Anon: Sorry for the long wait!
Everyone: What took you so long!?
Anon: Somethings at home and again writers block =.= you gotta hate it
Elsword: Well at least you made it a longer one.
Anon: The writers block was trying to write some romance on Chi's request, I hope you like it XD
Well off you go reading the chapter.
Chung's POV:
"So where exactly is the Transporting Tunnel B4-1? Can we access it?" Adel only scratched his ear as he went into thought.
"From what I can remember, the Transporting Tunnel B4-1 was constructed when we were expanding our mines. Though in doing so must have brought us close to something that they didn't want us to discover. We were mining there when one day they attacked, forcing us to retreat and seal off the tunnel's entrance. The Nasod had taken over the mining tunnel for some time until the Alterasia plant spores came along and didn't do anything at first, but then they started t spread and infect the Nasod that were in the cave. It's a troubling sign that the Alterasia spores are found on the surface."
"Why's that?"
"It's a problem because it means that the spores are spreading. As you've seen what has happened with your friend here, you can see why this is bad." I sighed and glanced down at Blaze before back at Adel.
"So is there anything you have that can help us against that Alterasia spore?" The Ponggo that was named Amos then came back out of his shop with an empty jar and some fairly large tweezers.
"I'm working on a potion that will cause you to be immune to the spores but I will need more of them to develop it completely. You people mind staying around for some time so I can get enough samples?" Proto the floated over to Amos and disappeared before dematerializing with out a speck of the spores on her and where she used to be was a small pile of the green spore.
"Well, that clears me and I think Blaze is cleared too of any of the spores. I'll bring him back to the house. Have fun you guys." She waved before floating off towards to our home here on Altera.
"Lucky, she gets to go home while we stay here and wait to be picked for the spores." I sighed and stepped forward setting my Destroyer down and then pulling my Silver Shooter out for it and Amos began picking away. 'This is going to be a long day.'
Proto's POV:
I reached the door to our house fallowed Moby and Reby who were still caring Blaze on the makeshift stretcher. Opening the door, I ushered both of the two bots inside before heading in myself and fallowed them both upstairs into Blaze's room. Removing all the gear all of his gear and setting them against the wall, I tuck him in under the sheets. I sat at the front of the bed looking at the sleeping face of his and smiled. I patted the two drones who flew in a circle of joy before I said for them to return to Eve. They both started to play with each other before Moby zipped out of the window with Reby close behind.
'He looks so peaceful when he sleeps,' I thought. 'He is usually so serious when we are out in the field and sometimes when we are back in a safe area.' I reach my hand down brushing some of his hair away from his face. He rolled over, turning his body away from me and batted at my hand playfully making me smile. He then turned back over to face me with his eyes opened and a grin spread across his face.
"You're awake, how are you feeling?" I look on into his red eyes seeing the all present flame imprint in them.
"I feel like bad, but not as bad as I felt out there. What happened exactly?"
"That green stuff on those Nasods, it's a spore called Alterasia. When that one Nasod got on top of you, you must have inhaled enough spores to put you in that condition."
"Did everyone else get hurt from them? Where is everyone?"
"Everyone else is fine and right now there over at Amos, the villages alchemist, shop getting picked dry of those spores. He's also working on a formula to counter the Alterasia poisonous properties." He rolled over onto his back with a sigh-of-relief and closed his eyes for a second before reopening them half lidded and a frown on his face.
"Something wrong Blaze?"
"I don't know what or why, but there's something about Altera just doesn't sit well with me. There's something about this place that just doesn't seem right." He tried to stifle a yawn, but a small one escaped and I smiled at him.
"Well, don't beat yourself over the head thinking about that. Go on and get some rest, we will have a busy day tomorrow." I leaned down and planted a kiss before leaving his room with a smile.
'So, Nasods aren't supposed to have emotions? Well, I wouldn't know where I would be if I didn't have any of them at all.' I placed my hand over my mouth and giggled at that thought before going back to Eve's mind to sleep.
Chung's POV:
"Ok Chi, you're clean too. Elsword, you're next." I could see her grumble something un audible as she picked up Zentai. I stood by the door watching the group and fallowed her out.
"Hey Chi! Wait up would you!" She turned and looked at me with her one violet eye that had a slight look of annoyance.
"What do you want?"
"I was wondering if you would want to...to take a walk and explore this place with me." She cocked her head off to the side giving a light smile
"Sure, I guess so. We all could use the break right about now."
"You said it. Going from the Mines, to aboard Wally's ship, to the Black Crow, and finally to the Return Plains. I'm surprised that we been through so much in one day and we suffered minimal damage." We were walking through the middle of the village and watched as the Ponggo's bustle about getting their everyday needs. It saddened me to watch them because it reminds me of the bustling streets in Hamel before the demon attack and before my father had...had lost control.
"Chung is something wrong? You look extremely depressed." She must have saw the sad look that I gave the Ponggo's and I only shook my head.
"It's nothing Chi. Just some old memories that are resurfacing." We turned around and started to head back to our house.
"What are they exactly?"
"Some that are before we met up and before the El went missing or when I had met Elsword and the others."
"What happened?"
"Well, lets start off with where I am from. My home town is Hamel in located in the southern Elrios Continent of Pluone. It was a beautiful place then and it was full of life. I was their Prince and fallowed under the watch of my father who was known as 'Hamel's White Colossus' and I the 'White Wolf of Hamel.' It was peaceful back then and I was still in training. Everything was so nice back then and I only wish that today was like that back then."
We both reached the front door and entered the house to see Rena curled up against Raven and rested her head on his shoulder. He only turned his head slightly towards us and put his finger to his lips before pointing down at her. Nodding in reply, we slipped past the two and glided up the stairs when I noticed something in Elsword's room. Taking a step back, I peaked through the little crack in the door to see Eve sleeping with her head on Elsword's chest. I cracked a grin and looked up to see Chi standing there with her hands on her hips waiting for me impatiently. I opened the door to my room and we both entered. I hung up my Silver Shooter holster on one of the wall pegs and went over to where my Destroyer was leaning up against and spread my feet about shoulder width apart. Tapping a few things buttons on my gauntlet, I spread my arms out as my armor starts to unfold at my arms and work it's way down to my feet. Finally completely free from the suit, I step out of it rolling both of my shoulders before heading over to my bed where Chi was sitting. Sitting next to her I continued with the story.
"Then it happened. The demons attacked and my father went out to defend our home. He went out to defend our home yet I had to stay back to complete my training. Though through every battle that he had fought had also taken a tole on him for he was slowly getting corrupted until the one day that he had finally snapped. I knew that confronting my father was the only option I had to try to snap him out of it. I hadn't completed my training and I knew that even if I did, I would still be out of my league but I had to try. I tried to reason with him but he was to far gone. Injured badly I was tossed out to sea and went on to drift aimlessly through the sea unconscious until I ended up on a beach not that far from where Elsword's hometown, Ruben, was located. Apparently, from what he told me, he saw something shinny in the sea that was coming towards the beach and he went down to investigate. I washed up onto the shore just when Elsword had managed to make it down to the shore when Aisha came along too wondering what was that white figure that came from the sea. They got me kind of far into the woods before I started to have these convulsions when Rena came along and stabilized my condition. Little did we know that we were going to band together to find the lost El."
I looked down to see Chi had fallen asleep leaning on my arm and I was to tiered to move her to her room, so I let her stay there and lay down on my bed before drifting off into a dreamless sleep.
Blaze's POV:
'So, another day begins in search of the lost El.' I stared up at the ceiling before rolling out of my bed. I stretched my arms out as I walked over to me weapons to do a quick inspection. Finishing that, I strap on my pistols leg holster before heading out of my room to venturing downstairs. Reaching the bottom of them, I could see both Rena and Raven passed out on the couch and I tiptoed passed them out the front door. I took in a deep breath of the warm moist underground air before heading out towards the market area. Reaching it and picking out what was going to be our breakfast I ran into Adel.
"Oh it's you. It's good to see that you're up and about. Matter of fact, I was going to go find a member of your group to tell you that the entrance to the transporting tunnel is now clear and you can pick up the potion to counteract the Alterasia spores. Please, when you go down there, eliminate any Alterasia plant you see. We don't want to have it spread any further than it has." I thanked him for the info before heading back to the house to prepare todays meal. Raven and Rena were starting to wake up as I opened the door and entered the kitchen to start cooking. Turning the stove on, I start to make some omelets. The eggs sizzled as I folded the omelet over on top of the grated cheese. Sliding the finished omelets onto the separate plates, I brought them over to the hungry crowd that waited at the table. I passed out the plates to everyone and they dug right in. Siting down at me seat, I started to eat my food and waited for everyone to get about half way done before telling the mission details.
"So are we going to go down into the transporting tunnels?" Elsword said through a mouth full of food.
Nodding I replied, "We are. They just cleared an entrance today. Also Amos had also completed the development the potion to counteract the effects of the Alterasia spores effect. After gearing up, we'll head over to Amos's place to pick up the potion and then move onto the tunnel." Nods were given in return and we all finished our meal before gearing up and heading off on our mission.
Entering the tunnel's entrance, we could easily tell that the spores comes from this place. The walls and ground where covered in the green stuff and to make things worse, the end of the entrance leads down to a huge drop.
"So, how are you six going to get down there?" Proto then joined us and pointed at the four of us. I peaked over the edge throwing a rock down experimentally to have it disappear into the unknown for multiple seconds before it hit the bottom with a light click. Looking back at the group, I only shrugged.
"Well, I'm pretty sure that both Elsword's, Rena's, and Ravens swords are strong enough to pierce the rock without breaking and ride down on them along with Chi's scythe. I'm also pretty sure that Chung's Destroyer has enough power to cushion his fall once fired."
"And for you?"
"Well that's an easy one. See you guys at the bottom!" I then jumped backwards into the hole and started my decent barley hearing Proto say, "Oh the nerve of that boy." I spread my arms and legs out wide as I could with my back to the abyss bellow. I watch as the others flew over the edge after me with Elsword, Rena, Chi, and Raven sliding down the wall, Eve and Aisha floating down, and Proto flying right towards me. I flipped over still having my arms and legs out wide when Proto flew right beside me.
"Are you crazy!? You know that there isn't anything that can slow your decent!" I only smirked at that.
"Of course, I do. I have you to do that." I looked down to see that the ground was approaching and it was now or never to act. I reached out and grabbed Proto's hands as she slowed her decent. In doing so had swung me forward so I let go of her hands doing a somersault before landing on top of a corrupted Nasod Miner. Pulling out my pistol I unloaded 5 rounds into it's head before back flipping off of it. I look up to see Proto flying down with spears at the ready to strafing run on some other corrupted Nasod's. I turn around to see a a fairly large green spore float down to a broken down Nasod Miner and absorbed itself into it. It started to move in jolty movements and got up to it's feet to rev its drill before being crushed by Chung's cannon. He stepped out of the mini crater he had created and rushed forward when Nasod Excavator started to rise to have Raven, Elsword, Chi, and Rena come down on top of it and plunged their weapons into it before jumping off and continue with the mission. Running with the rest of the group, we continued on as Eve and Proto provided support from the air by attacking the Sonic Bats and the corrupted Nasods. We hacked and slashed through the corrupted Nasod's and the destroyed the large Alterasia spores and the Alterasia plants as we went through when we came to a giant Nasod Turret that was infected with an oversized Alterasia plant. It poked what you would call the 'head' of the plant out of the turret before locking itself away inside the turret with these metal doors.
"Well, this looks like it's going to be a problem." Chung hefted his cannon onto his shoulder and twirled his Silver Shooter around as he looked towards the turret.
"Problem or not, we still have to destroy it." We charged out the turret to destroy it's protective shield when two ports opened up and missiles started to fly out towards us. "Scatter!" We split up to engage the shield when multiple cannons popped up and opened fire on us. Chung brought up his Destroyer to block a cannon shot when one of the missiles impacted the ground in front of him sending him flying backwards into a wall. Raven and Elsword had made it to the bottom missile bay and began to destroy it and Proto was flying high with a machine gun shooting at the metal shield while also dodging fire from the cannons.
I ran at one of the cannons shooting it to get it's attention before jumping on top of it and blasted away at pointblank range before rolling off it. Chi had gone over to Chung who had fallen unconscious from the blast when Aisha and Eve finally broke the turrets barrier while Rena went over to help Raven and Elsword in destroying the missile launch bay. I rolled to the side as a cannon round wised past me and came up in a crouch to be knocked off to the side as a missile exploded next to me. My vision was blurry from the blast and I look to see the cannon aimed at me when multiple Nasod spears impale its side and caused it to explode. I was then hauled up to my feet by Proto who then flew off to finish off the last missile launch bay. Chung was now up and active for he and Chi are going at the plant itself. Eve and Proto finished off the final missile bay and the plant let out a deafening scream that caused us all to cover our ears before it's tentacles went limp and everything was quite.
"Was that it?" Elsword huffed and puffed from the fight.
"That almost seemed a little two easy." I looked skeptically at the turret knowing that it couldn't be that easy to defeat this when three yellow orbs started to form. Two at the missile holes and one where the plant was exposed. Aisha had only brought up a shield as the lasers fired. The shield held for a moment but cracks started to form on the outer edges and sweat started to bead up on Aisha's forehead from the exertion. Elsword ran up to add his magic energy having the cracks retract come but to have them once again creep towards the center when finally it the laser stopped. Aisha then collapsed while Elsword leaned on his sword to keep his balance. Raven and Rena helped Elsword and Aisha into cover while I signaled Proto down for a second.
"What do you want? We're in a middle of a battle you know?"
"Yeah, I know that, but I have an idea that might end this fight." I explained the plan and she gave me a worried look as always. "I know it sounds crazy but I'm positive it will end this." An explosion shook the ground. Turning around I saw both Chi and Chung get sent flying backwards from an explosion. I turned back around and Proto nodded. I pulled out my sniper rifle and let it hang, by its strap, loosely around my neck and took her hand. Flying upwards, we came level to the red orb of the plant. She started to spin around in a circle with myself hanging on before letting go flinging into the plant.
"Charge Shot!" I sat suspended by this weird orange red colored liquid and all I could see was a red orange color. The end of my gun lit up with light and I pulled the trigger. My gun went off inside of the plant when a chain explosion went off sending me flying out of the plant back into the cave, covered in that weird red orange liquid slim. My HUD started to go fuzzy before shorting out and going black. Sighing I pulled it off and stuffed into one of my jacket pockets. I look at the Nasod turret as it exploded into a cloud of smoke and dust.
"Well, that takes care of that." Chung holstered his gun while everyone relaxed from their fighting positions.
"Easy for you to say, you didn't get covered in this red orange slime. Plus it also tastes disgusting. I knew that it was a bad idea." I wiped off a glob of the goop off of my jacket.
"But hey, it worked and it destroyed the plant. Mission accomplished." Elsword was sitting on the ground chewing away on corner of a hard tart before taking a gulp on his water skin.
"You and Aisha doing all right? You two looked exhausted after holding up that shield." Aisha only smilled.
"We're both fine, just a little tired. We'll both be all right. Though I still could've done it without your help Elsword."
"What do you mean without my help!? You so needed that extra power to hold that shield up!"
"It means that I'm stronger than you~."
'Great, when I thought that their arguing was behind them.' I sighed looking down while putting my hand up on my head. I only looked up to see Rena in her scary form walking up to Aisha and Elsword.
"Are you two fighting again after a long time of quietness?" Both of them looked up at her instantly backing down from their heated discussion.
"Of course not Rena! We aren't arguing right Elsword?" She gave a death glare at Elsword but he didn't need further questioning for his answer.
"No! Not at all! See me and Aisha are friends!"
"Good~!" She then returned into her normal cheery self when I saw Eve staring at the location that the infected Nasod turret. The dust and smoke was starting to clear from the area when I notice that beams of sunlight started to penetrate through. The smoke cleared and the dust settled to revile a broad plain on the other side.
"Where do you think it leads to Eve?"
"I'm not really sure but there's only one way to find out. Aisha, Elsword, I think you two should head back. Rena, do you mind escorting them back?"
"No problem, lets go you guys." Rena went over to help support Aisha and started to walk back to the village while Elsword went over to Eve.
"Please stay safe." He kissed her on the cheeks before jogging over to Rena. Eve had a slight blush on her face and tried to hide it by turning towards the plains entrance. We fallowed her through the entrance into the sun filled plain. I took a deep breath of the crisp fresh air before pulling out my pistol and SMG, holding them at a ready low position. Eve seemed to stair off into the distance as if she's reading a map when she grabbed her head in pain and fell to her knees.
"Eve!" We got into a defensive circle around her with our weapons on alert and our eyes watching for an attack. My eyes graze over the surface looking for any sign out trouble when I heard her whisper, "Wait... I know that voice." I flicked the safety off on both guns of my weapons when Eve finally got up.
"Eve, what was that all about?" She looked at me with her poker face but I could make out some confusion before turning away.
"Lets move out, I need to confirm something." Both Moby and Reby looked confused and Proto had a slight frown on her face. 'What's with them? Did it have to do with that moment?' I gave a light shake of my head before fallowing the others but I couldn't shake this feeling that we were being watched by someone. I look behind me scanning the area before turning around. We all walked for sometime without encountering any enemy resistance and that got us on edge. I stayed at the rear of the group with my guns ready when a Nasod Scorpion jumped out of the bush at me. I raised up my SMG unloading a burst into it before smashing it into to the ground with the but of my pistol. Just then more, and more scorpions came out and attacked us and we welcomed the action.
"God, I was wondering when they were going to make their move. I was starting to get really bored with all of this walking around." We fought through the scorpions before heading off farther. I glance off to the side and let a burst from my SMG rip through some Oro's and destroyed an Oro House when huge chunks of ice started to fall from the sky.
"Incoming!" We all bounded and weaved our way through the ice shower when a blue Nasod, with a huge cannon like right arm, stepped out and glared at us.
"Why Eve? Why must you betray your kingdom!?" He pointed his cannon at us, causing multiple ice spikes to shoot out from the ground. I back flipped twice to avoid the attack before bringing my guns up and unloaded into him.
"My suspicions are confirmed, it was you Leviathan. Where's your brother Ignis and when did you acquire the ability to use ice as a weapon? I never remembered you having that ability! Why are you attacking your Queen!?" She sent multiple electric balls at him that exploded on impact.
"Much has changed in your absence but you are not considered the Queen anymore! You have betrayed your kingdom, there's nothing left for you."
"But, we still got something for you. We get a special delivery for you! Heavy Railgun!" Chung lifted his Destroyer into a shoulder firing position and shot off a high velocity cannon shot into him. Leviathan was thrown back from the explosion and teleported away leaving Eve in a state of shock and anger.
"Eve, you all right?" I walk over to her placing my hand on her shoulder and she turned around sharply.
"All right? Of course I'm not all right. My kingdom has been taken from me and my position was stripped away from me!" She yelled at me and I back off looking away. The others looked worried about Eve and Proto came up.
"Look Eve, we know that you are angry about all of this, but don't take it out Blaze here. Don't take your anger out on a friend, but on the enemy." Eve's face was contorted with rage but it slowly faded as she realizes her mistake.
"You're...you're right Proto, sorry for the yelling Blaze, it's just that, ergh! It's just so frustrating to know that everything you had just taken away from you."
"It's all right Eve, we are in this together and we will try to figure something out to change things. Everyone here in the group has lost something important to them yet we still fight. Now cheer up and lets finish this." She nodded before looking down the path.
"From what I can tell by my scanners, there a fairly large concentration of El energy somewhere down there." I locked new mags. into my SMG and pistol mag. wells before starting our trek towards the energy source. I shivered as a breeze whipped through the tree and being covered in that nasty plant juice didn't help one bit. We came upon a wide flat area when the same Nasod from before appeared on the right along with Nasod that was the same except the color, who must be Ignis.
"Everyone, both of their weaknesses are their generators. Destroy them and we will have a fighting chance!" Both Ignis and Leviathan raised their arms up into the air and meteorites mixed with freezing ice shards fell towards us. The six of us split up into two teams of three with Chi, Chung, and Raven going after Ignis's power generator leaving Proto, Eve, and I to take on Leviathan's generator.
"Go after the generator while I distract him!" I branch off from the two and weaved myself though the onslaught of fire and ice, I cracked off a few shots at Leviathan before placing both my SMG and pistol back into their holsters before drawing my sniper rifle. Rolling to the side dodging multiple ice spikes that shot out of the ground, I come up into a crouching position with my rifle raised. I brought it up aimed at the blue Nasod who sent down a rain of ice at Eve and Proto before charging at me with incredible speed. I only fired off one shot before having the rifle ripped up and back out of my hands. I rolled backwards retrieving the ruined rifle finding the but stock and a portion of the grip shattered. I replaced it back in it's holster on my back and pulled out my 416. I backflipped again to avoid another one of Leviathans charges and brought up my gun pulling the trigger firing of seven shots before it jammed. I pull the bolt back ejecting the spent cartridge to see that it was covered in that orange red plant goop.
"Damit!" I look down to see an ice spike shoot up from the ground. I jumped up an away from it trying to avoid it, but it still touched the edge of my boot and ice started to form on it before spreading up my leg up to my knee. The ice and fire is still falling and I could see that both Eve and Proto busy destroying the generator along with the others. I look up and roll to my right as an ice shard fell right where I used to be laying but, it still nicked me causing ice to form seizing up my right arm and my gun in a right angle. I struggled to get up on one of my legs and succeeded to see Chung getting knocked back by an attack by Ignis, but Chi and Raven had destroyed the its generator and began attacking him. I grunted as Leviathan grabbed me from behind and spoke to me.
"So pitiful that we have to destroy you, you where such a great asset to the Nasod Kingdom."
"What do you mean asset?"
"Oh, you still don't know? Well, I bet this will jog your memory Alpha!" My eye's widened as he hurled me towards Eve and Proto. He must have misjudged the throw for he had thrown me straight into the damaged generator. The impact had finished it off that caused an explosion that had freed both my arm and legs.
"Blaze!" I was on the ground with the sparking generator next to me and my vision was blurred and I couldn't see out of my right eye. But from what I could see through the blurry vision, I could make out Proto and Eve coming towards me but halted just short of me. "Oh, my god..." At that I knew something was wrong. I tried to move my right arm and I could only move it slightly before nothing at all. Proto was now kneeling next to me and Eve had her back to me and only glanced a few times at me with confusion on her face before heading out to fight Leviathan. Propping myself up on my left arm, I glance down at my right arm expecting to see it all bloodied and broken but came to a shock to see that what was supposed to be my 'skin' torn into shreds and underneath it all was a metallic arm that was broken and sparking. I then looked down at my leg to see the same with my pants leg torn up revealing a broken and sparking metallic leg. I looked back down at my arm and then up to Proto who was just as confused as I was.
"I never really knew who I was before and I had an idea who I might have been. But now, I don't even know what I am. Tell me, how bad do you think all of this is?" She only glanced away from me and bit her lower lip. "Please, tell me how bad it is." She sighed and turned back to me.
"From what I can tell right now from a visual scan is that your right arm is destroyed, your right eye must have been damaged for it is now a grey color, and you right leg didn't suffer as badly as your arm did but you can still walk on it for a short time before it needs to be replaced." I sighed at her analysis before asking her to help me up to my feet. We both walked over to the remains of my 416 rifle and placed that back in the holster too. I could see that the others had finished off Ignis and Leviathan when they had noticed Proto and I.
"Oh my god Blaze, what happened to you." Chung, Chi, and Raven looked at me with astonishment and I only looked down.
"What happened is that I discovered who I really am, I'm a half Nasod."
Anon: Well the secret stuff is now out in the open. Yes, Blaze is part Nasod!
Blaze: Why Nasod?
Anon: Because, being part demon is cool and all, but Nasods I think are cooler then them.
Chibella: Why you little son of a-
Anon: But demons are cool too! Plus the amount of demon OC's to other types of race is waaaayyyyy bigger
Chibella: Good.
Anon: So now that the secrets out, I guess I have some filling in for Blaze's Job Changes. Whooh I have a lot of work ahead of me