Chapter Forty-Three

Elysia glanced at the oddly unaware group. “Any idea how I’ll escape with Umbra if I reject the deal?”

After taking a second to think, Joe replied, “Maybe, but it’s risky.”

Elysia stared at him as if he was an idiot. “Well, as you can see, our current situation is risky.”

“If they take the bait, we are free to leave, but if they see through it, they will hunt me down. Before we go further, are you willing to let me stay on Umbra until I can find a safe place to leave?”

Elysia looked at the camo gunship still floating a couple dozen meters away. “Does it involve your boat? Are you going to shoot them?”

Joe’s eyes widened in surprise for a moment. “No, Shawn would never turn the guns on people. He’s also one of my teammates who was sent to the capital after refusing to turn in his sister when she turned into a Changed. Whatever they did to him caused him to surrender his sister. He can’t be trusted to help. At best, he is a neutral party.”

“Why do you want to help me? Don’t you have a family and career here?” questioned Elysia.

“Family no, and after the events of this dungeon, I’m sure they will send me to the capital for questioning. Marc Evans had enough clout to keep most of us safe, but with him dead, I’m a sitting duck.”

Elysia sent another glance at the group, staring at a spot to the right of her for some odd reason. “If you can get us out of here, I’ll take you along, but I don’t know where you will sleep. Also, as payment, you have to answer all my questions. I need to know more about pretty much everything.”

Joe gave her a smile. “Deal.”

“So, are you going to finally tell me what you have in mind? And why aren’t they wondering why we are ignoring them?”

“My class evolution gave me several illusion-based spells. Remember when I trapped the nightcrawlers in a loop? I cast an illusion of them chasing us.”

“So your plan is to trick them so we can escape?”

“Yup.”

Elysia shrugged her shoulders, at a loss for a better option. “Go for it. The only other option is to fight if I don’t take the deal.”

Joe nodded his head before turning to the gathered Changed. A massive wave of warmth radiated out of Joe, directed at the group in front of them.

The group immediately tensed before scrambling off Umbra onto their rafts. They turned toward Port Alberni while gunning their rafts, including his former squad mate. However, by the time they were a hundred meters away, they stopped.

Joe’s eyes widened as he fell to his knees, sweat pouring down his face. “Run now!”

Before she could move, Umbra’s engines burst to life. Umbra’s heavy body jerked into motion, plowing through the Changed team’s boat on its way down the inlet.

Elysia scrambled into the control room to find Eva at the controls. Joe limped in a few seconds later. He collapsed on the couch, uncaring of the scattered clothes.

Within a minute, the rafts disappeared from sight as Umbra rounded a corner. Unfortunately, a couple minutes after that, the sound of a helicopter drew their attention out the window. The helicopter gained on them, prompting Elysia to turn to Joe. “Can you put them under another illusion?”

Joe shook his head. “No, I’m out of mana.”

Eva glanced over her shoulder at Joe, then at Elysia. “What happened to those mana crystals under the couch? I heard they could power spells.”

Without thinking twice about it, Elysia scrambled down to her bedroom. After inputting the code, she grabbed the bag full of the crystals and ran upstairs. She dumped the bag on the couch next to Joe, showing him the contents.

Joe’s breath hitched as he stared down at the crystals. “Where did you get these?”

“Dungeon rewards for killing the boss.”

“The blue ones are mana crystals, and those aren’t too rare as monster waves sometimes leave them behind, but the others are another story.” With a shaky hand, he grabbed the white crystal, holding it gingerly in his hand as if afraid to break it. “These are skill crystals. I can’t appraise the exact skill, but expect it to be something the slain boss used. One of these would be enough to buy anything.”

Greed flashed across Elysia’s face. “Can I use them? Maybe one of them could get us out of this mess.”

“Do you have mana?” questioned Joe.

“No,” Elysia replied with a pout.

Before Elysia could ask further, Eva cut in, “Hurry up! They’ve almost caught up!”

Joe grabbed the mana crystals, instantly perking up as the first crystal dimmed. He walked out onto the rear deck, three crystals grasped in both hands as he stared up at the helicopter. All six crystals dimmed before crumbling to dust as he waited for the helicopter to approach. When it was within a dozen meters, he let loose a wave of warmth many times larger than his previous spell. The helicopter suddenly swerved to the right before righting itself. It turned again as if dodging invisible attacks, this time catching the landing gear on a treetop. The helicopter spun, but the expert pilot corrected it and ascended above the treetops.

Joe scowled as he ran inside to grab more crystals. With another six crystals in hand, he released another spell, layering it on top of the already active illusion. Unlike before, the Changed inside the helicopter launched their elements into the air at invisible targets as the helicopter swerved.

After several minutes, the helicopter overcorrected, catching the tail rotor on another treetop. The helicopter went into a spin. Unfortunately, the pilot leveled out the helicopter just above the water. Spent mana crystals crumbled to dust in Joe’s hands as he collapsed to his knees, gasping for breath.

In desperation, Elysia gathered lightning from her core and released it, but like last time, instead of a controlled lightning bolt, a massive streak of lightning shot from her hands and into the sky above the helicopter. As it passed over the top of the helicopter, sparks connected with the blades, traveling to the motor. Smoke billowed out of the motor, sending the helicopter tumbling downward. Just before the helicopter crashed into the water, a blast of air slowed its descent, followed by a cushioning platform of water nuzzling it to shore.

Before they could catch up, Eva gunned the engines.

Mission done, Joe stumbled back into the cabin, pale and sweaty. He collapsed on the couch just inside the cabin, releasing a shuddered, almost pained breath.

Elysia stared out at the water behind them until the crashed helicopter disappeared into the distance before turning her attention to Joe with a worried expression. “What’s wrong?”

Joe took several seconds to respond as he got his body under control. “Apparently, using a mana crystal comes with a cost. The mana was potent, allowing me to supercharge my spells, but it wreaked havoc on my body. I won’t be any help for a while. I think I’m going to take a nap.”

Before Elysia could say anything, Joe passed out cold on the couch.

She peeked into the control room to find Eva reading a manual, then out at the water in front of them. A mast sticking out of the water near the right shore caused her to freeze. In a panic, she grabbed the steering wheel, drawing Eva’s attention. “What’s wrong?”

Elysia frantically scanned the water in front of them. “Don’t you see all the sunken ships? What if Umbra beaches on one?”

Eva relaxed and waved her hand. “Oh, the ship graveyard. Don’t worry about that. As long as we stay in the center of the inlet, we won’t hit anything. When they rescued your boat, they cleared a path to avoid a similar issue from happening again.

Unconvinced, Elysia left the control room and walked out onto the front deck, but as Eva said, she found a path wide enough for three Umbras to cut through the ship graveyard. Appeased, Elysia returned to the cabin. “Still, please keep an eye on the water. I’m going to check on Ione.”

Elysia wandered downstairs to her room again. Hopefully, that was the last they saw of the Changed teams, but she doubted it. At least for now, they should be safe. If they had other teams on standby, they would have struck by now.

The moment Elysia opened her bedroom door, a blur of silver and purple shot toward her, rubbing all over her legs before hissing at her. After remarking her, Ione turned her butt to Elysia, fin-tipped tail raised as she strode back to the bed. With a graceful leap, Ione sprang up on the bed, turning toward Elysia as she loafed.

Judgmental violet eyes followed Elysia as she entered the room. A smile spread as Elysia made eye contact with Ione. “Sorry, Ione, it was too dangerous out there. When you grow up, we will go on a ton of adventures.”

Ione hissed as if to say she wasn’t a child, but then she shifted to a regal raise of her head.

Unable to resist, Elysia dove toward Ione, hugging her to her chest. Ione struggled for a moment before her purr motor fired up under the dexterous fingers of Elysia.

Elysia lay on her bed, sinking into the memory foam mattress as she curled around Ione and kneaded the sheets in her dazed state.

Her hand gravitated to Ione, absentmindedly petting her. Should she evolve her class or spend her attribute points? She got retroactive points when she chose her first class, so it might be worth waiting. Would she go through another trial? Did she even have to evolve her class? She leveled past level 50, so she could keep her current class, though it didn’t add much. She gained more charge from incubating Ione and evolving than leveling up. There must be something big with the class evolution if people like Joe were so strong. Though to be fair, after her race evolution, she smote the helicopter out of the sky, though her aim needed some work.

Elysia pet Ione for a few more minutes before focusing on the class section of her status. As she feared, a moment later, a notification popped up.

Commencing class selection.

Good luck. You will need it.

A moment later, everything went black.

The next moment, she found herself in a stone room with violet veins pulsating through the dark gray stone. Her gaze landed on five statues of her in different forms.

The farthest left statue had her levitating off the ground with lightning writhing around her body. To the right, the statue had a spear, looking ready to thrust with lightning sparking off the tip. Next, was her with bare-handed lightning sparking off her fists. Different from the previous statues, the fourth statue had her riding Ione into battle. Finally, the fifth was her sitting at a table, tinkering with electronics.

Elysia took a step toward the rightmost one but stopped and shook her head. She needed power to defend herself, not work in a lab.

Before narrowing her choices down, she approached the statue with her riding Ione first. She touched it, hoping to get more information.

Path of the Companion.

Would you like to commence the trial?

Unsure, Elysia touched the next statues.

Path of the Fist.

Path of the Spear.

Path of the Lightning.

Why couldn’t they give her more to go on? She should have expected this. At least last time the system gave her stats for the class. It looked like she had to take a gamble. But what path should she gamble on? If she took the farthest right statue into account, she thought it started with the most powerful on the left. Path of Lightning sure seemed powerful, and it was fun smiting people, but it left her vulnerable if she ran out of charge. Spear seemed like the easiest choice, as she fought with a spear a lot, but did she really want to lock herself into the spear? Throwing knives were fun too, but she didn’t have an option for those. Did she even know if her path choice locked her into a certain style or would it just give her bonuses? She didn’t want to fight things without a weapon or lightning, so she eliminated fist. Besides, unless the class gave her a huge strength boost, no way could she crack a giant crab shell with a punch.

Elysia’s gaze gravitated back to the Companion statue before shifting to the Lightning path, both singing to her in different ways.