I opened my eyes to see Yuma poking at my face. Except my mask happened to still be on so she was just making metallic tapping noises. How I slept in it I have no idea.
"Are you awake yet?" she said, moving her face closer to mine — trying to see my eyes, I'm guessing. Except my mask has visors for eyes not open slits.
"Yes, I'm awake." I said in a low voice.
"Oh, sorry. I, uh, can't tell with that thing on. Why do you wear it anyways?" she asked.
"It was a gift, Plus, it's good for protection," I said, slowly sitting up.
"From who?"
Who? Who did I get it from? I can't remember. I've had it for as long as I can remember. Even before I made it to Nazul. I don't know where it came from though.
"Um, I don't remember."
"Really? But you wear it everywhere, so it must be important, right?"
"Yeah, I guess." I didn't know why, but it did feel important, "We need to make it to that mountain as soon as possible. The sooner we get there and figure out what's going on, the sooner we get out."
"Alright, then. Let's go!" said Tessara, a little too excited.
She couldn't stop smiling. This is her version of not getting enough sleep — it boosts her energy level through the roof. You might ask what's wrong with that? To put it simply, she becomes reckless — far more than usual. She also gets anxious and extremely nervous.
"Wow, she's happy today," whispered Yuma
"Don't be fooled. I can already tell she's gonna crash and burn. I bet I'll be dragging her out of that mine by her ankles." I whispered back.
"What are you guys whispering about?" she said, still smiling. "You know secrets don't make friends."
"Let's just get going," I said.
"Yes!! I'm so ready for today!!" Tessara said, fist pumping.
With that, we started walking. The mountain was only about four hundred meters away — an easy walk. The only thing was, we didn't know where the entrance was. We walked for about ten or fifteen minutes before we heard vehicles driving.
We continued walking towards the trucks and stopped behind a patch of bushes just before an open lot. The lot was full of trucks and tons of crates. Most were sealed, but we saw a few full of some metallic material. It had to be talamite. And there were soldiers all over the place. They were dressed the same as the ones from the city. Given what went down last night, I assumed they'd be expecting us.
"We should move around the side of the mountain and find a less populated entrance."
"Wait, so what even is the plan once we get in?" Tessara asked.
"Well, if we charge head on, we put the people inside at risk. Not to mention we have Yuma here. We need to be cautious. Let's get inside then we'll assess what to do next. Once we have the people safe, then we can collapse this whole mountain if necessary."
"Sounds like a plan, what about the soldiers though? Remember it's against the Luminaries code to kill."
"Yeah, yeah I know. Trust me, we can do this without killing. It's not like this is our first difficult mission," I said, focusing on the guard movements.
"Right, I guess. Yuma, stay close to me. Just because we can't kill doesn't mean they won't."
"O-ok," she said, nervously following up on Tessara's left side, away from the clearing.
We all began moving around the mountain searching for another entrance. We made it all the way around to a cliff without getting spotted and without finding another entrance. We now had a clear idea of the surrounding area, though. The mountain was backed up to a cliff on the edge of the ocean. Around the front and sides was dense tropical forest, there were a few open cargo loading areas scattered around the base of the mountain, but each entrance was as guarded as the front. So this was going to be just as hard as I thought.
"So what are we going to do?" Asked Tessara.
"I'm not sure we have much of a choice in this situation, but I think we should take the left entrance. It seems to have the least amount of soldiers."
That was our best chance of success, if only barely. All it takes is for one extra soldier to ruin this plan, so even one less gives us a better shot at making it through. We all made our way back to the left side and took a moment to thoroughly survey the area.
That's when I noticed two trucks coming from the back side. But how? We already checked the whole mountain, there was no entrance back there. They had to have come from somewhere, I think it was worth checking twice. I looked back to Tessara.
"You see those two trucks?" I said, pointing at them.
"Yeah, those came from the back."
"The back? But that's just a cliff edge, which we checked. There was nothing," Said Tessara
"I know that's what I thought too, but they came from somewhere. I think it's worth another look."
"Yeah, let's go," Tessara said, snatching Yuma's hand and dragging her.
We walked back around the mountain. Perfect timing. A truck came down a ramp that was built into the back side of the mountain. The rocky holes must have blended in the first time I checked. Another truck came out of the doorway and down the ramp. This one was the same as the other two. The trucks were different from the ones in the other entrances. They were just trailers with metal crates, labeled eloq crystals. So based on this, the talamite came from the main entrances and eloq crystals from the back, higher up the mountain. So there must be small amounts of eloq crystals near the top of the mountain, and the mass collection of talamite on the lower sections or maybe even underground.
"That's our entrance," I said.
"Oh, yeah! Let's blow this place sky high!" said Tessara.
"First, we rescue the people," I said with a sideways glance.
"Right, right. Then we blow it sky high!!"
"Yes, then we can blow it sky high."
"So uh what do guys want me to do?" asked Yuma.
"Just stay close," I said.
We slowly crept up to the rocky archway and made our way up the ramp while it was clear. We sprinted up the ramp all the way up to a metal door. Great, now we were stuck.
Slowly, the door started to open.
"Shit. Grab onto me now!"
Yuma immediately wrapped around my chest. I made a split second decision and jumped off the edge, pulling Tessara with me as I lunged. I shot my grapple hook up and it stuck in the edge just below the ramp edge.
Terror filled Tessara's face as she looked up at me. She quickly climbed up my arm and onto my back. Then started digging her nails into my shoulder gripping on for dear life.
"That was way too close!" said Tessara, shaking. "Whatever you do, don't drop me, please."
"I wasn't planning on it," I said, gritting my teeth.
She briefly looked down and tensed up even tighter, and squeezed again. Tessara doesn't do good with heights.
"Door please open, please open, PLEASE OPEN!! Ahhhh, stop swinging us."
"We wouldn't be swinging, if you just stopped moving," I said, tightening my jaw. "Holding you two isn't exactly easy and if you keep swinging we're going to fall."
"Sorry, sorry, I'll stop! Just don't let go, please don't let go!"
There was a small click and then the door slid open again.
"Go in now! Let me in! LET ME IN!!"
"Stop it! If we go in now the people in the truck will see us and this whole thing is compromised." I said, straining every amount of energy in me trying to hold us and not have my arm fall out of its socket. The truck came out of the doorway and down the ramp. I pulled us up onto the ledge and helped them both up. Quickly, I detached the hook and we scrambled to our feet. Tessara immediately ran in the door and lay flat on the floor, trying to grip the rock floor.
"Never again, never. Nope, not happening ever again," she mumbled.
Me and Yuma stepped into the door and it closed behind us. I looked down the path from where I was standing. It was a long corridor, about ten feet tall and ten feet wide. The walls were stone from the mountain, with metal support beams every few feet.
"We need to get out of this area before another truck comes by," I said as I stepped over Tessara and started down the path.
"Ughhhh," Tessara moaned.
"Tessara now!"
"Right, right, I'm coomingg!" she said, almost singing. It echoed down the hall.
"Tessara, shut your mouth, this isn't the opera house."
"Sorryy," she whispered
We made our way down the corridor. It was dimly lit with old eloq circuits that buzzed and made the tunnel glow a dark orange shade. As we grew closer to the end, it opened into a huge, cavernous area.
We walked to the railing at the edge. It probably went about fifty feet down. There were spiraling ramps going around the edge all the way to the bottom. With tire tracks all over them. The walls had small pockets of eloq crystals sticking out all around, making the cave glow all sorts of colors.
Down below, workers were chained to hooks in the ceilings above them with thick metallic wire that linked to the single cuffs on their hands. They had small metal drills that they were using to break the crystals with.
I looked down the spiral ramp descending next to us. There was no one on the upper floor with us, just below.
There was a lot of ground to cover.
It didn't look like there were that many workers — they were scattered pretty far apart. I'd guess maybe twenty at best. Still, twenty is a lot to rescue. We're going to have to be smart about this. There's definitely no easy way of doing this, but I knew that before we started. I looked over to Tessara, only to find her not next to me. I looked around confused, and found her with her back pressed flat against the back wall.
"Don't worry about me, I'll be safe back here. Heh heh," she said nervously.
This is about to be even more difficult unless Tessara gets a hold of herself.
"Get over here," I whispered.
"No, it's fine. I'm good right over here."
"Tessara, now get over here so I can tell you what we're doing."
"Why can't you come here?"
"Because-"
"Why huh, why?"
"Tessara please—"
"Nope, I'm staying here."
"You idiot. I have to show you what I'm talking about or else I can't explain it."
"Ummmm…"
"Do you need me to hold your hand?" I said mockingly.
"No, no. I can walk there just fine on my own," she said as she slowly started walking towards me. Once she made it next to me, she held onto the railing with a death grip. Her knuckles were as white as could be.
"Soo...what's your plan?" she said, blankly staring at the bottom of the cavern.
"You see the hooks there at the top of the ceiling above the workers?"
"Mhmm."
"I'm thinking that I create some sort of distraction while you start shooting them, I'm guessing they're heavily enforced. You have your armor piercing rounds, right?"
"Yeahhh…" she said, almost mindlessly.
"Tessara, hellooo?"
"Ok sounds good," she said, continuing to stare at the bottom with her death grip on the railing.
"Did you even hear what I said?"
"Yup...shoot the thingys...so the thingys can be free."
"Close enough." I said with a disappointed tone.
"We just need a good enough distraction so you can shoot them without being noticed. You got a suppressor?"
"Mhhmm, I always have my attachments with me."
"Right, okay. Good — that should help keep you unnoticed."
"I might have a distraction idea," said Yuma behind me. I had completely forgotten about her.
"What is it?" I asked, turning to face her.
"Well, I can create a large illusion. It might take me a little time, but I can try," she said shyly.
"Alright, let's try that. Tessara, you find a spot to shoot the chains from while—" I said, looking over to her. She was now laying flat on the floor scooting back away from the railing.
"Tessara! Are you even listening?"
She just nodded. This is hopeless, all I could do was hope she got it together before things go wrong, because they almost always do.
I continued, "While you do that, me and Yuma will make our way to the bottom and get into position for our distraction. Got it?", I said, staring at Tessara. She just put her thumb up.
"You better be ready."
"Mhhm, yup! Totally will be," she said, continuing to scoot back towards the wall.
"Let's go," I said, rolling my eyes and grabbing Yuma's hand.
She stumbled a bit as I pulled her. We then cautiously started making our way down the ramp. There was no way we'd be able to just walk all the way down — and grappling was sure to get us seen. I think I had a plan though.
We slowly made our way down to the nearest truck. The driver was on the side facing the wall towards one of the workers. I would take him out, but I needed him to drive down the ramp. As he drove we'd hide on the trailer until we made it to the bottom.
We hopped in between boxes of eloq crystals, ducking our heads so we wouldn't be seen. After what felt like an eternity of stopping and going, it finally came to a complete stop and the engine slowly turned off. I peeked my head up and looked around. We finally had made it to the bottom. I spotted a pile of metal crates about twenty feet away to our right.
"There," I said, hopping out of the trailer with Yuma behind me. We made it behind the boxes and I surveyed the area. The soldiers and the workers seemed to all be pretty occupied with their work, neither of us had been spotted on our way down. The only issue, Tessara was nowhere to be found. I guess at this point, I just had to hope she was ready. She had more than enough time to find a spot.
"You ready?", I said, turning to Yuma. She nodded.
"Alright do your thing."
She closed her eyes and began to squint hard. Then said, "il-n-dep-lit-spa-li-anima-do."
A dog appeared in front of us. A regular dog...not the distraction I was planning. A few soldiers took notice and started moving in closer.
"Yuma, we need to distract all of the soldiers, not a few. Try something bigger."
"Ok I'll try." She said, squinting even harder, "il-n-dep-lit-spa-li-anima-bi-do."
Then suddenly the dog started to shake. The soldiers that were slowly approaching it stopped and just looked at it. Then the dog grew to the size of a truck then twice the size.
Now that was a distraction.
It started barking and running around like mad, leaving a trail of toppled crates and trucks in its path.
I did not know an illusion could affect real things.
The soldiers were all distracted now. There was no way anyone could miss something like this.
I looked back at Yuma and she was still squinting pretty hard, I doubt she could keep this up much longer. That's when I looked up and started seeing the hooks in the walls shatter and split. It's working. Not gonna lie, I was extremely concerned about Tessara not being able to do it, but there she was breaking them.
The soldiers started firing on the dog, and it was just growling and swinging its paws around at the boxes and trucks all around. All the soldiers seemed to be on the ground level by now, dealing with the illusion.
Yuma's face was turning pale — she was pushing herself too hard. I'll say I definitely didn't expect her to do something on this scale. I put my hand on her shoulder, "You can stop now, that's good enough."
She opened her eyes and let out a long breath, "Ok…I hope it was enough," she said, panting.
"It was more than enough, you did great," I said, looking up.
The dog was gone and all the boxes and trucks that were knocked over were back where they were. Wait, was she manipulating the whole area, not just the dog? That explains why the dog was able to knock stuff over, because it was an illusion over the entirety of the environment. I'm no magic genius by any means, but I know something like that takes a lot of power. I looked back at her and she was still breathing kinda heavy.
"Stay here. I'll be back in a moment."
I rushed out from behind the boxes. The soldiers were all in a confused daze trying to figure out what happened. I quickly assessed them — about ten in total. They were in small scattered groups around the cavern floor.
I had to be fast. I sprinted at the first group, activated my sword, and slashed through the gun of the nearest soldier. I spun and kicked a second in the chest, then slammed a third behind me with the hilt, while kicking a fourth to the ground in front of me. I then whipped my sword around and punched a fifth in the throat.
A nearby group noticed me and started shooting. I quickly dodged their shots. As their weapons charged the next round, I lunged into the center of their group. Thankfully they were using rotating rounds and not air powered rifles.
I slashed through their guns effortlessly and began breezing through the soldiers. I kicked one in the head and punched the next in the chest. They both collapsed to the ground. I elbowed a third in the nose, and kicked a fourth in the crotch. The fifth one I hit with a jab from my right fist and whacked them in the side of the head with my hilt.
Another small group slowly walked from a doorway to my right. They were too distracted with their conversation to notice me. Then one looked over and saw the soldiers on the ground and raised his gun. The rest followed and began shooting at me.
A week ago, that may have been a problem. After that training course in the guild hall, however, I was confident in dodging their shots.
Some of the soldiers were now beginning to realize they were out matched because many of them dropped their guns and ran, but I wasn't going to allow anyone to leave.
I ran after them, stopping them clean in their tracks. I kicked one in the back of the leg and slammed him to the ground. I punched another's stomach and the next one in the back of the head. I was at the final few soldiers who seemed to have already accepted their fates, or they were just stupid.
They continued to shoot at me, but it was too late. I was already within arms length of them. One started to run — he was too far away to chase by the time I noticed, so I improvised. There were two near me. I had already disarmed them, but they insisted on fighting me hand-to-hand. I quickly spun around with my sword, which they managed to dodge. That's alright, though, I wasn't trying to hit them yet, I was just trying to create some space.
I deactivated the plasma edge and flipped my sword in the air. It started flipping back down as I took a few steps back then lunged into a front flip. The heel of my right foot hit the tip of the blade and sent it flying like an arrow. The two guys by me had stopped for a moment as the sword flew through the air, the hilt slammed into the back of the escapees' head. I wasted no time and immediately attacked the two next to me. I went for the one on my left first.
He threw a punch as I moved towards him. I sidestepped, grabbed his wrist, pulled him forward and kneed him in the stomach. He let out a gag noise and fell into the other soldier who was following behind me.
I ran at them as the first guy started to turn towards me. He was still a little crouched from the hit. Perfect height. I kicked him full-force in the throat, knocking him into the other soldier again. They both fell to the ground, the first guy was grabbing at his throat and wheezing.
The last guy I threw the sword at laid on the ground, terrified. I swiftly kicked him in the head and he slumped to the ground. I grabbed my sword and deactivated it, then put it on my gauntlet. I turned to look at all of the unconscious and groaning soldiers on the floor.
I didn't want to do that to them, but they left me no choice. At the same time though, they did deserve it. Stealing people, forcing them into slavery for your cause, trafficking people, creating and selling advanced weapons to criminals — they were not good people.
I looked over at the ramp and saw Tessara was scooting her way down the wall with all of the workers. They all seemed extremely happy to be free, thanking Tessara for her effort. She made it to the ground level and finally seemed to relax. We walked over to her, and Yuma ran to hug her.
"I'm so glad you're okay!" said Tessara. "And I'm shocked YOU didn't kill anyone."
"It's against code."
"Since when has that stopped you?"
"Who cares? I didn't kill them, so what? We'll just tie them up or something."
"Great, more work," she exclaimed sarcastically.
"Whatever. Anyways, I'm surprised you freed them. For a minute, I thought you'd be too scared to even pull out your gun up there."
"Oh — uh, yeah. I wasn't scared! Nope, not at all! And I shot all of those chains too. Yup! All by myself," she said, laughing nervously.
"Oh here's your gun miss." Said one of the guys as he handed her her pistol back.
"Really?" I said with a disappointed look.
"What?"
"Really?"
"I...just had him help a little," she said nervously once again.
I just gave her a look that said, are you sure?
"Alright, fine! Yes, I was too scared to shoot the chains, because I was so high up I didn't want to leave the wall. So I gave him my gun and he just so happened to know how to shoot one so he shot all the chains down. Alright, there, I admit it," she said, turning away and crossing her arms.
"So all you did was scoot down the ramp along the wall."
"And I gave him my gun, and cheered him on so he'd shoot good!"
"You're something else," I said, walking towards the group.
"If you were me you would've done the same," she said under her breath.
"Well, I'm not, so I didn't," I shot back.
"I didn't say anything, weirdo," she said, turning away again.
The people were huddled in a group near the center and I made my way towards them. "Hello everyone, my name is Vera and this is my partner Tessara and our friend, Yuma. We're here to get you out of here, plus everyone else in this mine. Then, hopefully, we can destroy it-"
Tessara cut me off. "I know it's asking a lot, but we would really appreciate it if you guys helped us save the rest."
I turned to Tessara who was now next to me and whispered, "What are you saying, we don't need them, we can do this ourselves. Plus, they're civilians. Yuma is already enough to worry about."
"Oh relax, help never hurts."
"They'll get in the way."
"Relax, it's fine," She whispered.
We turned back to the group and a guy started talking, "We may not be soldiers, but we can still fight. We'll help. These are our friends, so I say it's our job to rescue them too."
"Yeah, especially if Yuma is here. If she can help, then so can we!" said one.
"Yeah!" yelled another.
"Let's do this!" said a third.
"Alright, fine. I guess that's the least you deserve after what they put you through." I said.
"But no killing," added Tessara.
"Why not?! They attacked and killed our people!" one of them yelled.
"Yeah!" yelled the others.
"Because it's not right. And it would make you no better than them," she pleaded.
"Who cares? They deserve it!"
"You'll only make it worse. By killing them, you're going to do nothing but embolden more of them to come and kill more of you. They have the firepower and the numbers. Besides, don't stoop to their level. They are disgusting, horrendous, people. Don't sell yourselves so short as to become like them."
I turned to Tessara, "Tessara, they have guns, we can't expect to bring a group into what will most likely be a firefight and ask them not to shoot to kill — especially when the soldiers will be," I tried to say without the group hearing, but a few responded.
"Exactly, how do you expect us to win?"yelled one.
"Yeah, right!" yelled another.
"Alright, pick up a rifle, but only shoot if they fire on you. We don't want to make this more than what it needs to be, but do whatever you think is necessary."
"Vera, no, we can't."
"Tessara, in the field I'm in charge. We may be bound by a code, but they are not and we can't force them to be."
"But-"
"That's final. Now we need to move while we still can." I turned away from her and back to the group. "Let's go."
"We're right behind you!"
"Sounds good. Just keep a low profile," I said, hoping they would listen.