Chapter 169: Inside the Rock

Kael tested things and blinked over random alien sacks, stabbing them all, and taking away their crystals.

There were creepy gurgling sounds accompanied by a wheezing sound, probably caused by either the aliens catching their breath or the sacs deflating somewhere.

Silence passed by, and they waited for any reaction for the next minute or so. However, things were unexpectedly calm with the sac simply losing its bioluminescence.

Kael then looked at the hundreds of ‘sacs’ still asleep. “I can’t say the same for the others. Would you like your family to awaken early? We’d have to see whether killing multiple of these immature aliens would be enough to prepare their bodies, however.”

Naia was genuinely nervous about getting her family to absorb the crystals. She had seen people fail in awakening many times before. Some of them were even her friends she shared life and death moments with.

In her generation, people went through an (optional) awakening after twelve years old. Every child would go through harsh physical training, and they would also be taken to kill an alien scout (or other weakened variations) here and there, along with adults, in controlled environments to gain experience.

Then, when the time came, they would absorb the crystal to awaken an ability, increasing their chances to survive outside by folds.

This was what humanity learned—after many sacrifices, trial-and-error, and deaths—that killing aliens before absorption would increase the chances of surviving the awakening. However, it still wasn’t a 100% guarantee of survival.

Even in her generation, even after training, there was still a 30-40% chance of failure. That was the minority, but that number was massive added up, especially since humanity’s population had been declining sharply even before that.

It was why many didn’t dare go through awakening, choosing to live ‘normal’ lives, assigned to do jobs nobody was willing to do.

Failing was a horrible sight, seeing someone you know transform into a non-human in front of your eyes. They would be killed before the transformation was completed and they could hurt someone.

Sometimes, they even asked the younger generations to do the killing.

After all, it was something that they would go through eventually on their own.

Naia’s eyes looked at the slumbering aliens with sharp light. “You saw how troublesome a single one of these is,” she told the group. “We really ought to get rid of them while we can, don’t you think?”

Regardless of whether they would absorb the crystals at a later time, they ought to kill these parasites anyway.

….

Naia, along with the others, entered the rock with their weapons up and ready to stab. Marcus and the men had tested the enhanced weapons and they were obsessed. Although they were scared to face these monsters, they were also looking forward to actually using the weapons.

To make a comparison, if a pre-enhanced sword could cut meat like a normal knife, it could now cut it as if it were tofu.

With Naia and Kael’s guidance, they were taught the best ways to kill these beasts. For example, which weak spots to target, at what angle, and so on.

In Linlin’s case, she was given a long knife too. They had to absorb the invisible essence released by the aliens to gain an advantage, and her using long-range weapons wouldn’t do that for her.

As for the crystals, it was too time-consuming to pry open each corpse, so Naia would just take the corpses into her space later. Fortunately, she had enough control to keep the space from absorbing them automatically.

The family worked in duos, just in case, and they worked near the exit. Kael purposely chose the difficult-to-access ones above arm’s reach, while Naia chose the ones at the edges so if there was an emergency her family would be the first at the door and she could hold the problems back.

Slash!

Slab!

Squelch!

The family was not comfortable at first, naturally so, since they were basically taking lives. They were modern law-abiding people, after all. It was fortunate that this group was mainly farmers, while Glen and Gale had already experienced the harsh realities of life after being kidnapped and enslaved. This was why they could act relatively quickly.

If Naia took in those people outside in here, it was estimated they’d still be dawdling in front of a sac.

Naia only had to remind the family of what these things would do in the future and how many each one could kill. She pointed at the powerful Kael’s bandaged shoulder, and the group’s righteous indignation was reignited.

It was a one-sided massacre. Not to mention the family, which hated the aliens through secondhand stories alone, Kael and Naia were getting addicted to this type of slashing.

They lived their lives having trouble with this thing. Even when they grew stronger and could slash down weaker aliens with a shot or slash, it was because they were using the awakeners’ skills that ultimately tire them out after a while.

Kael and Naia prioritized killing the vanguard-types first, which were definitely much more difficult to kill. This meteorite had several archetypes, and it would be good to use them for study later.

As for how the scout ended up waking up earlier than others, they realized it was because of Naia. She had tried to absorb the essence into her space, and it triggered the sack nearest the spot she was absorbing from. So, if she wanted to take in the rest of the rock (which would be greatly advantageous to the space), they had to kill all of these monsters first.

To be safe, Kael actually used his ability to add pressure so, in case the aliens awoke prematurely, they wouldn’t be able to retaliate for a few seconds, which was enough for Naia to make the finishing blows.

Perhaps it was because the aliens had just landed and they had expended a massive amount of energy in traveling; they were able to do this easily. They were not naive enough to think that dealing with the other meteorites was the same, though.

…the other meteorites.

At the back of her mind, Naia wondered: Where were those other small meteorites again?

Will resume after one of the other ongoing stories end~ Thanks!