Chapter 9: Just Like Reality [2]

Xema and Warren have hunted down the stragglers in their current district and are moving to a new one to search for and destroy new Nests of Tedeum beasts.

Both of them have already caught glimpses of the newcomers from the distant orbital dropships while they were still airborne.

Especially Warren, who managed to catch a glance of a familiar silhouette from one of the dropships.

But he didn't have the luxury and time to think about it too much, because he was fighting a Simia Tedeum beast variant, bigger than a human, with massive arms and a massive torso.

Its legs were small, its body supported mainly by its two powerful, rounded arms and fingers that could crush boulders with ease.

This Tedeum beast had no head, instead its entire front body was covered with a chrome-like shell. It had the posture of a gorilla and moved similarly.

The Simia Tedeum swinged its mighty arms to grab Warren but he easily moved sideways to avoid its grasp like a seasoned gladiator

His greatsword "Hybrid Guard" features both great power and defensive capability.

Designed for tough frontline combat, able to protect its wielder while dishing out serious blows against heavily armored Tedeums in its first form.

Its second form shortens the greatsword, the excess materials then folds into small rhombus like segments with a blue dot in the middle and slides towards the user's whole arm, distributing itself equally.

Forming an arm-length armor who closely resembles the ancient roman gladiators armor pauldrons.

And with this greatsword he cut the waist of the beast from the back.

Cutting the whole waist and with it, both of its legs clean off.

There was an audible crunch. It leaked out a dark purple liquid from its bisected areas.

The Tedeum staggered, whereupon Xema took the opportunity to strike its weak points with her throwing daggers at its armpits.

She renders the beast's arms inoperable for a short while.

Before Warren then exerted himself to finish it off while it was on the ground by ramming it in the back with the greatsword where it was no longer armoured, finally taking out the Simia-Tedeum beast.

Even though he finished it, he was not cheerful or happy, for he had something quite different in mind besides the beast.

Thinking back at Xema's previous demonstration of her pure destruction.

Warren just couldn't help but feel powerless by her potential.

It made him remember the time when he fought her in a sparring match back then.

She didn't even used her Artificer ability when they fought.

It was an absolute defeat. He really couldn't put it in any other way.

"Warren, you're spacing out."

"Huh? What?"

She sighs, retrieving her throwing daggers. Then they stopped near an alleyway to hide.

"Try to keep your mind off of useless things. We are currently in the middle of the battlefield. I don't need teamates who can't even focus what's in front of them."

"Of course, I know. I was just wondering about something."

"Wondering about something? What is it?"

"It's nothing important. I just had a question why you didn't use your ability back then when we were sparring. But, I think I already know the answer."

He finally looked at her in the eyes.

"Good. Then let us not waste anymore time. Our archer support stopped 3 minutes ago. We should go check on their team. Something must've went wrong on the Big Ben."

"The Snow Wolfs? I think we should actually go and link up with the reinforcements. If the Snow Wolfs do need our help, we will have better chances with more people. "

She thinks for a moment as she peers cautiously out of the corner of the alley.

"Alright. We save the reinforcements. Then we go find the archer team."

"Wait, saving the reinforcement? Shouldn't that be the other way around?"

He followed her anyway, while Xema was already paving the way to link up with the backup units.

Out of nowhere, buildings collapsed, clouds of dust rose from the rubble, black streams of energy exploded all over the city.

The second wave had finally begun.

Above them, black impossibly flying aerial structures, hexagonal, pyramid-shaped entities with many elongated wires like appendages, which apparently served as means of aerial propulsion, flew by like the newest modern fighter jets.

Those Hostile Aerial Phenomenons or HAPs, dropped black spheres which unveil themselves upon impact with the ground.

As large as a giant Isopod, many-legged metallic creatures, each a bit different from the other ones.

Some have more legs, some can spit acidic projectiles that can melt reinforced concrete with ease, some seek out targets and explode as little lethal suicide bombers.

They are not quite so dangerous when Irregulars encounter these Tedeum Mettisopod Bales in small numbers, but extra care is needed to remain mobile and not be swarmed by these large critters.

As a general rule of thumb, when there is a 10 to 1 ratio of these polygon Ticks compared to an Irregular, utmost caution and care must be exercised due to their increased intelligence to use tactics when reaching larger numbers.

Xema clicked her tongue, seemingly out of annoyance.

"Tsk! Five minutes earlier than I thought. Warren, retreat. We can't help them in the midst of a new wave. Otherwise we will be surrounded and wiped out before we even reach them. We need to hide."

"You can break through."

For some reason he was determined.

"Warren?"

"All we need is to divert most of their attention away from you and the reinforcements. In simple terms, I will use myself as bait."

"But Warren, that's suicide. You couldn't even hold a door right."

"Xema, I know that my brother is at the other side. I can't just leave him to save myself. Even if this is all just a simulation. I know that you can reach them even without me. I trust in your capabilities."

"Warren... you should know better to not let your personal feelings get in the way of-"

"I know, Xema! But we are not mindless killing machines. We shouldn't leave anyone behind and save ourselves like that!"

Xema grabbed Warren by the shirt quite aggressively.

"We are a team. Either we both go and die a meaningless death or we hide and survive to continue fighting later. I won't make the irrational decision to have ourselves killed because of your stupid sentimental feelings."

"...you didn't take me because of my IMA ranking as the second place graduate."

"What...?"

" You chose me because I was simply the next best available candidate at the time. Someone else would have worked out just as well."

"Warren what the hell are you-"

"Xema... you weren't interested in improving your teamwork in the first place... you wanted to know if you could take care of someone while in combat..."

". . ."

"I don't know what motivates you to do such a thing. But I can take care of myself just fine."

She stares for a moment before letting out a sigh and holds her right hand at her own forehead.

"Haaa... You know how to gain their attention? They aren't just mindless animals even in a sim after all."

"Ahh... I have somewhat of a plan."

She gave him a cold look but still handed him a flare gun and one of her throwing knifes.

"Use it if you need my help. I will immediatly come back for you."

Warren smiles at her and pockets the parting gifts, which was the signal for Xema to go and help the reinforcements.

"..."

When she left his proximity and snaked through the streets. Far enough out of the reach of her ears, he sighs in great relief.

"Huuuh- that was a gut-wrenching experience. To think that I guessed her true intentions correctly.... ugh, it makes my head spin..."

He steadied himself against the wall of the building in the alleyway to take a mental rest.

"Never imagined it would be so scary to push her buttons..."

It was a intuitive gamble when he said all those things. He never expected to be right, but when he finally calmed down from his lucky clairvoyant moment, he sets his mind straight for what will happen next.

"Alright... now I just need to survive for the next few seconds. No, next few minutes at the minimum. Huuh, alright I'm ready."

Warrens veins slowly glowed a blue luminescent light.

He was ready.

•••

The newly arrived reinforcements are under heavy fire. However, they are not bested by the sheer numbers of hostiles to take care of. Instead, they offer fierce resistance to their enemies.

They make the Tedeums suffer terribly for every millimetre they gain.

Although they were frantically screaming their lungs out due to the sim rooms highest difficulties mandatory setting which prevents every form of long and short range communications that doesn't come from your own vocal cord.

"Muliple Ticks, left side! Fighters needed!"

"We are currently a bit busy supporting the Frontguard!"

"Lead Archer squad 1 talking! We need to move somewhere less open! We are doing our best keeping those HAPs clear of our airspace but we can't keep up!"

"Ranger team 3 over here! Multiple Tedeum tanks charging through our lines. We need Frontguards to cover us!"

They fought in Trafalgar Square.

An antiquated relic of the past. Surrounded by massive collapsing and burning buildings, the battle was fierce but even when they are putting up quite the resistance as if the battle was real, the Irregulars are having great difficulty to defend their position from the constant assault.

In the midst of battle, Coridan was a Fighter. Like lightning with his straight plasma saber, he cleared swarms of Ticks and Canine Tedeums out of the way.

He left trails of electric current that shortly paralysed those he could not finish off. And left it to the Raiders or Rangers to put the finishing blow.

This is where Kishi Yumina comes in.

She was a Raider and with her team she could easily eliminate the remaining leftovers. Her equipment consisted of her self-recharging heavy pistol with explosive armour-piercing projectiles and her well-rounded vibro dagger.

Rangers were keeping the less armoured beast away from closing in too fast with their high output sub-machine guns.

Even if the Tedeums somehow gets close, they can near instantaneously dispose the threat with their own close in melee weapons.

"Don't get outmanoeuvred! Fall back to the Museum building behind us!"

"The back line has been compromised! We can't hold them back!"

"They are pouring out the Museum building! Protect our Archers!"

"Leave them to us! We'll distract them-"

Before the two Irregulars from the Frontguard Unit could take their positions four large steel like platforms crushed the Tedeums beneath its weight. Before they lift back up into the air and formed a wall.

Charlotte was standing in the middle of the hovering four blocks of heavy monolithic metals covered by dust and clouds of finely crushed rubble powder.

Before sending the floating metal walls forward into the Museum, commanded seemingly just from her sheer force of willpower.

Unsurprisingly nothing was able to stand and defy the wide rectancular blocks of metal. Pushing everything in its way inside and out of the building in a massive explosion of crushing kinetic energy.

Just as the building itself is about to collapse due to having many of the support pillars spewed out the back like a bad night of eating hot chili taco, the blocks of metal divided itself to substitute as the support pillars and temporarily hold the roof in place.

"The lower floor is mostly cleared now. Raiders! Take care of the stragglers!"