123 [13-48-32, 98-23-09. Trotter. 128:14:60]

"Ahhh!" Screams of the weak-bodied researchers filled the air. The powerful gust of wind caught every one of them off-guard.

With each passing moment, the world was getting buried under the thicker layer of snow. It turned the land into a white graveyard.

The temperature dropped to such a degree that their bodysuit couldn't regulate it to keep them warmer.

They scrambled to run inside the building. A few of the soldiers assisted those weak-bodied researchers to the labs and other faculties.

"Let me help," Aiden said to the soldier who was dragging two unconscious men.

"Thank you, brother." A thick layer of frost covered his thick mustache as he smiled at Aiden when he handed over the almost 50 years old man to Aiden. Aiden checked to confirm it was Charak and carried him towards the direction Robin was.

"Hop on." In the sharp and noisy wind, Robin had to shout from the transporter. As he opened the door, Aiden carried Charak in the transporter.

The transporter was a little smaller than the transporter he had used before, but to Aiden's surprise, there was a small armory of guns and ammunition in it.

Aiden strapped the unconscious Charak on the seat as the transporter came to an abrupt halt.

"It's an emergency. We need to leave now." Aiden could hear that Robin was talking to the security.

"I know the system is down, but we have to leave now. Also, we don't know when the system will be coming back online." It was natural that the weak argument couldn't convince the security.

"I understand you have no way to check, but we really can't wait. You know..." Robin tried hard to persuade the guard. However, Aiden whispered, "run over the fence," from the side.

Robin turned to look at Aiden, to understand his intent, and Aiden nodded. He turned off the communication screen and accelerated straight into the electric less fence.

Even if the guard kept yelling, they couldn't hear it. Realizing that Aiden was anticipating an attack, Robin said, "The system is down. The whole outpost is out of control. If they have to attack us, they have to do it manually."

Aiden sat beside him. But everything in front of the transporter was white. The strong wind had turned into a blizzard, and it had become difficult to see.

"You shouldn't have asked me to run through the fence. If the monsters attacked, they would be vulnerable."

"Do you remember the army that Laika was talking about?"

"Are they here?" Robin had guessed too much, "It was the door, wasn't it?"

Aiden nodded, saying, "If the army had taken possession of the castle, even the army would have no hope of surviving."

"The grey cloud now had enveloped the entire planet. All the communication systems are down, and we have lost even the satellites." Aiden took a deep breath before saying, "They'll be fortunate if we can escape the planet."

"What about us?" Robin did not dare to take his eyes off the road as the thick curtain of the blizzard veiled the path before the transporter.

"There's a chance." Aiden took a peek at the unconscious Charak before responding. " They had destroyed the satellites. Can you navigate to the dock?"

With a slight curve at the edge of his lips, Robin pushed a button. A holographic map floated above the dashboard with a continuous flickering light in the center of it.

"This is!" Aiden glanced at the unsophisticated terrain map. He understood it had something to their current position, but he did not understand what it was.

"This is the GMPS. Geo-Magnetic Positioning System." Robin explained, "Unlike satellite positioning, it measures the planet's magnetism to navigate through the planet."

"GMPS! Isn't that an obscure system?" Not that he didn't know about it, but Aiden wasn't sure if it was reliable or not.

Understanding what Aiden was saying, Robin added, "They also used GMPS on Earth and Will, but GPS was more reliable. They used it here too. The only problem with this planet is that the magnetic field of the planet is weak, "

"But don't worry, it's enough for us to reach or get close to the dock." Robin smacked on the dashboard and added, "and this is an all-purpose vehicle. It has both GPS and GMPS. It has a MANA generator, solar even the Seeback generator."

"It can generate electricity no matter what." Robin grinned confidently and said, "It might be slow, but we will reach the Spaceport no matter what."

"You don't need to worry about energy. The mana concentration in the air has increased a lot."

"Mana concentration increased!" Robin frowned, "No wonder the mana generator is overheating. For now, I think I need to shut down the generator."

After he did, he turned to Aiden, "What will happen if they find us?"

"They might eat us. Who knows?"

"You can kill them, right?"

"If they brought the entire army, even I would be powerless. It's no longer about the quality." Aiden smirked, adding, "Remember, there's something that can capture that crazy wolf alive. Do you really think I could do anything against it?"

Robin nodded, adding, "And on top of the, there's that turtle thing."

"Our only hope is to get the hell out of the planet."

"So it will become the second Earth."

"No." Aiden shook his head, "It would have been easier to be on Earth."

And the monotonous drive continued. Realizing that there was nothing to do, Aiden retreated into his mana space.

By the time the alarm woke him up, the transporter had stopped moving. The error message was continuously flickering on the screen.

"What's wrong?"

"I fall asleep." Robin gave a silly smile as he tried to decipher the error code.

When Aiden checked the clock, he realized that more than 17 hours had passed. Looking back, Aiden noticed Charak was still asleep.

"Something is wrong with the terrain." Robin frowned as he was trying to explain something that even he didn't understand. "Approximately 200 meters. Take a helmet with you."

As Aiden was about to leave the transporter, Robin threw it. Aiden put it on and shut the door behind him.

Soon a screen appeared in front of Robin. The camera in the helmet couldn't see more than a couple of meters in the dark.

The shards of ice and snow flying across the screen and the sharp sound of the wind made Robin realize how horrible the thing was.

"Reverse the car a bit, and rest for a while. I will wake you up when I return." Aiden's voice came through the communicator.

"Don't worry about me." There was no one to see the dumb grin on his face as Robin added, "I've had six hours of sleep. I'm all right now."

When Aiden didn't respond for a moment, Robin spoke again, "Don't go over 10 km from the transporter. You will lose the signal."

Before Aiden could respond, the dark curtain in front of the helmet became a little thinner. And soon enough, a bright red sky emerged in front of them.

"What the heck!" cried Robin in the communicator.

"Don't talk unless it's necessary." Even if Aiden asked Robin to remain silent, it surprised him too.

He looked down to find that he was standing at the edge of a cliff. It was 15 meters straight down from where he was standing.

Behind him, the strong wind was carrying snow and ice, obstructing the view. In front of him, the sky was red with the dwarf star. However, there was not a single speck of cloud in the sky.

Aiden looked around to find that the cliff was similar all around. The cliff was 15 meters high at most of the places. Some areas were over 30 meters deep.

[The host has activated innate skill [Blink]]

With a Blink, Aiden reappeared on the land below. And the first thing he noticed was the ground was a lot harder than he had expected.

"It's a solid block of ice." Instead of snow, the ground was a thick block of translucent blue ice.

"The mana circle had turned the snow and into mana and consumed it."

'So the mana circle had left such a crater here?'

"Yes." Mraz confirmed, "Though the mana circle used blood mana to initiate, it must have used the ice mana to maintain."

Listening to him, Aiden looked around before confirming, 'That is why the portal gate has vanished.'

"Of course." Mraz sighed, "even I would have kept it open for at most 10 minutes."

Aiden ignored his bragging and moved towards the spot that looked like a ruin. "Robin, can you confirm whether there was a research post here?"

"It was supposed to be Research Post #4k." Robin had already checked the location, "Was it targeted, too?"

"That is not the case," Aiden shook his head, "how deep the underground labs had been?"

"About fifty meters."

Aiden pointed at the hole in the ground and said, "this is the path to the underground labs. All the building was 15 meters above this place."

"When the mana circles transformed the ice and snow into mana, those buildings fell off the ground and shattered."

As he explained, Aiden entered the underground labs and soon reached the junction of the lab. There wasn't much destruction in this area. Rather, the place was too clean. The only alien things were lying around the ground.

"What the hell had done that?" Robin exclaimed.

Aiden sighed as checked the dried-up bodies of the humans. There was not a single drop of blood in the body. As if somebody had squeezed the blood out of its body.

"Those were human, right?"

"They were." responded Aiden, "But the mana circle squeezed all the blood out of them. I don't think this is the only one. Similar things might have happened to every post in the area."

"Could it be that they had invaded and took control of the research post just to set up mana circles?"

"That's not impossible, but..." Aiden was about to say something, but he stopped. He rushed out of the underground labs, asking, "can't you hear it?"

"What?" Robin asked in confusion. However, Aiden had already silenced his speech as he felt someone had transmitted a message to his helmet.

[13-48-32, 98-23-09. Trotter. 128:14:60]