Chapter 393: I’m Back!

"Has there been any news?" President Cain asked, facing the wide windows of the oval office.

And the aide standing still behind him went stiff for a moment before letting out a long breath, "No sir, we have received no form or attempt of contact from any division..."

His words sat in the air, for a few seconds the office embracing the tense silence that followed.

This was the fifth time the president was asking this in the span of six hours.

And each time he was given a disappointing response.

The president waved his hand, dismissing the aide, leaving himself alone in the office once more to ponder the verdict of the event he had instigated.

Even after barging into the human ancestral shrine with fury and disappointment, he had been forced to side with the very culprits he had gone to condemn.

And the two ancient figures who had acted had been admonished with nothing but a light slap on the wrist.

And even after that was settled, the whereabouts of Seth and all soldiers from the seven divisions were still unknown.

And worse, the only two individuals that could possibly trace their location had their hands tied.

The Grand Weapon Maester and the Asura King had been placed under strict scrutiny.

Their action to save Seth might have been overlooked due to the significance Seth held to the human race.

But the act was still frowned upon regardless, as it posed a dangerous risk to the plan the humans had been weaving for several thousand years.

So naturally the two would have to be kept under surveillance to make sure they wouldn’t repeat their actions, regardless of whether Seth’s life was in danger or not.

President Cain’s fingers drummed against the windowsill, those kids were stuck out in the middle of the sea with no way home.

They were assets that would be insanely helpful in solidifying the victory of the west in this war.

Assets they couldn’t lose no matter what...

"Please be safe..." he muttered under his breath as he looked at the dimming skies...

...

"Hold! We roll back as arranged! Break formation and we die!" Robert, an evolver from team alpha, barked.

Standing in a frail line maintained by the dwindling numbers of humans.

The more the soldiers retreated into the Dune Rift, the more difficult it was for the others remaining behind to do the same safely.

And seeing this play out, some anxious minds hurried to escape before their turn.

An event Uriel had feared would happen, alas, it was only human nature.

Faced with a path to life, soldiers began to lose their rationale, rushing into the rift and giving no heed to the order in which they had been assigned.

Choices began to seep into their ranks, and many began to die, as more broke protocol and rushed towards perceived safety.

"Fuck!" Uriel grunted, taking the chance to escape a clash, his frame gliding backwards, evading a scalding plasma beam.

He took a quick glance at the chaotic mess the human forces were turning to and he scowled.

If things proceeded to spiral out of control at this rate...

He, Elaine and Lucas wouldn’t even get the opportunity to retreat.

As though this nightmare couldn’t get any worse...

[Warning! Warning! The user is drawing power from vital essence...]

Uriel straight up dismissed the text, fighting to keep his increasingly heavy eyelids open.

He couldn’t count how many times the same notification had been issued by the system.

But each time he kept ignoring it, right now nothing mattered more than staying lucid and alive.

His blurry sight cleared, and the frame of a giant, slithering serpent covered his view.

The slits of the charmed beast glinted venomously, as a metaphysical flow ripped loose, a spectral form of the beast lashed, digging its fangs into his soul and injecting a lethal flow of venom.

This sequence of movements occurred so fast that Uriel’s reaction speed, now slower than ever, couldn’t keep up.

His already fractured mind falling further into shambles...

He let out an incoherent wail as the serpent’s tail struck, digging into his ribs, rupturing organs and pulverizing his left lung...

Bang!

Uriel was sent flying, his vision fading, all sound going distant, as his brain was overloaded with so much pain it was forced to shut down to protect itself.

This was the last straw, there was simply no way Uriel was going to recover from this attack fast enough to save his life.

And this was noticed by the other two captains...

Elaine could only scream his name, her voice breaking, as the realization that she might just lose a friend today set in.

Unfortunately she was a good distance away from Uriel and there was nothing she could do to help in this state.

Swarmed by three charmed beasts on her end, the brief moment of attention she had given to Uriel’s situation had cost her a shallow cut to the side of her neck.

Had she reacted any bit slower and she would have been decapitated.

Her heart burst into an erratic rhythm, as a chill sank into her bones.

This time... they really might die...

Just as this horrifying realization crept into her crumbling psyche, a cold force stirred awake from deep within her core.

Elaine didn’t know what was happening, but she could feel the presence of something foreign seeping into her being.

Something dark, cold and vile...

"Open up to me, girl... if you don’t want to die, that is..." a voice, cold and rough, echoed loud in her collapsing consciousness.

Elaine didn’t know what it was, she wasn’t even certain that she was currently lucid.

Her thoughts swam, her limbs felt leaden, her frame trembled as all three charmed beasts converged on her...

Her fading consciousness tried to focus on the foreign presence.

"Come on, girl! There’s no time!" the voice boomed anxiously, causing her mind to rattle.

She could feel the presence more clearly than ever, and somehow she felt it to be intimate... familiar.

Almost as though this wasn’t her first encounter with whatever it was, time seemed to slow as the attack drew closer.

Fangs glinted bare, and claws streaked flowing with deadly lights, all converging on her frame.

The raging winds whipped as the glow in her eyes dulled, her consciousness failing to hold on any longer.

It shut down forcefully to protect what was left, a force of instinct she couldn’t resist even when she knew this would result in her death.

She remained helpless, and did the only thing she hoped would remove them from this fate of inevitable doom.

She opened her mind, a sequence that came to her so naturally almost as though she had done it before.

Her expression went blank for a brief second, before the foreign mind took over faster than the enemies’ attacks could connect.

Elaine’s eyes grew black, as coils of pure death essence began to seep out of her frame, the air going cold.

Her lips twisted into an unnatural smile, her eyes curving with sinister allure, as she muttered in a voice that wasn’t hers... "I’m back!"