Dungeon Raider System-Chapter 437: Ghost part 3

After Rusty spoke, everyone finally understood how deep in trouble they were. They had assumed that just because they were still able to hear Rusty sobbing at a distance meant he was still safe, but now they knew he was actually dead and the strange phenomenon that allowed people to come back from the grave had affected him too.

Needless to say, they were beyon terrified. Especially Young who made the terrible mistake of using her trait on a heavenly rank soldier, rendering him useless for battle for at least a couple days. It was also the first time anyone ever saw her using her trait like that and the reason for that was simple.

It wasn't that she was able to simply become younger once a year, it was that once a year she sacrificed someone in order to become younger. Her trait wasn't to become young by spending flux energy, it was to drain the life force of other people but she kept that fact a secret. However, since she didn't kill Tallyman she didn't become younger and only gained a temporary buff.

The only reason why the troublemakers were even allowed to remain in the army was that their traits were incredibly rare and had the potential to even turn the tides on the war against cryptids.

"I guess... I have no choice now," Young said with a troubled grin on her face, her eyes still brimming with power. "I didn't mean to hurt him. Goodbye darling, I'll see you on the other side."

"Mom!" Mayhem let out a prolongued cry after her mother said those words, but Young didn't even turn her head to look at he just continued walking towards the strange mist.

With Rusty and Young gone, the already small unit became significantly smaller and also weaker since Tallyman was also out of combat. His body was perfectly fine, but he was too old and could barely walk on his own feet. His eyesight, hearing and even his mind became that of an old man, which meant he was of no help at all until he regained enough flux energy, or so Young said.

"Iris, make a new campfire, Stella use your trait to secure the perimeter." Cassandra commanded as she herself took a fighting stance.

"Colonel Sword, I can't see past this mist. I tried to use my trait and see what is it made of, but it's just regular water even at a microscopic level."

"Then why does it shine? Is it flux energy?"

"It might be, but my trait only allows me to 'zoom in', I can't tell if it's flux energy."

In the meantime, Iris did the best she could to light the campfire, but Young used water to put it out and it wasn't catching fire. As if things weren't bad enough, as the mist grew denser, her flint and stick became completely useless and the light of their gas lanterns began flickering.

"They're coming!" Nika shouted as she drew her gun and shot at a seemingly random direction.

"What are they?" Cassandra asked.

"I can't see shit, just focus on your ass and you'll find them." Nika replied, though her words made no sense to Cassandra and she wasn't amused by her apparent joke.

"Stop messing around, we're in real danger here." Cassandra scoffed, but Nika paid no heed to her words and continued shooting at the shadows cast on the mist. She had no clue if shooting them with her coilgun had any effect at all, but it was a better alternative than remaining idle like the rest of them.

"Colonel Sword, I suggest we move towards the Zeppelin." Stella said in what was supposed to be a professional voice, though fear oozed from her every word.

"We can't walk blindly, but there's something we can do." Moving from their location in those circumstances would only land them in a worse situation and was their absolute last resort. But Stella gave her the idea t shoot a flare up in the sky to let those nearby know of her location.

After all, they took what they thought was the safest path, but they weren't that far from the Pegasus. It was a longshot, but if Luna saw the flare, Cassandra was confident her sister would come rescue her. Their relationship was complicated to say the least, but for many years all they had was each other and even if at times they hated each other's guts, their sisterly bond was unbreakable.

However, as soon as she fired the flaregun they were able to see not only the countless shadows surrounding them, but also the outlaine of a gargantuan creature that moved silently above them. They couldn't see what was it made of or whether it had an exoskeleton, skin or fur, all they could see was the undetermined outline of what seemed to be a quadruped.

"How is it possible for that thing to move without making a sound!?" Stella cried, though the answer was already dawning on her head. "It's the mist!"

"What? You're not making any sense." Nika turned her head and saw Stella covering her open mouth.

"The creature, it's this mist!" Stella insisted.

"Soldiers, our new mission is to survive at least until we're able to warn the army."

"Warn them about what?" Nika asked, confounded.

"That a Titan level cryptid is heading west, towards our megacity." Cassandra replied in a grim voice.

Nika was tempted to ask which city, Texas or what Uriel found out to be Lousiana, but then she realized it didn't matter. Wherever it went, a tital level cryptid would raze everything in its wake and the only thing humans could possibly do was to evacuate before it was too late, but considering this particular cryptid's ability to move unnoticed an evacuation wasn't likely to happen.

"Well, fuck me sideways. Can't your girl contact people at a distance?" Nika asked pointing towards Iris.

"Distance is not a problem for her, but she needs to be able to know who exactly does she want to contact and their exact position, but that's impossible under our current circumstances."

As time passed the mist grew even thicker than before which forced them to hurdle all together back to back. they tried to cover their gas lanterns in order to keep them from going out, but that didn't stop them from dimming enough for the shadows to come near them again.

"Turn off the lights dear, I swear everything's going to be fine. Come with me, come to mom. The whole family will be reunited again." Young's voice echoed in the mist, but that didn't have the result everyone expected.

"You bitch! You haven't acted like my mother my whole life and now you want me to fucking kill myself!?" Mayhem shouted as she pointed her hands towards the source of the voice and activated her trait. The sudden explosion took Nika by surprise, but it had two possitive side effects

The firs was that they were able to see what they were up against. It ewas the corpses of the people who spoke to them, but they weren't made of flesh and bone. They were made of all the swamp things, moss, tree bark, twigs and even insects. Their pitiful figures showed an uncanny pained expression that contrasted heavily with the sweet voices they heard the whole time.

Young's expression was particularly unsettling, her mouth and eyes were wide open and she held an expression of the utmost terror, but there was also Rusty and even Nika's first love. Had she lingered on his visage, that dreadful picture would have shattered all the memories she had of him, but that didn't come to happen because of the second side effect of Mayhem's trait.

Nika hurriedly disappeared into the shadows that were cast under their feet.

"That bitch betrayed us!" Shouted Stella, who lost all sense of respect for Nika after seeing her flee, but this time that wasn't what Nika was trying to do.

She focused all of her senses into finding uriel's location. She knew no one would be able to fight that cryptid, but at the very least she wanted to let him know the threat headed his way. The problem was that he was already too far away to contact him.

Together, they tested the maximum distance she could leap into his shadow, but it varied depending on the density of the shadows between them since she used them as something similar to footholds to get to him but because of the mist there were no shadows she could use and for that reason, contacting him directly was impossible.

However, that didn't apply to Uriel's trait. Nika had spent so much time inside his museum she was now able to access it even when at a distance. After all, it wasn't a physical place but an ethereal one.

This content is taken from fгee𝑤ebɳoveɭ.cøm.

The further apart they were, the harder it was for Nika to sense his trait and she had never been able to enter the museum from such a distance, not even when they were in different districts inside the city, but this was a life or death situation.

Not just for her, but also to Uriel himself who might be on the path of that impossible enemy.

By channeling her flux energy and sensing the connection with Uriel, Nika was able to briefly enter his museum. As soon as she entered she could already feel the connection disappearing and she had but a few seconds to leave him a message.

She scanned the whole place and didn't think of anything better than to grab his phone and attempt to unlock it several times until it was blocked.

"This will do." She said as she was pushed out of Uriel's trait after losing her perfect focus.