A Taste of the Future, Part 2

"Damnit!" I growled, forming a wall of stone in front of me by slamming my hands onto the ground and flooding it with my mana to increase the speed to form it. 

Despite it taking less than two seconds for the wall to form, a phaser blast still managed to hit me in the shoulder which sent a searing, shocking pain throughout my whole body. Echo and L'Naan ducked down behind the wall without getting hit, but that did not surprise me as both their packs were full. This was not the first ambush that these assholes had pulled on us in the past two months that we had been here, and I doubted that it would be the last unless we did something about it. 

These aliens bordered on the line of elemental beasts, but thankfully, they could not use True Magic. What they could do, however, was mask their presence whenever they approached, much like Echo, though not quite as well. If they approached within sixty feet of me, my Wind Domain could pick them up if they made a sudden move, though my Earth Domain would still be fooled, hinting at an affinity for Earth magic. 

"What's the decision?" L'Naan asked with annoyance. 

Echo and L'Naan had been ambushed for the first time a month and a half ago, not too far from our makeshift home, and were heavily injured. While our mana had been greatly suppressed here, the Borg connection to Echo had not been affected, so I raced over as soon as I sensed that they were under attack and drove off the attackers, but I killed only a few, and I was weakened for another week due to the heavy mana cost of saving them and healing what Filigree could not handle. After we recovered enough, the three of us still went hunting, but if they appeared, we would immediately shift to defense, toss out half our portion of food collected, then retreat while harshly retaliating at any of those that followed. While it was a cowardly strategy, it had been one that I had been developing for a reason. 

"Time for Phase Two," I replied, cradling my injured arm and leaning against the stone wall with a smile despite the pain. 

Echo and L'Naan both grinned. Echo's mana flared as she casted a simple illusion spell to hide L'Naan switching out both of their packs with special backpacks that had been stored in her ring. One of the biggest advantages of an 'Inventory' ability, when it is not a common understanding of the population, is the level of deception that can be used alongside it, if properly applied. 

L'Naan passed me her bag and I threw it out like I normally did, yet I sensed something strange in the air. Honestly, I could not describe it better, yet there was a light sense of warning at the back of my mind, so I knew I had made a wise decision, even if I did not know why. I did not have to say anything to Echo as she instantly understood my thoughts and conjured another, more powerful, illusion, which looked like herself and L'Naan. The illusions retreated with me while the two of them remained hidden, and, no surprise, that turned out to be a good decision. 

Multiple bolts of phaser fire were aimed at the illusions and me. I managed to dodge most of the attacks, but two still landed on my body, causing me to yell in pain and 'crawl to safety' while the illusion of Echo and L'Naan looked unconscious, lying face down in the sand. I was in pain, no doubt about it, but I actually preferred the energy-based weapons, which were harder to heal, to arrows that could lodge in the body which Echo and L'Naan used in our sparring matches. 

"Lay down your arms! The leader wants you alive!" an alien shouted from the cliffs to our side. 

"Tell him to fuck a boulder! You won't take me or my sisters!" I shouted back. 

With a flare a mana, I conjured a Sandstorm to mask our position and blanket the region. Finally, I could sense the aliens within a hundred-foot radius as the storm took shape, and we were surrounded by nearly fifty people. My old arrogance wanted to balk at the number since I had taken down starships, but I could barely use my Dusa form for more than a few minutes while the idea of shifting into my Dragon form seemed nearly impossible. Fifty people, with phasers, would likely be able to whittle me down before I could eliminate them all, but I still had plenty of tricks up my sleeve. 

Under the cover of the Sandstorm, I grabbed the illusion of Echo and L'Naan, who were thankfully light, then retreated with them in case anyone was watching outside the small storm. At this point, having used the same tactic to escape the last four encounters, I knew that they were watching me, so I 'fled' like I always did, yet there was still a few surprises waiting.

An eruption of violent mana exploded right in the middle of their group, as they came to collect the bounty of rock spiders and stone lizards we had hunted, but instead found the decoy bag with an unstable mana crystal rigged with the enchantment used for the V3 torpedoes. Many of their people had been killed by the explosion, but I quickly learned that they had a second team of nearly thirty people as they approached my hiding spot without bothering to hide their position.

I sighed to myself while leaning heavily against the rock that I was hiding behind, my body aching under the multiple phaser burns that were on par with some of the nastiest ship-phasers that I had received. This was a new tactic that they had employed, nearing the 'date' that Voyager should develop a way to save us, yet I had already countered with our next step against the aliens... whether it was pure Chance, or Sancu's prediction would bother me much longer than the effects of the decision. 

I shifted into my Dusa form and pulled out a stormy gray crystal from my storage ring as I stood up slowly. Thankfully, my regenerative abilities were enhanced in this form, so my body was being healed at the cost of my Soul Power. Without hesitation, I crushed the mana crystal and absorbed it, refilling my mana reserves. 

"I'll give you one chance," I growled, breathing wisps of fire to further intimidate them, "fuck off, or I will leave you in a worse state than death." 

Several of the men took a step back as I glared at them, but those in front were not as skittish. They raised their guns, so I made my move right before they opened fire. Dashing straight at them, I retrieved a large metal shield from my storage ring and held it out in front of me to absorb the phaser blasts, but each hit would shave a bit from the shield; clearly, their phasers were at maximum strength. 

I launched the shield directly into the main grouping, killing the poor unfortunate soul that was closest to me while six others were thrown off their feet, yet not critically injured. While they were distracted by that, I teleported right in front of another leading member and delivered a full-strength punch to the center of his chest, shattering his sternum, numerous ribs, and likely causing bone fragments to lodge within his lungs. I activated my Lightning-based superspeed and flashed to the next closest, delivering a similar heavy punch. 

"Scatter and open fire!" one amongst the crowd shouted. 

Now, I was forced to deal with a web of random phaser beams as they shot at me with no regard for their comrades. I summoned a metal staff out of my ring while dodging and continued to chase after the closest of targets. When I brought the next down, I swung my staff at the furthest opponents, releasing a volley of blades that were an inch wide which ate away a quarter of my staff. They had no way of countering the blades other than dodging, but five were still riddled with numerous wounds with the metal still sticking out of them. 

Unfortunately, there were still more that I had not attacked, so they continued to fire. I managed to avoid most of the blasts by teleporting, one getting a lucky hit in as I landed a punch against his jaw. More phaser fire was directed at my new location, forcing me to teleport away, but I was using far too much mana with my dodges. The blasts hurt, no question about it, but tanking the shots and fighting my way through these peons would be more effective at eliminating my targets. 

I had incapacitated over twenty of the group that had circled me, but there were still six standing, and their aim was far better than I would like. To force my way through all of the 'soldiers' that I had, I took about a dozen hits, though I managed to use a few of them to target their own people, but mostly, I was forced to deal with the attacks. The last few remaining were scattered far apart, but they had their phasers trained on me while I huffed and puffed with exhaustion, dismissing my Dusa form since my Soul Power was getting low. 

When I fled from the initial ambush, Echo and L'Naan both retreated to Yin Realm and moved out of range of the pending explosion. After the trap went off, they exited the realm and opened fire on the dozen or so men that survived, getting the revenge that both of them had been waiting for weeks. Both had complete trust in my abilities, so they focused on ensuring that everyone was eliminated rather than worrying about me. 

[Echo... some help would be nice.] I sent through our connection. 

[We're on our way, three minutes out.] she responded. 

"You'll pay for this, pi'cor!" one of the remaining men spat. 

"Sorry, I left my wallet back in my cave," I mocked, despite the pain that I was in while retrieving another mana crystal. 

"Fire!" another yelled, and they all listened. 

Since I was not in my Dusa form, I could not directly crush the crystal and absorb the mana immediately, but I could draw it out somewhat fast. I had saved enough mana to teleport myself out of the way, though I was nearly out, forcing me to pull out a phaser from my storage ring. I took a few shots at the nearest one and took him down while running at another. 

Five beams of pure energy came flying at me, so I gathered my mana and threw myself forward with a superspeed infused jump and a gust of Wind, dodging all but one of the phaser blasts. I traded a hit to my chest for a solid punch on the man's jaw, sending him several feet back. A few tried to fire at my back, but I had expected such an attack and teleported myself again as the mana crystal crumbled in my hand. 

"Enough! Throw down your weapon and come with us willingly, or these two will get it," one of the last men said, standing between the collapsed forms of Echo and L'Naan. 

I could not help but smirk at the threat as I sensed Echo closing in on our location. Giving a dramatic sigh, I tossed my phaser to the ground and raised my hands above my head to show that I was surrendering. As one of them approached me, two figures appeared on the hilltop and launched two arrows wrapped in Weapon Force. The two nearest me were hit accurately, drilling a two-inch hole in the center of their chests. 

Both yelled out in pain as they dropped to their knees. I knocked the phaser out of the hand of the man closest to me then used his body as a shield when another shot at me. The one who had threatened 'Echo and L'Naan' fired on the illusions, but their 'bodies' just shattered like glass, revealing that they had never been there in the first place. I fired a few more 'random' shots, but they forced the last two men to retreat right into Echo's and L'Naan's second arrows. As they both slumped over, dying, I gave a sigh of relief and dropped my human shield. 

[How are you holding up?] Echo asked while she and L'Naan jogged over. 

[Been better.] I huffed with exhaustion, both physically and mentally. 

I was covered in a dozen or so phaser burns, none worse than the last one I received. Since I had not been transformed at the time, my jacket was charred, and the upper left side of my chest was covered in a nasty third-degree burn. I groaned with both pain and annoyance as I took off my jacket, since I knew that I would be carrying the wound for a week at least, even with Filigree helping me heal. 

"Well, you look like shit," L'Naan remarked with a smirk. 

"Your concern is heartwarming... hopefully, that can keep your belly full until we can go hunting again because you'll be on half rations until I'm better," I retorted. 

While eating had become more of a luxury over the years since I had awakened my Dusa form, being in this environment made it easy to realize that my hunger had always been suppressed in the 'universe'. Dragons were notorious for their hunger to the point that any Elemental Creature that I came across expected me to eat it rather than talk to it. For lack of a better explanation of it, the universes of 'The 100' and 'Star Trek: Voyager' were 'uncontrolled worlds', meaning that nothing fought 'us' for control of the natural mana. With "someone" suppressing the natural mana of a 'world' meant that we had to struggle to draw in every scrap of mana we could get, which honestly, was nothing like what we had faced before, even in Sancu's Game where we were fighting the undead for months. 

Now that I 'needed' to eat, I finally understood the Dragon Hunger that my kind were so well known for. There was a constant nagging in the back of my mind, reminding me how hungry I was, and it would only grow worse when I was close to strong sources of mana... like Katye, Echo, L'Naan, and especially Filigree. Thanks to a collection of mana-enriched fruits that Katye had stored in her ring, which was Filigree's favorite treat and what I used for my Spirit Wine, Katye was able to tame down the beast within me due to the high mana concentration, but our supply was exhausted a week ago and, with the heavy healing that I would need, my hunger would be at an extreme level. If I did not start eating them or the rocks with our typical rations in the next few days, it would be a testament to my restraint. 

"That's why Katye doesn't let us hunt near our cave. This should buy us a few days of freedom to hunt the vicinity of our hideout," Echo said with a bit of wisdom. 

"Sounds dandy... I want to know why they decided to pull this double ambush today, so find the least injured one and tie him up. We can drag him back to Katye, and she can get us some answers," I huffed. 

Neither of them argued with me as they were both used to me barking orders when I was in a bad mood. The last one that I punched was the only one without life-threatening injuries, so L'Naan tied him up with some extra wire and literally dragged him behind us while Echo helped me walk back to our cave... 

A/N: Sorry Readers, I know that my releases are getting delayed by much more than I would like. My new position has me crunching numbers, so using my mind is getting harder since it's often mush when I get home. I will keep releasing on Fridays, but sadly, I can't promise that it will be every week. I'm not giving up the story, I'm fully committed to not just this book, but at least a 3rd... Life just gets in the way of side quests sometimes =)