716 One last detail

"Do we have any pepperoni left?" Nethe asked, pushing himself off the ground with his wings while using his feet to open the pizza boxes.

Hornet reached out from his chair, but the box he was trying to get was a bit too far for the dwarf, prompting Hera to push it in his direction. He smiled and opened the box, taking one of the slices of pepperoni and passing the last one to Nethe, "Here."

"Oh, thanks!" Nethe picked up the slice with his feet and turned back to the whiteboard in front of the group, "Man, they really made this in the right place. Right in the corner of the room."

"Unfortunately, that is the case. I can't help but admire their work. Using the invisible walls of the room to reinforce the structure was a stroke of genius. I just don't know why they bothered making the concrete walls against the invisible ones," Lysandra sighed. She was still staring at the pictures and blueprints of the prison. There was just one part of the plan left to solve. How to get inside the prison.

"It should be because nothing can interact with the invisible walls. Despite the psychological warfare that would create, they couldn't make it perfectly flat against the room wall. There would be some small crevices that would make it easier to escape," Eirik frowned and looked at the pictures again, "We are sure that we can't just dig our way in?"

"The area around the prison is made out of concrete and metal. Digging is an option, but it would make too much noise. Not to mention the amount of dust that would create," Becca shook her head.

"And if we try to dig from here or from the basement of any building in the city, that would trigger the Clockwork protectors, right?" Sylvi took a bite out of her slice but groaned as she tasted it, "C'mon. Who asked for anchovies and didn't warn everyone."

"Oh, that was me," Nethe raised his wing, "But that's the table where the weird flavors are. There is even pineapple."

"Pineapple is not weird. It's an acquired taste," Hornet grumbled.

"Stop!" Lysandra called, "We are not having that discussion again. Last time we wasted three hours and broke two chairs."

"One of them was an accident," Livy added, still feeling embarrassed. The Leviathan overestimated the chair's resilience and tried to sit in one, only for it to crumble beneath her weight.

"But the other wasn't, and that's the point. Focus," Lysandra sighed.

"Zestra, how many people can you turn invisible?" Freya turned to the spy.

"10 with a basic version of it, and two with a version that would make us completely undetected by the sensor or anything else. Well, almost completely," he glanced at Hera, the first person who was able to see him through that spell without any heavy assistance from tools and sigils.

"Ok... So you can do it with all of us for the basic version, but going in and deactivating the sensors would warn them that something was wrong," Freya nodded.

"Yeah, especially since Becca and Eirik are staying behind. That leaves just the seven of us," Zestra nodded.

"Hang on… Nethe, can you carry someone? While flying, I mean," Hera asked.

"Yeah. Maybe Lysandra or Sylvi. Hornet uses heavy armor, so that's a bit much for me."

"How high can you go?"

"I'm a child of the sky! I can go as high as I want," Nethe announced proudly.

"What are you thinking, Hera? We know that going in from above will trigger their sensors," Lysandra rubbed her forehead, already expecting another idea that wouldn't work.

"Yes, but the sensors only look to the outside, right? The inside is clear."

"That is correct, but the sensors will notice anything in a range of 500 meters, and they have several of them spread around the area," Becca pointed to a part of the map showing the triangle shipped prison against the corner of the room and the sensors with their reach.

"Yes, but how high are the clock towers?"

"What?" Eirik asked.

"How high are the clock towers? Do we know? Do people know what the actual shape of this room is? From what I understand, the corner where the prison is located is a literal corner, like one of the edges of a cube. If the room is actually a cube the ceiling of the room would be very high up," Hera looked around to see if anyone knew the answer.

Eirik looked at a few files, and when he couldn't find anything, he took out a computer connected to the internet through a router that would disguise the location of their signal to a different room. Sure, if someone actually tried to track them, they would be able to. But it would require them to look for the right things while Eirik was using the computer. After a few moments, he turned it off, having sent the data to a tablet that couldn't connect to the internet, "Ok, here is what we know. Attempts to go above a certain height in this room triggered the clockwork crows to attack. However, all the tests were made inside the city, not in the outskirts. As a matter of fact, during the prison construction, there were machines that went beyond the height where the crows attacked. No one thought much of it, but it might mean that in the outskirts, we wouldn't be bothered. The room also seems to be cube-shaped. At least the four corners on ground level follow that pattern. This is not counting the underground since no one did any type of survey of the area beneath the ruins. Not extensively, at least. They tried finding roots or something like that from where the other buildings were growing but to no avail."

"So going from above is a real possibility?" Lysandra asked.

"I mean… There is nothing that goes against it. As long as we can confirm that the invisible walls are an actual cube and not some uneven shape. More specifically, if the walls above the prison are high enough or not and if the sensors wouldn't detect a large-sized object coming from above," Eirik turned to Hera, "Can you find that out?"

"Nimbus, Lurize? Can you guys check that out?" Hera turned to her titled blades.

"If Zestra turns us invisible, yeah. Even if I'm small, I would probably be noticed by anyone who is looking in my direction," Lurize turned to Nimbus, who nodded.

"Yeah. And if we are together and need to run, I'm more likely to be able to escape than Lurize in his beetle form," Nimbus patted Lurize's back, who couldn't say anything against that. The Sentinel's top speed when flying was close to 80 km/h, and the Royal Tutor simply couldn't compete.

"I can do that, but only with simple invisibility. The whole point is to see if they would notice that," Zestra explained.

"I'll go out for a smoke then," Hornet stood up. They couldn't let the doors of the hotel open by themselves, and all the windows were currently closed. So, someone had to appear coming out the building to let Nimbus and Lurize pass by.

"Get as much information as you can, but don't get too close. We can't let them detect you," Hera turned to her blades and gave them her hand for them to kiss. As they did so, all her mana rushed out of her body, giving them around three hours to complete the Royal Quest.

"One more thing," Sylvi tried speaking, but she had a large bite of pizza in her mouth. Everyone gave her a moment to finish chewing before she continued, "The sun will finish setting today. So try not to take too long. Tomorrow will start the next 6 months of night. This room's day-night cycle is super weird."

Lysandra nodded, "Yeah, but better for us if we do this during the night. So it means that, starting tomorrow, we can go for it when we are ready. But that comes with another problem. We have two people that can fly, or take people flying. That would mean what? Five people who can be there?"

"Four, actually. I can carry Hera and one more person. If we add a third, I won't be able to get as high," Nimbus replied.

"So unless we have more people who can fly. We still need to come up with a way to get the rest of the team inside," Lysandra sighed.

"I can fly," Hornet was taking out his pack of cigarettes, getting strange looks from the rest of the team, "What? When you are known as Hornet for as long as I have, you lean into it. What kind of hornet would I be if I couldn't fly?"

"Can you carry someone?" Becca asked.

"One person and it's not something I can do often or for longer times. I can hold on for around 30 minutes," Hornet explained.

"So that means we are still one person short…" Freya frowned.

"Actually. We can work with that. If we reduce the team by one member, we don't have to worry about getting another person inside, and the one who stays behind can help Becca and Eirik secure our escape route," Lysandra smiled with a glint in her eye. The plan finally coming together.

"But who would we take out from the rescue team?" as Freya asked that question, Lysandra and Sylvi looked at her with intention. It took the explorer a moment before she gasped, "Wait, why me?"

"You are the logical choice. I'm afraid. Hera, Nethe, and Hornet are our transport. Zestra needs to be there because of the invisibility spell, Sylvi is the healer and essential for the plan, and if we get into trouble, they need someone to formulate a plan quickly, which would be me. I'm not saying I'm smarter than you, but I have more experience."

Freya opened her mouth and closed it a few times as if she found a response but decided it was bad until she groaned loudly, "Man, this sucks. I get it, but I wanted to be a part of it."

"Don't be sad. What we are doing is also important. Also, didn't you say that you had a way to find some information using your relic?" Becca tried to change the subject so Freya wouldn't be as sad.

"Yeah, me and Hera. Hera actually can do that in two different ways," Freya turned to the Empress.

"But neither works when we are talking about things people built. Well… sort of. I can try but I can't promise any answers. I've been asking my relic about the sensors, but it can never give me an answer," Hera explained.

"Why did you wait until now to tell us that?" Eirik gasped.

"Because we didn't have a plan, and the way we get information has to be very specific. I can't go into details or I won't be able to do that again, but it's very complicated. We talked about this and decided to mention it when we had a plan to iron out any details that might be missing instead of using this as a base for making the plan," Hera continued.

"Why are you talking like you can only do that once?" Nethe tilted his head.

"Because we can only do that once per room. Not Hera's relic question, that's a separate thing, but she's been using that since we started planning," Freya opened a soda can and took a big gulp.

"The problem is any question I'm asking my relic with the weaker skill is not working. And I've tried a lot of things," Hera sighed.

"Couldn't you ask about the size of the room with those questions?" Hornet asked.

"I can, but not if the sensors will detect us, which I think is part of the reason why we want Nimbus to go. And any question I ask about the clockwork monsters doesn't work for some reason," Hera turned to the dwarf as she gestured to Nimbus.

"Fair enough."

Lysandra clapped her hands, "They also told me about that, and I agreed with their suggestion to wait. Zestra, turn them invisible and let them go. We can start ironing out the details of this plan, and if the two of them get back with good news, we can make a list of things we could use so Hera and Freya can do their thing. I'll say this already, but we won't be going there tomorrow. Ideally, we go over the plan for a couple of days before starting the operation. We will also do some exercises to consider what to do if things go in an unexpected direction. I'll explain to you all about this later, and Hera. I know you are the most anxious of us to go there-"

Before the elf finished speaking, Hera cut her off, "But we need to make sure we have a solid plan. I understand. I won't say I like it, but I understand."

"I don't think any of us likes any of this," Eirik said with a somber voice.

After a few moments, Zestra turned Lurize and Nimbus invisible as the two of them headed out with Hornet. This was the last piece of the puzzle, and if they found what they were looking for, all they would need to do was make sure everything was in the right place, and everyone knew their assignments by heart before going in to rescue the people trapped. But, before that, Hera and Freya could ask one mighty being for help.