Chương 15: More Questions Than Answers

Ray had remained unconscious for nearly a minute. During this time, two members of his team had been knocked out of commission, and the last two were currently trying to protect him. Awakening from the hard impact was already a taxing endeavor, his mind a tousled mess and his blurry vision refusing to completely focus. He finally managed to grasp some sense of composure when he saw the Killworm crashing through the last of Kiara's shields.

Frangle met the Beast head-on and was crushed into the hard ground, creating a human-sized crater as blood and rubble flew. Kiara let out a terrified scream as the Killworm slammed into her, sending the green-haired teen flying into the wall, meeting the same fate as her comrades. The Killworm let out another roar and turned towards the now-standing Ray. The young man was battered and bruised. Blood ran down the side of his face and he heaved shallow breaths as he used meditation techniques to relax his heart rate.

'I have to do something,' he thought.

'They're all going to die!' Fueled with determination to save his newfound friends, Ray did the only thing he could think to do. His Mana reserves had reached a measly 10% in the minute since the fight began, and he no longer had use of the Mana Rune as it was on cooldown. He could absorb a Beast Core. That would fill his own core with Mana, but the process would take a bit of time.

Ray was already lacking such a precious commodity, seeing as the Killworm was currently staring him down, seemingly looking lovingly upon its next meal. In all reality, he was completely out of options. It was probably best to curl up and hope it wouldn't hurt.

'Fuck that.' Ray pulled on the last of his remaining Mana, willing every one of his Essences to activate. The Lightning Essence responded immediately, but Ray didn't need just lightning. That already seemed rather ineffective. Using Mana Circuit, Ray pushed the Lightning Mana drawn from its Essence back to its source while simultaneously pulling on the other two Essences. Neither of them responded, sadly.

'It has to work!' he thought.

'I'm running out of time!' The Killworm had seemed to grow bored with the staring contest and reeled back, ready to charge. The air pulsed as Mana radiated from the large Beast like an industrial fan. Ray willed all the Essences to activate again, all while cycling the tiny amount of Mana coming from the Lightning Essence. He finally felt a response. The Dark Essence started to glow, and Dark Mana began to seep into his Mana Ways. Ray felt a sharp pain in his mind as multiple System messages appeared.

He willed them to disappear and focused on blending the two different types of Mana. The Lightning and Dark Mana began to swirl around each other, rushing throughout his Mana Ways to every inch of Ray's body. Tendrils of black lightning began to burst from his skin. Ray could feel his core fill with Mana as a seemingly endless supply of Elemental Mana was pulled from the two Essences. The black lightning began to pool and form around his back.

It then seemed to stretch and wrap around his body, much like the cloak from his Fungal Cloak Ability. Power surged throughout his body, and Ray leapt into the air. The Killworm took this as a sign of confrontation and charged at the airborne teen. Ray leaned forward and kicked his legs back, positioning the soles of his feet away from the oncoming Beast. A burst of black lightning sent him flying at the Killworm.

Pulling back his fist and flexing every muscle in his body, Ray charged all the Mana into his arm as tiny blades emerged from his caestus. A sphere of black, almost purple lightning began to form around his fist, quickly reaching the size of a volleyball. Ray swung his fist just as the Killworm bit down with its gigantic maw. BOOOOOM! A wave of inky electricity covered the room as Ray's fist collided with the Killworm.

He felt a slight resistance that broke like glass as his fist entered the head of the enormous Beast. The entire head of the Killworm exploded, raining gray flesh and blue blood onto the cavern walls. Ray's momentum sent him flying past the point of impact, and he spun, trying to correct his course before slamming into the wall. He fell onto the ground with a thud and let out a low groan. This time, however, the Recruit did not lose consciousness and almost immediately rose to his feet.

His body felt light but not in a good way. Like he would just blow away if a strong gust entered the cavern. Ray swayed as he took in the sight of the blood-soaked cavern. He looked to see Phora, Frangle, and Kiara slowly rising to their feet. Only Jerome had yet to move. Kiara was in the best shape, followed by Phora, who had a slight limp as she approached Frangle, who was covered in blood and rubble. The large teen's face was covered in purple bruises, and he held his midsection as if his ribs hurt.

Kiara made her way over to Jerome and began to activate her healing Ability on him. Several seconds later, the red-haired teen was also on his feet, albeit not the most lucid. Ray waved to the group with a smile. He was happy everyone was safe. Kiara gave him a look that was slightly different than her usual flirty gaze.

"Damn, Captain," she said.

"They weren't kidding when they said you were tough." Her normally girly voice was in a lower register and more comfortable than normal. It seemed the young woman had been behaving differently until now. At least Ray felt she had changed rather suddenly. If you encounter this story on Amazon, note that it's taken without permission from the author. Report it.

"Good job, either way," she continued.

"Color me impressed." Ray checked in with the others, and once he decided everyone was fine, he began to go through his System messages. What he saw filled his chest with excitement. [Technique developed] [Unnamed Tech, Rank: 1] [System directory has been updated with a unique creation] A surge of information entered his mind, and the text on the message changed slightly.

[Coalescence, Rank: 1] [System has added term (Hybrid Mana) to directory] Ray was still reeling from the System messages when the corners of his vision began to grow dark.

'Huh?' he thought. A new System message appeared in his view. [Mana Overcharge state detected] [User has drawn on more Mana than the System recommended amount. User may experience fatigue and reduced Mana regeneration] His head felt light, and the room began to sway. He looked to the group and reached toward them before taking a step and falling onto the ground. Ray once again lost consciousness. - Frangle felt like he had been dropped from the top of the GLMB.

His entire body hurt, and a sharp pain rang out in his chest with every shallow breath. At least one of his ribs was cracked, maybe worse. The Killworm had slammed him into the ground with enough force to completely flatten a building. At least the Frangle-sized crater in the ground made it seem that way. Luckily, Frangle was a Strength specialist and had a high constitution. Not to mention his armor was very durable and sported tons of defensive Runes.

It was safe to say the others were lucky he was the only one who had received a full-on attack. In all reality, Frangle barely noticed the pain. He was too busy looking at the cloaked figure standing above the corpse of the Killworm. Once again, Ray had done the impossible. It was just as jarring as the first time.

'But man, he sure looks cool,' Frangle thought. Black lightning was flickering in the air around Ray as his cloak began to turn to tiny particles. It was obvious their Captain had used up his Mana reserves. The cloak had likely been dismissed on its own. No sooner had the cloak fully vanished than Ray began to sway and fell face-first onto the hard ground. Frangle's body jolted, and he found himself lumbering towards the now-unconscious Ray. The black-haired teen was covered in blood and grime.

Three different colored bloods stained his battlegear, and his hair was slick with sweat. Frangle would assume the worst if not for the rise and fall of Ray's chest indicating he was at least breathing. Frangle checked again just to be sure. Ray's breathing was weak, but it was there. The rush of seeing the Killworm die had already faded, replaced by the uncomfortable realization that winning had nearly cost them the person who made it possible.

A victory didn't feel very impressive when their Captain couldn't even stand. Phora and the others all rushed over, and once they deemed Ray was safe, began to scavenge around the cavern for Beast Cores. Using the System, they also called for a retrieval team. This would dispatch a Soldier and pilot to meet them at the location. Normally, it would go against the mission guidelines to request a pickup, but Phora urged them, seeing as a Stage 3 Beast had shown up.

If Ray hadn't been there, they would have needed to send out a distress call and survive long enough to be rescued. Ray remained unconscious until they had retrieved all the cores and boarded a carrier to return to base. The group was picked up and brought back to the GLMB. All the while, Ray never stirred. The team was worried at first, but the Soldier on board with them said he was going through something called Mana Overcharge.

Apparently, one can pull on Mana deep inside of the Soul Core, beyond what the System recommends. This is a concept called breaking the System. It can unleash a vast amount of Mana at critical times, but the body experiences a tremendous backlash. Being unconscious was about the worst case and could last upwards of 72 hours. This made the trip back to base rather solemn. Upon returning, the group was met by medical professionals and given thorough examinations.

Ray was put in his room after the checkup, the group having left his share of the Beast Cores, mainly the ones from the queen and Killworm, in his Recruit bag. Each member of the group was then debriefed and told to wait until Ray had awoken for further orders. - Ray woke up confused by his surroundings, a System message filling his vision. [User has recovered from Mana Overcharge]. Ray dismissed the message and looked around. He recognized that he was in his room; he just didn't know why.

The last thing he could remember was watching everyone get knocked out by the Killworm. After that, everything was kinda blurry. A flash of black lightning rang in his mind, and he suddenly remembered the end of the battle.

'I killed it?' he thought.

'There's no way, right? I mean the Cavernclaw and Stonemite Queen are one thing. Those are Stage 1 Beasts, easily within the realm of what I should be able to handle.' The primal fear he felt when the Killworm emerged came back in full swing just from imagining the monstrous creature. Ray could remember the black lightning and how the System said he created a new Tech. He didn't have the surge of info in his head like when he created Mana Circuit. Instead, the Tech felt like it was locked behind something.

Maybe it was his understanding of it and that implied the System didn't know or wouldn't tell him. Just how insane of a Tech had he created? Coalescence. It almost seemed fake. Far too overpowered. How could something like that even be allowed? The System wasn't all-powerful. It was just an interface used to understand the different aspects of growing more powerful through Mana. Even so, Ray explicitly remembered reading something about mixing elements not being possible.

It was basically outlawed by the System, deemed too dangerous to be done. Anyone who had tried in the past had permanently ruined their Mana Ways, making them incapable of even using Mana anymore. The System even explicitly said that those who try to become generalists need to avoid mixing the different elements. It was one of the basic rules of Mana. And Ray seemingly broke that rule. Just like every other rule set before him so far. Ray suddenly felt like he was under a microscope.

'They know about this Tech,' he thought.

'If it was really against the rules, I doubt I'd be sitting here now. Maybe the rules aren't as concrete as I thought. I'm sure the people who created the System can bend whatever rules they please. They've known about everything, every step of the way. More and more powerful people keep coming into contact with me, pushing me towards whatever agenda they have. It could be that they just want me to be a powerful shield. I've shown a lot of talent, so they show me attention accordingly.' His eyes narrowed.

'Maybe there's more, though. How much do they really know?' Ray had a feeling he wouldn't be getting any straight answers anytime soon.