Chương 149: Chapter : 149

"Please just be hiding in a pile of garbage," Naomi prayed silently as she ran.

"Please just be taking a nap somewhere." Meanwhile, at the absolute bottom of the dark, endless shaft, a loud, heavy thud echoed through the empty basement.

"Ow," Ken Eliot mumbled in the pitch black. Ken slowly sat up, rubbing the back of his messy black hair. He was sitting right in the middle of a massive, overflowing pile of discarded cardboard boxes and soft, shredded packing foam. He didn't have a single scratch on him. He didn't have any broken bones. To a normal person, falling down ten flights of stairs into a dark pit would have been instantly fatal. But Ken was completely fine. He hadn't even used a glowing magical shield to protect himself.

He had just casually adjusted his center of gravity mid-air and landed on the boxes like he was falling onto a soft mattress. He climbed out of the pile of cardboard and dusted off his clothes. He looked down at his expensive, newly tailored navy blue suit in the dim red emergency lighting of the basement.

"Oh, come on!" Ken complained loudly, his voice echoing down the empty concrete hallway. He grabbed his left sleeve, looking at a massive, jagged tear in the fabric near his elbow.

"Are you kidding me?! I literally just bought this suit yesterday! Do you know how much tailoring costs in this city? Falling down an endless pit is terrible for the fabric. Naomi is going to yell at me for ruining my clothes again." He let out a long, highly dramatic sigh and shoved his hands deep into his pockets. He wasn't scared of the dark, and he wasn't worried about the mutated monsters lurking in the facility. He was just annoyed that his outfit was ruined and his relaxing afternoon was totally ruined.

"I really hope they aren't mad at me for leaving the fight early," Ken muttered to himself, lazily strolling down the dark, metallic corridor. He didn't run. He just dragged his cheap shoes against the floor grids, making his usual scuffing sound. Scuff. Scuff. Scuff.

"I wonder if there is a vending machine down here. A cold soda would really hit the spot right now." While Ken was casually wandering the deepest levels of the laboratory looking for a snack, Naomi, Elma, and Raja finally reached the bottom of the long stairwell. They burst through a set of heavy steel double doors, stepping out into a massive, wide-open central intersection. The ceiling was lined with thick, hissing steam pipes, and the red emergency lights flickered wildly.

Before Naomi could even call out Ken's name, the sound of heavy, rushing footsteps echoed from the other three hallways connecting to the intersection. Naomi instantly raised her daggers, and Elma readied her twin silver swords, expecting another wave of mutated, heavily armed guards to attack them. But the people who ran out of the shadows weren't guards. This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it It was the rest of the grand alliance.

Prince Hephaestus jogged into the intersection, wiping a thick smear of black engine grease off his forehead. Right behind him was Heart, his tough Vice-Captain, holding a heavy metal wrench. From the opposite hallway, Sayma rushed in, adjusting her thick glasses. Zaima, Hestia's scowling lookalike, followed closely behind her. And finally, Laxmi jogged into the light, panting heavily and shaking her hands to cool down the small sparks of orange fire popping on her knuckles.

"Man, these bunker guards do not know when to quit!" Laxmi laughed loudly, completely out of breath but looking incredibly excited. She wiped some sweat from her chin.

"We just had to fight our way through a whole squad of those crazy bug-guys! Oh, hey Naomi! Did you guys clear your section?" Naomi slowly lowered her daggers. Seeing the rest of the team safe brought a tiny wave of relief, but the heavy block of panic in her stomach did not go away. Sayma immediately stepped forward. Her highly analytical mind instantly scanned the group standing in front of her. She looked at Naomi's pale face, and then she noticed the obvious, glaring gap in their formation.

The polite, calm smile completely vanished from Sayma's face. She stopped walking.

"Naomi," Sayma asked, her voice dropping into a deadly serious, tight whisper.

"Where is Ken?" The entire intersection went completely dead silent. Laxmi's excited grin melted away instantly. Prince Hephaestus stopped wiping his forehead and looked over, his eyes wide with sudden worry. Naomi swallowed hard. Her hands were shaking so badly that her daggers rattled slightly.

"He fell," Naomi said, her voice cracking as the terrible reality of the situation finally hit her all over again. She looked down at the metal floor, unable to meet Sayma's eyes.

"A massive guard mutated into a monster. It tried to spear Elma. Ken shoved her out of the way, and the monster knocked him through the railing. He fell down a dark shaft, straight into the lower levels. We couldn't catch him." Laxmi took a step backward, completely stunned. The fiery, hot-headed girl stared at Naomi in total disbelief.

"Fell? Down a shaft? But... he doesn't have any defensive magic! He can't even shoot a proper spark!" Elma looked at the ground, hugging her arms tightly across her chest. She looked absolutely miserable. The atmosphere in the central intersection turned incredibly heavy and suffocating. The alliance had just successfully fought their way into the heart of the enemy bunker, but none of them felt like celebrating.

The lazy, goofy slacker who always brought a smile to their faces was missing in the absolute dark, alone in a facility filled with monsters.

"We have to find him," Zaima snapped, completely surprising everyone. Even Hestia's bitter, arrogant servant looked genuinely stressed out by the news.

"If he is down here alone, he isn't going to last five minutes. We need to set up a search grid immediately."

"Agreed," Sayma nodded firmly, her polite demeanor replaced entirely by the cold, calculating focus of a Vice-Captain. She pushed her glasses up her nose and looked at the long, dark hallways stretching out ahead of them.

"Prince Hephaestus, does Raja's scanner show any life signs below us?" But before Raja could even lift his device to check, the heavy metal doors all around the massive intersection suddenly hissed loudly. The red emergency lights above them started spinning wildly, casting harsh, chaotic shadows across the walls. The loud, blaring sound of a security siren cut through the heavy silence of the room.

"We have company!" Heart yelled, gripping her heavy wrench with both hands. The doors flew open, but the people who rushed into the room did not look like the giant, mutated insect guards they had fought earlier. They were going to have to put the rescue mission on hold, because a completely different kind of ambush had just arrived.

The massive metal doors slammed open, and a dozen people poured into the central intersection, completely surrounding the allied Royal teams. But these attackers did not look like terrifying, mutated monsters. They didn't wear heavy tactical armor, and they didn't carry massive, high-tech Gatling guns. They were wearing long, white laboratory coats.