“Boom! Boom!” one light blue energy bolt and a fiery bright red one landed on two legs of the silver rhinoceros beetles, one on each side. The two silver legs broke off and shattered into pieces of energy shards and flew off into the air and dirt, the silver rhinoceros beetle stumbled and almost lost balance, but with two legs on each side it was still able to keep on going.

“Fucking nimwits, aim at the legs on the same side!” the tattooed man yelled and raised his hands in the air as he continued his pursuit: “Attack on the right side! The right side!”

The woman in a suit of black leather armor raised her longer sword in the air and swung it down, and released a blood red energy blade shot out against the right side of the silver rhinoceros beetle. The tattooed man extended his arms forward, with his hands in claw shapes, two blobs of pale energy were unleashed from his palms and merged together into a giant shadow serpent. The shadow serpent coiled its body in midair, then lunged itself also at the right side of the silver rhinoceros beetle.

Just when other pursuers attempted to attack, the silver energy shards from the shattered legs of the silver rhinoceros beetle that were floating in the air and buried in the shallow dirt expanded and changed in shape - some became floating energy balls with spikes like sea urchins or exaggerated naval mines, some became sharp spikes that protruding out from the ground. One pursuing man wearing some kind of enchanted tactical armor was impaled by one of the silver spikes on the ground on his leg, and a pursuing woman got cut on her shoulder by a floating spiked energy ball.

The attacks from the leading tattooed man and the woman in black leather armor struck the silver rhinoceros beetle on its right side of the body, creating a huge hole it and stranding it on the ground.

The head of the silver rhinoceros beetle opened up like a blooming flower, and all the passengers inside ran out from within, and into the woods and mountains before them.

“Boom!” the silver rhinoceros beetle exploded, shooting out tens of thousands of sharp silver energy shards in all directions but the direction in which the five passengers escaped. Two more pursuers were hit by the energy shards and became instantly incapacitated.

“We need backup. Where’s our backup? ” the woman in black leather armor asked: “They have way too many tricks up their sleeves, we can’t afford to lose any more of our men.”

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“You think I don’t know that!?” the tattooed man yelled: “They’re out of their escape vehicle now, let’s go grab these sons of bitches.”

With the attackers that caught up with them after a short while, the tattooed man and the woman in black leather armor had five others with them in their attempts at capturing the five passengers from the silver rhinoceros beetle.

“They are right in front of us! Not that far away!” a red headed woman in a dark green cloak leapt onto the top of a tree and said: “They’re trying to cross a ravine ahead!” But just when she was about to say something else, a burst of five bullets were fired at her way and brought her down from the top of the tree.

“Melinda’s down, Melinda’s down!” the red headed woman’s teammates became even more agitated than before, and they sped up their pursuit: “We need visuals! We need fucking visuals!”

Thomas turned back briefly and opened fire at one of the closest pursuers again. This time his target grew smarter and held up a small metal shield with a crystal ball pattern before him, and the bullets just bounced off from the surface of the shield, leaving only a few marks.

“Bang bang bang!” Aimee joined Thomas with his attack and opened fire on the same pursuer. The bullets flew around the man, and one particular one hit the ground and jumped into the man’s left leg. Just when the man’s defenses were down due to the pain, Thomas unleashed another small burst fire and buried one of the bullets in the man’s neck.

“Die!” a man with wolf-like fur on his forearms and long, sharp fingernails lunged from far away and right at Aimee and Thomas.

A spinning energy shadow of a round shield flew in a curved trajectory through the air and struck the man with long fingernails on his jaw and knocked him out of the air. And then came the silver shadow of a tip of the spear, aiming at the man’s chest.

But this silver shadow energy attack did not land, for it was blocked by the bare left hand of the tattooed man who launched the first attacks on the safehouse. Then, the tattooed man swung his right hand downwards, and the pale shadow of an arm and hand with sharp claws struck down at Aimee and Thomas.

Garret Peyton leapt forward from behind, and jabbed his scepter at the claw shadow, the golden energy concentrated at the tip of the scepter clashed with the pale shadow claw. An explosion broke out and sent both the tattooed man and Garret Peyton back.

“Get back! Find a place to hide!” Caroline jumped forward and swung her translucent orange and red axe at a female mage in a blue robe.

“And use it when you need to!” Jason jumped forward and unleashed a flurry of silver shadows of spear tips at the man with long fingernails and fur forearms.

Jason’s target tried to block Jason’s attacks with his arms, but the shadow spear tips still cut through his muscles and fingernails, and his blood gushed into the air. On the other side, the energy shield created by the female mage was not strong enough to guard against Caroline’s strike of wind, flame and fury, and though she was not cut in half, she was knocked back and fell down the slope.

The woman in black leather armor had her two swords in her hand and came from the side, the longer sword thrusting towards Caroline’s shoulder.

Caroline raised her shield and parried the thrust, then she sidestepped to dodge the cut from the shorter sword. But when she turned her at her opponent and was about to strike her with the pommel of her axe, she froze with surprise.

Having got a clear view of Caroline’s face, the opponent froze as well.