Chapter 21

Our pilot shifted the controls and angled the ship slightly away from the projectile, the bolt hit the ship before ricocheting off of the hull of the ship. MoonShadow shook briefly before stabilizing before I rushed to my captain's chair, "What in the world is shooting at us? I thought we were heading to the dungeon!"

Rin zoomed in on the mountain ahead of us and answered my question in a frantic voice, "There isn't a dungeon here, it was an orc city."

I looked at the image as it came into focus and sure enough, there was a massive city, it was hard to make out the details as the sun had just set but it was built around the entire mountain. The walls were incredible, completely made from metal, and lined with armaments though that was impressive we were no match for an entire city.

"Turn us about and get us home!" the pilot gave the affirmative and carried out the order. I watched the monitors as we came around, dozens of bolts were launched from the wall as our broadside was left open, our pilot tried to evade the bolts by putting us into a dive toward the ground.

The ship shook violently and I fell from my seat, I stood up to see red lights flashing on the bridge and an alarm blaring, "Turn off that alarm and what is our status?" I shook off the fall and checked on Rin and Sett.

Warren ran over to the weapons station and checked on the unconscious gunner, he had hit his head and half of his face was coated in blood. The look on Warren's face let me know the young man was fine, I cast a minor heal on him after making sure Rin and Sett were uninjured.

They were shaken up but otherwise fine though Sett was muttering how combat zones were the worst.

Warren's shout came a moment later, "Three direct hits have penetrated our armor, the rest missed or bounced off. The engine is fine but the weapons systems were knocked offline and we didn't bring an engineer."

The pilot slammed his hand down on his station before I could react, he gave me his report, "navigation is also down, I'm not sure what is going on. I still had access a moment ago!" He kept trying to regain access to his terminal but all that he received was an error message.

I started to sweat, If we crashed anywhere near the orc city there was little chance we would survive.

The doors to the bridge opened and Hextia walked in and stood beside me, "-Don't worry master I have taken control of the ship, I will be starting the point to point defense. I advise you to hold on.-"

I grabbed the edges of my seat and called out to everyone, "Brace yourselves!" The pilot held onto his seat, Warren grabbed the unconscious weapons operator while Rin and Sett huddled together.

I held onto the armrests of my chair while Hextia held onto the back to keep herself steady. "-Beginning the operation now master.-"

I watched the monitors as the weapons system activated, the ballista on the walls had been reloaded and was taking aim at the ship, one of the engines flared and turned red on the screen as it was put beyond what it was designed for while the other cooled down.

The ship turned quicker than I thought possible and once the guns on the ship focussed on the wall as we waited for the next volley. We were now barely within range of the enemy ballistae when the second engine roared to life as we faced away from the city and balanced out our course.

The bolts launched from the wall and a moment passed before the ship's guns returned fire, for every bolt fired at us we fired three shots to intercept the incoming projectiles. Only one of the dozens of bolts made a direct hit while three others made glancing blows, the rest were destroyed by Hextias' impressive defense.

The ship groaned as we sped away from the dangerous city, with the danger now over I looked over the damages to my ship and my wallet ached as I saw hundreds of components that would either need replacing or repair the engines would need repairs as well since they had nearly been burnt out to make our escape.

Looking around the bridge everyone seemed to be ok even Sett had a smile on her face, though it seemed a bit manic, after comforting the girls and making sure the unconscious operator would be alright I went down to my lab.

Hextia was waiting for me on the bridge. I noticed a bright purple core slotted into the wall, she had cloned herself that much was certain though that could wait. I walked to her and cupped her face in my hands looking for any sign of injury I started to check the rest of her body before questioning her, "Are you alright? Why did you create a clone? How are you feeling?"

The rapid fire questions left her stunned for a moment before a small smile tugged at her lips.

"-I am alright master, the king slime bloodline was activated and enhanced my abilities, the clone is not a secondary being like we thought. It is like a second brain or a node, I am still me but I am also the ship in a sense, I have full control over both bodies.-"

I let out a sigh in relief that nothing had happened to her.

"-I made the clone because it was the only way to guarantee your safety master, if I had not intervened the ship would have been brought down by the second volley and making it back home on foot so close to enemy territory would be certain death. I couldn't bear the thought of you dying master!-"

By the end of her explanation, there were violet tears streaming from her eyes, I pulled her into a hug and let her cry into my chest, she had been so frightened of becoming lost and then forced to make that decision from the fear of my death. It had been too much for her to maintain the stoic persona she usually wore.

I rubbed her back and let her work through her emotions at her own speed, twenty minutes later she had calmed down though she refused to let me go so I picked her up and sat in my captain's chair.

While we sat together we looked through the footage of the orc city and compiled mountains of evidence against the guild, whoever had called this a dungeon and instigated the adventurers to scout the coordinates must have known what they would find and set this war into motion.

The question was why would anyone want to start this war?