Chapter 9
After we got back to Wyterra, Jeena, Maja, and I proceeded down to the village and we smiled at how they had actually finished repairing the village completely. Now the houses and arches were back to normal and the fountain in the town center actually had a diagram of the various planets in the Kaio System... at least, that's what my interpretation of it was. We then went to Radeese's hut and he smiled at our presence.
"I see you've returned from Doldogo. Did you happen to find Kamtoga?" he asked.
"No, he wasn't there. But we did manage to rescue the entire planet from the Krawl as well as found a strange shard within the Green Ruins... and I have a feeling the Krawl were trying to go after this shard specifically, as they were trying to poison the giant tree that housed the ruins," Maja said to him.
"You must mean the Tree of Life! You have done a great deed by saving that tree, heroes... by the way, you said a strange shard? Would you be referring to the shards of the king?" Radeese questioned.
"If you mean Beast King, yes. Here, I have it with me," I said as I showed him the shard and he gawked at it.
"I... Good heavens!" he exclaimed, us knowing that didn't sound good. "This red glow, do you know what it means?! It's... It's an omen of impending doom!" Our group gasped at that as Radeese looked to his desk with fear. "It can only mean one thing. Krawl. The shards always warn us when those monsters are massing... but this is frightening even to me! I've never seen such a glow, nothing as intense as this!... I wish it weren't true, but this confirms it: our Wyterra is facing an unfathomable disaster!" Radeese spoke, Maja gasping at that as she thought hard.
"It must have something to do with Wyterra's former Spectrobe master. Maybe the Krawl are massing to exact their revenge for all of their ranks he slaughtered by destroying his planet of origin! We need to find the rest of the shards before something awful happens!" Maja said with seriousness.
"It may be possible that your assumption is right, Maja. Here, take these coordinates. They will lead you to Kogoeria, where Kamtoga actually has a base camp set up at. There are ruins that contain a shard on each of the planets other than Wyterra, so I suggest going to see Kamtoga. If anyone would know where the ruins on Kogoeria are located, it'd be him. He may even have some answers for you regarding your possible origins, Maja," Radeese said, Maja perking up at that as Radeese handed us the coordinates. "And would you mind if I were to have the shard? I'd like to study it to see what kind of disaster we may be dealing with."
"Of course, just promise not to lose it," I smiled as I handed him the shard and he smiled at us as we then left his house and proceeded back to our ship. Jeena then smiled as she put the coordinates into the database and we proceeded to jet our way to Kogoeria, where we saw that it was gigantic, blue, and it actually had an aura of dark blue surrounding the planet, which made sense as it was the furthest planet from the Kaio system's star thus far. We then landed in an area that looked like a base camp and were confused at how no one was around the place at all, Maja actually shivering a bit from the cold temperatures.
"Where the hell is everyone? Not even a warm welcome party," I frowned.
"Well, I'm not sure, but from the looks of these tracks it looks like wherever they went, they left in one big hurry," Jeena said as she looked at some foot tracks that led to a nearby exit of the camp.
"I-It c-could only mean K-K-Krawl... brr... this place is c-c-cold..." Maja shivered as her teeth started to chatter.
"I agree. Let's go and follow these tracks. Maybe we can find them and see if we can help them take out some Krawl in the meantime," I smirked as we went in the direction of the tracks and eventually made it to an area that had quite the beautiful landscape with the snow and ice formations around us. And the child Spectrobes all went to searching in the snow and had already found quite a number of items as we continued our trek through the snow including 4 more Evolve Minerals, a Defense Mineral, and 3 different fossils. But then, as we got to the center of the tundra area, we encountered a group of Krawl, them being water-based for their property, which meant we needed to use those of the Sky element, as our Cosmolinks had explained how the Kaio System properties worked.
"Iku Ze!" I exclaimed as I sent out Zappira, Jeena sent out Bazora, and Maja sent out one of the other Spectrobes from Nanairo in the form of Mesathorn. And its powers had also become different in the Kaio system as opposed to back home in Nanairo. Instead of him sending fire attacks, he quaked the ground on the Krawl and also sent rock attacks at them from afar! He was now a long-range attacking Earth type! And he made quick work of the smaller Krawl while Jeena and I handled the armored Krawl with our more powerful Spectrobes.
But once we handled them, Maja gasped as she sniffed the air in confusion. "I smell something nasty inside of this cave, guys... it smells like a big one," she said with seriousness. And immediately after she spoke, the ground actually started to quake around us as if it were footsteps! "Let's get in there! A Krawl that size would make short work of regular people without the help of weapons or Spectrobes!" Maja said as she rushed ahead of us and we followed suit, me actually liking how she wanted to do the mission as soon as possible. She and I were a lot alike in that sense now that she had changed... but I still had to explain to her about what happened to make her have her memory loss.
"Hey, um... Maja?" I asked her as we continued through the cave.
"Yes, hon?" she asked me.
"I want to tell you something serious... do you know why you lost your memories?" I asked her. Maja looked a bit confused at this and shook her head no. "Well, when we were in Sector W, you invaded our ship and were about to attack me just as we went into the portal. Jeena was the only one wearing a seat belt so both you and I flew all around in the cockpit as a result. And I landed directly on your head accidentally during the turbulence... and when you got up you forgot nearly everything," I explained to her, Maja smiling and hugging me again with a smile.
"It must've taken a lot of guts to tell me the truth, Rallen... I don't care that you accidentally caused it. Because of you, I'm able to be a better person," Maja smiled at me with a happy face. I responded by kissing her on the lips before Jeena interrupted us by throwing a bit of snow at our heads.
"If you two are done making out, we have a Krawl to take down and people to save," Jeena smiled at us.
"Right, sorry," Maja smirked as we went further into the cave while finding more minerals until we got to a part of the cave that was in the shape of a giant arena. And inside that arena? A gigantic Krawl in the shape of a seal with its entire front end encased in crystal! "Looks like a tough one, guys! Let's do this!" Maja said with a smile as she and our group summoned our Spectrobes and weapons and attempted to attack the giant Krawl... but for some odd reason, our weapons barely did any damage to them and our Spectrobes were also having difficulty getting through the crystal-protected head that took up 75 percent of the Krawl's body!
"This isn't good! We need more firepower!" Maja said with fear as the Krawl roared again and rushed her, Maja barely dodging out of the way as we then heard a voice from out of nowhere.
"Hey! How can you expect to beat that thing without better equipment! Here, heads up!" the voice exclaimed as Jeena and I saw two cubes appear from above and we caught them.
"What are they?" Jeena exclaimed.
"Nevermind that, just insert them into your Cosmolinks! They're the only kind of weapon that can cut through that thick hide!" the voice exclaimed as Maja gasped at it.
"That must be Kamtoga! Listen to him, guys!" Maja exclaimed as she got chased by the giant Krawl again and she had to resort to flying to get out of the way of another charge attack! I immediately inserted the cube as did Jeena and we gawked at how we now both had an axe in our grasps.
"Come and get some, beast!" I exclaimed at the giant Krawl as Jeena and I rushed him and our axes actually managed to slice right through its giant crystal beak! After assaulting it numerous times, it finally disintegrated after a loud roar, Jeena and I sighing afterwards as Maja joined back up.
"Whew... that thing almost ran me over," Maja said with concern.
"Haha! Never thought I'd see a Krawl on the good side, but now I have," we heard a voice say from behind us, prompting us to turn around and for Maja to gasp.
"Are you Kamtoga by chance?" Maja asked.
"Heh, yes I am. And who are you, miss? I'll be honest, never thought I'd meet a Krawl that looked and acted like a regular young woman, let alone one that kisses a human," the older guy said, Maja blushing in embarrassment at that.
"You saw that, huh?... I feel a bit embarrassed now," Maja smiled.
"And thirty years ago, believe it or not, I was one of the two using that Cosmolink your friends are holding in their hands there," he smiled at us.
"By the way, Mister Kamtoga, thanks for helping us," Jeena smiled.
"Ah, it was no sweat," I admitted, trying to play it off like it was no big deal.
"Hahaha! Last I checked that big boy was about to wipe the floor with ya! Now you obviously want my help, but if you ask me, you could use a couple of battle pointers in the future," Kamtoga said, me getting a bit angry at him for making fun of me like that. "Anyways, I'm gonna head back to camp with my boys here. Feel free to visit when you have the chance," Kamtoga smiled before he and his party left, me growling at his words.
"Can you believe him?! He's poking fun at us!" I said with anger.
"Hon, calm down. It may hurt your pride to admit it, but he's kinda right. If he hadn't given you guys those axes, we'd all have been dead meat. That monster couldn't even be attacked by our Spectrobes! Imagine how that would be in the future if we came across any future Krawl with armor that thick. We should be the ones thanking him. If anything, he rescued us," Maja said to me, which I groaned at as I simply sighed sharply.
"Fine... I guess you're right. Let's just go back to camp and see what he has to say," I frowned as we began our trek back to Kamtoga's base camp.