“We need to leave. And I don’t just mean the station.” Krovukk heard Philip say, and he couldn’t help but agree. If they had sent that many high level assassins after a single girl, he didn’t want to wait around and see what they had in store for them.

The only reason they were only healing some wounds with healing potions and not dead on the floor was Maya. She was… strong. Stronger than he had ever thought she was, and he had recently passed level thirty. He guessed the assassins had been mostly around level thirty plus. He and Xar would probably have matched rather evenly in a one on one, or two versus two, but he also knew he couldn’t think like that.

Assassins didn’t excel in direct combat, but in surprise attacks, which meant, if they came after them, they had better know it was coming or they were done for. So it was lucky in a sense they had come upon them when they had. Of course there was no guarantee these people were the same ones that were after them, but it did seem rather plausible. She was doing research into the very same thing that had happened to them, and now a group of six high level assassins were after them? It was a miracle the girl was alive at all. Had she seen them coming? What level was she? What class did she even have?

He didn’t ask, instead he thought back to what Philip had said. They needed to leave, that much was obvious. If they gave the assassins enough time to set up, he wondered how long they had before their heads would unfortunately separate from their bodies. But that also raised several questions.

“I agree we need to leave, and sooner rather than later, but where do we even go?” He asked the group and they turned to look at him. To his surprise it was Maya that answered.

“Why not go to the old world? I suspect we will find our answers there. If this truly is a weapon of some sort, I’m fairly sure it can only be there. Nowhere else could such a massive project be set up without being discovered, especially with how much mana I suspect it is taking.” Krovukk saw Xar thinking about it, the others mostly looked at him for his expertise in matters of magic. Obviously he wasn’t the best person to ask, but he was rather knowledgeable.

“Why are you looking at me? How am I supposed to know?” Xar grinned at them.

“But if it truly is not a natural phenomenon but engineered, I also think something of this scale can only be hidden there. Also, I feel like going to Dust right now might be a death sentence anyway. I mean, hiding on Dust is rather hard, unless one goes to the more… dangerous areas.” He said and the others nodded. The options to hide on Dust were rather limited. The only few places where one could hide from the more conventional laws were… usually very special in their own way.

“Alright, so what, you just want to go there and do what exactly? Find this… thing?” Kali asked, clearly skeptical.

“Well, it’s also the best place to hide in either case, is it not?” Maya said. And it was true in a sense. The old world wasn’t really colonized or anything like it. It was wild and only adventurers ventured there.

“You do realize it might take us years to even find this thing, if we ever find it. Old world contains so many Pieces in close proximity that it’s not only dangerous but unpredictable. And I’m not even talking about the monsters.” Philip spoke up.

“True, but it also means tracking anyone in there is hard, and we should be able to lay low, if anything.” Xar countered.

“Is this our plan now? To go to the old world?” Philip asked the group as a whole, clearly, it was not something he wanted. Krovukk nodded and saw Matt not sure what it truly entailed. Kali also seemed to agree.

“Oh, and pray tell, how do we even get there?” He challenged them.

“We take a ship?” Maya asked like it was the most obvious answer.

“You mean, we steal a ship? I know they have some money left, but it’s not enough to buy us a ship. Sure we could rent one, but when we fail to return it, guess what? We’ll be criminals. And then we just made the Crystal Tards jobs easier as everyone will be looking for us. Forget laying low, we’ll have to live in the old world.” Philip said as he shuddered at the idea. Krovukk himself couldn’t help but feel a chill at the idea.

Yeah, no one wanted to live over there. There were rumors that some people did, but they had never seen the elusive and crazy old-dwellers as they were called, the few times that they had been. Most adventures went there once or twice to see how they fared against a well known dungeon, but nothing more. Obviously there were still some uncleared dungeons, actually, rather a lot, and even more still to be discovered, but the amount of danger to treasure ratio hadn’t ever seemed to be worth it. It simply was too risky to try in that crazy cluster of wild magic. And now? It seemed like they just might be headed over there, for an extended period of time too.

“It’s true, we can’t just take a ship. And we don’t have enough money for a decent ship. Unless you have a ship we could use?” He asked Maya.

“I teleported here, so no I don’t have a ship.” She said and everyone but Matt stared at her.

“You teleported here, from Dust? How rich are you? She might just be able to buy us a ship out of this trap!” Philip said a bit too loudly. But Krovukk agreed. It didn’t surprise him as she seemed to be rather high level.

“Are we even going together?” Xar asked and Krovukk saw Matt stare daggers at him from behind.

“Of course we are, we can’t leave her here. It’s basically the same as killing her.” He argued.

“Oh is it? I say we rather don’t know nearly enough about this little lady to my tastes. What level are you even? She just might have other tricks up her sleeve.” Philip said in a critical voice.

“So? She is strong, is that a bad thing if she is with us? I mean, aren’t you all saying this old world thing is dangerous anyway? We might need to have her around just to make it out of there.” Matt argued back. To Krovukk’s amusement, Maya seemed uncertain on what to say and just stood there.

“Let the girl speak for herself, boys.” Kali said as she rolled her eyes and they both turned to her. She paused for a moment, gathering her thoughts before she responded.

“I am strong, yes. But I don’t have any tricks up my sleeve. I… I’d like to come with you to the old world, if that is possible. I believe I could be an asset.” She finished meekly.

“Of course you can.” Kali said and clapped her on the back.

“Anyone who has saved our lives can come.” She added with a grin and looked at the rest of them.

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“I think you actually saved mine, but I appreciate the sentiment.” Maya responded, still in a rather subdued voice. Krovukk’s group was rather loud compared to this young girl. She seemed to be insanely strong for her age, which raised a lot of questions, but they would have time later.

“I think we’ve lingered here long enough? We can talk about options to leave, but I’d wager we’d better go to the spaceport anyway.” Krovukk said as the other nodded.

They started to move and the few hotel staff they crossed stayed out of their way. Some of them had been waiting without daring to come up to them. The hallway was… as you’d expect. One could still see where Maya had been thrown through a wall. Krovukk wondered how in the system’s name she had survived that. He stole a glance towards the girl. She looked weak and didn’t give off that aura most high level people did. No wonder the assassins had misjudged her strength and been surprised.

“I should have enough money to buy a ship.” Maya said after a few steps.

“Well, if you teleported here, I’d be surprised if you didn’t have enough for a ship. I mean, it probably costs about half of the teleportation fee.” Xar said with a small laugh.

Krovukk stole another glance at the girl. Despite all the mysteries surrounding her, he got a good feeling, and that was something he had always trusted. He’d always felt he had a good gut feeling for people. He just hoped he wasn’t wrong this time, because they really couldn’t afford him to be.

*****************

Xar couldn’t help but frown a bit as they walked to the space port. He had obviously seen Krovukk’s approval of the new girl, but he still didn’t really trust her. Obviously she was their way out of here, so he wasn’t complaining, but he was sure Philip would agree some caution was warranted.

The girl had been strong, yes, but what had really surprised him was how… ungraceful she had been. Her movements were that of an amateur, and she had only managed because she had been faster than her opponents, and had been able to parry their blows. Which was also strange as he hadn’t seen any bracers on her.

He had tried several times to see if she had anything under her long sleeves but her movement hadn’t made it possible to see. Plus the way she behaved just didn’t fit with someone that strong. Now she was rich, apparently, so maybe she had used potions, scrolls or something else to make her faster and stronger? Because to him, she didn’t look like someone above level ten, or fifteen maybe.

Speed and strength was one thing, but technique was something else altogether, and she was clearly lacking in that area. Now she had some technique. Like someone who had studied and trained a bit, but she had clearly never fought someone before, aside from a training dummy. So he inspected her from the corner of his eye, and also saw that Matt was clearly trying to say something to start a conversation, only to stop as he clearly didn’t know what to say.

Feeling a bit bold, Xar stumbled on purpose and tried to grab her arm or tug on her sleeve to feel or see what was underneath. She easily averted his attempt and he caught himself from his fake fall.

“Sorry, too deep in my head I didn’t mind my steps.” He said as he scratched his head. Damn her. Had she seen through him? He almost grinned but held it. This might just be fun.

**************

Maya was annoyed at Xar. He kept trying to reach for her arms. And she could not let him see them right now. She had several cracks in her otherwise perfect arms. She had been surprised that the men in black had been able to even damage her. Her whole body was enchanted to be stronger, and the base material was already strong beyond belief. Their attacks had made several deep cracks that had easily broken through the small skin layer. The worst was her back, where the first surprise attack had struck her, and she was lucky it hadn’t broken her body in two.

Slowly her body had been mending the cracks, but it took time and she still was damaged enough that anyone seeing her arms or back would instantly understand that she wasn’t human. Nobody had cracks in their skin, not like that.

Xar tried another approach and she moved her arms out of the way. It was obvious now he was trying to see or grab her arms. He didn’t even try to make excuses now and was basically grinning like a maniac and trying to get a hold of her arms. Was this normal? Was she missing something? But the looks on the others' faces was confirmation enough.

“Xar? What the hell are you doing?” Kali asked the rat man and Maya was happy to see this wasn’t normal.

“What? It’s a game between us.” He said, and Maya wasn’t sure how he had gotten that idea as she avoided him yet again. She frowned but wasn’t sure what to say. Had she simply missed something and he actually thought they were playing a game?

“I’m not sure she likes the game.” Kali said in a flat tone as she pointed at Maya.

“Oh, it’s fine.” Xar said, looked at Maya and then back at Kali before raising his arms in surrender.

“Fine! I’ll stop. You guys are boring.” He said and hopped up on Krovukk’s shoulder. He looked embarrassed at his friend’s antics.

“Thank you Kali. I’m not sure if I somehow hinted at playing this… game, but I indeed did not plan to play.” She said in a more assured tone. She was relieved. It had been the rat man that had been strange, not her.

“Yeah, don’t hesitate to say something next time. Boys be stupid sometimes.” She said and winked. Maya wasn’t sure what that meant, but wasn’t about to show her ignorance to the friendly girl.

“Even I thought that was weird.” Matt said and they both turned to him. He seemed to get redder in the face instantly. Did he have a strange condition? It had kept happening every time she had turned to look at him, but not when it was someone else. Strange indeed.

“First time I ever see such a strange ‘game’ myself.” Kali added, and openly snuck a look at Xar who rolled his eyes.

“Alright, fine. You got me. I wanted to see how she blocked those blows earlier.” Xar sighed. Everyone turned to look at her at that, clearly curious about it now, and it was Matt who came to her rescue.

“It’s fine if you don’t want to show everyone.” He said with crossed arms. Xar and Philip seemed annoyed at him. But then she got an idea, and it just might work.

“It’s a skill, temporary.” She answered, hoping that would be enough.

“Cool! What’s the name?” Matt asked to her horror. Name? She didn’t know what that kind of skill would be called. Would ‘Blocking Arms’ work or was that stupid? Maybe ‘Plasteel Arms’? No, plasteel wouldn’t have been strong enough against those guys. She kept trying to find a suitable name, but the silence was clearly dragging on. But for once, her silence actually saved her.

“It’s fine if you don’t want to tell us. I mean you barely know us so I get it. We’re all curious about you, as you can guess, but you shouldn’t feel forced to tell us anything.” Kali defended her and smiled. Kali was definitely her favorite. She was nice.

“I’m sorry, but I do not want to reveal anything about my abilities at the moment.” She told them plainly. From her knowledge, skills and classes was something fairly private that you didn’t share with most people. She was confident it would work with Kali’s earlier words too. Plus, she didn’t really have any good explanation for them except the truth. And she did not want the truth to get out, or it might just be the end of her.

Or maybe not. They didn’t seem that strong, compared to the other guys. But on the other hand, she had only survived because they had been reliant on poisons that didn’t work on her, that and they had scried her a bit earlier, letting her know something was up. She had almost missed them coming despite it, and the initial blow had surprised her. Obviously they had prepared badly as they thought she had been made of flesh and blood.

That and the others' arrival was the only reason she was alive, which begged the question, could she survive if they all turned on her? It wasn’t something she wanted to find out, besides, she kind of liked them. Some of them at least. She snuck a look at Xar and Philip. Those two were annoying though.

They were almost at the spaceport when an explosion caught their group off guard, the others had been thrown to the ground and seemed dizzy. She was the only one still on her feet when a metal ball seemed to appear out of the resulting dust cloud going straight for her face.

Shit, that wasn’t something she could block easily, especially right now as she was still recovering. She avoided the blow fairly easily, but another one appeared at the edge of her vision, and then another to her right. She might just be in trouble and the other ones were clearly still recovering.