章 627: 66
Date
2011 February 23rd - Tuesday - Earth Bet Time
As they stood in front of the flesh wall that was part of the meat sack that, according to Dragon, hid the ominous Ball, Taylor wondered what they would find on the other side.
"So anyone with phasing power?"
"Don't be ridiculous, Lux. We will just simply cut a nice hole here," said Alexandria, and immediately raised her sword and slashed furiously towards the flesh wall.
Instantly a sizable vertical hole appeared, leaking unknown and disgusting fluids, but the darkness in the hole revealed none of its secrets. It stayed like for a few seconds, then it closed up like a very disturbing fleshy zipper.
"Well, that was impressive," quipped Narwhal, throwing a ridiculing look at Alexandria.
"It seems we need something that will keep the hole open," spoke up Dragon, preempting any argument that could happen. "Do it again Alexandria, then Narwhal use your force fields to stretch it wider."
All of them grimaced at hearing that.
"That sounded wrong…" said Nero while shaking her head in disgust.
Nobody liked how Dragon phrased it, but they still complied with her idea. Alexandria once again slashed mightily with her sword, and as soon as the wound appeared on the flesh wall, Narwhal's force-fields flew forward and began stretching it out, creating an uninviting gateway into the belly of the beast.
Taylor ignored the bile rising in her, and without prompting sent in a few of her clones to see if it was a viable route for them.
"Yeah, it's empty from what I can see," she said after a few seconds of scouting. "For now…"
"Then let's go!" exclaimed Dragon and jumped through the hole.
An excited Nero, a very nervous Cardea, and stoic Armsmaster followed her. Alexandria waited for a moment, then she flew in, making sure that not touch any part of the hole. Taylor looked around a final time and nodded to Narwhal.
"Go, I will cover you!"
The purple woman didn't answer, she just simply went through the hole, still keeping it open. Taylor created a few more teams of clones, just in case, then also jumped through, the wound closing up immediately behind her as soon as Narwhal let go.
Taylor already saw the inside of the abominations through the eyes of her clones, but it was entirely different to see with her own (sadly enhanced eyes) what madness spawned from the collaboration of the Goblin King and Simurgh.
The walls were of course slimy, dotted with cancerous tumors leaking some kind of pus. The floor was rough and uneven, sometimes broken with root-like veins illuminated from the inside with the same green light that the plasma fired by the monsters. The air was damp and way too humid, but thankfully she only knew this due to the sensor built into her suit and not because she felt this on her own skin.
The only light besides the things they brought with them were the veins bulging on the ground and on the walls filled with the glowing green plasma. The eerie darkness was only broken by the periodic vibrations of something that sounded suspiciously like a heartbeat. It beat to a steady rhythm, and if it weren't a towering monstrous abomination, Taylor would have even called it gentle.
Her senses previously confounded by the warped space inside recalibrated, giving her a pretty clear picture of the situation. The walls, the floor, and everything else was filled to the brim with energy, especially the veins transporting the volatile plasma.
However, the space inside this bio-horror was so vast, she couldn't sense the location of the Ball.
"Where to, Dragon?" asked Narwhal, while curiously looking around.
Dragon spent a few seconds looking at nothing, presumably checking her sensor, before pointing towards one end of the hallway they found themselves in. "That way."
Everyone nodded in understanding, then as one, they began walking towards their ultimate goal.
As they walked through the warped space inside the abominations, a veritable tsunami of monsters continuously beset them. Alexandria didn't even hesitate to throw herself into the middle of the biggest clumps of monsters, while Narwhal was doing her best to become a giant human-sized blender.
Armsmaster was methodical, his movements efficient, not wasting even a drop of energy, dispatching one monster after another, while Nero and Cardea used their issued guns to take potshots at the monsters. Nero started with grenades, but after she threw one, the entire construct shook enough that they collectively decided that they would manage without the creative bomb Tinker's grenades.
Dragon, with her new rifle, was standing next to the two of them, keeping an eye on them while shooting down monsters with inhuman precisions.
Taylor herself was everywhere. She flooded the hallways and chambers they walked through with clones both on the ground and in the air, trying to match the incoming army of monsters in numbers. She personally was darting in and out of the groups of monsters, delivering an insane amount of damage, then retreating.
Thankfully, they didn't have to fight any of the giant beasts, though the bowels of the meat sack were sometimes wide and tall enough to fit at least a dragon inside them.
Even with their powers, it took them at least an hour to reach the Ball. Mostly because they proceeded deliberately slowly to make sure not to fall into any kind of trap. But in the end, they reached the Ball, which was hovering high in the air in one of the biggest chambers they had seen on their way there.
They arrived on a ledge that had slopes connecting it to a pit under the Ball where they could see the portals hovering, and the ludicrous amount of wildlife was pouring through them. On the ground near the portals were holes that immediately swallowed the arriving fauna, probably transporting them to processing.
The sound that this generated was beyond deafening. Thankfully, their communication equipment allowed smooth communication.
"Oh, my god!"
"Wicked!"
"Fascinating…"
"Let me guess, you want us to set the bomb up down there in the middle?" asked Taylor dryly.
"I'm afraid so, Lux," answered Dragon with an equally dry voice.
"Joy."
They spent a few minutes carefully clambering down the slimy and slippery slopes, avoiding the mindless wildlife streams. However, the moment they stepped inside the circle of portals, the chamber began flooding with monsters.
The monsters came from everywhere. From the hallway they used to get there, from the ceiling, from other entrances, some even crawled up from the holes that swallowed the incoming animals. Taylor saw a few of them literally tear through the walls to get to them.
She immediately activated her trusty lightning barrier enveloping the Tinkers and Cardea, who looked like she wanted to curl up into a small ball and cry herself to sleep. Narwhal then created her drill, cutting through the rough fleshy floor then after a few seconds of wet tearing sounds, dirt. While the leader of the Guild did that, the Tinkers began to set up the last bomb, making sure it would go off.
Alexandria and Taylor were, however, out there, keeping the monster away from the barrier. The Brute was a whirlwind, cutting through swathes of enemies, while Taylor used her senses to precisely target the more problematic monsters. She had her clones create a wall around the barrier destroying any monster with lightning weapons or blasts that would come close to them.
A minute into the fight, she noticed the monsters changing. Before they were fully fleshed, albeit horrible-looking monsters, now they looked more like a kid's attempt to create something out of clay that got stepped on.
They were missing limbs, or the limbs were deformed, the cancerous growth multiplied, sometimes even covering the monster entirely, or they simply looked half-melted. And as time grew, the number of monsters also grew, but due to the decline in quality, it meant little.
Taylor pivoted around an incoming plasma projectile, using the movement to slash through a hulker, then jumped into the air, fired off several lightning blasts where the plasma originated, then took a quick look around.
Her shield was holding, her clones were holding, the Tinkers were working.
She extended her jump into a short flight towards Alexandria, who was cutting several half-melted mammoths to pieces.
"You good, Alexandria?"
"Excellent, Lux." answered the heroine, not even stopping for a second. "How goes the setup?"
"Not long now, I think."
"Good."
Then Taylor joined Alexandria, and the two began a deadly dance of sword and spear as they moved around the chamber, cutting down monsters by the score, either on the ground or in the air with their backs to each other.
They didn't slow down for anything, circling around and around the shield in the middle, taking out everything in their way. In the end, they fell into a comfortable rhythm, almost anticipating each other's movements or assisting each other by setting up kills.
A minute or so later Dragon's yell was what broke them out of their fugue. "We are done, let's leg it!"
Date
2011 February 23rd - Tuesday - Earth Bet Time
Assault smashed apart another monster in the long line of monsters he had already smashed apart. Frankly, if it weren't for his power deciding that he apparently needed superhuman stamina around right now, he would be back in the medical hall conked out.
The fight at first was interesting and exciting. Something new, something where they could go out without paying attention to regulations, laws, or anything like that. But as it is with a lot of things, it turned into an endless boring grind.
He didn't know how long he spent in the 'trenches' so to speak, but he knew he wouldn't be lasting long, superhuman stamina or not. His wife already went back to rest several times, and as he took her perspiring body near him, he was sure the next break would be coming soon. Maybe he would even join her…
He was about to ask her about it when his communication, and presumably everyone else's, came alive, based on how the people who previously were mindlessly exterminating monsters suddenly raised their heads.
"This is Dragon speaking. The Operation was successful, detonation imminent. Everyone retreat towards the walls, then brace for the explosion. Detonation after final roll call. I repeat…"
He didn't pay attention to the rest, he just jumped toward his wife, grabbed her, then threw her over his shoulder, ignoring her protests, and began legging towards the wall as if the hounds of hell were chasing him. Which, based on how those annoying plasma spewing dogs looked, wasn't exactly false.
He saw all the other parahumans also running towards the gate, while those capable of flying, and Eidolon who never came down from the air, laid down a covering fire, illuminating the battlefield in rainbow-colored explosions.
As soon as he cleared the gate, he put down his wife, and while enduring her complaints, he began to pull her even farther away from the wall. Ethan would trust Dragon with his life, but in this case, he was making sure that neither he nor Sherry was anywhere close to the explosion, no matter how tempted he was to watch an entire city get annihilated.
When Sherry realized what his goal was, she stopped speaking and began jogging with him. He gave her a smile, then turned his attention to his legs. Tiredness was really creeping upon him, and he was pretty sure as soon as he stopped he would collapse.
They were behind the farthest building, sitting on a crate, leaning against each other, barely capable of speaking when the communication came online again.
"This is the final roll call: Assault, Battery situation?"
"This is Assault, I'm clear."
"Battery here, I'm clear too."
"Copy that."
Then the line went silent again. They looked at each other, then as one, they leaned out from behind the building, looking at the still shield-covered city.
"This is Dragon speaking. The final roll call is complete. I repeat, the final roll call is complete. Detonation imminent. It is advised that those who do not have safety equipment do not look at the explosion directly."
Battery reluctantly stopped looking and yanked Assault back into the cover of the building.
"You can watch it later on the recordings. I would prefer my husband able to see…"
"But, I…"
"No!"
Their argument was stopped by Dragon speaking up once again.
"Detonation imminent. Countdown in 60 seconds. I repeat…"
An unfamiliar siren sounded, drowning out the sounds of an explosion from the battlefield and everything else. And he saw the news helicopter also began to flee. He would bet a considerable amount of money that at least a few of the crew would need medical attention due to injuries to their eyes, all because they couldn't contain their curiosity.
He wished them luck, but in the end, he had to agree with Sherry. He much preferred to look at her than at explosions. Maybe… It depended on how cool of an explosion Dragon could make.
"Detonation imminent. Ten… "
They both braced their backs to the building while huddling between two hefty crates. He hugged Sherry closer to himself and closed his eyes.
"Detonation imminent. Five…"
"Four…"
"Three…"
"Two…"
"One…"
There was a brief silence, followed by a small crackle, then a flash and everything went white.
週次パワーステータス
-- 推薦
ランキング 
-- 推薦
チケット