How to Stop a Missile.

Cain emptied his mana reserves all in one go

'Fuck!'

He felt a little lightheaded, nauseous even, but forced himself. Overusing mana and stamina could have negative effects on the body, and Cain was experiencing them firsthand.

This had happened to him before, but not on the scale he was experiencing now. His muscles spasmed, and throbbing veins appeared on his head, as a terrible headache began building up. But regardless of how bad it was, he forced himself to stay off his feet, eyes wide open as he observed the events that would determine whether he lived, or died.

"Shield of frost!"

"Earthen barrier!"

"Steel Rampart!"

Light blue, grey, and Golden speckles of light gathered from all directions towards Steve's outstretched arms, forming various circular magic rune arrays that rotated around his forearm, down to his fingertips as he conjured up barrier after barrier. All 9 barriers were created in the blink of an eye.

"Alright... I've done my part." Steve wiped down the sweat from his forehead, taking his arms down in the process.

He also looked a bit exhausted as well. Light flashed in his hands as he retrieved a blue MO Regen potion from his inventory, gulping it down in one swig.

"My turn!"

As soon as Steve let his hands drop, David took a knee and placed his hands on the ground.

"Crimson Guard: Bloodline."

A magic array appeared on the ground with his palms as the center. Numerous threads of blood spread out from his hands onto the ground, twisting and twining until they formed a thin, red translucent film. These threads of blood were created from condensed blood elemental energy, not David's blood.

"Done!" David said. Cain observed that rather than an MP Regen potion, David hurriedly retrieved an HP regen potion instead. This got Cain wondering;

'Don't all skills run on mana?'

He kept this new piece of information at the back of his mind for now.

'For now, there are much bigger things to worry about.'

The missile came down when no one expected it...

BOOM!

The resulting explosion immediately caused the metal dome Cain created to cave in, destroying it in an instant. But it still served its purpose, which was to trigger the explosion of the missile.

Once Cain's barrier was destroyed, the first thing that hit them was the extremely bright flash of light accompanying the explosion, followed by the sound waves. Following that would be the intense heat that came with the detonation of an explosive.

Steve's barriers shattered like glass under the impact. He arranged them according to the order Cain had told him to. The first one was the earth attribute barrier, followed by the metal attribute, followed by the frost.

There was a reason why this order was important. The earthen barrier had to come first because it was there to act as a buffer. It would greatly reduce the heat, force, and shockwaves the explosion produced. But that was its main purpose.

The next one had to be metal. Its main function was to absorb and dampen the intensity of the shockwaves coming from the blast, as well as the shrapnel created from the earthen barriers and the explosive.

The last barrier would be the frost barrier. They would absorb the heat generated by the explosion. If all went according to plan, there wouldn't be any need for David's barrier. Cain only had him create it as a fail-safe.

Cain watched as each barrier gave way one after the other. By the ninth barrier, the force of the explosion had dissipated a lot, but the frost barriers didn't do much against the heat. The heat of the blast was just too powerful.

'We are screwed.'

Cain recognized that if David's barrier didn't stand, they would be baked to death without question.

The waves of heat slammed down like hammers onto David's barrier.

"Come on... come on... Please hold out!" David muttered under his breath whilst shaking. His face turned a bit pale, as the barrier was drawing power straight of his health pool.

Cain's eyes narrowed in exhaustion as he racked his brain on what to do. He had never expected a situation like this to play out. One moment, he was about to engage in a life-or-death battle, and the next, his life and death were in the balance.

'How ironic...'

Con steeled his nerves as he began to prepare another failsafe. His mana had regenerated a little, but he noticed that it was doing so a bit slower than usual. That was when he received the system prompt.

{Host is currently facing a mana overdraft due to the complete depletion of mana reserves. The mana regeneration rate is reduced by 50% until the mana pool is returned to 100%.}

'What the hell?! This didn't happen last time. What is going on, system?'

{Replying to host: This is one of the functions of your {Mana Heart}. Previously, you didn't have a mana regulator, hence, you might not have felt these symptoms, but your potential would gradually be eaten away by doing this often if you don't have something to control it. One of the many uses of a mana regulator is to control the mana usage and consumption of the host to prevent any long-lasting side effects}.

'Side effects? What type of side effects?!'

{Replying to host; Further information can be purchased at the system shop...}

'Stupid system!'

{Replying to host; "..." }

'Guess I have to rely on the MP Regen potions. But I only have a few left. They most definitely won't let me recover back to full.'

Each MP and HP Regen potion only recovered 100 points. And Cain had less than 20 of them with him, so there was no way he could recover back to full. Even if he had more of them, there just wasn't enough time to do so.

'I'll do what I can, and leave the rest to fate, I guess...'

Right now, it was done, or die. If David's barrier couldn't hold out, they were all dead...

"I... I can't hold on for much longer... The HP potions recover too little, and the skills' duration is about to expire. I'm sorry!" David said shakily. Blood rolled down from his nose, as he apologized to the rest from the bottom of his heart. He felt as though he had failed them all.

His barrier was about to die out, but it was clear that the flames produced by the explosion were still at large

"It's okay, Mr. David. You've tried your best. I wish I could've helped, but I don't have any defensive skills. I doubt I can absorb this much heat without exploding to death." Blaze said, trying to comfort him, but this only made him feel worse.

"Dumbass," Vincent said as he palmed his forehead.

"No! It was my job to protect your kids, but I failed. I failed terribly. I was too weak. If only I was a bit more powerful, then maybe-"

"Ah, for fuck sake old man. That's enough. You tried your best, so stop letting it eat you up. Do you want to become a restless ghost when you die?!" Vincent said.

He looked up at the top of the Crimson dome with serious eyes, "I doubt there was anything any of us could have done that would stop this. We tried our best."

He turned to look at Cain with sincerity in his eyes, "At least we were given hope. Even if we go down, we'll rest easy knowing we went down fighting."

Manny who had been quiet for some time now finally spoke up, "Well, I have no intentions of dying here. If you like, you can give up. As for me," He drew his blades and a magnificent undying green aura enveloped him.

"I ain't gonna die here."

He intended to fight till the end.

"Hahaha! That's the fucking spirit! I too won't go down without a fight." Vincent said as he retrieved his rifle from his shoulder. Dozens of soft light blue lines appeared on its surface. The aura of roaring seas appeared to envelop him for a split second.

Susan drew her bow and said coldly, "I won't give up as well! I might not be able to do much, but I'd rather die on my feet with pride than die in fear!"

"Hehehe... Seems like no one wants to share grace today." Steve said with a strange chuckle.

"What should we do, Hunter?" Dan raised a brow at Hunter.

"What do you think? Do you want to die here?" Hunter said without looking at him.

Dan traced his eyes to where they were focused on and wasn't surprised to see who they were trained on.

"Keke... Seems like the heartless and cold-blooded killer, Hunter the Hunter, has finally found a worthy opponent." Dan teased with a smirk on his face.

But he didn't expect what would come out of Hunter's mouth.

"Maybe..."

"Eh? Is the world about to end? Did you just admit there is someone you can't defeat?" Dan asked with wide-open eyes.

"Yet... Can't defeat yet..." Hunter said coldly. He turned his gaze away from Cain, before drawing his weapon as well.

A smile tugged at the corners of his face, 'Hohoho... Things are starting to get interesting...'

"Everyone..." David said with shock and embarrassment on his face.

"None of us are going to give up. Not now, not ever." Cain reassured him with a soft expression. Cain could understand all that was going through David's mind. The feeling of not being worthy, of being useless. He could understand it all. He would have been like this as well if not for his fortunate encounter.

"Besides, who said all hope is lost?" Cain said with a grin.

He downed the last of his MP potions, then raised his hands to the skies.

"Metal Creation: Golden Dome of Protection!"

Just like before, a magic circle created from runes appeared on the ground, before a construct of metal sprang out from thin air, creating a protective covering over all of them.

At the same time, David finally gave in to exhaustion, and his skill was deactivated. The crimson dome shattered instantly but was immediately replaced by a golden one.

The waves of heat slammed repeatedly into the golden barrier, threatening to destroy it, but it held out. The inside of the dome began to heat up tremendously, but that was quickly controlled when Dan activated a skill.

"Thanks..." Cain nodded thanks to him.

Dan scratched the back of his head embarrassed, "Hehe, Don't mention it. Really..."

After a while, it all stopped...

They all let out sighs of relief simultaneously...

"We survived!"