Chapter 77

Seeing my look everyone glanced at each other before they shrugged. "Without our powers I don't know how we can fight them." Bill spoke up a moment later.

I didn't either. I already knew I didn't want to deal with a twisted during the mana storm, now I knew why. "Any idea how long the storm will last?" I asked looking at my elementals.

All of them shook their heads. "Sorry master. Mana storms are difficult to predict in the higher realms where they are more common. I have no idea what a mana storm in a lower realm like this will be like." Delilah told me.

I sighed then looked through the portal to the grocery store. The angle the portal had opened didn't give me much to look at other than a counter and some shelves that had been cleared and moved to form a barricade. Since I had opened the portal in that place once I could make it again. With that thought in mind I seriously considered just closing the portal and waiting the storm out. Once the storm had passed we wouldn't have as many problems dealing with the twisted and beasts. It still wouldn't be easy, but it wouldn't be impossible. More importantly Grace would be awake, and as a healer she could fix up anyone who got injured.

Thinking about Grace I wondered where Caly had gone. "Where is Caly?" I asked Karen. I kind of hoped Caly might have an idea of how to use abilities in a mana storm, or something useful like that. While the elementals were all older and more experienced, their way of thinking and views of the world was different than humans.

"She went to check on Grace. She was worried the mana storm may have an adverse affect on her." Karen replied.

I considered that for a moment then looked back to my elementals. "How many groups of humans are there? Where are they in comparison to the portal and the threats?" I asked.

Before they could answer there was a loud scream from the other side of the portal, what made it worse was the fact that it was the terrified scream of a child.

I hesitated for a moment, it wasn't anyone that I knew and if I closed the portal I wouldn't have to hear that scream anymore. Yet I didn't close the portal. Even though I knew it wasn't my problem and it would be incredibly dangerous, I also knew I wouldn't be able to get that scream out of my head if I didn't do something. So after a moment of indecision I rushed through the portal and took off towards the screaming.

Was it a brilliant idea? No it definitely wasn't. Stupid was a much better word to describe my actions. Even as I ran through the store I knew I was being foolish. Though I knew I wasn't completely stupid. I had a mythril core now, and as I had explained to the others before, my body had strengthened considerably when I advanced to a true metal core. Add in the fact that my physical ability had advanced to the second stage and I was sure that even without my other flashier abilities I could fight against a twisted. Or at least that was how I was justifying it in my head.

As I finished the justification in my head I reached the women's apparel section. Apparently this store sold more than just groceries. Amongst the women's clothes I spotted four battered twisted gathering around one large circular clothing rack. Each of them were mostly red in color but had small splashes of green, gray, and blue. It made them look like they were covered in a terrible camouflage.

The twisted were looking around stupidly unsure exactly where the scream had come from. The scream was being muffled now, so I guessed that there was more than one person hiding within the clothes. Seeing that the twisted hadn't noticed me and were heavily injured I rushed forward and then jumped up to land a powerful blow on the back of the nearest ones head.

My fist caved in the twisted's head but my landing wasn't all that graceful as I had too much momentum and collided with the twisted's broad back knocking it forward towards one of the other twisted. While I was laying on its corpse just feet away from the other twisted I caught sight of several people hiding with the nearby clothing displays. They stared back at me with terrified expressions. Thankfully they were stupid and still had not realize what happened.

I jumped up to my feet quickly, just in time to see Chewy, Delilah, and Sil pounce on the last three twisted. A moment later all the twisted were dead.

"That was stupid master!" Delilah admonished. "Didn't you hear anything Aura told you!"

"Now isn't the time." Megan said running up to my side. "We need to get the kids and get back to the portal." she said then squatted down and peered into the clothing displays. I noticed her stiffen when she saw that there were more than just a couple kids hiding in the clothing displays.

"If you want to leave here, come out quickly." I called out to everyone in hiding, while trying to be as quiet as I could.

Micheal and a few others all arrived a moment later. "Done already?" he asked in a hushed voice.

I nodded. "Yeah, they were twisted, but I don't know where any of the other threats are." I told them.

Micheal nodded and looked around warily while the others noticed the people hiding in the clothes racks. One by one a group of nine people, mostly children and teens, appeared along with one woman who was clutching tightly onto the hands of two of the children. "We can leave here?" she asked us warily.

I nodded then pointed. "We have a way out of here over there, just follow Micheal." I sad and slapped Micheal on the shoulder to indicate who I meant.

"You're not coming?" Micheal asked.

"Bringing up the rear." I replied.

Micheal nodded then gestured for everyone to follow him. As soon as everyone was moving I started to follow. Aura appeared by my side a second later. "Master, that was the last of the twisted in here. The other three seemed to have been killed and dragged off by the scaled wolves. They are busy eating them near the one of the store entrances." she told me.

"What about the overgrown beasts?" I asked.

"The fox and tarantula groups are fighting in the area where the food is kept. We can't locate the snake." Aura reported.

I grimaced and hoped that the beasts didn't eat everything. "Any chance it was killed by the others?" I asked then shifted my sight to mana sight and looked around cautiously.

"I didn't see its corpse, and given its size it couldn't have been eaten so quickly." Aura replied.

I nodded. "It might have awakened a stealth type of ability. Even if that isn't the case we need to be careful." I said.

There was a loud clap of thunder that startled me and caused me to look up in surprise. Just in time to spot the oversized rattlesnake as it sat motionless, coiled up within the metal rafters and air conditioning ducts. It had pretty black and white scales that formed the classic diamondback pattern. It wasn't paying any attention to us as it stared towards the produce section but as if it sensed my gaze it shifted its attention down towards me. Our eyes met for a couple of moments and I felt a ripple of fear course through me for a moment, but it was quickly quelled leaving my mind clear.

As if sensing that I was unaffected by the fear the snake tensed up and continued to watch me warily. While I seemed able to defend against whatever fear inducing ability the snake had. Staring into the eyes of a snake that was at least forty or fifty feet long was fear inducing all on its own. If I was able to use my abilities… wait, how did it use a fear ability on me?

I frowned as I wondered about that but I figured I would as the elementals or Caly once I was back at the portal. I decided it was best not to linger. I started to move towards the portal while keeping a close eye on the snake. Its gaze contained a frightening amount of intelligence, and since it wasn't moving I figured it knew I wasn't there to harm it. That or it was never afraid of me, I wasn't sure which.

"Aura, where are the other humans?" I asked.

"The largest group is hiding in the back by the big doors. I think they are waiting for the storm to pass before they leave. There is a smaller group hunkered down where the jewelry is, and the last group have barricaded themselves in the furthest corner where there are bottles of smelly liquids." Aura replied.

I frowned, I wasn't sure what she meant by smelly liquid but they sounded like they were pretty spread out. It would take some time to gather all of them up. It was questionable if the other beasts would stay occupied long enough to gather them all. As I kept moving towards the portal I realized that it was in the electronics section. I was in such a rush earlier that I hadn't realized where I had come out from. Realizing that, the idea of gathering everyone didn't seem so far fetched. The hardest group would be the ones hiding within the jewelry counters as that would be closer to the front of the store where those scaled wolves were.

As I moved further and further from the snake it seemed to ease up. Then it partly uncoiled as its head lowered down to the ground revealing that it was probably a lot longer than I thought it was. I was momentarily worried that it would try and sneak up on us, but after a moment the snakehead came back into sight as it coiled back up. However as its head rose back up I could see that it had one of the twisted in its mouth. Then both the snake's head and the twisted both disappeared into the coils. Yeah the snake was definitely longer than fifty feet.