Shield Ability

"A traitor of my city…" Ella breathed, disgusted by the sight before her.

"Although not as common, some City P soldiers did join the enemy, not as much as City F fortunately," Calliope added with her arms crossed and holding a tablet.

The three stood in front of the wounded City P soldier, who was slowly starting to regain his bearings and sit upright, still clutching onto the gaping hole in his chest.

As Ella looked on, her face grew from hatred to utter disbelief.

"Joshua!?" She stepped back, confused by what was in front of her.

"Friends?" Clara asked.

"No, the people of our city just know each other deeply." 

To what Jacob can recall, apart from City P being made up of loyal defenders of who they serve, they are also a tightly knit city, where many know each other's names and are normally friends.

"Why did you betray us?!" She pointed her mace at his head, her hand twitched in fury, resisting the urge to bash his skull. The man remained silent, and in a few seconds of no response, Clara raised her mace. 

Clara grabbed onto the mace, stopping her from delivering a killing blow.

"Let Jacob handle it, i wish to see the outcome of this," Clara remarked, ordering Jacob to deal with the City P traitor himself.

Jacob snapped his fingers, revealing the ability he was thinking of trying. But with it, he saw the other stat.

[Soul Thirst: 40/100]

'This thing really can't wait huh?' He thought before he tapped the ability, a text box appeared.

[Ok, just in time for the show. And to see the fair lady] Clara sighed, knowing who he was referring to.

[And for a little extra, i will add a little reward if you can handle taking away their ability.] After the text vanished, a new task appeared above him.

[Use Rip Ability on target: 0/1] 

[Rip out the ability from the screen alright?]

"Yes, glitch in my system," His finger tapped the ability, and his hand began to glow dark green.

Clara sighed, turning away and taking up her phone to avoid seeing it. Clara stood by, eagerly awaiting what would happen next.

Jacob knelt in front of the wounded man, his eyes met Jacob's.

"You people are fighting for the wrong side, we have the greater power!" The man managed to speak with a rough and weak voice, coughing violently. 

As his hand got closer, the screen of the man appeared next to them.

'Rip out the ability from the screen…' Jacob drove his glowing hand into the screen and immediately began to feel a searing pain as the screen began to crack and glitch violently, the man started to struggle, trying to stop Jacob, grunting loudly in pain. 

The pain surprised Jacob, but he continued trying to pull off the ability text from the screen, only causing more pain and struggle from the two. 

"Get off already!" Jacob pulled his hand back with great force, causing the screen to crack and fall to the ground, this time glitching violently as it did. In front of Jacob, the man lay lifeless on the floor.

He looked at his hand, realizing that the cloth and his arm were heavily burnt. Opening it, he found that the text and the green glow from his hand were gone.

Looking at his system, he found a surprise waiting for him.

[Abilities: Harvest, Rip, Shield]

[Objective Completed 300 XP rewarded!]

[Rank 9 progress: 450/1000] 

[Soul Thirst: 100/100] 

"So that's what the soul thirst was about," Jacob remarked, looking at the stats in the screen. A small feeling of joy grew in Jacob as he realized that he gained the shield ability, taking it from the traitor, he could now use it.

"Interesting," Clara noted what she saw down on her tablet. While tapping on her tablet, Zeph called for them.

"We found something from the camp data!" 

—----

The three arrived in one of the burned tents, extinguished and leaving torn cloth and broken communication equipment. But a few info tablets managed to survive the fire. Zeph and Rin rummaged through the remains of the tent, moving chunks of destroyed electronics and other items to the side, he pulled out a few data tablets, to Clara's satisfaction. 

"Interesting," Checking further into its contents, her eyes slowly began to widen.

"A planned bombing of key locations?" She muttered. 

"Grab the remaining info tablets and destroy any equipment left," Clara ordered, smashing a nearby terminal with her bow.

The rest followed, finding any electronic that wasn't burned by the fire, smashing it to bits and finishing their mission.

Jacob sighed a breath of relief, happy to finish a mission to help his city fight back, but also for what just happened earlier.

'So this is what the ability does huh? Ripping abilities from other people, along with the soul thirst thing. oh god does that mean I'm a vampire now!?' Jacob asked himself while Ella stood right next to him, looking off in the distance with a blank stare.

"Are you ok?" Jacob bumped Ella's shoulder, snapping her out of it.

"Oh, I'm fine. Just happy that all this is over," She turned to Jacob, "Say, can that ability even work?" 

"I don't know," Wanting to test out his new power, Jacob tapped into the shield ability on his screen.

[Shield ability cost per use: 20 energy] 

"A bit cheaper than mine, that glitch offers discounts too?" She chuckled.

[Energy: 20/100]

'Hmm, I'm at my limit, but since it's night time I could just get the energy back for free.' Jacob thought.

Jacob could recall that when the day ends, the system's energy automatically resets, only artificially regained with the energy cans.

Jacob pressed the ability again, activating the ability.

On his burned hand, a large circle of yellow started to form, attaching itself and taking shape into a shield similar to Ella's.

"Ooo, awesome!" She examined the shield, activating her own so the two could match it.

"If you want, I can teach you some ways to use the shield effectively." She smirked, nudging Jacob.

"Man, all of this was far more tiring than my training days in the city," Ella yawned loudly, exhausted by everything that just happened today. Jacob shared the same feeling, yawning and scratching his eyes, wishing to hug a pillow and pass out like his academy days.

The rest of the team soon joined with the two, carrying data tablets among other pieces of information they could use. And to their luck, the ship arrived and began to land in front of them.

Its doors opened, letting the team in, leaving the destroyed communications camp, and accomplishing their first mission as a team.