Chapter 20: Array

"This is a mechanical lift," Xi mumbled trying to compose himself, now with less blood dripping off his clothes.

Dust filled the room, a rectangular lift made of iron, fitted enough for four to six people. On top of it, was a wooden plank hugged by dust and some parts are crumbled by time. Sides were hooked by rusted chains going up. Besides, the lift was, a box, waist leveled, at the top of the box was a button made of iron. 

Exhausted and hungry, the four, now with a normal Coco, stepped inside the lift. Xi pressed the iron button, but with no avail, the lift didn't work. Xi pressed for the second time, the third, and forth, the lift still didn't work. 

"Of course, no one has used it for years," Ned with his Butterfly sheathed, messy hair, tattered clothes, and green liquid—the blood of goblins sprayed some from his clothes, exited the lift. "We should have expected it not to work."

Toni, with Coco embracing him, moved to check the box, and see if she could find a way for the lift to work. Her pale smooth skin breaths out of her tight leather clothes—which was now mutilated of holes and scratches from the dead goblins. Seeing the mechanical box, her head tilted, she was confused, for it was beyond her knowledge to fix the lift. She smiled, blinked, and frowned. 

Seeing Toni's mixed up face, Xi standing on one leg trying to support his injury slowly moved towards Toni. "Let me see," Xi said.

"Uhmm...can you fix it?" Toni stuttered, her dark hair swayed when she moved to give way to Xi. 

Chest popping out, standing nice and tall, like no injuries at all, Xi answered Toni with pride. "Of course," now with the box in front of him, Xi bent to check the box. "My family is merchants, and out of my six brothers, I'm the only one who managed to learn mechanics," Xi added. Now feeling proud of himself, for his studies about mechanics, which his parents forced him to learn, was now rewarded.

With the assurance from Xi, they sighed with relief. But not for long.

The room they were in, was, once again, exploded. Luckily the iron wall was tough enough to block the explosion from going inside. Debris and smoke blocked their view. But once it dispersed, they saw the Hybrid standing tall. Fuming with anger and eyes filled with rage. The stone shined once again.

"He doesn't know when to quit," cried Xi, leaning on the box. Debris settled on his hair.

"Xi! I'll buy some time, try to fix the lift!" Gritting his teeth, Ned unsheathed The Butterfly. His hunter's clothes jogged together with his sword. "Vanish," Ned muttered 

[Vanish skill activated.]

[Ned that's your last.]

I know. Ned said, in his thoughts.

Surprised and confused, Toni saw Ned, suddenly vanished. Again. She doesn't have any clues on how Ned did or conjured his skills without any Mana. But with the Hybrid, steaming hot, she reserved the thoughts. She gave Coco to Xi and draw her Kiki'Dorra twin dagger and dashed to help Ned. 

The Hybrid saw Ned vanished again, with his battle instincts, and numbers of spells, he roared. The stone on his left hand, shined once again. This time, it was not a Fireball, not a firesword, but a Field of Fire surrounding the Hybrid. with his limited vision, the Hybrid made sure that Ned couldn't let pass him. 

[Vanish skill dismissed.]

Ned who couldn't move closer to the Hybrid, because of the field of fire, did nothing with the Vanish skill. He tsked out of frustration. 

The three, Ned, Toni, and the Hybrid battled in the middle of the chamber. Shadows danced against the torch's light. Air whistled with blade cutting empty space. Even without the Hybrid's blade, he was still a formidable opponent. Using his bare fists, the Hybrid rammed in every direction. He doesn't seem to run out of mana and stamina, he's a Hybrid after all. 

Even with the two of them, all they did was to defend against the Hybrid's fists. 

"Ned! It's done!" Veins popping out his neck, Xi shouted. Some blood exited his wound, "hurry!"

"Toni you go first, I'll hold him!" Ned blocked the Hybrid's fists with his sword. The fists and the sword clanged. "I'll catch up," he smiled. 

"But."

"I'll be fine, just go."

"Uh, you better be," Toni moved back directly towards the lift. There, she found Coco, carried by limping Xi on the lift ready to move.

Ned was surprised to battle a monster with a level of grade D on its peak. All his training rewarded him at last. This is tougher even with the Warg and Butriki leaders combined. Ned thought. Leaping back and forth, to evade the Hybrid's fist. The stone shined and Ned smiled, "I've been waiting," he muttered.

Sphere started to form, a fire then shot out of the Hybrid's fist. It hummed going towards Ned. But Ned was unmoving, he smiled, raised his Butterfly and the tip pointed towards the Fireball. 

When The Butterfly's tip and the Fireball collided. The Hybrid was surprised, he couldn't believe what he saw, the Fireball was absorbed by the sword, down to its last fume. 

With the Fireball absorbed and sword raised, Ned lunged towards the Hybrid. "Fireball!" Ned shouted.

Startled, and not fast enough to evade, the Hybrid took the Fireball head-on. The explosion was bigger and stronger than the Hybrid's Fireball. He was thrown meters away from Ned. 

With this, he dashed towards the lift where Toni, Coco, and Xi are waiting. He moved inside and pushed the button. The mechanical lift creaked, dust scattered then it shook. The lift ascended, for an inch, and stopped. 

"What now?!" Xi cried. 

"You said it's fixed," Ned asked.

"Yes!" It was "wait...wait...could it be," Xi jumped off the lift, pried open the box, and there, he found that the energy source ran out of, well, energy. "Shit!" He cursed. He had been cursing a lot lately. Xi took out the energy source, blue to greenstone, that emits a very faint light and was handed to Ned. 

"Look," Ned examined, raising the stone high up for everyone to see. "It looks familiar," he added.

"Uh, now that you mentioned it, it looks like…" Toni gazed towards the Hybrid, laying on the ground, body emitting smoke. 

"The Hybrid," the three resounded at the same time. 

Meow? With Coco.

Not far from them, the Hybrid moved, broken armor, scorched skin, and eyes popping out of anger. He ran towards the group of humans. 

Meow!

"Are you sure?" 

Meow!

Ned bent and bit his finger to feed Coco with blood. 

Coco turned to tiger and strode towards the incoming Hybrid. 

Ned, Toni, and Coco, with Xi and a bow, fought the Hybrid. With one goal in mind. The stone he had been using to cast a spell. 

Arrows flew, dagger slashed, sword clanged and thunder roared. They fought the first toughest monster the group ever had, maybe their last. 

They fought until one of them was caught by the Hybrid. Eyes dilated, Toni was holding her breath under the grip of the monster. Stone was on his left and Toni was on his right. "No!" Waving his sword Ned cried. "Let her go!"

Ned stampede towards the Hybrid, with the Butterfly ready, he slashed the arms. 

Strong and cunning, the Hybrid uses Toni as a shield. Ned stopped his attack midway. Think, think, Ned, shuffled his brain. 

Meow?

"No we can't attack him, he'll just use Toni as a shield," Ned answered the frustrated Coco. 

"That's it!" Ned stabbed his hand with his sword and blood flowed continuously. He then leaped between Toni and the Hybrid, raised his hand, and brushed the blood in the Hybrid's mouth.

He sneered. The Hybrid let out a low growl mocking Ned of what he did. "Are you out of your mind human?" That's what the Hybrid would say if he could. 

The Hybrid was about to crash Toni's head. When he suddenly felt his blood boiling, muscles stiffed, breathing uncontrollably, and his Mana went berserk. His muscles threaded like waves. He let go of Toni and the stone. He kneeled, saliva flowed out his mouth. And he rolled on the ground. Holding his head, sometimes, his body, back to his head again. His armor clanged on the ground. He was evolving. 

Ned saw that the Hybrid was momentarily stunned, he helped Toni up, picked up the stone, and ran towards Xi. "Xi!" Ned raised his hands and throw the stone straight to Xi.

Xi caught the stone and placed it in the box. With enough energy, the lift shook for a moment then ascended. "Hurry!" Xi cried. 

With distance too far, Ned lifted Toni and placed her on Coco's back. He jumped and rode Coco as well. 

Coco jumped on the lift that was now ascending. Just in time when Coco reversed back to normal. 

With the Hybrid wailing and roaring in distance, the group ascended towards the exit. The structure was almost eight-floor high. So it took them double the time to reach the top. 

The lift stopped in a room - a room that could fit eight people at once. Full of papers left to dust, storage full of mining tools. Pickaxes, lamps, scrolls, old rusted chest, iron tables on top was a schematic of some sort. The source of light was a flickering stone attached to the walls. At the end of the room, was a human skeleton leaning on the wall. On the skeletons right, was a wall, with no decorations, just a plain old wall. Engraved writing could be seen at the edge of the plain wall. "Array," Xi mumbled. 

"How'd you know?" Ned asked. Ned was surprised that Xi knew about arrays.

"The writings," Xi limped towards the plain wall and slid his fingers on the writings. "They are old Array incantations, they are so old it wasn't even used today."

There are languages I don't even know, a system that I didn't find familiar, this world. Needs to be explored. And I will not sit here trapped in this room. Ned was determined to explore his current world. To think that my subjugation will turn to exploration. Ned was thrilled. "What does it says?" ICE, can you read it?

[Negative. The language written was either ancient or localized.]

"I don't know much," Xi answered with confusion, "out of hundreds I can only read one or two?" Xi kept on sliding his fingers on the wall.

"What does it say?" This time, it was Toni who asked.

"Passage and Exit," Xi answered. "It could mean that this is a Passage Array." 

Passage Array, Ned thought. "Then how do we activate it?"

"Something this old, are complex combinations of Runes, maybe four to six different runes. Powered by Mana stones, no maybe one Mana stone powered this. The combinations must be inside a Holding Claim. Camouflaged to look like, maybe a book, or a chest, look form something that stores!" Xi cried with excitement.

Not long after, they found a book hidden beside the human skeleton. The inside of the book was hollow, at the edges were four Runestones and in the middle was a stone almost looking the same as the Hybrid used to cast the spells. Mana stone. So it was Mana stone after all. Ned examined the runes and the stone. The two runes seem familiar to Ned. "These two," pointing at the two runes, one at the upper right and the other at the bottom-right edge of the book. "They look familiar, I saw my Master used these runes once," pointing at the upper right, "that's a barrier rune and this one is illusion rune."

"Illusion and barrier runes," Xi thought that it's strange to have barrier and illusion runes together. Unless, "strange, unless the people here are hiding something that they don't want to be discovered."

"Uh," Toni agreed.

This kid, he's actually smart. Ned thought looking at Xi with wonder. "Then how do we activate it?"

"The Mana stone's energy is depleted," Xi answered.

"Uhmm…this?" Toni pulled the Mana stone from the lift and showed it to the group. 

"Of course," said Ned.

The moment they replaced the old mana stone with the new one, the plain wall started to emit light. That suddenly looked like the teleportation magic used by the Royal Mage back at the town square. 

The three went into the Passage Array. And landed in an empty and dark cave, at the end they saw light, with trees, and some low-grade creatures feeding on grasses. 

"We're back, at last!" Xi cried out of excitement.