Riding Airatis's Wedge

Lucas smirked. He had already prepared a plan to sabotage their ambition for the core by taking it for himself.

"I better hurry up, or things won't be fun if they kill each other. Hehe."

Lucas was going to go all in this time as he knew those who had survived till now were the best amongst the group.

"There were mentions about the private garage of the king being in the basement, right? Hehe, it's time to take a look at it."

Lucas found the basement easily now that he had learned the Alis language.

He opened the door by swiping a diamond-shaped card, which was actually the master key prepared by King Airatis to use in times of need.

Lucas found the key inside a box lined with smooth cloth. He thought it might be something important, so he grabbed it.

"Guess this key gives me class one access to all Alis facilities."

When the metallic door slid away, what awaited him was a sleek, long black wedge, not too different from the previous one except for the change in color and length.

"Let's see what's inside."

This time, the side panel slid up only when Lucas hovered the master key over it. The interior was quite spacious. Lucas threw Shiv in the back and sat in the front.

Immediately, a screen came up, showing a map. Lucas then typed something on the hovering screen, and the black panel in front started to twist and turn in a cubical manner. It resembled the movement of many pixels, which finally turned out to be two cylindrical sticks hovering in the air vertically. Lucas kept his hands over them, and the car illuminated with white light along its edges, making the interior much brighter.

He then pushed those sticks forward, and the vehicle immediately sped ahead.

"Whoa… this thing is powerful, worthy of a king's ride." After handling the sticks, which acted as the control system of the wedge, Lucas gained some understanding of it.

"Let's rock and roll."

Lucas then drove the vehicle along the main road. The speed of the vehicle was at least three times faster than the earlier one. The vehicle was easy to control and better tuned than the earlier vehicle which Lucas drove.

Lucas started messing around with the control settings of the car and, to his delight, came across the 'engage combat' option after searching through the settings of the wedge.

He pressed it, and the vehicle transformed. The front was still wedge-shaped, but the back trapezoidic part dismantled from the center, and both halves slid along the wedge's right and left sides.

The end result was a black wedge with two sets of four beams at its sides embedded in a rectangular box stuck to the side panels of the vehicle. The vehicle's basic shape still resembled that of a wedge except for the additions at the side panels.

Lucas was now very excited. He wanted to try out the combat systems as soon as possible, so he increased the speed and sped off.

Earlier…

After the big explosion at the base of the central tower, there were 30 survivors. After calming down, 17 assassins decided to climb the tower. As for the rest, some of them were injured due to the explosion, and a few had lost the will to climb and thus took the path of retreat.

The 17 started climbing the central tower, but just as the first guy reached 300 meters, they all heard an explosion. To their horror, they saw a bloodied figure of a man falling down, screaming at the top of his voice. After this, many of them wanted to give up, but then they saw a figure climbing up swiftly, and they took part in the competition again with increased resolve to get the codex.

In the end, four of the climbers died, and three were injured due to the explosions while climbing.

The remaining 10 of them climbed arduously while taking part in small skirmishes from time to time.

The assassins had entered the top room almost at the same time, and when they saw the crystal which matched the codex's images, they couldn't bother themselves with the whereabouts of Lucas and Shiv and started fighting amongst each other. After the battle finally ended, seven had died, and only three remained. These guys were for sure top-class experts.

One of the assassins, looking for an opportunity, grabbed the codex and jumped out of the window from the top floor. The other two decisively gave chase after him, and thus things came down to the present scenario.

The Present Situation…

Two of the assassins at the front were fighting each other while the third one was following them hastily. All three assassins were hitting each other in short bursts. Lucas, who was able to see them from the wide window of the wedge while sitting in his seat, just smiled after looking at the scene. He excitedly activated the combat system, and several graphical indicators in the Alis language came up.

Lucas aimed at one of the assassins.

"Hehe, let's see what these guns can do."

THUD!

The assassins heard a sound and turned around.