210 Returning to the City

"Darn, how can they do this much damage in such a short time?" Leo cursed out loud as he gritted his teeth.

"It's already bad; we must hurry to the Hall of Governance, if any place can hold out for long, it should be there..." Razel said with an urgent tone of voice.

Oron, Irene, and Julie nodded, as Leo glanced at Evan to hear his opinion, Evan stared at them before he spoke, "Good, we'll do it that way, you guys can go back and acquire any information you can on the situation. Once you've done that, use our communication drones to pass the information along."

Leo nodded as he heard those words, without wasting another moment, he and his crew left in a hurry, moving like blurry figures towards the wrecked city's direction.

As they saw Leo's group left, everyone looked at Evan as Layla asked, "Evan, what do we do now? They've attacked much earlier than anticipated..."

Evan stared at them and replied, "We can only adapt to the circumstances, since they came early we must strike at them before they can become even more of a nuisance and leave the rest of the matters to Leo and those of Qeodreona."

After saying this, Evan pointed his finger towards the looming dark reddish cloud that shrouded the sky, as even now, one would see groups of mosquitoes leaving as they went to attack different directions.

Evan had a cold look in his eyes as he spoke, "We'll need to lure her away from the city, but the only way to do that is to destroy enough elites. In this case, we can acquire a lot of exp points and further our enhancements, the previous battles in Checkpoint 01 should have already brought you guys to Level 11. I am still just a tiny bit off from Level 12... and by now, you should all be more than capable of single-handedly dealing with any mosquito general."

When Joe and the others heard this, they nodded with a surge of confidence in their eyes as they spoke.

"Haha, well, I guess we aren't so weak anymore, I think that if we team up, we might even be able to give that Mosquito Witch a run for her money..." Joe said with a somewhat hearty laugh, he wasn't feeling good after seeing the deaths of so many recently and wanted to ease his tense mood.

Emilia knew her brother well; she tapped his shoulder and smiled at him, causing him to scratch his head.

Breya looked on curiously as she jotted down something on her tablet as if taking notes.

Evan knew what he was doing he smiled and gave him a nod, but Rick whose eyes never left the surroundings and spoke with a sharp gaze, "Hmm, okay, how do we split up?"

As Breya started to speak, everyone's eyes changed from curiosity to brightness as if they heard something unusual. 

Not long after, everyone made a sly smirk as their looks turned sharp before they scattered towards different directions, beginning their next battle against the Mosquito Horde.

***

A few minutes passed as Leo and the others had arrived within the vicinity of the Hall of Governance.

"How truly awful... must we really return to that time spoken of by those officials?" Julie muttered as she felt pain as she saw dozens of corpses on in different locations while they had made their way here, they could feel an aura of hopelessness even within the eyes of those that survived with injuries.

Leo had heard her words, he looked at her and sighed as he spoke, "We will overcome it, no matter how many times we fall, we can rise back up again."

Julie felt a bit better hearing those words, as Oron and Irene nodded their eyes, showing firm looks as they were determined to fight to the bitter end.

'Well said Leo, the battle isn't over until one side loses their spirit...' Razel thought with sharp eyes as he glanced at the looming clouds that covered everything in sight.

By this time, the attacks around the barrier had already ended as the mosquito horde was currently assaulting different areas.

When they neared the barrier a few guards that stood on alert shouted, "Stop right there!" 

They carefully looked at their group as a drone flew by and scanned their bodies, after confirming they were humans they saluted and gave the go-ahead.

Soon, the rounded shape entrance appeared again, and Leo had entered along with his company.

As they entered, a few of the Evolvers and military made salutes and greeted them before they went back to their duties. They knew that even though the enemies had momentarily stopped attacking the barrier, they could still launch another assault at any given time.

Not long after, Leo and the others had entered the main building; there were broken wires and other constructs everywhere. Some individuals stood at key locations as technicians were working at rapid speeds to ensure most functions were working.

"Welcome back, Esteemed Heroes!" The persons said as they saluted Leo's party, they were naturally still treated as heroes alongside Evan's team.

Leo and the others greeted before they hurried to the main room at the summits of building, once they arrived here, they saw a solemn scene. Vernisa and a few other core officials had gathered once more, with the others focused on preparing the evacuation measures.

"Mother, what's happening?" Razel said as he hurried ahead of the group and stood nearby Vernisa.

Vernisa and the others only now noticed Leo's group's arrival, but none of them showed surprised as they had seen that both their team and Evan's team had made it back via the monitoring devices.

Vernisa didn't waste a moment to speak directly on the core issue, "It's bad... not only did we lose to their surprise attack, but we've also lost touch with City Head's air fleet as they were the first to encounter their assault."

"What?" Leo and the others exclaimed in surprise.

Leo's mood turned dark as he hurried spoke, "B-But how? What happened to the father and the fleet?"

The room remained silent as Vernisa didn't know how to reply, she sighed before waving her hand to an official and speaking, "Play the video feed..."

Not long after, a screen popped up, showing the events of the attack and the scene of Electro Sonic Bug's EMP Wave that shut down most of the facilities, it then ended at the clip where the ships were descending before everything went blank.

Now, the only clip available was the videos of a series of ruined buildings and wreckages of air crafts wrapped by flames and smoke.

Leo's mind felt like it had exploded as he saw this, he wanted to shout in anger, but his mind and discipline didn't allow him to break standard protocol.

His face turned savaged as he swallowed his pain while tears leaked from the corners of his red eyes when he spoke, "Do we know of their status?"

Vernisa sighed and shook her head as she spoke, "We don't, this all that we have... right now, we are preparing to evacuate as many of the survivors we can through use of the underground pathways. We'll be moving to the Underground Base Camp... originally, I thought that we wouldn't have been given the time, but with your party and Sir Evan's team's arrival, it should be enough for us enough time, even if they were to launch another wave."

Leo thought for a bit before wiping his eyes and returning to normal, but if one looked in his eyes, they would see a dense amount of killing intent.

He spoke in a cold tone, "What should we do?"

Razel and Julie looked at Leo a bit worriedly, but they said nothing, they knew how he must be feeling right now and decided to let him overcome it by himself.

Vernisa thought for a while before her eyes flickered when she spoke, "It's like this..."

The parties here continued to discuss the plan forward, but while they debated amongst themselves, the outside scene was about to undergo a different change.

***

Author's Note:

Feeling Generous? Support this series by reviewing it on Webnovel and voting power stones.

Ascenders Rift - https:///book/16131271505970705