ar that came at her. Narati could thank her, but he had something to do.

The young Fa’ar always knew that he had a good memory, which helped him in this situation. He repeated the same sequence he saw the Fa’ar was doing, and another one was freed. Narati did this to the rest of them and, while the situation was still not improving, he managed to free the captives. By the time he was finished, Tulis and N’Dari had the situation under control.

“They certainly did not expect someone to jump them,” boasted N’Dari. “Can’t say they ever had any basic combat training other than swinging their weapons around.”

“Don’t let your guard down,” said Tulis. “I’d watch the stairs if I were you.”

The Leonian nodded and quickly scrambled towards the stairs, expecting reinforcements, alongside Tulis. Narati was busy removing everything on one of the nearest captives, coughing and gagging as Narati removed a long tube that went into the human’s throat.

“Before you start throttling me, I just killed your captors and fought alongside a Leonian and a Mygalean. I know we're not as you expected, but at least you're saved.”

“Don’t sweat it. I saw what you did,” said the human, straining his voice. “I can appreciate help, even if it is from a ratfolk.”

“Good that you understand. A question. What did they do to you. What is this machine?”

“The only thing I know about this machine is…that it extracts our mana reserves, but at a considerable amount so as to not kill us. Whoever put us in these machines know that they need someone with a naturally high mana reserve. I saw a poor soul who’s shriveled into a husk a while ago. God, how long has I been here?”

“Whatever the case, you are free,” said Narati. “Though you’re not out of the pan yet. Did I say it right? That’s…a human impression, right?”

“We’re not out of the fire yet,” corrected the human. “And you’re right. We need to get out. There is a dampening field that prevents us from using any spells. I don’t expect a Fa’ar to be able to tell, though.”

“Not an issue. Though the issue is…are they your friends?”

The humans looked at the rest of them. “No,” said the human. “But shouldn’t we take them down?”

Narati realized he got his priorities wrong and said, “Ah, shit. You’re right.”

“And do you have anything to wear?”

“Uh….”

Narati slowly turned his head towards the Fa’ar that was just killed. His dirty coat was caked in blood. The human sighed and said, “It’s better than nothing.” He then pulled out the knife nonchalantly and took the blood-soaked coat.

Without questioning why the human did not look disgusted at the least, Narati proceeded to help the other former captives with the human, all while wondering what Karkas was doing while he was trapped down there.

He was concerned. Karkas seemed hell-bent on revenge. Narati did not want him to be careless. Something told him that Asran may not be what he seemed.

“What is this 'thing' he talked about?” wondered Narati. "This Asran might have something dangerous with him. Please...stay safe, Karkas. For our sakes."