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The Path of Nothingness

The higher world has its denizens comprised of the four elements: Life, Death, Space, and Time. The Four Nations who exemplified these Elements lived opposite one another, all dedicated to their particular element. War-torn for years, an outside threat, the Beasts, caused them to come together, but it was too late. Internal strife and differences caused too many differences and they couldn't mount a proper defense. The nonsensical monstrosities overran several of the settlements of those living in the higher world, leaving nothing but death and destruction in their wake, forcing those remaining to dig into the last remaining city and defend it as best they can. Years later, a new group of young soldiers seeks to defend their home, and one of them, a young man named Wesley, carries a power never before seen. The Soldiers don't know what to make of him, but his unique abilities give him an edge over the Beasts in a way that they've not seen before. With his and his allies' power growing from the unnatural effects his unique gifts carry, can he be the one to pave the way for humanity to return?

BrainFrog · Fantasia
Classificações insuficientes
63 Chs

War Waits for No One

The pastel-haired girl moved away from the rest of her allies, coming closer to Wesley and the rest of his group. "I guess you guys had the same idea we did? Coming out toward the Wall just in case, I mean," she clairified, looking from Wesley to the rest of his group.

"Yeah," he agreed, although it was a little awkward for him because he hadn't ever gotten her name. Granted, the reverse was true as well, and she didn't know his name either, but that didn't make it any easier to communicate. "Major Gustave mentioned that we might be needed, and so we decided to come this way."

She smiled easily, nodding at him, before looking past to the rest of his group. "You guys were part of that group that fought with that Beast yesterday morning, right? That was pretty brave of you all."

"Yeah, Wes has a head for strategy, dude. So we followed his lead along and we were able to get in and get out without too much harm. It wasn't easy, but at least we all made it."

The pastel-haired girl nodded, glancing for a moment behind the brothers to Evie and Theodore (while ignoring the death glare she was getting from Sasha). Her gaze lingered on them for a moment, but before she could say anything to them, a voice called from behind her.

"Hey, Serria. Come on- we've got our orders." The speaker was a red-haired young man. He was lean, but there was a sense of skill in the way he carried himself.

The girl, Serria, turned and looked over her shoulder and nodded before she beamed another smile at their group. "Hopefully you keep the same luck with waht's coming up here," she spoke before turning, heading back to follow after the others.

Wesley exhaled slowly. He had actually forgotten about her in the chaos of everything that had followed. Her bright green hair and darker skin tone should have stood out to him in memory, but between nearly getting killed by the Beast and then dealing with everything that had followed with Dr. Tenor... he had almost completely forgotten.

But now he had the name of Serria. Not that he would really do anything with it. She seemed nice, and much like before, even just talking with her had helped to calm his heartbeat a bit that had been rising at the thought of having to fight against a Beast yet again.

"Once this is over, you had better start talking," Sasha spoke, the young woman moving past him, and Wesley watched her go, a slightly confused look on his face. He had seen Sasha's glare toward Serria, but he wasn't really... sure why she was acting that way in the first place.

"Oh man! Did you see her hair!?" Evie crowed as the group made their way toward the command post, the girl's arms held out wide. "I've never seen anyone else with that kind of hair before," she called out. "That was so crazy," she called, seeming to be quite excited about Serria's bright green hair.

Sasha shook her head as they drew closer, but allowed Wesley to take point. "It's probably just dyed anyway. I don't know how you'd get it that color, but I'm sure she did something with it. No one has a natural color like that- I'm sure of it," Sasha grumped, the young woman seeming to be quite put out at the moment.

Wesley was about to say something to her, but he saw his brother coming closer to speak with her, and he took that as his excuse to step away and move to actually start talking to whatever Commanding Officer was on duty at the moment.

As he came closer, he could see a tall, broad fellow who seemed like he'd be far more at home swinging a hammer on a blacksmith's anvil than his current place, which was seated at a desk while hastily writing out what looked like reports on something. "Wesley Ralsten reporting for duty, sir," he spoke, giving a salute to the man. "My Squad is with me."

The large fellow peered up, looking at Wesley with a slight glance. "I'm Major Malik. You're the Twenty-Fiver, right? The rest of your Squad's all over the board, slight lapse in Space, correct?" Malik returned, looking back at the rest of them.

Wesley blinked, a little surprised that the man knew of their entire team that quickly right off the top of his head like that. "That's... correct, yes sir. We only have one Space Framework," he responded.

"You won't be any good at Support..." Malik mused under his breath, the large man thinking for a moment. "I'm going to assign you to Major Ellen's unit," Malik murmured after a moment, jotting something down on a piece of paper, handing the form over to Wesley.

Wesley recalled Major Ellen. She was one of the few who actually knew that he wasn't a Twenty-Fiver, but had the Void Elements. Granted, she also wanted to keep his abilities quiet, which he wasn't certain about, but he hadn't had the presence of mind, then, to actually ask what that had been about. So far, he had just gone along with it because he assumed there was a good reason for it.

The more he'd been thinking about it, hwoever, the more it seemed they were just trying to keep him quiet, which he didn't much care for. But this would actually be a good chance to ask her about things... assuming they weren't too hectic.

"Follow the Wall back this way," Malik murmured, gesturing to his right. That was back the way they'd come. "Take the second set of stairs up the Wall and you should be able to see Ellen and her crew from there. Give her that form and she'll fill you in and assign you," he spoke, and without a moment of hesitation, he added, "Dismissed."

Wes nodded, giving another salute before he came out of the Command Post, which he realized was just set in the very center of the Wall. It wasn't incredibly wide, but it was enough to keep away the Beasts... at least for now. He swallowed at that thought, before looking at the others.

"We've been assigned to Major Ellen. We'll need to head back that way and then they'll put us where we need to go at that time," Wes explained.

Sasha frowned, but didn't say anything. All of the forced moving around was more than a little annoying, but she knew that it couldn't really be helped. "Well let's go find the old bat," she muttered. Much of the bite from her voice was gone in the face of actual danger, it seemed.

"She was someone... with high Space Framework..." Theodore mused as they began to head back the way they'd come at Wesley's lead. "I wonder... if we were assigned... for that reason."

Jay glanced to him, and then his eyes moved over the others for a moment, realizing that none of them (except Sasha) was all that focused in the Space Framework. "Maybe, dude. We could help out somehow though."

Wesley knew that most of the Tier Ones that fought against Beasts either tended to die right away or at least get wounded enough to have to be taken off of the field. The most they could really do was to delay the Beasts, and allow the Tier Two and Tier Threes to come forth and actually do some real damage.

He looked down at his hand, and closed it tightly. If there was a chance to pull in some more Framework from one of the Beasts, he'd take it. Besides, there was no other real option for him. If he was going to get strong enough to actually deal with the Beasts themselves, he would need to rely on his Skills.

"Here's the stairs," Wes called over his shoulder, and the group began to hurry up them, still augmented by the Acceleration from Theodore. Wesley theorized that he could also shrink vertical Space as well as horizontal, but he didn't want to test that when they could very well fall far enough to break limbs.

At the top, he felt a slight wave of vertigo washing over him as he looked down over the Wall itself. It was tall, he knew, but actually seeing down below was something terrifying in its height. He glanced back over his shoulder at Sasha. "Don't look over the edge," he cautioned, having learned she was not the greatest with heights.

The young woman's gaze narrowed in a mild glare at him but she didn't speak further as the rest of them followed Wesley up on the wall, and began to look around a bit.

There were several fights going on down below right now- it seemed like there were more than one Beast fighting at the moment, and that was a little frightening on its own. Wes had always assumed they had attacked one or maybe two at a time, but down below there were several.

"Are you my support?" a voice came from right next to them, and all five turned in surprise at the appearance of Major Ellen. She had appeared flawlessly, without even the slightest hesitation.

"Yes ma'am," Wesley responded, saluting and handing over the missive that Malik had given him but moments ago. "What's the situation?"

A grim smile moved over her face. "Bad. But now we're going to start turning the tide."

Serria seems an interesting sort. I wonder where she'll crop up in the future...

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