Chapter 78

I kept checking on the snake as I made my way back to the portal but it seemed content with its meal.

As soon as I reached the portal I found that only Micheal, Courtney, Chewy, and my three girls were the only ones waiting on this side of the portal. As soon as I stopped beside my girls Karen hit me in the shoulder. "That was stupid Daryl! Don't ever do something that reckless again!" She admonished me while glaring angrily at me. Caly didn't seem to be very happy either.

"How is Grace?" I asked Caly in an attempt to change the topic.

"She's fine, don't try and change the topic." Caly told me.

"Leave it for later. There are others we can save while the beasts are distracted." I told them.

The girls didn't seem happy about that but they didn't say anything else.

"Did you find the snake?"' Aura asked as she appeared by my side.

"It has a stealth ability or something like it. It is coiled up in the rafters over the twisted we just killed." I told them as I glanced back to confirm the snake's location. "It seems content to eat those twisted so it would be best if we don't mess with it"

"You can see it?" Aura asked.

I nodded. "One of my abilities." I told her. "From what I could see, the snake is huge and it seems to be pretty intelligent."

"Did you want to tame it?" Micheal asked.

I shook my head. "No way, it seems to be fairly intelligent. It would be hard to forcibly tame it to a safe level, and after that cat" I said then let it drop. "I would prefer to not mess with it at all if we could."

"You know we won't be able to loot this place if it stays here. Especially if you are the only one who can see it when it is in stealth." Micheal reminded me.

I nodded. "I know." I said with a sigh. "But let's focus on rescuing the other people first. There is no telling how long we have before those monsters decide to go human hunting. Worst case scenario all the beasts will realize fighting each other isn't as great an idea as hunting the weak humans." I told them.

"He is right. I can hear the scaled wolves eating, but the sounds of fighting from the other beasts has quieted down." Chewy spoke up from beside Courtney.

An angry hiss drew my attention back to the snake. Its head was poking out of its coils and glaring at an enormous tarantula that had climbed up the wall of the produce section. By my best guess the spider looked to be between ten and fifteen feet in length. It was hard to tell given the distance and how the legs bent. It was not nearly as overwhelming in size as the snake, but still worthy of nightmares.

Hearing the hiss from the snake the tarantula paused in its movement.

"Chewy do you think the spiders won?" I asked worriedly.

"I don't smell much blood. Maybe the spiders were driven back?" Chewy replied.

"We need to hurry." I told Micheal and the others. "There are three groups still in hiding…" I started but was soon interrupted.

"Master, someone is coming." Delilah reported from my shadow.

I frowned then looked around. As the tarantula and snake continued in their silent face off a small group of people appeared from around some shelves. They were all hunched over and moving as quickly as they could.

'Where are these ones from?' I asked Aura mentally.

'Jewelry.' she replied back mentally.

'Go see if they left anyone behind.' I told her mentally.

Aura disappeared from my side. Micheal and the others noticed her disappearance but didn't say anything as we watched the other humans approach. There were only five people in the group. Two teenages, an older man, and a man and woman who looked to be in their early thirties.

Micheal stared at the group for a moment as they approached, "This way." he called out to them as quietly as he could while ensuring they heard him.

The group glanced in our direction and seemed relieved to see us. They hurried over and Micheal gestured them through the portal.

As they went by I examined all of their cores. Four of the five weren't awakened but the old man had awakened a green core. Once they had gone through the portal I moved to Micheal's side and whispered the fact that the old man was awakened. I had no idea what his abilities were, but at least we wouldn't be surprised that he had some.

Micheal nodded then whispered to Courtney who went through the portal. To my surprise Chewy stayed with us on the store side of the portal.

Aura appeared a moment later. "No one was left behind." Aura reported to me.

I nodded. That was a few points in their favor. Unfortunately that left two other groups left to save.

"Caly do you know any way to use our abilities during this storm?" I asked.

Caly shook her head. "No, external abilities are no good, too much of a chance of it backfiring or failing. Internal and mental abilities aren't affected though." she told me.

"Mental?" I asked remembering the fear I felt from the snake. While I knew part of it was the natural reaction to facing an enormous snake, part of it felt artificial and was squashed by my mind guard ability. Was it able to do that because it was a mental ability?

"Yes, mental abilities form in your mind then are sent out once completed so the crazed mana from the storm can't affect them." Caly explained.

That kind of made sense, not really but I wasn't going to argue with her on it. The snake was able to do it so I could too. My bond ability was a mental ability right? While I still wasn't really big on the idea of taming another beast, if it was the only option I had, besides punching them in the face, it was worth a try. It would depend on the situation though.

Wait! I realized I had been completely overlooking one of my abilities, and while it wasn't lethal it could be a great boon in our current situation.

Angry hissing distracted me from my thoughts and drew my attention back to the snake and tarantula. As soon as I did my blood ran cold.

While the snake and tarantula were having a staring contest the other spiders had somehow snuck up on the snake. Now there were ten black spiders that looked to be around five to ten feet in length climbing all over the snake.

The snake quickly struck out and swallowed one of the spiders, but the other nine didn't seem bothered by the death of their comrade. Instead they kept crawling over the spider. After a moment I noticed that the spiders were wrapping the snake in webbing and while it was able to rip the webs as it moved, the ripped webs still stuck to the snake and hindered its movements.

After a couple of minutes the snake had killed two more spiders but was halfway covered in webs. It had tried to run away, but the webs slowed it down so much that it made the act pointless.

I pulled my gaze away then my blood ran cold as I realized that the oversized tarantula had disappeared.

"Girls, I need to know what is going on with the other beasts." I called out urgently then motioned for everyone to get closer to the portal. While I knew Bill and them wanted to save more people to add to our numbers, I wasn't going to fight a losing battle.

There was a loud thunderclap that startled all of us. It seemed so close that even the spiders paused in their work before they continued wrapping the snake in webs. Then a moment later there was another thunderclap just as loud as the first. It was quickly followed by a third and fourth. I shivered as I felt the mana in the air becoming more unstable with every thunderclap.

Then I nearly jumped out of my own skin as Aura appeared by my side. A fifth and six thunderclap followed her appearance so I couldn't hear anything she said.

'Master the fox and its coyotes have been wrapped in webbing. There are a few spiders guarding them, but another five are heading towards the back with the tarantula.' Aura finally reported to me telepathically when she realized I couldn't hear her speaking aloud.

I nodded to show I heard her.

'That's not all, we can't find the scale wolves.' Aura added.

I frowned, 'did they leave the building?' I asked telepathically.

'I don't know. Ariel and Enya went to peek outside.' she replied.

I frowned but didn't know what else to do.

More thunderclaps came, each one louder than the last. I had no idea what was going on and it was starting to freak me out.

Then there was an exceptionally loud thunderclap that seemed to shake the air. The mana in the air all started to fly around like sugar crazed toddlers. Then it was blessedly silent. Just as I was about to relax the lights went out. A moment later the battery operated emergency lights came on but even with those emergency lights on, the store was creepily dark. Add that to the fact that oversized spiders were crawling around the building and I was ready to be done. Go through the portal and close it behind me.