...??? PoV...

I take one last look at the contents of the cloth bags wrapped around my body. They all contain the same thing, food that is either stolen from the nearby shops or that I picked up from the trashcans of said shops.

But I pay attention to one particular bag attached to my left thigh; this one contains medicine. Stealing the expensive medication was hard since the security measures of a pharmacy are nothing like the one in a fast food place, and I wince when a bag brush against a fresh gash in my right flank. I grimace and bear with the pain; I can get this wound looked at as long as I get back to camp quickly.

Medicine is always in short supply in our Shard, and she needs it.

Shaking my head does little to chase the images of my sick little sister, but I do my best to suppress the vision and start to run. The store owners should have given up pursuing me by now. I hope that they didn't follow the trail of blood that I left behind...

The throbbing pain almost makes me fall over, but I have to endure. Everyone is counting on me, and fainting here would mean certain death to these people. I rush as fast as I can through the hidden back alleys of the Surface, avoiding dregs and drunks as best as I can while heading towards the isolated area where I arrived.

I stop in the middle of my journey and take a brief look around. My long and droopy ears twitch with the slightest sound, and I focus on the mana fluctuations in the air. Many things have been hammered into our heads during our Diver training, and one of the most important is to make sure that we are not followed.

The reason for all these precautions is my destination that I finally reach after running for another five minutes. To the untrained eye, it looks like a pile of trash that has been left here for years.

I reach for an old copper locket hanging around my neck and press one of its two buttons. The inauspicious pile of garbage flickers out of existence, revealing a rusty suit of protective armor. The suit is a standard heavy set of armor, but the top part is bell-shaped, and a band of darkened metal that breaks the otherwise rusty bronze surface acts as a visor. It's held together by old rivets that aren't in good shape, and some had to be replaced by new rivets made in the Shard.

However, these new replacements are nothing like the original components, and they can barely handle a single Dive before breaking or dissolving into nothingness.

This may be one of the reasons why the mortality rate of Divers keeps increasing.

I shake my head to chase the gloomy thoughts away. Divers are a necessity if we want to survive, and being chosen to become one is a great honor. I press the second button on the locket, and the old suit comes to life, it's ancient mechanisms rumble and the top half rotates to the side until it reveals the interior of the suit.

The massive metal construct is too big for me, but Divers are specifically chosen for their small size. It saves space in the suits to allow for more items to be brought back from the Surface.

I dump all my bags into the suit and take a deep breath. The air around here is stale and doesn't smell good, but it's still better than the stuffy recycled air in the suit. It isn't rare for Divers to pass out in their armors if their Dives take longer than expected, and the amount of time they can spend Diving seems to become smaller as time goes by...

I take one last look at my surroundings, those back alleys of the Surface aren't nice by any stretch of the imagination, but they are still better than the horrible Shard that we live in.

If they have all of this, why do they bother invading us?

The Invaders from the Surface are ruthless and cruel, and they make our lives even more miserable.

What have we done to deserve this?!

I grit my teeth and hop into the suit. The controls have been adapted to a smaller person, and various levers haphazardly welded around allow me to more or less control the hulking metal construct. I press a switch, and it causes the suit to close, thus cutting me off from the external world. The only thing I hear is the rumbling of the old machinery, and blue screens appear in front of my eyes.

They display unknown symbols and shapes, as well as various red windows. The number of red windows seems to be bigger than last time, but I'm sure it isn't anything to worry about...

We might not understand the displays, but the knowledge on how to operate the suit was passed down by our ancestors since times immemorial. I clench my fist and repeat the sequence that has been drilled into our heads since we were children. It has become a sort of prayer amongst Divers, and it's not uncommon to hear them mutter the activation sequence before a new Dive.

Top right then middle, swipe up and down until the button lights up...

I sing the activation sequence in my head until the suit slowly stands up on its own and test the controls one last time to make sure that they work correctly.

Everything is fine, so it's time to go home. I use all my strength to move a rusty lever into position, it bears traces of many repairs done with varying levels of skills but it somehow still works. A large blue arrow appears in front of my eyes, and I move the suit towards the pile of garbage near an abandoned building.

I press another button, and a small point extends from the palm of the suit, so I slam it into the ground. These areas are where the Surface is thinner than usual, so it allows us to pierce through. A tiny crack that looks like a night's sky appears on the ground, and I put my foot into the break.

Immense pressure bears down on me as the suit is sucked into the hole that's already repairing itself. The gash on my side becomes even more painful, and a small stream of blood stain the metallic interior of the suit.

Shit, I need to wipe that off!

Blood tends to be slightly corrosive, so I must remove it or else it might damage the suit more than it already is. I reach for an oily rag near my head, but the visor darkens and the suit buckles at the same moment, causing me to smash my head against a lever, splattering even more blood.

I grit my teeth as the suit buckles and groans. The metal construct is thrown around, and I hurriedly use the loops on my armor to attach myself into the built-in harness. The flashing screens hurt my eyes, but I bear through it and diligently wipe off every single speck of blood-

A sudden shock almost knocks me unconscious, and dozens of red windows appear in front of my eyes.

I'm already there?! This journey is faster than usual. I hope the suit will hold together...

I yank a cord near the controls for the left arm, and something rumbles in my back. The cylinders welded to the back of the suit release the compressed air they contain, and it starts to spin uncontrollably. My best efforts to stabilize it don't amount to anything worthwhile. I feel the sudden pressure change in my guts as I enter the Shard and slam into the metal door which is supposed to protect the crack in reality we use to Dive.

The resulting concussion is hard to deal with, but at least I'm still conscious so it can be considered a good landing. I glance around as the visor clears, and struggle to position the suit into it's designated spot before banging on the door using a specific code.

Ropes tense up and pulleys move around as the ground under my feet turns, and the groaning door is opened.

It reveals the other side of our Diving Station, where six men are using all their strength to turn long cranks welded to a defunct engine that used to power the entire facility. Now it's only used to manage the returning suits.

The portion of the hard ground beneath my feet rumbles and is slowly pulled towards the Station, where it rotates towards the docking bay where three other suits are stationed.

My head is flung backward when the docking procedure is finished, and I emerge from the Diving Suit with a slightly wavering step. The ones in charge of the suits barely pay attention to me as I grab all my bags, they are busy with inspecting the compressed air reservoirs, and from the look of things they are changing the dented landing plate welded on the left shoulder of the suit.

Now I need to get back to-

Throbbing pain interrupts my thoughts, and I can only grit my teeth when I see the red stain spreading on my side. I chuckle, I must look terrible right now...

"Hey!" A high-pitched voice takes me out of my stupor, and someone behind me flicks my thick long ears. "Roshia, you're back!"

I make a wry smile and turn around, "Elora, it's nice to meet you too but..." I point towards my flank and my bloodied head, "Could you calm down for a bit?"

She eyes my wounds and gasp, "How did you..." Elora glances at my bags and sigh. "I see you brought back even more than last time... You need to calm down."

My friend passes a hand through her neck-high brown hair and grabs some of my bags before attaching them to her armor. We are both wearing the same thing, a set of used black clothes with a lot of belts and loops. These clothes are a sort of uniform for Divers, although we technically don't have a specific outfit.

Elora's slightly drooping ears twitch, and she turns towards me. She's almost a head taller than me, so I have to look up. "Are you sure you can go out like that? You should rest a little before-"

"I'm fine," I interrupt her. I can't let my little sister wait for too long. She can only rely on me, and I won't forgive myself if something happens to her.

My friend sigh, "All right, but be careful. Those bags are heavy, and they'll slow us down. And I don't know how we'll fare if we encounter any Invaders..."

"We'll be fine," I say with confidence. Invaders rarely encroach in this part of the Shard, and we don't have a lot of distance to cover before we reach the safety of the Tunnels.

We head out of the Diving Station, and Elora glance at a collapsed part of the tunnels, "It's too bad that we can't clear this path. If we could, then we would be able to go back home without venturing outside."

I push her from the back; there's no point in wasting time thinking about things that will never happen.

We arrive in front of an old modified airlock, and I take a glance at the old cracked piece of glass framed in steel hanging on the wall by a piece of string.

"There's nobody around, so we should be safe." I declare, and Elora nods before nervously tapping the handle of a long white weapon hanging on her side. It's a cheap but effective mass produced weapon that she looted off the body of a drunk Invader who wandered too close to the Station's entrance.

"All right... Are you ready?" I nod, so she focuses back on the door and takes a deep breath. "Three... Two... One... Go!" she pulls a spring-loaded lever, and the door behind us closes while a part of the wall opens. We jump outside, just in time for the bar to go back up and shut the door behind us.

"That was close... We should look for an opener for this place." Elora says after wiping her forehead. I smirk, the Station and the Tunnels are so old that finding anything related to them today is almost impossible, so finding something as useful as an opener is a lost cause.

But I don't say anything, Elora has always been a bit of a dreamer, and I gave up trying to convince her to abandon her silly dreams.

"We shouldn't linger here, let's go!" I say, and my companion nods. She reveals her weapon and narrows her round, almost entirely black eyes before grabbing my hand and bolting forward. I struggle to keep up with her pace since I'm still light-headed from the shock, and my wound is still throbbing.

However, I have no other choice but to endure until we reach the safety of the Tunnels.

I grit my teeth as Elora expertly weaves through the dark alleys of the Shard, avoiding the area with more people, and thus the bulk of the Invaders.

We jump and weave through the crumbling buildings. The few people who cross our path either don't care about us, or they are too weak and malnourished to pay attention.

Elora suddenly stops, and I slam head first into her back. I want to protest, but she covers my mouth with her hand and points towards a ruined area.

My heart skips a beat when I recognize the yellow uniform of the Invaders, from what I can see there's three of them wandering around the rubble.

"So, found anything?" one of them asks.

"Nothing, the Boss is gonna be pissed if we don't fill our quota..." one Ratman holding a palm-sized device replies. The other one surveys the surroundings with an alert eye, and I can barely contain a scream when his gaze briefly stops on us.

However, he didn't notice us and resumed his patrol.

"Shit... What do we do?" I ask my friend.

Her hand holding her weapon is trembling, but she still forces a smile. "Don't worry. We'll have to take a detour..."

She doesn't sound convinced, and I can't blame her. This route is the shortest one to reach the Tunnels and the only one where we have a minimal chance of encountering any Invaders.

But today isn't our lucky day.

"Hey, check this out!" One of the Invader shouts before beckoning one of his companions. "This thing has different settings, I have no idea what they are but-" he randomly taps onto his device, and a grin spreads on his ugly face.

"We've got two hits!" he shouts before pointing towards our position. "Behind this building!" Elora's already pale skin becomes even paler when the Invader who was silently surveying the area rushes towards us. She grips her weapon with two hands and pushes me away just before the Invader strikes.

"There's two trash over there, get your asses over here!" he shouts after easily parrying Elora's desperate attack.

The expression of the other two Ratmen becomes full of greed, and they casually walk towards our position with their weapons out. I try to cast a spell but my aim is off, and my fireball hits a pile of rubble.

Shit, my head is throbbing, and I feel like I'll faint if I use another spell!

"Roshia, I'll hold them off! Get out of here!" Elora, who's already sporting some new wounds, shouts before lunging at a Ratman, who fails to dodge her strike completely.

I can't abandon my friend like this! But I can't do anything!

The pragmatic choice would be to run away, but I won't be able to forgive myself if I someone dies because of me again! I grit my teeth and clench my fists before focusing all my remaining energy into the palm of my hand.

A ball of blue flames appears over my two clenched fists, and I scream my lungs out before slamming the two blue flames together. A bright light erupts, and a beam of fire blows off a good chunk of flesh from the leg of one of the Ratmen. I fall to my knee, my head is spinning, and my breath is ragged.

Shit, I missed...

The Ratman that I hit groans and grabs a red potion hanging on his belt before chugging it down. The pain in his expression disappears, and his flesh is slowly getting healed back to normal.

Tears flow from my eyes. All my efforts were for nothing! I'll never see my little sister again, and I can only hope these Invaders grant us a quick death, but-

The air suddenly gets heavy, to the point where I struggle to breathe. I glance towards Elora, and she's on one knee while using her sword as support.

What kind of trick is this?!

My surprise increases when I see that the Invaders are in no better shape, and they exchange worried looks before focusing back on the origin of the pressure.

I'm slammed into the ground before I can get a good look at the new attacker, but I somehow raise my head.

What I see petrifies me.

A humanoid figure wearing a set of armor unlike anything I've seen before along with a red robe that exudes a golden regal aura walks towards the Invaders with his hands behind his back. He's flanked by two people carrying weirdly shaped black weapons, and the Ratmen shout something in a language that I struggle to recognize.

"Who are you?!" one of the Invaders shouts.

I learned a bit of their language, so I can more or less translate the ensuing conversation.

"You have incurred the wrath of Prometheus!" one of the robed figures shouts.

"By the will of Prometheus, your lives are forfeit! Prepare to face retribution!" the other declares.

The golden flames surrounding the armored figure seems to grow in intensity when he moves his hand faster than I can see, and three detonations echo in my ears.

My jaw drops when the Invaders explode from the inside, and a beautiful red mist splatters over everything around me.

I can only gaze in horror as I realize that there's nothing left of the three Ratmen. Their lives have been snuffed out by this armored being in just an instant.

The helmeted head of the armored person turns towards us, and I feel my very soul screaming in terror.

I never believed in gods before, but after seeing this display...

I might want to reconsider my beliefs.