“Hey, little lady,” Ace said, nodding in Annabelle’s direction. “Does your little Amp thing have anything to protect from bullets or something like that?”
She saluted. “Affirmative! My Armor Amp can provide a barrier around your skin that will greatly reduce incoming damage until it’s worn through!”
“Alright. I’ll take it.”
The android pressed her palms against Ace’s chest, and the glow of her eyes shifted to a slightly different hue. “Armor Amp, activate!”
A burst of pressure coursed through Ace’s body, though he braced himself for it so as not to be too surprised. He didn’t feel any different physically, but he could see a very faint blue light pulsing over the surface of his body every few seconds, so he assumed it was working.
He turned to Dahye. “Want some too, cap?”
She nodded and stepped forward, curious about this Amp system. “How will we know when it wears out, Annabelle?”
“The barrier will crack with continuous damage, and shatter when fully depleted!” She then pressed her hands into Dahye’s chest. “Armor Amp, activate!”
Unlike Ace, Dahye had not been prepared for the sudden pressure, and nearly stumbled backward from it. While she managed to not lose her balance, she did not manage to not lose a few buttons on her shirt from the shockwave, causing her ample chest to pop out against it, revealing some cleavage.
Ace patted the android girl on the head amidst her resulting salute and apology, and Gisela whistling in the back. “A+, kiddo.”
Dahye scowled, turning away as her cheeks grew hot. At least she still had her tie to keep herself a bit covered… “Let’s just go already…!”
Upon entering the Diabolus base, Seth passed by numerous armed guards and through the open ground floor level, which was lined with racks of pallets and workbenches. He made his way up a set of steel steps, past the next few floors all the way to the top one, before heading down the hall and into the main office. Waiting inside was a small squad of soldiers. These did not bear the red colors typical of Diabolus’s men – these men were clad in very unnoteworthy gray camo-print uniforms, but there was one amongst them who did stand out.
He was tall and deathly pale, with a strange, gray helmet covering the top half of his skull. It had been fashioned after some kind of horned monster, and upon further inspection, one would find that the helmet had actually been physically melded to the wearer’s head, rendering it impossible to remove.
Seth had been alerted by his men outside that this squad of soldiers were awaiting him, though actually entering an enclosed room with them still made him a bit nervous. The office was large, with a big open space in the center of the room, but the soldiers’ presence, particularly their masked leader, made the room feel half the size.
The leader went by the name of Ghoul, and he and his men were veteran mercenaries. They had, on occasion, been hired by Diabolus for various combat missions, though after their recruitment of Luke, they hadn’t enlisted their services since. Seth certainly hadn’t missed them…
“Ghoul…” Seth greeted, trying to project an air of confident assertion as he made his way to the desk at the back of the room. The mercenaries were leaning up against the front wall, and remained there, each one keeping an eye on the various Diabolus guards posted around the office, though Ghoul himself followed Seth to take a seat on the opposite side of his desk. “Can’t say I was expecting to see you here today.”
“Just thought I’d drop by for a little visit, kid,” Ghoul stated, his voice rugged and gravelly. “Been a while since I heard from you Diabolus guys, after all.”
“Must mean the higher-ups haven’t had a need for your services recently. That’s not really my role, so I’m not sure why you came here of all places.”
Ghoul chuckled. “Don’t worry. I’m not that bugged about not getting hired again; there’s plenty of opportunities for us out there. We won’t go hungry.”
Seth exhaled through his nostrils, none too thrilled about the lack of direct explanation from the merc, and growing more nervous about whatever point he was building up to would be… “That’s great. So, I ask again, why are you coming to me?”
“Well, just because your bosses don’t feel the need to hire us, that doesn’t mean you don’t, right?”
“As I’m sure you noticed when you were escorted up here, I have plenty of guards.”
Another laugh, though this one was accompanied by the mercenary kicking his boots up to the top of the desk. Seth felt his eye twitch in irritation at the blatant disrespect, but he knew there wasn’t anything he could do about it. “No offense, but your boys aren’t gonna be much good for the enemies who are about to come knocking on your door.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Heard you went and got yourself a FORMA. That true?”
Seth’s eyes went wide for a flash, though he tried to return to a neutral expression as quickly as he could. It was no use, though, as Ghoul had undoubtedly seen it, and knew the answer. “…Maybe I did. What’s it to you?”
“Easy, kid, I’m not here to take it from you.”
“Then what are you here for?”
Tucking his hands behind his head, Ghoul continued, “Well, now that you ‘maybe’ have a FORMA, you know you’re about to be hunted down by GLYPH, right?”
Seth raised a brow. “GLYPH? Never heard of it.”
This time, Ghoul’s laugh was a loud bellow that had Seth and a few of the Diabolus guards flinching instinctually, chills running down their spines. “Well, damn, you haven’t even heard of them? You really are about to be shit outta luck then, kid!”
Clenching his jaw, Seth slammed his fist against the surface of the desk. “Just get to the point, already!”
“GLYPH’s a little, ehhh… ‘company’ that likes to collect those nifty FORMA cards. Whenever one pops up and gets snatched up by someone else, you can bet your ass GLYPH’ll be on the hunt for it.”
Seth glanced down at his jacket pocket, where the [Chain] FORMA card was hidden. Another dumb move doing so in front of Ghoul that he mentally reprimanded himself for. He’d been told that FORMA were valuable, but he hadn’t considered the possibility of there being an organization who devoted themselves to actively hunting for them. “And? If they come for me, I’ll deal with them.”
Ghoul shook his head, but before he could say anything, the alarm throughout the building began to blare, and the radio on Seth’s person buzzed on, and a voice called out: “Sir! Two intruders have entered the building!”
The mercenary clicked his tongue. “Damn, what perfect timing.”
“Two intruders. Big deal,” Seth replied, scowling. “My men will have them dealt with in no time.”
“Hah! One GLYPH soldier’s worth ten of your boys at minimum, kid,” Ghoul replied, bringing his feet off of the desk in order to lean across its surface. “You wanna walk outta here alive, and maybe even get to keep your fancy little FORMA card, you oughta make the smart decision to hire us as your bodyguards.”
“You seem confident you can handle them.”
Ghoul grinned. “Well, yeah. You’re talking to the only man on Earth who’s managed to kill three of ‘em, after all.”
Ace’s smoke grenades had most of the bottom floor of the building clouded, obstructing the vision of everyone inside. Well, except for himself, of course, on account of the handy goggles installed into his mask. He could keep track of everyone through the smoke, which made firing at them or sneaking around and physically taking them down a breeze for himself.
As he slid around a corner and choked one guard out, he flicked the first three dials on the lock around to the 741 combination, and out came a set of remote-detonated bombs, which he slipped under some of the nearby machinery. That was the key component of their plan to destroy the Diabolus base, though it did, of course, mean that he would no longer have access to his smoke grenades, as they began to vanish in a digital green light.
After entering the facility, Ace and Dahye had split up, with the latter operating as the frontline fighter. Her goal was to draw as much enemy attention as she could and handle them herself, giving Ace time and space to maneuver around the base and install the bombs.
And she was certainly doing a hell of a job.
Dahye emerged from the first burst of smoke with a flying heel kick that smashed directly into the first Diabolus guard’s jaw, and sent him hurling up high into the racks of pallets.
Divekicking into the chest of the next guard, she flew up into a higher level of the racks and quickly drew her blade, slicing away at the support columns of the rack. In an instant, a huge portion of the shelving broke down and collapsed to the floor below like dominos, burying a Diabolus grunt and sending others nearby scrambling to avoid the same fate.
Dropping onto the top of the nearby pallets, Dahye began dashing along the top, which made it difficult for the guards to get a clear shot at her, and she kept her sword out to deflect any bullets that did manage to find their way towards her. Two bullets bypassed her deflecting, striking her on the legs, but thanks to Annabelle’s Armor Amp, they came to an immediate stop on the barrier surrounding her, and fell to the floor.
Dhara appeared beside her as she ran along the top of the racks. “I see you are going out of your way to not kill them, Dahye. It would be much faster to simply cut them down.”
“I’ll kill the ones I have to!” Dahye retorted sharply, deflecting a bullet that blasted a hole in the wall a mere inch away from the shooter’s head. “I don’t need to be lectured about it right now.”
“I do not seek to lecture, but it would be wise to overcome that mental barrier now when your foes are weak, so you do not carry that hesitation when going into battle with a much stronger enemy.”
Dahye dropped back down to the ground floor in order to use another row of racks as cover from the incoming bullets. More Diabolus grunts had appeared from the upper floors and were taking position, raining fire upon the GLYPH agents. Ace would likely have already finished setting up his bombs on the far side, and would be advancing further in soon, so she needed to hurry and give him more space.
Momentarily returning her Dragonsaber to its scabbard, she called out to the Blue Dragon Spirit, “Be ready.”
“I will always be.”
Dahye then spun around the corner, redrew her sword, and slashed. She had precious seconds to line up each slash appropriately to cut down at the first wave of Diabolus soldiers, and each one needed to be perfect.
The first was a vertical cut that was extended by Dhara – a lone, blue wave that severed the machine guns of the first three soldiers clean in half, and opened a long gash in the concrete floor.
The second came after Dahye hopped into the air and kicked off of the rack to her right – a horizontal cut aimed at the second level of the metal staircase, and the two Diabolus grunts taking aim at her from that level. The brilliant blue wave emitted from her sword sliced the incoming bullets to pieces, as well as the guns themselves.
Finally, Dahye, at the apex of her jump, spun around in a full circle and swung her katana at a downward angle. This third and final azure shockwave cut a long path across the open space of the warehouse, blasting several racks to pieces, and toppling over and drowning a pair of soldiers who were snaking around the far end of the room towards Ace.
That final obstruction gave Ace the perfect cover to sneak through to the other side of the warehouse and plant another set of bombs. With that done, he dashed around the corner and began ascending one set of stairs towards the upper floors. They still needed to find Seth and claim his FORMA, then retreat from the base in order to blow it to pieces.
But as he made his way up to the higher floors, he suddenly came to a stop, and he felt his breath hitch in his chest.
At the top of the next set of steps was Ghoul, accompanied by a few of his gray-clad soldiers.
“Ah, shit…” Ace muttered, a genuine tremble in his voice, though he made sure to bury it with his next words. “Ah, if it ain’t Ghoul and the…actually, are you still letting your boys roll without a proper team name? That’s pretty self-centered of you.”
The mercenary leader grinned. “Long time no see, assassin! Surprised you’re still working for GLYPH. I figured you’d have quit after your girlfriend bit the dust.”
Ace shrugged, though his face contorted into a grimace beneath his mask. “Hey, at least now I get to sleep around as much as I want, right?”
“Hahaha, don’t try to play aloof with me! I still remember your anguished little screams when she died, boy!”
Ace’s grip on his ArsenALL tightened. “You know, I thought we were lucky when that Seth guy showed up here right on time. But now I get to kill you, too? After all these years?” He chuckled, holding up the briefcase. “Guess God’s making amends after all the shit he’s thrown at me so far, huh?”
The soldier on Ghoul’s left raised his gun to fire at Ace, already knowing better than to let the agent operate the locks. But he never got to pull the trigger, as a bullet suddenly blasted in from the upper windows of the building and drove right through his skull.
Outside, on the distant rooftop, Gisela’s green lips curled into a smirk. “Gotcha.”
Ace took that moment of surprise to reach into his pocket and retrieve the flashbangs from earlier, tossing them at Ghoul and his remaining soldiers’ feet. In the blast of light that followed, he vanished. The mercenaries fired at where he’d been, and a few bullets did hit Ace as he dropped down and disappeared, but he was kept safe due to the Armor Amp barrier, and the bullets bounced away.
When the light died down, Ghoul chuckled, and nodded down the steps. His soldiers hurried down in pursuit of Ace, while Ghoul himself leaned his back up against the wall and grinned. “Oh, rolling with bigger teams now, are you? Guess you GLYPH dogs learned better than to keep sending your goons out on their own, huh? You’re welcome for the lesson, hahaha!”
Ghoul pumped his left fist, and his forearm quickly began to rotate, mechanical clicks and clacks whirring around on the inside until the limb transformed into a gatling gun.
“Come on out, assassin! I’ll be more than happy to send you to join your girl in her grave!”
Dahye hurried up the steps on the other side of the warehouse. Though she was incredibly quick on her feet, it was difficult to avoid machine gun fire from multiple directions, and her Armor Amp barrier suffered for it, little cracks beginning to appear in the faint blue glow around her body.
She drew her blade in a flash, slicing apart the first Diabolus soldier’s gun. Taking advantage of his confusion, she twisted around and blasted him with two, three, four – ten kicks to his face and chest in the blink of an eye, completely disorienting him.
She spun around and hopped up, slamming her heel into the side of his head, which sent the poor bastard tumbling over the railing of the stairwell, and plummeting down to the ground floor with a thud.
Another pair of bullets struck her, and the cracks in her barrier grew. She drew her katana, using the flat of the blade to deflect the remaining flurry of bullets coming from the next guard. It was rough on her hands, not only to move the sword quick enough to block each shot, but even more so to avoid sending them back to the shooter and killing him.
She rushed forward as she blocked his machine gun fire, and when she was close enough, she swerved to the side and ducked low, sweeping his legs and sending him onto his ass. As she rotated around in a full circle with her sweep, she slashed upward, and cut his gun in half as it left his hands, then slammed her heel into his face to knock him unconscious.
“Behind you!”
Dahye turned towards the hall perpendicular to the stairs she’d just ascended, though she was caught off guard by Dhara’s declaration. She hadn’t seen any other Diabolus grunts within its walls through her peripheral vision when she’d rushed forward to deal with this second soldier. But it turned out to not be a Diabolus man anyway. It was one of Ghoul’s soldiers, and he’d camouflaged himself on the concrete wall, thanks to his dull gray uniform.
He was also a much better and faster shot than any of the Diabolus soldiers had been – even faster than Dahye. A storm of bullets launched from his weapon. The first two struck the Armor Amp barrier around her chest, which promptly shattered to pieces around her, having taken more damage than it could handle. The second two blasted holes in her actual stomach, and the third only missed because of the way her body lurched after being severely struck.
She dropped her sword and stumbled to the side, back down the steel steps, out of the field of view of the hallway Ghoul’s soldier was in. He hurried out to pursue her and finish her off, but as he came out into the open space of the warehouse, he himself caught a bullet to the forehead, his blood staining the wall behind him.
“Dahye!” The Blue Dragon Spirit called out, manifesting in the area and observing her host as she fell to her knees, clutching at her bloodied stomach.
Dhara was quick to act, thrusting her long incorporeal tail down directly through the staircase, and even through the concrete floor below and into the earth. Underground, barbs extended from the tip of her tail, and spread through the rock and soil below like roots. Little twinkling blue balls of light arose from the earth and began floating into the tail.
The dragon coiled her upper body around Dahye’s as the blue light rose up from the roots deep below the ground, coursing through her from the tip of her tail all the way up to her head. A blue, misty breath then escaped from her jaws, and washed over Dahye.
The wounds in the GLYPH agent’s stomach spat the bullets out and patched themselves up. Dahye’s ragged breathing quickly returned to normal, and she stood herself back up with a gasp. “Th-thank you, Dhara.”
“There is very little energy in the Earth here,” the Blue Dragon Spirit replied, retrieving her tail from deep below. “Healing you has drained me of all of my power for today.”
Dahye nodded, and went to retrieve the Dragonsaber. But before she could grab it, Dhara flew around and intercepted her, until the two were face-to-face. “I mean it. Do not needlessly endanger yourself simply to spare your enemy’s life, Dahye, or you will die.”
“I unders-”
“Do not lie to me, girl. I chose you as my inheritor because you showed promise in wielding my power.” A low rumble echoed in the Blue Dragon Spirit’s throat, and Dahye found herself leaning her head back ever so slightly. “But I will not hesitate to strip you of this blade if you do not continue to show that promise. My power is not for those who would be so weak as to die in a meaningless battle because of their own foolish hesitation.”
Dahye nodded again, keeping her eyes locked on Dhara’s. “I won’t, Dhara. I’m sorry.”
The Blue Dragon Spirit faded from view without a word, and Dahye reached down to retrieve the Dragonsaber, and continue deeper into the Diabolus facility.
