Chapter 92: The Den of Iron II

Chapter 92: Chapter 92: The Den of Iron II

Alena did not waste another breath.

She stepped squarely in front of the heavy reinforced door, her boots planting firmly into the stone floor. Raising her right hand, the runic circuits woven into her Blackthorn exosuit flared with a bright, pitch-black glow. The air around her gauntlet warped, hissing under the weight of condensed, heavy dark mana.

"Darkness Blast."

BOOM!

A tight sphere of compressed Dark mana blew up point-blank against the reinforced alloy barrier. The blast echoed down the narrow corridor like an artillery round.

The steel doors groaned, tore clean off their hydraulic hinges in a shower of sparks, and flew inward. They crashed across the cavernous staging hall like falling blades, smashing a stack of empty supply crates to splinters against the far wall.

"What was that?!"

"An ambush?! Who’s there?!"

Shouts and angry curses tore through the room at once.

Eric, having already downed the Invisibility Potion, was moving the second the shockwave blew through the door.

Shadow Steps.

Completely hidden from sight and sound, Eric slipped across the messy floor like a ghost.

The assembly hall was huge, an open underground bay carved straight out of the mountain rock. Overhead, industrial mana lamps hummed under steel bolts. Across the floor, dozens of armed syndicate goons had been right in the middle of loading crates of expensive ores, illegal goods, and stolen weapons onto heavy armored trucks.

Standing right beside the lead truck was Scarface Vane, leaning hard on his iron cane with his scarred face pale with shock.

Next to him stood a wide, thickset man in an expensive pinstripe suit, his fingers loaded with heavy gold rings and raw mana gems. The suit barely fit over his broad, muscular frame, and it did nothing to hide the suffocating pressure rolling off him. A real Captain-rank fighter.

Slipping quietly past the transport containers, Eric locked his eyes onto the syndicate boss.

Appraisal.

│ Race: Human

│ Talent: Rank C

│ Stage: Captain

│ Level: 3

*Captain Stage Level 3 with a Rank-C talent,* Eric thought, making his way up to the shadowed stairs above the command deck. *He’s got deep mana pools and solid physical stats, but a basic C-rank talent caps his output. One-on-one, he’s not in Alena’s league.*

The boss glared toward the smoking, broken doorway, his face turning red with fury.

"Who’s stupid enough to attack my base?!" the boss roared, his voice rattling the stone walls. "Show yourself!"

Through the settling clouds of dust and stone, Alena Blackthorn walked inside.

She walked with calm, steady steps, her traveler’s cloak cast aside to leave the dark Blackthorn exosuit out in the open. Glowing lines traced the edges of her armor, and her rapier rested loose in her hand, the steel catching the harsh overhead light.

For two seconds, nobody made a sound.

Then, the syndicate boss let out a loud, mocking laugh.

"A kid?! Hahaha! Look at this! A little girl thinks she can kick down my door and take us all on?!"

A wave of ugly chuckles broke out through the ranks of thugs. Near Vane’s side, a greasy goon with rotten teeth leaned forward, his eyes scanning Alena’s frame as he licked his lips.

"Boss... she looks good," the thug sneered, grinning ear to ear. "Can I have her after we break her arms and drag her down?"

"Sure," the boss smirked, crossing his arms. "After I’m done with her! Hahaha!"

He took a step forward, pointing a ringed finger straight at Alena. "Come here, girl. Drop that fancy blade and surrender right now. You’ll live, and I’ll make sure you have a real good time, too."

Alena’s face did not shift at all. Her pale expression stayed as cold as ice, her red eyes narrowing with disgust.

"Filthy trash," she said, her voice dropping into a flat, icy tone that cut right through their laughter. "Try catching me."

The boss’s smirk vanished, turning into a venomous snarl.

"Bitch has a death wish! Boys, take her down together!"

"Kill her!"

"Rip that suit off her!"

The whole floor erupted into violence.

Nearly a hundred men charged forward at once. Summoning arrays of messy red, green, and murky brown light flared across the floor as wild hounds, giant scorpions, and scaled lizards piled into the open. Blades cleared scabbards, spears leveled off, and low-tier mages raised wooden staves to start chanting spells.

It was an overwhelming wall of bodies and steel.

Alena did not back up a single step.

She raised her left hand, her ruby eyes blazing with total authority.

"Come out, Dino."

VUUUM!

A massive summoning circle, ignited across the stone floor right at her boots. The circle burned with an ink-black light that chilled the whole room, blowing out torches and making the mana lamps flicker.

From the center of that black mist, a nightmare stepped through.

It was a ten-foot-tall apex predator. A colossal drake covered in dense, pitch-black scales that seemed to swallow the light around it. Its spinal ridge bristled with jagged bone spikes, its heavy tail slammed the stone with enough force to crack the floor, and its eyes burned like twin pools of boiling blood.

High up in the shadows on the crane beam, Eric had to hold his breath.

Even while totally invisible, the raw pressure pouring off that drake forced him to lean against the steel support. His talent clicked on purely by reflex.

Appraisal.

│ Race: Darkspire Drake

│ Rank: S

│ Stage: Captain

│ Level: 5

*Level 5 Captain... an actual Rank-S Drake,* Eric realized, his hand tightening on the Wavecaller’s hilt. *This is Alena’s real trump card. A walking siege weapon.*

ROOOAAAR!

The Darkspire Drake threw back its head and let out an ear-splitting roar.

The shockwave blasted across the room like a bomb. Lightbulbs shattered overhead, loose crates flew through the air, and the sheer sonic weight rattled everyone’s bones so hard that dozens of low-tier thugs dropped their weapons to cover their bleeding ears. Nearly twenty of the weakest Mortal-rank grunts passed out on the spot.

In the middle of the panic, Impy made his move.

Hovering just behind Alena, the Dark Imp vanished in a puff of purple smoke. In a split second, he shifted his body into an exact copy of one of the knocked-out thugs, casually rolling behind a parked hauler to wait for his opening.

Alena’s lips curled into a sharp, lethal smile as she brought her blade up level with her chin.

"All of you are dead."

"Kill her and that damn lizard!" the syndicate boss screamed, the veins on his neck bulging out hard.

The thugs were shaking down to their boots under the drake’s aura, but the boss’s yell forced them to move. Gripping their weapons with pale knuckles, the survivors charged in a messy wave.

"You think you can play games in my house?!" the boss roared, ripping off his suit jacket and throwing it to the floor.

He slammed both hands forward, driving three soul links straight into the ground.

Three summoning circles flashed around him in a burst of violent mana.

First came a giant toad with rough brown skin, its wide skull topped with two thick stone horns. Second was a heavy silver-coated feline wrapped in clouds of thick fog, a Mistmane Lion. Third was a long, dark reptile that hissed hot embers from its jaw, covered in ash-gray scales.

Eric scanned all three beasts from his perch in the roof beams.

Appraisal.

│ Race: Boulderhorn Toad

│ Rank: B

│ Stage: Captain

│ Level: 3

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│ Race: Mistmane Lion

│ Rank: C

│ Stage: Captain

│ Level: 2

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│ Race: Ashscale Lizard

│ Rank: C

│ Stage: Captain

│ Level: 1

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*The Boulderhorn Toad is his main frontline tank at Level 3, the Mistmane Lion is his crowd-control disruptor at Level 2, and the Ashscale Lizard is his ranged backline at Level 1,* Eric calculated instantly.

Without making a sound, Eric brought up his smartband and sent a quick message straight to Alena,

[Eric: Boss has 3 Captain beasts. Priority Target: Boulderhorn Toad (Rank B, Lvl 3) — heavily armored tank. Secondary: Mistmane Lion (Rank C, Lvl 2). Weakest: Ashscale Lizard (Rank C, Lvl 1). Crack the toad first and his defense collapses.]

Down on the floor, Alena’s eyes flicked up slightly as the text popped onto her display. She gave a barely noticeable nod.

She leveled her sword straight at the giant horned toad.

"Dino," she called out through their mental bond, her voice cutting clearly through the noise. "Take out the ugly toad first."