197 Monster (4)

We were actually inside the edge of the barrier. One step away from the wildlife behind us. The birds bounced off from the tough surface of the barrier as their attacks failed. I almost cheered out loud as the tension in my shoulders began to disappear.

However, what waited for us was a long path of walking to Luke's mansion since our hover car was abandoned. I sighed since we also didn't have enough energy to expend more of our mana to use teleportation. It was clear that none of us had the energy to walk there since it was such a long distance away.

"Aren't you guys supposed to be at school?" Cillian stopped his ride when he noticed us outside and stepped out of his own hover car.

I became filled with relief as Sienna ran out to help us up. I did hear that the other class was to come back from their practical mission soon from the fourth district. I actually preferred being in the lower districts now rather than the first district. At least those places had no monsters, no matter how cruel the people were like in the fifth district.

"We went to go visit a charity for our mission, but ran into a horde of monsters," Shelly shivered while she explained.

"You ran into a horde of monsters?" Sienna almost yelled with Cillian like they were wondering how we were still alive.

"I need a hover car to Luke's mansion," I interrupted them to skip all the small talk.

"Sure," Cillian quickly passed his keys to Luke, noticing how tired we all were.

The hover car lit up as I heard sounds of crackling noises coming from above. Before deciding that it was only me being paranoid, I looked up in the direction of the sky to find cracks in the barrier. There were a swarm of birds using their beaks to get into the barrier. It was understandable how everyone was too tired to notice.

The only reason why I noticed was because the medicine Luke emptied was making me more alert to the noises around me. I shoved Sienna back into the car before yelling, "look up!"

Everyone rushed into the car, having no time to wonder when the barrier would crack. The swarm would invade the less protected regions of the residential area soon. Alex didn't hesitate to put on the acceleration switch this time as we rushed towards the inner region with stronger barriers. I did feel sorry for whoever owned those empty mansions we were escaping from, but who knew the birds that followed us were powerful enough to destroy the barrier?

Both Cillian and Sienna appeared extremely shocked while Shelly was beginning to get used to the bad luck we were running into. I grabbed Sienna's hand to comfort her before she flinched when the barrier behind us exploded after we entered the next level barrier. Luke yelled out the directions to Alex while looking at the map.

We were perfectly coordinated as Alex used the buttons to prevent us from crashing into the mansions ahead of us. But it was clear the birds would destroy this barrier too with the cracks that were beginning to form with every passing second. As my role as the lookout, I unfortunately shouted the status of the barrier, making Sienna more frightened.

"It's ok, we'll get to Luke's mansion within two more minutes," I tried to cheer her up.

However, both Cillian and Sienna tightly grabbed onto the handles like they were anxious for their lives. It was clear to everyone that we didn't know if the barrier would last more than few seconds as not only the mutated birds were attacking, but the monsters from before came out of the forest. With the outer barrier destroyed and the lost blood from the boy that attracted more monsters, they began to work together.

Sienna screamed as we barely passed into the next barrier before the increasing swarm of monsters sprinted after us after breaking the barrier before us. We couldn't even attack them this time since we would be helping them in breaking the barrier. Sienna began to panic as she asked, "how much time before we get to Luke's mansion?"

"One minute and thirty-five seconds," I gave her the bad news.

"Is there any way to increase the speed?" Alex asked Cillian.

"This is the maximum speed," Cillian shook his head as he tried to hide that he was trembling.

To make it worse, the barrier shattered behind us while we were miles away from the next one. Without any hesitation, Shelly opened the window and began to mutter some spells. Although the laser beams worked on the monsters with the powerful jumps, it bounced off the birds like a mirror. Since I was running out of mana, I shook Cillian to help as he quickly unfroze.

Both Sienna and Cillian began chanting more spells like their lives depended on it to figure out the birds' weakness. When an ice spear chanted by Sienna made a bird stop flying, we knew water-based spells were the weaknesses for the birds. Shelly and Sienna quickly clicked as Shelly used more laser beams on the monsters running with their feet while Sienna used ice spears on the birds.

"Three seconds until we reach the next barrier!" I shouted to them to stop with the attacks.

I clasped my hands together in prayer as we had to make it to the next barrier before they reached us.