Chương 1333: 1332. Reconnecting

---Thres---"Finally, we can do our own mission," Alison said with a sigh, garnering some awkward gazes from the people around. As the leader of the Alchemy Expedition into the southern forest, she had the authority to give orders to the saplings of the Guardian Tree. Because of the people of the Muir Empire that had an affinity to mutiny, she and the rest of her expedition had stayed at Thres, while Mike went to find Adam.

For someone looking forward to getting back on their mission, Alison had enjoyed her position of power a little too much. Malicious gossip had it that she used her role to vent on the mermen and harass them whenever she had the chance. Had someone asked Alison about it, she would have openly admitted so. There were few thing she hated in the world, but merman were simply the worst.

"Yeah, I can't wait to be done with this and get back to Minas Mar, " Evee agreed with her for a different reason. Like Seth, Evee was a child of the districts. The time she had spent on the journey in other system worlds was the second worst of her life. The times when she and Edward were able to travel by fantastic and magical means were few and far between.

On the other hand, travel by coach, or mount, spending most of her time on some unfortified trail between cities or in the untamed wilderness, being shaken to the bones, was only topped by her times when she had to survive as an undead without hands, right after her camp in the ruins was raided by bandits. She tried both and was honest when she said, that she would rather scavenge to survive in the ruins of a district filled with monsters, than having to hike through a forest all day long.

They could drive the civilization out of Urth, but not the city out of city kids.

"Right, I'm already working on recipes to try with the dragon blood," Alison shared as they clinked their glasses together. The two were sitting on a vast terrace of the restaurant of a restored high-class hotel. They were sharing a bottle of wine taken from the hotel's basement in celebration of the good news that Adam was already on his way back with the people he and Mike had freed from Emerald City's laboratory.

"But who would have thought that there were still secret laboratories left?" Evee wondered. After the fall of the districts, many of their current problem emerged from hidden places of secret experimentation. Most prominent examples were the sea of trees they were about to enter and the terrifying zombie plague raging in the north around Omega.

"You would be surprised, "Alison commented knowingly. As an avid reader of everything, Alison also had a profound wealth of knowledge about conspiracy theories on Urth. Just because nobody had to suffer, living in the districts, didn't mean that there weren't certain undercurrents." If you ask me, what we saw so far was just the tip of the iceberg. I bet you that very second satellite city had something secret going on, illegal or tolerated by district leadership.

Actually, I think we are quite lucky that there are only a few this that escalated quite like the trees and the plague," Alison, the conspiracist, shared her professional opinion. Evee nodded slowly, her thought occupied with what she just heard. It probably made sense that not everything emerging from those places could have a far reaching impact, considering what these creations had to compete with. The author's tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon. Beta was a good example.

They knew about Adam's story. The quest of a pharmacy group to create hybrids with other species from the Pathworks to increase power quickly. The dream of mass-produced super soldiers, a tale as old as time. Ultimately, most of the beast-like hybrids had become controlled and used by the enemy to bring about Beta's destruction. Now, none of those hybrids were left. Their bio-engineered powers could not compare to invaders from portals or dungeon breaks.

As they lost their title as Ori Humas, their growth was also stunted compared to ordinary players. It was hard to imagine how many horror movie level catastrophes emerged from the darkness beneath the districts, only to face harsh truth, that they were not strong enough, not horrible enough, to survive in this cruel world. How many horrors had wilted away like a greenhouse plant in the desert? Evee found this thought funny because she was alive, and they weren't.... And if they were?

Maybe the immortal necromancer, Champion of the Queen of the Underworld, would consider adding them to her army.

"When are they returning?" Evee asked again.

"They should arrive here in a few days, maybe a week? We should probably get our stuff ready to set off soon," Alison reminded her. While Mike and his party were going further west to look for a coordinate to place the stone gates, Adam and the refugees they saved had to cross Beta to return to Thres. Since they set off roughly two days ago, and had a bunch of people traveling, a week was an optimistic estimate....

--- Y-City, Area of TS 12--- The boss exploded into bits of gore, frozen and burned meat, and a man wearing a ram helmet charged through him. The Lv. 89 troll champion boss guarding G-Station stood no chance against the Chosen of Krios. When Baker proposed the operation to retake the speed rails between the districts, Cale had his doubts. The right-hand man thought Baker had lost it, being hellbent on clearing the speed rails after the project to build a subway between the tree stations.

These tunnels had been neglected for almost four years and their preliminary assessments estimated a monster activity similar to the Abyss of the Adventurer Guild's Holy Land. With what was left of the players of Y-City it would have been a futile endeavor. Like throwing men into a meatgrinder. Using airships, like the ones built in Epsilon, seemed like a better option, although he had to admit that they also had drawbacks.

Not mentioning the limited cargo capacity, the central mountain range was home to a plethora of massive flying monsters, as displayed during the Great Tournament in Little Gamma. Every journey would have been a perilous odyssey without a guarantee of arriving at their destination. At the time, this still seemed more probable to Cale, however, things had changed. Seeing the Chosen of Krios wreak havoc among the beasts filled even the pessimistic Cale's heart with excitement.

They had gotten a glimpse at the power of the champion during the tournament, but seeing him fight in person was another story. With the support of Bart and his experienced people, this crazy plan actually seemed possible. As the Tower Master had promised Mayor Baker, Bart and his people had joined TS 12 soon after their encounter in Spring City. Although Cale had been a little worried about their background, as they had been living as outlaws in the ruined parts of Y.

City, in the end most of them were also just people that fled tyranny and only a small part were former criminals. They were all people of Ypselon, so they integrated at TS12 with little friction and actually became a great support to them. Especially, Bart quickly became their siege weapon to break though the bosses and monsters they stood little chance against. Now however, with the Chosen of Krios on their side, they were finally able to make their first step into the lost tunnels of their city.

They had cleared a few subway tunnels and stations so far, but those had all been within the city and were managed until recently. G-Station was the true beginning of their venture to retake what was lost during the apocalypse. The speed rails and tunnels from here on were dangerous and filled with terrifying beasts, but once they cleared the rails through the No Man's Land, they would regain their connection to Delta, making one step toward reconnecting humanity. Cale started to believe in Baker's vision.