Chương 78: Episode 23: Reunions

My feet pounded against the dirt as we tore through the underground tunnel, thick dust and grit swirling into clouds around us. The stampede echoed like thunder in the pitch-black hollow. Ahead, the suffocating passage twisted and narrowed, but we had no choice except to run. If we slowed down for even a second, we were not getting out. Adrenaline burned hotter than the dirt-laced air in my lungs as I snapped my owl wings open, feathers glimmering faintly with neon-blue energy.

Kicking off the ground, I soared above the others while the tunnel whipped past in a blur. Flyers joined me in an instant, streaking forward like comets. Dark blue energy crackled through me as my narrow eyes glowed behind my glasses, the weight of responsibility pressing down harder than the ceiling above. The plan was simple: get out, then get Olsen and Don over here. The tunnel finally opened into a chamber featuring huge metallic doors that towered like giants in the underground. Our exit.

Victory was right there, and I could almost feel it, until a metallic crash echoed behind us. I turned as my heart dropped. CyberBots poured through the gaping hole in the wall, scarlet eyes locked onto us as their jetpacks roared and blasters hummed with charging red energy.

"Dammit," I hissed through gritted teeth, making my choice.

"NERD'S GOT THIS!" My voice boomed through the tunnel. Without hesitation, the others sprinted forward, leaving streaks of light and dust in their wake. I hovered midair with my wings flared wide, fists clenched as blue veins of light crawled up my arms. The first CyberBot lunged, and I met it head-on, smashing my fist into its face with a bone-rattling blow. Sparks exploded as the bot's head detached, its body collapsing into a fireball behind me.

Another swooped in, so I spun, whipping my feathers around to drive my knuckles straight through its skull as another explosion shook dirt loose from the walls. I barely leaned back in time as a flash of red energy scorched the air past my face. Twisting mid-air, I charged my arm and fired back a concentrated bullet of pure blue energy that connected cleanly. The tunnel screamed as a portal swirled open into a black hole of crackling blue and pitch darkness.

Gravity bent inward, tearing rock and dirt free while my hair whipped across my face. The CyberBots froze for half a second before the void dragged them in. They screamed in metallic distortion, sparks shredding off their frames as they disintegrated. The pull threatened to take me, too. My arms strained as I slammed my hands into the ground to hold steady against the shifting earth. My wings whipped uncontrollably and my chest heaved with effort as dirt cracked under my grip.

"Not yet," I growled, snapping my fingers with one last burst of will. The black hole imploded in a violent flash, leaving nothing behind except silence and the fading glow of blue light. I staggered forward, wings folding back as my body trembled from the strain.

"ANGEL!" Class 101 shouted from the threshold, urging me to move. Mason stood front and center, slamming both fists of dough into the metallic doors with explosive force. The massive gates shattered, scattering fragments across the floor. I drifted down until my feet hit the ground, pulled my hood up, and adjusted my backpack straps before stepping through the threshold. The sight before me froze me in place.

A vast metallic base sprawled beyond the shattered doors, humming with strange machinery beneath artificial lights high above.

"We made it," I muttered, chuckling under my breath. The crew turned to me, uncertain and waiting for my word. I straightened my hoodie, a smirk tugging at the corner of my lips as I prepared to reassure them.

"I'll let them know we're here." Before my foot even touched the metallic floor, a low, sharp voice dripped with power from behind us.

"Finally found you kids." I froze, eyes widening as I turned. Standing right there was Power.

"Power?" The name slipped out like a shockwave. The entire group lit up at once, eyes wide as energy flared and disbelief snapped straight into excitement. Standing at the far end of the metallic hall, Power looked like a pillar planted in the middle of chaos. Electric-blue light shimmered across his body as arcs of energy snapped and faded like controlled lightning. He looked rough, with thick, dark stains streaking across his armor, dripping in places and carrying a sharp, metallic smell like oil.

But he was standing and very much alive. William broke first.

"YO, POWER?!" He rushed forward.

"Where have you BEEN?! We thought you were…" William cut himself off, jaw tightening.

"What happened to you?!" The hall immediately filled with overlapping noise as relief spilled out all at once. Everyone began shouting over each other, asking if he was okay, where he vanished to, and what he had been fighting. Power did not move at first, then offered a small, tired smile.

"Miss me that much?" A couple of laughs broke through as tension cracked like glass. Sophia let out a quiet breath, lowering her arms with a shake of her head.

"You had us thinking you got erased or something." I stepped forward, wings tightening slightly as I scanned him up close. The stains were layered thick, showing he had been fighting for a long time.

"That's not normal blood," I said quietly. Power glanced down at himself, then back at us, his tone shifting the room from tense to focused.

"It's not. I randomly got yanked into some kind of broken dimension. Out of nowhere, the space around me just tore open and dragged me in." Every head snapped toward him.

"And?" William asked, his voice sharp and locked in. Power's gaze hardened.

"It was completely unstable. The whole realm was corrupted, full of these glitching monsters tearing through the terrain. Code and static bleeding into physical matter. They kept reforming every time I hit them, so I had to tear through waves of corrupted beasts just to keep moving. That is what this is." He gestured lightly to the dark, oil-scented blood.

"It's theirs." Nobody spoke because everyone believed every word.

"It took me longer than I expected to find a way out," Power added, his voice calmer again.

"Time didn't exactly work the same in there. But I fought through the source of the distortion, broke the tear, and the first place I landed was here." Silence lingered for a moment before William let out a sharp breath and grinned.

"Yeah, that tracks." A few chuckles rippled through the group as the tension dissolved completely. Sophia crossed her arms with a small smirk.

"So basically, you got swallowed by a glitch dimension, beat up a group of nightmares, and just walked it off." The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation. Power shrugged.

"More or less." Jocabed stepped forward, lowering her blades.

"Well, you're back. That's what matters."

"Yeah," Mason added quietly from the back.

"We're good now." Power let out a low chuckle, glancing around the metallic halls.

"Heh, so you found where I live." He tilted his head toward the corridor ahead, his tone calm but focused.

"Come on. I'll show you around. We have a lot of work to do." We exchanged looks, ready for whatever came next. Without another word, Power walked past us with faint trails of electricity flickering behind him. Everything snapped back into place. I folded my wings, took a quiet breath, and fell in beside the others as we followed him without question.

The both of us landed onto the surface at the exact same instant. I kept my knees bent and swept my gaze across the area. The ground was solid black, slick like volcanic glass, fractured by veins of violet that glimmered faintly with every movement I made. What surrounded us were walls of amethyst crystal. We were standing on a long narrow path that led to the edge of the land, and that edge led to the sprawling horizon. Nothing too crazy. I unsheathed my grand Earth Axe, blade gleaming.

"We're clear, Bite. Hope you don't mind killing a couple of creatures." I glanced to my right, and Bite was not there. No surprise that she was wandering around the whole place, darting back and forth, squealing because of how everything was made out of crystals. She zipped to my face, squealing so hard that I think the sound barrier shattered.

"WE'RE ON ANOTHER PLANET!!!!!!!!" I winced at the noise and calmed her down, patting her shoulder.

"Yeah, yeah, we're on another planet." Walking away, I turned to her while jerking a thumb behind me.

"Never been on another planet before, first time, especially with someone else." I turned around and she zipped to my side, matching my pace.

"What do you think we're gonna see?!" I shrugged.

"I don't know. I mean, we just got here." We walked underneath a glistening crystallized arc. Across the horizon blazed the light of an orange and violet glowing sun, and the land beyond it stretched into a larger terrain of crystallized mountains and structures. There were some crystallized caves arranged in a circle, so there had to be a couple of creatures lurking in there. The both of us stopped at the edge and watched for a moment as the morning light dappled upon us.

Bite sat down at the edge, kicking her sleek metallic legs in the air. I sat down beside her, dropping my axe near me, and resting both of my hands against my knees. Bite leaned closer, "This place looks amazing! I wonder what lives here!"

"I'm sure we'll find out," I chuckled, eyeing the caves down at the horizon.

"Say," I scratched my head, "how did you crash on Ickeris?"

"That?" she said, sitting upright.

"Uhm… well… I tried to fly through Ickeris, but the cold weather was so intense that it froze my insides, then… BOOM! I crashed!" I looked at her, and leaned away a bit.

"Oh… alright." She looked away from me and brushed her arm.

"Thanks for saving me, though…" It was a long silence. If Eddy were here, he would've said something about me and her feeling some tension. I'm glad I got that guy to stay up there and not tag along down here.

"What were you fleeing from?" I asked, quietly. Bite didn't answer at first, but she did anyway.

"Me and the Chosen Ones got attacked by some glitchy guy."

"Did you say the 'Chosen Ones'? And are you talking about Vironos?" I asked, whipping my head towards her.

"Yeah. I didn't want to fight 'Vironos' because he seemed to scary," she said quietly, staring at the sun.

"I flew as far away as I could." She hugged her knees.

"I kinda regret it now. I think I'm a coward…"

"You're not a coward," I said.

"Nobody would want to go against Vironos like that. Trust me, I tried."

"You tried?" Her optics whirred.

"You must be brave!" My face flushed.

"I still lost." She threw up her fist for a fist bump.

"At least you fought him!" Not gonna lie, I do kinda feel proud of myself for standing against him. Vironos was brutal to face, but I was strong enough to hold my own. I fist-bumped her, and we laughed right after. Now that the small talk's done, it's time to kill some creatures. I got up on my feet and so did Bite, and the both of us fixed our eyes on that one cave. I gave her a smirk.

"You thinkin' the same thing?" Her eyes made a cheeky expression.

"Thinkin' the same thing."

We camped in front of all eight of those caves, waiting until something decided to emerge. I was sitting cross-legged, and she was pacing around me with a hand on her chin, staring at all eight of the openings in front of her. She stopped and leapt into the air to perch on top of a crystallized spire.

"Hmm, you ever think that they're too scared to come outside?!"

"Going in there definitely isn't safe," I said.

"Spawn." Concray flickered to life right next to me and unsheathed his sword from behind him. Jawbreaker flickered to life right next to him, slamming his fists together. I coughed after telling them to "spawn." I really gotta get used to this ability. I got up and turned to the two.

"You guys go check it out in there, I'm not stabbing my throat again just to conjure a whole army." The two nodded, and stomped their way into the first cave. Bite was stunned, her hands smushed up against her cheekbones.

"NO—WAY!!!!"

"YOU HAVE YOUR OWN BUTLERS?!" She jerked a finger at me. I nodded.

"Not exactly butlers, but soldiers. I can create stone life using earth energy, and command the land to do things that I want it to do."

"OoooOoOoOooOooooo!" She zipped to the land and jabbed a finger at the ground with her arm raised.

"Can you turn the land into a MASSIVE TITAN SO POWERFUL THAT IT COULD DESTROY MULTIPLE CITIES AT ONCE?!"

"Ehhhh," I slid a hand down my neck, leaning back.

"Yeah, but it would nearly wreck my throat."

"Awww," she said, disappointed.

"That's boring!" I rolled my eyes with a smile.

"And it's safe. One drawback is that if I ask the land to create something too powerful, or do something too devastating, then it'll hurt my throat enough for me to barely even speak."

"Spawning figures and creatures made out of stone only gives me a little bit of pain. Whole armies is a moderate amount of pain. Making a whole titan is highly moderate. And ordering the land to kill someone is completely fatal." She plopped down right next to me, tilting her head at the caves.

"That's interesting." SLASH!!!! It echoed from one cave, and a head flew out of it before hitting the ground, landing near my feet. It was the head of a crystallized raptor. Purple blood pooled from the neck, and its eyes were wide open. I got up and glanced at the trail of blood before peering through the cave where the head had been hurled from. More heads were flung out of the cave, splattering against the ground. I drew my axe, grinning.

"That means they're done." Bite's arms morphed into heavy cybernetic cannons, with a cyan pulsing light inside of them that continued to intensify as she took a step forward.

"SHOW US WHAT YOU'VE BROUGHT, BUTLERS!" They delivered us a whole wave of crystallized raptors. They all charged at us, roaring and snapping their jaws with their claws spread and tails lashing. Concray and Jawbreaker charged out of the cave, with Jawbreaker smashing one to the ground and Concray slicing another in half. More raptors poured out of the other caves, a reaction to the disturbance. Bite shot back into the sky and started blasting at the wave of raptors surging towards us.

I charged forward with my axe behind me, and I hurled it into the air. The axe spun, slicing through the air, green energy crackling mid-motion. FWISSSSHHHHHH! A massive slash of earth energy tore through the wave of leaping and sprinting raptors, obliterating them all in an instant as they exploded in blood. I quickly held out my hand and yelled for the axe to return. It spun back toward me through the air and I caught it. I wasted no time sprinting toward the raptors.

Cyan energy blasts flew past me and detonated the raptors in light and blood. Jawbreaker seized two of them and smashed them against each other while trampling most of the raptors, and Concray sliced them with clean precision, also choosing to stomp on them when they attacked. I swung first—but one raptor slapped the weapon downward with a crystalline claw. Another leapt above me, dropkicking me from the sky and slamming me into the ground with bone-breaking force. The breath left my lungs in a violent gasp.

Before I could rise, the third lashed its tail around my neck and yanked me upward, strangling me in midair. My vision blurred. I gagged, blood flecking my lips as the beast's grip tightened, cutting off air, cutting off life. My aura flickered, black and emerald sparks dimming, sputtering out. My body was failing—I was seconds from death. Then salvation struck in a flash of green. A blur zipped across the battlefield, severing the raptor's head in a single motion.

The creature collapsed, lifeless, and I dropped hard to the ground, coughing, clutching my throat. My gaze shot up. Bite slid across the shard-littered ground, scattering debris with raw speed, before vanishing in a blink of cyan light. She reappeared behind another raptor, seized its tail, and swung the monster in a vicious arc before hurling it into the sky like it weighed nothing. In a flash, she stood beside me, fists clenched, cyan aura blazing. The aura vanished and her eyes narrowed slightly at me.

"How are you letting a raptor win?" BWAM! She blasted a raptor to death. I got up and stone armor snapped across my entire body like puzzle pieces fitting perfectly.

"Don't tease me about it." The both of us stood side by side as Concray and Jawbreaker battled against the wave of raptors. Her energy glowed in her cannons, my axe flared in emerald light. We both charged at the same time, and she fired off one little quip at me as she attacked.

"No promises, Terrabite."