Artificial 3: The Valla Chronicles

Chapter 25: Betrayal

The human cackles like a mad man as a rock wall shoots out of the floor where lights weren't.
The entrance of the cave shuts as well, the cave filling up with a green like mist. Instinctively,
I hold my breath, make a shadow hammer,
and begin beating away at the stone wall.
"Who needs a hammer when you got these."
Chace says.
He draws back his arm and pounds away at it bit by bit,
Sora pitches in and kicks it repeatedly, and finally,
Terra, she gets a running shart,
purple lightning shoots from her body, and drop kicks the wall.

Thinking on my feet,
I use the creation rune to make everyone a gas mask,
I don't know how potent or how much poison is in these runes but it's best not to fuck around and find out,
I tell everyone to breath normally then I reload my guns while we had the time.
I felt like a high stakes game of lazer tag with everyone sneaking around, covering each other's backs.
Everyone jumps when more zombies are heard,
but not ordinary zombies.
No,
these were some sort of mutated super zombies with body builder bodies about 7 feet tall.
Everyone parkours up anything,
ledges,
medium holes that can hold a body,
and of course,
I spray my P90 and AR15.

Flecia and Crystal come to my rescue by crushing two super zombies with an ice rune that shoots them into the cieling and crushing them feet first by a block of ice that goes to the roof.
Frost keeps their backs coverd by firing ice spikes from his hands,
Reina is swinging her Tetsubo like a bat hitting anything in her sight,
Terra,
using her lightning to take out as many zombies as possible.
"You all manage here. We're going to make an exit and find the little shit!"

Chace yells out even though the cave echoes with my gunshots.
Chace and Sora take off down a fork in the cave system,
leaving us to fend for ourselves.
The twin Oni's handled themselves well, but unlike they usually do,
they asked me to make some military guns,
so I fired up a creation rune while everyone covered me and constructed four guns and passed two to the both of them,
they immediately light up the cave, shooting any zombie that moved,
Flecia had the genius idea to create ice walls to block off the zombies, then told Reina and the Onis,
to use their Tribe's signature attack. Before my very eyes,
Reina and the twins made hand signs like in Naruto and then inhales,
I swear to God,
they are about to yell one of my favorite jutsus.
"Flame Tribes: Fireball Bazooka!" All three breath a medium-sized fireball, then the next one was a bit bigger,
and bigger,
and bigger until the fifth was massive, I'm talking bigger than them!

The first firball pushed the ice block into the zombies,
and the second one pushed them further,
the third,
a bit more.
The fourth melted the ice and any bodies in its way,
and finally, the fifth.
It incinerated all the zombies into burnt piles of bones!
We all split into two groups,
me and the Onis, Frost,
and his kids.
Before we head down our fork in the cave,
Flecia tossed a kunai to me that had her servant seal on it and told me to channel my demonic energy into it if we find a way out,
I nod and we split.

After blindly running down our path in the cave and killing a few straggler zombies,
we run into Chace and a large pile of debris.
Judging by the look,
I'd say an explosion happened and separated Chace from our sisters.
Chace was chucking rocks in a hurry,
as if digging like his life depends on it, his breathing was fast,
on the verge of hyperventilating.
"What the hell is going on, Chace?!"
We all rush in to help Chace,
each rock we move,
more come tumbling from the ceiling.
I could hear Terra faintly from the other side yelling for Sora to quit digging and yell if we could hear her.

Of course,
we're all yelling, too,
and she yells for us to find another exit and that we'll meet up soon.
"You better keep your word, sis! I'll be holding you to that promise!"
We get a loud,
she promises,
and I pull Chace away from the rubble. He hasn't calmed down at all and immediately clings onto Reina,
Reina isn't a touchy-feely person like I am,
and more like Chace,
thick skinned,
doesn't let things get to her aside from anger out bursts,
and all about tough love.
"Get! Off! Of! Me! Dammit!"
Reina keeps kicking Chace to get him to let go,
but her words fall on deaf ears.

"For fuck's sake, wait here and I'll lend you my medical bandages to clean your snot with."
Reina heads back into the shadows so we can't see her removing her bandages from her chest and Chace baffles us even further by going after here!
My jaw drops as I hear a loud echo of fist meeting face and Chace flying into my hands.
"Fucking pervert!"
I hold Chace in place while Reina takes a few extra seconds to replace the medical banadages then comes back and we all begrudgingly clean him up,
I've never seen my younger brother like this,
he's never this vulnerable,
I'm no doctor but my diagnosis is extreme separation anxiety.
I knew Chace and Sora were close for being twins,
but I never thought they would flip out like this.
Then again,
what sane person wouldn't?

The only reason I'm not emotionally breaking down with my brother is because I'm putting my trust in Terra to find a way out for her and Sora,
as for Niel,
where the sam bloody fuck did he go off too?

"Reina, I hate to ask, but would you mind being his emotional support pillar just long enough for us to get the fuck out of here?"
She gives me the really look and her facial expression is like she's asking me 'do I have to?'
She grumbles but takes Chace's hand anyway.
"Listen up, you two! You help Seth get us out of here. Any and all threats will be handled by you lot!"
Me and the Onis salute then take another route,
Jita, has his Katanas out,
dual weilding,
me and the other Oni have our guns aimed and slowly walk ahead of everyone,
whatever comes in my line of sight that isn't my sister,
Frost,
his kids or Niel, I'm lighting them the fuck up!

(Terra's POV)

As soon as I pulled Sora away from the rubble and took the lead,
she clinged to me like a frightened child, her body trembling.
I use my lightning rune to make my hand spark as a light source.
We didn't run into zombies,
but we sure as hell couldn't make heads or tails where we were going,
we must have wondered around for at least ten minutes,
sqeezing through narrow spaces, avoiding obvious traps like pit falls or pressure plates that trigger a spike block dropping from the ceiling.

After all that walking around,
I could hear the sound of wind,
rain,
a bit of thunder and bullets,
lots and lots of bullets.
I drag Sora with me,
who really doesn't have her head in the game right now,
when I really need her to,
after listening extremely closely,
we followed the sound and found ourselves outside where a dimension or portal,
or whatever you want to call it,
was monsooning rain bad,
I carefully look at my surrounding and take in every last detail.
Multiple smaller ilands the size of boulders,
broken stone bridges,
some bridges still intact but look unstable,
and lastly,
I see a bunch of zombie soldiers shooting at owl man,
I think Seth might have mentioned his name at one point?

I don't know,
but he's helping us,
so we might as well.
"Sora, I know your mind isn't in a good spot right now, but I need you to pull yourself together long enough to help me make it to that man."
Sora gives a nod,
and I pick her up on my back,
focus my aura on my body,
levitate,
and keep that focus,
then fly at lightning speed towards the enemy,
Sora starts to create blocks of ice and crushes zombies underneath the blocks only for them to return fire,
I coat our bodies in a lightning rune, creating a weak magnetic barrier that repels bullets and to a weaker degree, demonic energy.

A powerful gust of wind kicks up,
and a tornado touches down in the crowd of zombies bneath us.
"About time you all cought up to me."
We cought up to you?
We didn't even know you disappeared ya ninja flying bastard!
"It's a long story."
I say as I land by him and charge lightning in my hands.

"Good thing we got plenty of time."
He says amusingly,
if it was under different circumstances, I'd laugh,
but this is my sister,
and she's on the verge of a panic attack with Chace,
so I remained serious,
let's get this chat over with,
I want to go back home soonish.