Solo Trip 5

When Zyra saw the large red skin hand crushing part of the wall where the crack was she sensed its power. A side affect to her Psionic power is she can sense the cultivation levels of creatures within her [Shadow Field] or any techniques with shadow. Her eyes widened as she jumped back. Nascent Realm! 

'But that's impossible' she though! 'The Royal Guard aren't supposed to be this high in cultivation now! I have to get away!'

She jumped back again only to see all the Xeomorphs fleeing back down the way they had originally came. Without turning back to see the Royal Guard she ordered her shadows to attack. She knew her shadows wouldn't be able to defeat it, but she hoped they would slow it down enough to get away. She cursed her luck as she ran. 

Stepping out of the crack in the wall was an Xeomorph Royal Guard. It's height reached the top of the tunnel. It's face looked very human like, closer to that of a Danirum. It had no hair over its head, but long bending quills resembling dreads. It has 6 arms. Two of its arms were crossed in front of its check, another two hanging from its side with balled up fists and the last two were pressing their palms to the ceiling of the tunnel.

It's body was muscular, that of a body builder, but covered in dense grey carapace like armor over the vitals of its body. It's legs were normal legs with talon feet. Flickering back and forth behind it was a scorpion tail with a thick crab claw at the end. 

"Well well well. My nose was right. We do have a couple intruders" the Royal Guard said with a smile. 

Zyra's heart tightened hearing it speak. It's voice was like silk, but she knew that this was a ploy. An evolved ability to trick those into thinking it's not evil. She's heard that some Royal Guard have soothing voices so they can hide in the shadows and lure victims to them. She had to get away she didn't want get caught in a trap by the monster.

The Shadow Xeomorphs attacked the Royal Guard! They used claws and teeth try and hurt the monstrous alien. Even as a small horde of Shadowmorphs attacked with al their might, they did nothing to his grey carapace or even its red skin. They couldn't even leave a scratch on it. 

The Royal Guard's smile slowly began to fade into a face of indifference. Without even uncrossing its main arms the two arms on either side moved to attack. With a wide swing of its powerful arms the Shadowmorphs were hit into the walls and reduced to shadowy mist. Instantly killed. With each step it took it would swing its arms killing more and more Shadowmorphs. 

"Why are you running? I want to meet the one who intruded in the hive" it spoke softly, yet its voice boomed in the tunnel. Even as monotone as it sounded Zyra knew it was a threat. She could feel it deep in her bones. Fear. Utter fear. Even if this was all a training, it still felt real. She could feel an invisible force slowly closing in on her.

She looked over her shoulder only to see the last few Shadowmorphs killed in an instant by the Royal Guard. She began to sweat more as she knew there was nothing between her and the Royal Guard. Zyra began to pick up the pace and used [Shadow Trail] once again. She couldn't make a Psionic Shadow of the Royal Guard since it was a higher cultivation level as her. Plus she had to save as much mana as possible for her ace in the hole.

"I just want to talk" the Royal Guard said with a malicious grin. Zyra ignored the monster and kept running with a trail of shadows following behind her. The Royal Guard frowned. It hated to be ignored by something it believed was beneath it. It lowered itself like a sprinter about to start in a race. In a split second it had taken a might leaping bound and was on top of Zyra.

When she turned over her shoulder all she saw was a red fist centimeters away from her face. She tried to block, but was too slow. She was sent crashing into the wall creating an indent of herself in the wall. She coughed up blood and gasped for air. With physical force alone the Royal Guard had crushed a handful of ribs and had the air knocked out of her. 

The Royal Guard reached out grabbing her by the neck. It slowly pulled her out of the wall. "Now are you going to tell me why you are here?" Zyra was terrified by the smile on the Royal Guards face. It was mocking her. It was eager to eat her. She swallowed her fear and summoned all the courage she could muster.

"I've got nothing to saw to an abomination like you"! She said with a mocking grin and spit in the Royal Guards face. Spit and blood rolled down its face as it wiped it off with another hand. As soon as it did it's once smile turned to anger. "That was stupid of you to do" its voice was now much deeper and low. 

It slowly raised Zyra into the and use its other arms to grab her limbs leaving one arm free. Zyra quickly bit her bottom lip as she knew she was about to be killed. "Since I won't get anything out of you, I'll just eliminate you!" With its free arm the Royal Guard punched a hold through Zyra's stomach as the other hand around her throat closed. Crushing her throat.

She gasped for air that couldn't fill her. Her lungs and stomach were nothing but pieces of flesh. The Royal Guard smiled and dropped her to the ground. Her body hit the ground with a wet thud. More and more blood poured out of the hole in her stomach as she watched the Royal Guard walked away. 

Her body was broken and she was slowly dying. She could feel death slowly creeping up on her. She began to feel nothing, but pure rage. Her eyes burned with hatred as she watched the Royal Guard ignore her and walked back towards the crack. The Royal Guard raised its nose to the air sniffing for its next target. 

"A human huh?" It side with a smile looking back at Zyra. Knowing full well Zyra could hear it, even if she was just barely alive. Just as it entered the crack in the wall is close behind it. As the crack closed the light in Zyra's eyes dimmed. She had died. 

Minutes later her body began to turn to shadow and dissipated into smoke. The smoke moved dozens of feet down the tunnel in between the corpses of Xeomorphs. The smoke reformed into the shape of her body. Another minute had passed as the smoke fully remade her body. As soon as Zyra was reformed she gasped for air and clutched her stomach. 

Her nails dug into the earth as she did her best to breath. She could feel that her stomach and insides were back, but her clothes showed a massive hole where she was killed. She was filled with anger from being killed. She had to use such an advance technique her Master had taught her to evade death, just once a year. Unless she does a ritual to use the ability earlier, but everything has a cost. 

She felt more embarrassed than anything that she used such a technique to fake her death for training. For training! She really didn't want to risk punishment from the CIA for being killed in the training only on day 2. She sat up gathering herself as she thought of her next game plan. She couldn't believe a Royal Guard was already in the Nascent Realm!

"It shouldn't be possible. The Queen and her Royal Guard should only be in the Liquifying Realm! Why is a Royal Guard in the Nascent Realm? Something isn't right. I'll have to talk to the rest about this."

____________________________________

4 people sat around a table watching the training.

"So it seems the reports were right" General Xandria said. "So the Queen and Royal Guard did morph into s higher realm. Although there corpses weren't found."

"It is very peculiar" Agent Astronova said with her head on her hands looking down at the table. It was split into 4 sections with each section showing each Disciple. 

"That is it Agent" General Quilax spoke calming as though he was calculating many events in his head. "Though it is interesting to see Zyra use one of her advance techniques to trick the Royal Guard that she was dead."

"Yes it was a good trick." Agent Astronova said with a smile. "I've trained some agents to use the same technique, or something very similar, to get out of a tricky situation."

"Let's just keep watching and see what they do next" General Quilax said sternly. "They have a few more days left and have already made it farther than other teams. Let's see if they can figure out what happened."

_________________________________________

Xylon had formed himself into a large slime ball to roll down the tunnel. He was much faster than the Hive Guard Hunter running on all fours. He rolled as fast as he could with a small horde chasing after him. 

While rolling he left a trail of water. As he did so his body began to shrink ever so slightly. Slightly enough for it to go unnoticed by the Hive Guard hunters. After a good 50ft or so of rolling away Xylon sprung his trap. 

"[Watertide. Grapple]!" He turned to roll towards the horde as the water trail began to shake violently. Simultaneously tens of dozens of water whips sprouted from the ground grappling every Xeomorph within 3ft range. Xylon morphed his body to completely submerge a Hive Guard Hunter inside him.

"[Toxic. Lake]!" Xylons body slowly darkened till it was almost a deep shade of black. "I. Know. Anti-Poisons. And. Poison's!" 

The Hive Guard Hunter in his body began to rapidly dissolve into a fine mist. Xylon absorbed the blood and liquid inside his body growing larger in size and turning a very light shade of purple. While he was connected to the [Watertide Grapple] the water turned the same shade of purple. All the Xeomorphs grappled began to burn from the acidic poison in the water.