Know When to Retreat

Brance stayed silent as he stood back up and held up a small brass ring. Looking curiously at the ring in his bother's hand, the synapses in Cynrik's brain began to link up at lightspeed. Recognizing what the ring was, Cynrik instantly got up and started moving from corpse to corpse collecting similar rings. Of course, they weren't all the same color as the one Brance had, but each one had the same function.

He had overlooked a simple fact and was mentally beating himself up for it each time he collected another ring. Although everyone in Vinestra had access to a system-based inventory, it didn't necessarily mean their Inventory had unlimited space. Generally, people would want a way around this flaw; these items Cynrik was collecting were exactly that workaround. Between technological advancements and the magic-like abilities of Elemental Affinities, humanity eventually created small equipment that could store a small dimensional space within them. This equipment came in a nearly infinite amount of wearable fashions, but the most generic one happened to be Pocket Rings or, being the weeb he was, Cynirk just called them spatial rings.

Quite flustered by his oversight Cynrik bounced around like a small rabbit and within a few seconds had collected all six of the remaining rings and stored them in his Inventory. {Good catch. I completely forgot these things existed. I'll hold onto your share until we get out of here, so stuff that one in your Inventory. We will sort out their contents later.}

Brance gave his older brother a strange look; he couldn't help but be confused about how he had completely overlooked the existence of Pocket equipment, Tv ads for them ran every other commercial. Still, instead of dwelling on it, he chose to keep his focus, for he had noticed the over twenty Mana Signatures that were racing towards them. {What do you wanna do with the bodies, Cyn?}

Clicking his tongue, Cynrik didn't answer right away and instead took a moment to look over their handy work. He was proud of how far they had come. Staring out over the seven corpses and pools of blood, he realized this was their first time in actual combat since they had been reincarnated. HBTC aside, they had grown up fighting with a multitude of replica swords on Earth. Now, here they were fighting with REAL swords, not the virtual ones. Although the HBTC could replicate everything to near perfection, there was still a fundamental difference between fighting in there and fighting in the real world.

The two of them had grown up in the 90s, and early 2000s, an era known for its action anime shows about wandering swordsmen or even Shinigami who wielded swords; there were even multiple films about sword fighting as well.

Watching these series and films, Cynrik and Brance had spent the bulk of their childhood emulating the fighting styles they watched. The two had spent countless hours in the backyard flinging around plastic or wooden swords; as they got older, they would move from the ground while fighting up to their trampoline and bounce around while fighting in the air. This was all done while in bodies no bigger than the ones they currently had, the only difference being their lack of the Tobs. This form of play fighting carried on well into their adulthood, as they moved away from using cold weapons; instead, they started learning different types of hand-to-hand martial arts. Over time their play fighting was slowly transformed into unique fighting styles.

Ever since they had reincarnated into Vinestra, they had spent their nights training these same fighting styles, be it shadow sparring or just wrestling around in their room; it couldn't be said they were only training their Affinities. If you add all the physical enhancements induced by Tobs, they could be on par with adults regarding combat experience. Cynrik and Brance had tirelessly planned and devised different ways to integrate their Affinities and stat boost into said fighting styles. Their time in the Hyperbolic Time Chamber only escalated things further.

Where before they couldn't go all out, in the HBTC, they couldn't even really die; this allowed the two to put themselves to the test and see how far they could go. Their theories became fact, as they reworked over and over how to move their bodies with their stat increase effectively while integrating all their previous knowledge, turning what they once only viewed as fantasy into reality. The result of all this training was the seven corpses laying feet away.

{That went better than we could have imagined, alright, get back in place; we've got another batch of mobs coming;} dusting himself off and using his black rob to clean the blood off his face; Cynrik moved back to his hidden corner. Following suit Brance, moved back opposite of his brother into his one hiding spot.

Once in place, Cynrik pooled up a little mana and shot out several miniature BlackFire balls towards the tracks they created since they were covered from head to toe in blood. When the fireballs came in contact with these childish footsteps, they disintegrated immediately, effectively removing the trail they had created while walking to their corners.

As the last footprint vanished, Cynrik snapped his fingers, extinguishing the flames, and pulled up his Stats to check his Mana consumption. As expected, he had drained his Mana pool down to only 40 points. 'I need to get better at micromanaging my MP. It's still too low to go wild.' Heaving a sigh, he pulled out one of the six Mana potions he had bought from Saylin.

Instead of what he expected from a fantasy world, the clear liquid potion wasn't stored in a glass flask. Instead, what Cynrik was holding was no different from a mini water bottle from Earth, only instead of spring water, it contained a solution that would instantly recover 120 MP.

Brance watched as Cynrik unscrewed the white plastic lid and sniffed the Mana potion hesitantly. Earlier, when Cynrik had tossed him his sword and shield, Brance found three similar bottles on top of his shield. But, unlike Cynrik, Brance was significantly better when it came to managing his Mana expenditures, so at the moment, he was still close to a full tank when it came to his MP.

After sniffing the potion several times, Cynrik tossed his head back and downed the whole bottle in one gulp before burping loudly. {Yum, tastes like bubblegum;} feeling the fluid reach his stomach, a warm sensation spread out through his body before reaching his Codex.

  -You have consumed a Basic Grade Mana Potion-

  -You have recovered 120 Mana Points-

Cynrik read the notifications blankly, sighed softly, and shared the information with Brance. {Welp, that was pretty lackluster.} Brance scoffed at his brother's antics and continued monitoring the situation above them.

Upstairs, Myer led a large team of slaves down to the cells. Less than five minutes had passed since he received a distress signal from the group leader he sent downstairs. Unfortunately, before he could get any reliable information, the beacon went dark, indicating the person had died. In a short time, an entire team of seven slaves had been killed. The only thing he was sure of at that moment was that they would be up against some unknown entity.

Back downstairs, with bated breath, the two boys watched as a total of 23 Mana Signatures of all different colors were making their way towards them.

Cynrik quickly recognized that these people were stronger than the previous group solely based on the strength of the Mana fluctuations radiating off their Codexes. The stronger a person was, the more intense their Mana signatures would appear in his Mana Sight. So to fill the time it took the enemies to appear, he was shuffling about quietly, warming up his joints for a real battle, while Brance was doing something similar. Their last fight was too quick and unsatisfying for Cynrik, so he was getting pumped up.

Cynrik observed the new arrivals as they slowly made their trek down the stairs at a quickened pace. The closer they got, the more precise the Mana fluctuations became and the more tense Cynrik got.

Making eye contact with Brance, who was radiating an antsy demeanor similar to himself, Cyrnik quickly reevaluated his plan. Severely outnumbered and out leveled, Cynrik could only come to two conclusions. First, they could bank heavily on being underestimated due to their age and try pulling off the previous strategy, or option two was to slip off up the stairs stealthily.

{Brance, listen, even if we ignore the level difference here, we are still severely outnumbered; I'm counting over 20 of these guys, while the last group only had seven. If we try ambushing them in these close quarters, not only will we get surrounded, but I'm sure you wouldn't like to accidentally kill a kid or two as collateral damage.}

TAP TAP TAP

Hearing the myriad of footsteps coming from the stairwell, Cynrik made his decision and activated ShadowVeil, covering himself and Brance, {wait for them to go near the bodies, then we dash up the stairs.} Shaking his head in defeat, Brance could only agree to the tactical retreat and looked down the hall of cells one last time, just as the first wave of enemies stepped off the stairs.

"Spread out and move as one" The man in charge began barking out orders with a raspy voice as he saw the corpses of his former lackeys.