“Vacation’s over,” Alex said, her voice even more crisp than usual as it traveled through my Communication Amulet. “Meet at Rebirth City, ASAP. The second Zone Lord is attacking.”

Alex ended the call before I had time to ask, “What vacation.”

I was still dazed when I took the call. I had spent most of the night trying to fall asleep, with a lingering splitting headache that Samantha claimed to be unable to fix.

Believe it or not, I wasn’t all that bothered that the A.I. in my head—the same A.I. that I relied on to keep me alive on a daily basis—had tortured me in front of my family and then tried to have me kill my sister. I just felt… numb after what was well and truly a shit week and a half.

Samantha, of course, denied that she was responsible for anything. She had said, repeatedly,

A new Zone Lord was almost a relief, compared to dealing with Petra and Samantha at each other’s teeth. Despite this new tension, I was confident that Samantha would do her best to help me take down this new Zone Lord.

Lord Ignatius’ throne room had turned into a briefing room. Alex stood where Lord Ignatius’ throne used to be.

The room was full of people. I could see Hank, Amos, Parker, Petrov, Vasilia, Adia, Uman, Ethan, and many more. Many of the faces were familiar, from my time in the Crucible, but many were not.

There was even an Abelino clone standing in the corner of the room.

Needless to say, the room was brimming with mana and clashing auras.

Conversation died down when Alex chanted a spell briefly, and a bird’s eye view of Rebirth City appeared in front of us.

There were several gasps, as what was literally a flying mountain slowly approached Rebirth City. I could see trees, many of them collapsed, dotting the mountain’s sides. There was snow, at the peak of the mountain, as well.

In the image in front of us, we could see Dawnbreaker flying around the mountainside. It looked almost as if she were being pushed away from the mountain, unable to close in or step foot on the flying mountain.

Dawnbreaker lashed out with her sword, a blade of white light continuing past her sword, slicing directly through a good portion of the mountain. Some dirt and rocks fell, but for the most part, the section that she had attacked stayed flying.

“We are fighting a gravity manipulator,” Alex explained. “The mountain peak is teeming with high-level creatures, and the Zone Lord is likely hiding among them. Whenever Dawnbreaker tries to draw close, gravity increases many times over on her, slowing her down considerably. We predict that, if the mountain reaches above Rebirth City, the Zone Lord will drop the mountain directly on us, wiping out the city and its defenses in a single blow.”

“Fucking hell,” I heard someone mutter behind me.

“Dawnbreaker has dropped several Teleportation Stones around the mountainside. Due to the relatively normal monsters present on the mountainside, we believe that once we reach the mountain itself, gravity should resume to normal. As you may be able to tell, there is something of a gravity field surrounding the outside of the mountain, that makes it hard to approach via flight, and that is also capable of disrupting physical long-range attacks.

“The teleporters will leave in sixty seconds. If you are not interested in teleporting, please leave the room. We will break into three groups. Your goal once you land on the mountainside is to quickly find the location of the Zone Lord and notify everyone else once you have. You are not required or expected to engage the Zone Lord.”

Alex started listing off who would be in what group, and I realized time was a lot shorter than I had anticipated. I raised my voice, calling out, “Alex, I need the Spiritual Traveler and Soul Explosion skills. They will make this battle much easier.”

Alex looked annoyed. “Those skills are in the treasury. The Teleportation mages leave in 30 seconds. There’s no time. Find your group, and get ready to depart.”

We quickly broke into pre-assigned groups.

The groups were large enough that they didn’t actually matter that much who was in what group.

Everyone who didn’t think they could survive a thousand foot fall was encouraged to stick with teleporters, for their own benefit.

Everyone who was comfortable with the thought of falling a thousand feet was encouraged to rush through the mountainside, scouting quickly.

Left unstated was that nobody really knew what kind of greeting we would receive the moment we landed. We could hope that the Gravity Lord, as Alex was calling it, was focusing all of its mana on just keeping the mountain floating, so that hopefully it wouldn’t have anything special planned for our arrival.

Samantha said, in my head.

There were only a few second left, so I shouted out the information that I could to the group. “You’re looking for a Gravity Leech buried in the middle of the mou—”

I didn’t have time to finish my sentence.

The teleportation mages finished their spells, and after a brief white flash, I found myself on a mountainside, accompanied by seven or eight people.

There were no monsters attacking us immediately, and no unbearable gravity pressing us down, so that was already a good start to the battle.

I immediately went over to Petrov and Vasilia. They were already branching off from the rest of the group, heading up towards the peak of the mountain.

It didn’t take much for me to catch up with them.

“Petrov! Vasilia. Let’s work together,” I said.

“No,” Petrov said, immediately. He had upgraded his equipment recently—he wore a D-rank robe, and held a D-rank wand, which was half-way pointed towards me. “Leave us.”

I took out the Earth Magician Class Change book that I had collected from the Imperial Scouts, and tossed it to Vasilia. “I hope we can come to a deal.”

Earth Magician (D-rank class): Grants Earth Magic Affinity. Teaches Earth Manipulation. +2 Mana Pool/level; +2 Mana Regeneration/level.

“I want it,” Vasilia said, immediately.

“No,” Petrov said. “We cannot trust him. Give it back.”

I tossed a skill book to Petrov. “I just want you both to help me dig to the center of the mountain. That’s all.”

Hydro Drill (D-rank): Create a high-pressure jet of water that excels at dealing heavy damage to stationary targets. Requires Water Affinity. Cost: 10 mana/second.

“Nothing is simple,” Petrov said. “If my daughter dies, then you die.”

“And if my father dies, you die,” Vasilia said, staring at me defiantly.

“Agreed,” I said. “We don’t have much time. Learn your classes and skills.”

I killed the few creatures that wandered nearby easily. As I did, I searched the mountain with my Mana Sensing.

There was mana in the plants around me, mana in the monsters that were approaching us, and most of all, mana in a sphere around the mountain, similar in appearance to a Mana Shield—a wall of mana whose purpose was to mess with gravity, making it hard to enter the mountain.

The mountainside itself was thick with mana. Thick enough that I couldn’t see what was in the middle of the mountainside.

I followed Samantha’s best prediction, though, leading Vasilia and Petrov slightly up the mountainside.

The further up the mountain we climbed, the more numerous and deadly the monsters were.

There were Porcuspines, Rocs, Stickles, Stone Bears, and Velociraptors, all gathered on this mountainside. The Porcuspines were the most annoying for me, since I didn’t have an easy way to protect against their ranged attacks.

We blazed our way through them easily. Petrov and Vasilia letting me do the brunt of the work.

I couldn’t help but notice that Petrov rarely killed the monsters. He would pin them to the ground with his icicles, letting Vasilia deal the finishing blow.

“Use less mana!” Petrov grunted towards Vasilia, when Vasilia smothered a Porcuspine in the earth. “One Earth Spike, is all you need. Anything more is wasteful.”

We forged ahead for just a few minutes.

Already, I could tell that the monsters on the mountainside were gathering en masse, readying to swarm our group.

Samantha had led us towards the face of a rocky cliff ahead of us, a steep enough incline that required more bouldering skills than actual walking.

“Start digging now,” I said, repeating Samantha’s instructions. No matter how I felt about her, I knew that we both wanted the Zone Lord dead. “Dig at a slight incline so the water will flow down.”

With Vasilia’s D-rank Earth Manipulation, she was able to directly dig out a tunnel with a simple wave of her hands.

Unfortunately, her mana pool was limited. She dug out a tunnel about twenty feet long through solid rock, before she ran out of mana.

Then Petrov took over, activating his Hydro Drill that turned the rock in front of us into slush.

Meanwhile, I watched our backs, making sure that any monsters that tried to follow us through the tunnel we were digging met a swift demise.

It didn’t take long before we encountered a second wall of mana. A wall of mana that pressed us away, as though gravity itself were pulling us back out of the tunnel.

About 10 feet from the Gravity Shield, as Samantha called it, we could first feel the resistance. I had to dig in foot holds and hand-holds in the wall in order to approach past 8 feet, and even then, I felt an intense pressure pushing me away, wearing away at my muscles.

For some reason, the dirt and rocks around us seemed unaffected by this gravity shift. I dug my sword into the ground, to gain purchase. Vasilia buried her feet in the ground as well, and Petrov dug ice-covered hands into the ground as well.

With Mana Sensing, I was able to sense a powerful, vibrant signature not far past the wall.

“It’s just past this gravity field,” I said. “We’re almost there!”

“How much further?” Petrov asked.

“Just 20 more yards!”

Petrov took out a Teleportation Stone from his backpack and handed it to me. “Good luck. I just contacted Dawnbreaker. Wait here for her. We will try to help the others survive the landing.”

Petrov turned to Vasilia, holding out his arms. “Let’s go.”

“But I want to—”

“Now.” Petrov flashed his aura slightly, and Vasilia wilted, jumping up into Petrov’s arms.

“Wait—” I called, half-heartedly.

Petrov ignored me. Thin blades appeared underneath his boots, running from toe to heal, and he kicked off, the muddy earth below his feet freezing into a thin, perfectly slick layer of ice.

Petrov skated away easily on literal ice skates, incredibly quickly, holding Vasilia in his arms.