Chapter 172 - 172)How Easy Was It For Shade?

'Urgh, now that he's online....I can worry about this. That shit hurt like a fckin bitvh, damn....' after multiple tries, Nate finally managed to get to his feet. As The Prodigy he had some kind of responsibility, though he never let the title get to his head, he now had a public image to uphold.

Although the footage was probably interrupted because of the sudden attack, leaving the audience as well the reporters completely clueless. The Guardian of Mount Tempest, what initially seemed like a simple and straightforward victory, now turned into a complicated situation where they had a good chance of losing.

'This is nothing compared to his current situation....'

If just the opponents and their raw damage or power were considered, then Neo Thallius was definitely an enemy who could bring down wrath in a much larger and grander scale. Naturally, Nate didn't think that his friend would somehow miraculously defeat or overcome such a foe. He simply thought that the only one who could and would prove to be an asset in such a situation was Night.

However, just the fact that Neo was stronger than the three Guardians combined didn't make Nate's situation any less inferior. In fact, if they were paired with the thousands of monsters then the lives that could be lost were easily over tens of thousands, which is exactly why the group tired and focused so hard. They knew the importance of winning this battle.

'It's all his plan.....it has to be...the situations are interconnected and not separate..'

While Nate tried to gain stability, his mind began processing the variables at play. In a way, the situation wasn't Neo's fault, it was just him taking advantage of the monsters attacking Vraun. It wasn't fair to blame Night for the events. After all, how was he to realize the dangers of letting a Guardian becoming his subject? Besides, the majority of the civilians of Vraun would surely understand him, mainly because of Noel's presence during Shade's pledge of loyalty.

'Wait...would I get someone like Shade?'

It was clear that the fall somewhat made his thought process fluid and very impressionable. Just like that, he began to think of situations where he would get himself a Shade of his own. In his mind, it didn't even seem improbable, after all, according to Night, all he did was stand and look pretty and that resulted in Shade converting.

"Nate!"

'I wonder why I was given this power....it makes sense that Night got it. But why me? So I worked hard for a few weeks, is that all it takes to acquire such power? Out of the billions of players, I'm sure there must've been others who've worked this hard, if not harder and probably smarter as well. Everything was so random.....me getting summoned to the Teacher's domain, then Gaia forcefully teleporting everyone. It's been a blur but I've never really properly stopped to appreciate this power...'

"Nateee!"

'Hmm? It's been a while since I've been home.....not that I have a place there anyway. I like Luke's, it's warm here, homely. I don't fully understand why he hated it but I get it. I understand how it must have felt suffocating and intoxicating, especially to an oddity like him haha....an oddity? An anomaly?'

"NATE!!!"

"The Anomaly....? Huh? Where are we?" Nate opened his eyes, the ringing in his head slowly subsided until it was practically non-existent, his blurry vision slowly regain its past strength. A girl, no a woman with red hair knelt in front of him, her hand was on his shoulder and she looked slightly distressed. Right next to her was another man in heavy armor and a huge kite shield on the ground next to him. Both their clothes were a little torn, while the man's armor had a few prominent scratches.

"Night? Why about him? Whatever! That's not the issue right now! We need to move, the Guardian's closing in!" Eve screamed as she looked back to see the huge creature slowly approaching. Just the fact that the Guardian had to move forward meant that they were thrown really far back.

"Alright...." Nate replied in a woozy tone as he looked past his comrades to see a huge winged creature rampaging and causing destruction as it continued moving forward. It didn't care for any monster in its path. It had only one goal and that was to slaughter the fool who dared to take away its magic prowess.

"Okay! Phew! I'm fine, I'm alright, so what's the plan?" Nate asked as he used his hands to slap himself on both cheeks. "No wait, I know, how long has it been since we were thrown around like hay?"

"Well, it's been over a minute...."

"Alright, that explains why the speed of the wind is back to normal. Our only option is to finish this stupid thing in the next four minutes. Otherwise, we're just going to get sent flying again. It has three more attacks we need to worry about, namely, Gale Shift, Air bubble, and Tempest. Now I'm 80% sure that these attacks won't be as bad as what just happened but, they still have a large radius, making it annoying to deal with...."

"So you're saying we should send Noxx into the danger zone, while we finish it from afar? That sounds like a plan!"

"Hey, come on! At least pretend you're not evil!"

"Hold on....I don't really want to rely on these skills, mainly because I've never used them myself but I have skills just like Nights...not exactly but something like that, this isn't the time to talk about the specifics but, if worst comes to worst then we can rely on that..."

"..."

"...."

As tempting as it sounded, both of them were sensible and compassionate beings, that could understand why Nate wanted to hide those skills. Especially, in the presence of drones, which may or may not still be recording. 

"That's your call, and both of us would understand if you choose not to use those skills," Noxx reassured with a smile as he stood up and looked at himself. However, as soon as he stood up, he felt a hand holding his wrist. It was Eve.

"I disagree...."

"...I see, that's alr-"

"Don't use your skills at all. Because you're not going to need it. We're going to kill this creature, by just relying on the skills we've used so far. Except for this time, I get to go all out and you can watch," Eve said as the light in her golden eyes grew brighter.

".....Thank you.." Nate said with a grateful smile as he stood up and dusted himself, he closed his eyes for a second before opening them again. It was a familiar feeling for Eve and Noxx, it was similar to what they witnessed in the tournament. "I won't lose to you!"

As soon as he said that, the color of his eyes very slightly changed for a second before they went back to the usual, however, the atmosphere around him was different, it was more resolute and confident. Although, his entire look didn't exactly say "confident", especially with how damaged and covered in dust he was. Not to mention his mana reserves were mediocre at best.

At the same time, to their far-right were Mocha, Layla, and Davinky who, after a long and drawn-out battle that was annoyingly tiring, beat the Guardian. Mocha leaned against his staff and squatted down, while Layla was on her butt panting heavily, Davinky, on the other hand, was sleeping on his back without a care in the world.

"I'm not the....only...one who heard that right?" Mocha asked as he used his other hand to wipe the sweat that dripped off his forehead. Comparatively, they were in better shape than Nate's group, mainly because of how balanced their group was. However, balanced just meant that they had no obvious disadvantages, but stamina and pressure was still a major factor.

"For fcks sake.....we need to help them....but I can barely move...." Layla said as she looked at the tiny monsters fleeing. "Although I can't wait to check the notifications, I've probably leveled up like ten times...."

"You guys go on ahead...I'll catch up...." Davinky commented as he raised one hand while sleeping, barely a second later, the hand fall back onto his face. "Ow.."

"Clearly we're in no shape to go and help.....we're just going to be a liability, even if we reach on time, which we most likely won't, we have no mana left, and my health is at 8%, so a single hit and I'm done for..." Layla replied as she looked in Nate's direction to see a huge creature moving towards the borders.

".....Alright then, guess it's just up to them...I'm sure even Shade....is....tired....." Mocha stuttered as he looked at Shade walking with his hands behind his back, with only a few scratches that were barely noticeable. Far behind him was the corpse of a huge creature that looked like it got the living daily lights beaten out of it.