Co-op Battle

"Excellent, although not perfect. You managed to accomplish the objective, now for something new." After Clara spoke, a text box appeared.

[Objective completed 100 xp rewarded]

[Rank 10 progress: 150/200] 

"Hm, interesting, it's giving you tasks rather than us." Muttering voices could be heard from Clara's mic, researchers talking on this new discovery.

"We will further investigate this matter, other than that, time for the next test." Once Clara finished talking, a group of drones appeared in front of Jacob, double the amount from earlier. But he noticed some of them had saws attached to their sides rather than gun barrels.

"Why do some of them have saws!?" Jacob asked, afraid of the sight.

"Relax, they're fake, at most they will just shock you." After a small sigh of relief, he quickly went into position, preparing his scythe for a fight, but Clara started talking again.

"Calm down, this time you are not alone." A door opened, breaking off the disguise it once had. Ella and Zeph both walked out before the door closed shut and disappeared like earlier.

"I've dealt with some of these before, you have nothing to worry about!" Ella walked up confidently in front of Jacob. 

"I will act as support for you Jacob, my experience should aid us here." Both took up their weapons and prepared for the fight to start.

Ella snapped her fingers, and tapped something on the screen that appeared. In a moment, a streak of yellow appeared across arm, and a large glowing shield spawned, attaching to her arm. With a shield on one hand and her shock mace on the other, she was all ready.

Zeph stood next to Jacob, not pulling up his own system and simply getting into position.

"The test will begin shortly." Jacob managed to regain his breath, holding up his scythe alongside his teammates and ready for another battle. 

"Begin!" Just as she said it, the drones rushed onward, firing a full barrage of blunt rounds towards her while Jacob and Zeph stayed behind.

"Not strong enough!" In one swift motion, Ella swung her mace up and struck one of the low flying drones, quickly taking it down and causing the rest to begin dispersing and finding new targets.

Some of the drones began to focus on Jacob and Zeph, ignoring Ella entirely and rushing towards them. 

"Just like earlier, but faster this time." Zeph said. The two sprung into the fight, quickly taking down any nearby drones they could while being struck by dozens of blunt rounds and getting shocked by the saws of the drones.

Ella rushed to their aid, fighting alongside them while using her shield to protect the other two when they tried to catch their breath. 

As she protected the two after they took down half of the drones, exhausting themselves and getting overwhelmed by the constant barrage of blunt rounds, Ella found herself becoming the main protection of the team from the drones. Drones came from all sides, and Ella was getting pushed back by a group of drones using the shock saws while the rest bombarded the two from behind.

"Seems like the situation is not doing so well." Hiding behind Jacob and Ella, Zeph snapped his fingers to check on his screen, he quickly tapped on one of the abilities, and in a moment his sword began to glow.

"Jacob prepare to hit them when they fall." Before Jacob could even fully understand what he meant, Zeph rushed out of cover and slashed at the drones flying above, he noticed that sparks and electricity emanated from his blade. 

The drones began falling to the floor, struck by the electricity and struggling to get back up.

"Now's our chance!" Ella yelled. With Jacob, the two started destroying the stunned drones, stomping or slamming their weapons against the drones, penetrating and breaking their metal bodies before blowing up in bright fire.

Striking one more drone on the ground with his scythe, Jacob failed to notice one of the remaining drones hovering behind him. He was taken by surprise as the drone's saws hit his back, and a large electrical shock surged through his body, forcing him to his knees.

Before he could fall to the ground, Ella rushed from the side, smashing the drone with her shield and freeing Jacob. Before the drone could recover, Ella landed a hard strike on it, destroying the drone.

"Told you I got your back!" Ella spoke.

"Certainly didn't have mine just now!" Jacob spat back.

"Let's just forget that and get back to fighting." Silently agreeing, Jacob fought off the remaining few drones while Zeph started to slow down from his rapid assault.

The scythe cut through and buried itself into the drones, killing them almost immediately from the hard blows alone. But the battle came to an end once the final drone blew up, and the team finally had a chance to catch a breath and check their wounds.

A notification bar appeared next to Jacob just as the fight finished.

[Injury warning: Electrical shock and multiple blunt trauma wounds, heavy bruising expected!]

"Nice, we did it!" Ella celebrated, despite having far heavier wounds than Jacob and Zeph, along with having much more wounds visible across her body.

Out of all of them, Zeph was the least injured, only suffering wounds on his arms and nowhere else.

Jacob checked on his stats at the moment, all were the same, having only used 5 energy earlier and nothing else.

"Training successful, Jacob, you seem proficient enough in solo and team combat situations, this will only improve during live combat." Clara congratulated.

"For now we will prepare a transport and combat zone to improve your skill, and perhaps that glitch in your system may enjoy it."

[She knows me well already!$@%] A text box appeared after she spoke.

"We will bring you to a temporary quarters while we analyze our results and find a combat zone, congratulations again to you all." With that, the disguise of the room vanished in an instant, and Jacob could see Clara with the other researchers through the glass.