-----E-----

I counted dozens of boulders in front of us, luckily, we‘re not surrounded by them. They moved slowly towards us, and we prepared our artifacts.

They looked like they were just rocks that were somehow moving, but they likely have flesh and organs inside them, their stone carapace was weighing them down, but it was great defense.

„Nia, throw some of your grenades at them!“

„Problem! I can‘t charge them, my gauntlets are out of energy.“

Crap, we have no zettra stones to charge her gauntlets. We could use our other artifacts to charge them, but we likely needed the artifacts more. They had little energy left, so charging up two or three might consume our artifacts energy.

Franek had his sword that likely could go through stone, I had the shield that I needed to defend with, Letya had her healing gauntlets. I think the best one to give the grenades to are Letya, but if we take lethal injuries, then we might be in bigger trouble.

Letya and I had normal swords that likely wouldn‘t do much against stone, so we were kinda useless.

„Crap! What do we do now?“

„Hey, Nia!“ Franek called. „Couldn‘t you use other artifact weapons?“

„Ehh. . . yes, but I need energy for that.“

Thank god she needs energy to use that weapon, if she tries to hack it, then Franek would likely not have a happy face when seeing the vault‘s artifact breaking down in front of him.

Then I had a thought when I glanced at the artifact.

„The sword seems to have energy, Nia, can you take that to feed your gauntlets?“

„Oh, yup, I can!“

Wow, I didn‘t even need to think about our options about which artifact to give the grenades energy.

Nia quickly grabbed the sword from Franek and drained every bit of energy that was in there.

„All right, now we‘re ready.“

The boulders moved at a faster pace all of a sudden, and one of them was already next to me. I quickly dodged one of its attacks and tried to slice at him with the sword, but I only received a painstaking vibration when the sword hit. I could see the sword break a bit.

Now we can clearly see that a normal sword won't work. I dodged their attacks because I didn‘t want to drain my shield that quickly.

Nia threw some grenades at the boulders, their carapace broke apart, showing their inner organs within, but they didn‘t fall.

Now with their flesh exposed, we could do something to them with our crap swords.

I moved at one of them with caution, blocking an attack with my shield and I started to falter, but quickly recovered and pierced the boulder.

It started to thrash about, making no noise of pain or anything. Then it fell and laid still.

Just one strike at their inner parts and they fall? Maybe that‘s why they evolved to have strong armor?

Letya helped me out with the weaker ones, while Franek was taking care of some that Nia didn‘t explode.

Franek quickly took care of three of them, his sword was easily cutting through their carapace. But then I noticed his sword's light was gone.

„Franek! Back up, your sword is out of energy!“

He must have used some program that depleted his artifact.

Franek backed up from the boulders, while Nia threw more grenades at them.

„That was my last one, and I need more energy!“

„Just stand back while we finish them off!“ Franek called out to Nia.

There were only six left, four of them had their broken carapace, while the two others were not scathed.

„Can you two take care of the weaker ones for a moment, I think I could go through the armor of those two!“ I yelled to Letya and Franek.

I ran towards one of the unhurt ones and called out a program.

„Program! Armor Piercing!“

Spikes started appearing in front of my shield, and I ran with it to try and impale the boulder.

I quickly dodged an attack and the tip of the spike hit the carapace, but then the spikes suddenly disappeared and the shield's glow faded away.

„Oh shit,“ I muttered and quickly tried to turn around and run, but one of the boulder‘s arm struck my back and I fell down with a thud.

I coughed up blood and turned up to face the living rock, but only to see one of its feet going down to try and crush me. I moved my shield above me and held it with both hands.

It collided with my shield, and I started to feel like I was being crushed, literally. I could barely breathe due to the force of the boulder and the ground beneath me. I think some of my bones were starting to break.

„Ethan!“ I heard Nia yell.

Is this really how I am going to die? Crushed by a living rock? How lame is that? If I could decide on how I would die, then I would want to die surrounded by gold and riches, not surrounded by mud and rocks.

I suddenly saw the boulder blow up by his side, and I noticed blaster bolts and arrows flying in.

The boulder stepped off of me, trying to block the projectiles, but his carapace fell bit by bit, and its flesh and organs blew up.

The rest of the living rocks fell after the other, fragments of stone flew everywhere.

I moved my head to see where they came from, and I saw the gunslinger, Braxton, and also Ivy. They quickly ran up to us.

„Thank you, you saved our lives!“ Franek said.

„No problem, we can‘t have you die, then we wouldn‘t get a reward.“

„Eh, hm.“

„Hey. . a little help. . please. . .“ I said while coughing up more blood.

I couldn‘t stand up, and I felt a lot of pain in my chest.

Nia ran up to me.

„Are you okay? You would have been made a pancake if they didn‘t show up!“

„I‘m clearly. . not okay. .“

Letya quickly looked at my body.

„They didn‘t seem to do much to your skin, what about your insides?“

„I think I have a broken bone, but I am not. . sure.“

Letya moved her gauntlets towards my head.

„Open your mouth, and keep it open for a second.“

I did as she said, but didn‘t know why she needed my mouth open. Then when she held my mouth with her gauntlets, I felt something moving inside my throat.

I immediately recognized them as Nanos. I think one of my nightmares came true, and it felt horrible. I wanted to get her off me and cough up the Nanos, but I couldn‘t move an inch.

I felt my insides starting to move, and I groaned in pain. After a few seconds, the pain was gone, but I still could barely move.

„There, your bones should heal up over time by those workers.“

„Right. . thanks,“ I managed to say and looked up towards Braxton and Ivy. „I‘m glad. . that you guys made it just in time. .“

„Yeah yeah. Franek, have you found a way out?“ Braxton asked.

His face was hidden behind his mask, so I couldn‘t see if he was happy to save a life, or that he just didn‘t really care.

„No, we haven‘t, some vaults should have an exit, and sometimes others teleport us out.“

And just as he said those words, we all were surrounded by a strange glow, and we were lifted up from the ground.

It was a bit different than the last time I was teleported by the shield. I wasn‘t knocked unconscious, the scenery just blinded me for a second and there we were, in the middle of the forest, out of the vault.

It was night, but the light of Tessera was slowly showing itself.

„Wow, why didn‘t it do that when we got the artifact in the first place?“ Nia said.

„I don‘t know, but we should be glad that we didn‘t need to run around that cave to find the rest.“

„The rest?“

I glanced around and saw Reve and only two other hunters.

„Huh, so that lever made us go to the surface?“ Reve said.

„Mr.Guy!“ Nia called and ran to him.

„Hey! Good to see that you all are alive! Wait, who‘s Mr.Guy?“

I managed to stand up, I faltered a bit but didn‘t fall back down.

„Did you say a lever?“

„Yeah, we were walking around and took down some rocks and ended up finding a lever that we pulled down, apparently it was a lever that makes you go to the surface.“

„That‘s great and all, but where are the rest of us?“

We glanced around, four were missing.

„They are likely dead, living bodies should teleport with us, but dead ones don‘t,“ Braxton pointed out.

„Crap,“ I heard Franek mutter. He pulled out the vault‘s artifact. „This is likely the artifact here, so we did finish the vault‘s quest, but I wished we didn‘t lose people.“

He looked sad, but then quickly changed into leader mode.

„Folks, let‘s go back to Kamlin Gate, and then to Tyrida with our carriages.“

„Alright, Sir.“

We noticed that our backpacks that we dropped also teleported with us, but why not the bodies of the fallen? I grabbed mine and saw that everything was still in there, I took out a zettra stone and charged up my shield.

---------

I was getting better at walking now, that blow from the living rock did quite a lot, but Letya‘s Nanos healed me up. I would think that I might like the Nanos from now on, but I still hated them.

Kamlin Gate was at sight, and we went through and found our carriages. We started to ride back to Tyrida, the star was high up in the sky now.

„So, Ethan, what do you think of your first vault hunt?“ Reve asked.

This was one hell of an adventure. This hunt wasn‘t the hardest I have gone into, I have had harder times back in space.

„It was fine, I guess, but my ribcage broke and then was healed up.“

„Ouch, that must have hurt. I‘m guessing Letya healed you?“

„Yeah, she did.“

We entered Tyrida and got off the carriages. Franek was speaking to all of us.

„Good work to all of you, we sadly did lose four artifact hunters, but they knew that could have happened, all of us knew. The artifact from the vault is just one sword, I was hoping there would be more, but there wasn‘t. Let‘s go back to my family‘s mansion and have my butler test it out.“

We went up to the mansion and the butler was there, greeting us.

„Welcome back, Sir Franek. I hope the hunt was valuable,“ the old butler said.

Franek gave him the sword and asked him to test out on a dummy in front of the mansion.

People didn‘t need to connect with artifacts to use them, but the weapon would be less effective. The butler didn‘t have an artifact weapon, so he was able to use only the minimal amount of the sword‘s power.

He swung the sword at the dummy and it cut clean in half, we felt for a rush of wind from the blow. It certainly looked powerful, if someone would connect to it, then he might have one of the strongest swords around.

„It is strong, Sir. And it might surpass yours.“

„Great, and I thought I had one of the strongest swords around.“ He glanced back at us. „Tomorrow will be a small banquet at the mansion, we will give out the reward for you all there, we will also honor the fallen.“

He is such a good guy, he really cares about all of us.

I need to go back to the tavern and speak to Vincent, about the quest that I got from him.