Chapter 290: The Aftermath

The afternoon sunlight breaking through the misty Appalachian canopy was the sweetest thing Julie had ever felt on her face.

She practically crawled the last twenty yards out of the Sector 4 fissure, dragging herself across the slick shale until her boots finally hit dry mountain gravel. She collapsed onto her back, arms spread wide, and let out a long, theatrical groan that sent two startled mountain sparrows flying from a nearby pine tree.

"Solid ground," Julie whimpered, staring through the pine needles at the pale blue sky. "Dry dirt. Oxygen that doesn’t smell like pulverized quartz or alien bile. I am never going into a hole in the ground again. Never. If the world needs saving underground, send a badger."

Selena walked out of the dark chasm right behind her, completely unfazed by Julie’s dramatic display.

Strapped against Selena’s vest was the reinforced containment case. A faint green light along the latches showed that the stasis field was still working. Inside, the massive emerald Earth Stone sat quietly, its dangerous pulses completely sealed away.

Zero stepped into the sunlight next. He paused on a flat rock and slid his longsword back into its scabbard. The purple gemstone in the guard gave one final flicker before settling into a calm glow.

Nicholas emerged last. He walked with his usual relaxed stride, a canvas duffel bag hanging from his right shoulder. Aside from a few smears of gray dust on the sleeves of his dark coat, he looked as though he had just returned from a morning walk instead of fighting an eighty-foot monster underground.

"Get up, Julie," Selena said, nudging Julie’s dusty boot with her own. "The trucks are three hundred yards down the ridge. The transport is waiting at the base."

Julie didn’t move. She simply turned her head and looked up at Selena through her crooked sunglasses.

"Supervisor Selena, my leg muscles have officially liquefied. If you want me down that ridge, you’re going to have to roll me like a barrel of cheap cider."

Nicholas walked past her without breaking stride.

"Leave her. The scavengers in trench coats might still be hungry."

Julie’s eyes snapped wide open.

In an instant, the girl who had claimed to be paralyzed scrambled to her feet. She grabbed her rose-gold camera rig, kicked her dusty knees high, and sprinted past Nicholas, sending gravel flying behind her.

"I’m up! I’m moving! Full tactical retreat!" Julie yelled over her shoulder, her oversized pink sunhat flapping behind her. "Nobody gets left behind on Peach Fairy’s watch!"

Vixen let out a sharp laugh as she followed the streamer down the rocky path.

The forward base at the foot of the mountain was buzzing with activity when the strike team finally came out of the trees.

Three heavy black Association transport rigs sat on the cleared asphalt, their research pods mounted on the back. Association guards stood around the area with their weapons ready.

The moment Selena stepped onto the pavement, a containment team hurried toward her with a large transport vault.

"Transfer protocol initiated," Selena announced.

She placed the portable case onto the hydraulic lift. Two members of the containment team turned their biometric keys at the same time, and the case was lowered into the vault. The heavy metal lid slammed shut, sealing the emerald master stone inside.

A senior transport officer let out a relieved breath.

"Telemetry confirms the stone is contained. Grayland command is already preparing the maximum-security vault."

"Get it on the road under full escort," Selena ordered. "No stops. Clear corridors only."

While the convoy prepared to leave, Julie had already taken over a folding chair in the shade beside the research van.

She had plugged her camera into a charger, balanced a laptop on her knees, and propped her phone against an empty ration crate. Her fingers moved rapidly across the keyboard.

"Ten million..." Julie whispered, staring at the screen in disbelief. "Ten point two million views on the thirty-second short. It hasn’t even been live for forty minutes."

Selena walked over and grabbed a bottle of water from a cooler.

"I thought you were dying of exhaustion."

"Adrenaline is the ultimate pre-workout, Selena!" Julie squealed, spinning the laptop around. "Look at the comments! Look at the breakdowns! They’re calling the spatial drop where Vixen dropped a rock on that giant armadillo the ’Bouldering of the Century’! And the executioner slash Zero pulled off? The swordsmanship forums are writing actual thesis papers about his footwork!"

Julie clutched her face with both hands, rocking in her chair.

"My subscriber count went up by six hundred thousand! I have brand deals coming in from three energy drink companies, a high-end hiking boot manufacturer, and a company that makes tactical beef jerky! We are entering our golden era!"

"Good," a calm voice said from behind her.

Julie froze.

Nicholas stood over her chair with his arms loosely crossed. His dark blue eyes moved down to the sponsorship dashboard on her laptop, taking in the large payments flashing across the screen.

"Wh-What?" Julie stammered, quickly trying to lower the laptop screen. "P-Phantom! You’re back! Did you wash your hands? You really shouldn’t look at private business documents. It’s bad for your heroic karma—"

"Thirty percent," Nicholas said.

Julie gasped and grabbed her chest as though she’d been stabbed.

"Thirty percent?! On the brand deals?! Phantom, those are my corporate partnerships! I am the face of the brand! The tactical jerky company wants my teeth biting into their meat sticks on camera!"

"You wouldn’t have teeth to bite into anything if that stone monster had swatted you across the grotto," Nicholas said calmly. "And the energy drink contract explicitly mentions using my silhouette on the promotional banner."

Nicholas leaned down and tapped the screen beside a lucrative three-month contract.

"Thirty percent on the ad revenue. Thirty percent on the sponsorships. Wire it directly to the designated offshore LLC by Friday, or the next time an impure drops from the ceiling, I’m letting them borrow your tripod."

Julie stared at him in horror.

She looked toward Selena for help.

Selena simply took another slow sip of water and looked toward the trees as if the pine needles had suddenly become very interesting.

"You’re a demon," Julie whimpered, her shoulders dropping. "A soulless, tax-collecting mercenary. I am being financially bullied by an S-rank anomaly."

"It’s called business," Nicholas said, turning away. "Keep the batteries charged. We aren’t done."

"Forty-eight hours!" Julie shouted after him, raising a fist. "I need at least forty-eight hours of luxury hotel rest before I set foot in another wilderness zone! I demand a bath! I demand room service! I demand—"

"You’re not getting any of that," a new voice called from the open doors of the research van.

Dana stepped down the metal stairs with a field tablet in both hands. Her face was pale, and dark circles sat beneath her eyes.

"What’s wrong, Dana?" Selena asked, immediately becoming more serious.

"The second marker on the hide," Dana said, tapping her tablet. The data appeared on the large monitor mounted to the side of the van. "The linguistic team back in Grayland cracked the phonetic map for the South American cluster."

Nicholas, Zero, and Vixen gathered around the screen.

A high-resolution scan of Archon Ikar’s animal parchment appeared on the display. The strange markings along the long, narrow shape of South America were enlarged.

Dana highlighted a broken line of writing:

"FIRe... STONe... SLeePS... IN... ThE... SPLIt... OF... ThE... EARTh... WhERE... ThE... SKY... MEETS... FLAmE."

"The coordinates point to the high volcanic plateau between the Atacama Trench and the central Andes Ridge," Dana explained, bringing up a satellite map. "Specifically, an ancient dormant volcanic caldera known as the Laguna Caliente fissure."

"A volcano," Julie groaned from her chair, dropping her forehead onto the keyboard with a dull clatter. "Of course it’s a volcano. Why would an alien hide a power stone in a five-star resort in the Bahamas? That would make too much sense. Let’s go to the lava pit."

"It gets worse," Dana said, ignoring her.

The screen changed, switching to a live satellite feed.

Everyone went silent.

Over the high peaks of the Andes, there were no normal clouds or weather patterns.

A massive storm of crimson clouds hung over the volcanic caldera. The storm stretched for more than two hundred miles, swirling around the mountain like a giant red eye. Red lightning flashed constantly between the clouds and the peaks, turning the night sky into a sea of fire.

"What is that?" Vixen asked, narrowing her eyes at the screen. "That isn’t a natural storm."

"It’s an atmospheric anomaly caused by pure, unrefined plasma Qi," Dana said, her voice quieter now. "Seismic monitors in Chile and Argentina have been recording steady tremors for three weeks. But they aren’t coming from shifting tectonic plates."

Dana zoomed in on the glowing red center of the volcanic caldera.

"The tremors are footsteps," Dana said.

Everyone stared at her.

"The second stone isn’t sitting on an altar waiting for someone to find it. Fifty years ago, an impure host consumed the Crimson Fire Stone. It didn’t kill him. It changed him into a living volcanic reactor."

Dana brought up a classification file marked with the Association’s highest threat warnings.

"The regional garrisons in South America have classified it as an S-Rank Disaster-Type Impure. Codename: Ignis Goliath."

A picture of the massive red storm filled the screen.

"It gives off enough heat and plasma to melt an entire city block just by walking past it. And according to the latest readings..."

Dana paused.

"It just woke up."

Nicholas stared at the swirling red hurricane on the monitor, his dark blue eyes calm and focused.

The first stone had been guarded by a petrified beast in the darkness.

The second was inside an S-Rank calamity that controlled a hurricane of fire.

"Prep the long-range transport," Nicholas said quietly. "We fly south."

Behind him, Julie slowly lifted her head from the keyboard.

She stared at the enormous crimson storm on the screen.

"I’m going to need a much bigger camera lens," she whispered.