“Where is everyone?” a blonde-haired young man with golden stripes on his uniform speaks out. He looks at the crowd before him. There’s over 50 people but the space could accommodate hundreds more.

“They’re probably all dead. The casualty rates for this operation are immense, I can’t believe they approved it.”

“That’s not our place to think about. Now we’re here to do an important job for our shared benefactor. Are we still able to complete the mission? Who is in charge of this?”

A woman with glasses steps forward, she pushes up her glasses and holds a clipboard out. She taps it a few times before a large projection comes out.

A holographic display from the clipboard lightens up and reveals a large room. Thousands of creatures are crouching before a platform, many high and low stage creatures are all bowing towards a small group on top of a central platform.

The 4 gigantic creatures are on the central platform, three humanoid and one serpent-like powerful creatures, they too are crouching towards the diamond-prism structure behind them.

“We are waiting for them to complete the ritual, we will have to retrieve the item and escape quickly,” a few people snort while the glasses woman continues to speak, “we have just a single chance at this, the losses that have been sustained means that we just barely have adequate stations in operation.”

“These beasts are strong, there’s also the possibility of reinforcements.”

A few of the people snort again, “Those things are strong?” one of them says.

“Don’t be fooled, these are not your usual beasts. These are the elites, the elites of the war-beast Gy. Each of them has been tried on the battlefield already, Gy would not leave them here otherwise.”

“Gy? Where is he? Why didn’t Marty tell us that he’s involved in this mission? No wonder the casualties are so high.”

The people of the group have many changing expressions upon hearing that name, the glasses woman continues to speak.

“Gy is currently preoccupied with the main fleet several days from here. He would usually be here if he weren’t delayed. He has left behind his 4 elite captains under the command of an unknown new beast, we are to acquire information on the unknown if possible.”

“Why don’t I see that new beast on the display?” the blonde-haired man says.

“Terence, you will not see that until you acquire data on it.”

“Oh right. I knew that” the blonde-haired man smiles at the glasses woman, she blushes and continues to speak.

“We are to wait until the ritual is underway, the prism will open revealing the target. We are to retrieve it in the secure case. You are to not touch it, it will kill you instantly.”

“What are the beasts doing?”

“They are doing a ritual. They are attempting to bind the spirit of the life form in the egg to a universal donor egg on the outside.”

“How does that work?”

“Only the higher ups work, we’re here for a job. We need to retrieve either of the eggs.”

“Either? How are we meant to get the other one? Isn’t it enclosed within the ancient protective casing?”

“They have provided us with weapons that should be able to pierce through the casing but first we need to weaken the structural integrity of the building” the glasses woman presses something on the clipboard.

The room shakes slightly, a few of the people laugh.

“They buried those pretty deep. What about the beasts? Aren’t they going to know something is up and find us?”

“Do not worry, 85% of all patrolling forces have been dealt with while we have killed the remnants with that explosion. It would have been 99% if we hadn’t lost 88% of forces before phase 2.”

“Good, burnt beasts. They all deserve to be dead, those useless wastes and savages too.”

—

Sam holds the shield out before him. It covers his body as fire surrounds it.

Sam’s body is heavily thrown backwards, first he was hit by Benny then the large explosive fire that burst out from the hallway that Sam was just in. .

Sam almost feels grateful for Benny giving him the shield moments earlier but he’s now concerned with his own situation, he’s falling down a deep dark pit and it seems like the ground is quickly approaching.

He moves the shield to below his feet and hopes that this will allow him to survive the impact, he tries to force the string out like he originally could but it’s not working as his body’s energy gets strangely hot.

*BANG*

Sam collides with the wall, slowing him down but not enough, heavily hurting his shoulder and ribs.

He winces and holds back the pain as he prepares himself for what's next. The shield skims against the smooth wall as he falls down, his speed has slowed down even further at the sacrifice of a large part of his upper body’s skin.

That’s not all,

*BANG*

“FFFFFFFFFFFF–

Sam can feel his legs break after hitting the hard ground, he nearly passes out from the pain but he grits it and looks upward.

“FUCK!”

Sam drags the shield from under him with his one good arm.

*BANG*

He doesn’t make it in time, a red light appears around him when fire from above appears blasting down.

It covers him and the thing that fell from above, the badly charred remains of Benny.

Sam is knocked out and badly wounded.

*Screeeech*

Sam touches his nose, his nose is bleeding as he looks around.

“Wait… wasn’t I just badly hurt?”

He looks around confused, he’s on a red platform.

Sam looks over at the side and spots the familiar timer, it’s already counting up.

Sam knows from previous tricks, he feels around his pockets and remembers that he doesn’t have the stopwatch yet feels a relief that he doesn’t when remembering that fact.

“It was the only form of sanity I had…” he mutters while walking over to the timer, it doesn’t have any text below warning of consequences so it’s a different place at the least.

He rubs his finger along the surface of the timer and lifts it, “No dust?”

Sam looks above and notices several windows, high up on the wall with hundreds of cameras moving about. Many of them have flashing lights but no one is controlling them, there’s no one to be seen at all.

“It’s different, so… maybe I’m not going insane. I’m just somehow not hurt and in this place…”

Sam laughs to himself to keep his sanity before walking to the door, it slides open revealing a dark room that quickly lightens itself to… nothing.

‘Stop’

Sam waits for the shimmer and walks into the room, he inspects everywhere that he can but there’s nothing in this room except many stone tiles that cannot lift away. He returns to the door and normal time, no obvious traps, means he can only try it.

Cautiously, he walks inside wary of anything that will appear out of the sides, the door shuts behind him as a voice comes over the room.

“Prime Specimen #P-Y3 Alpha. Result needed, 830. Test subject: 000000000000001, commencing.” a female robotic voice speaks in a rigid tone.

“What? Result?”

A flap on the wall opens, it’s small no bigger than his hand. Sam looks inside it after walking to it and can see some sort of glass lens. It looks like a camera.

Sam suddenly pulls himself away from the lens as a beam of light appears, shooting straight to the other side of the room in a concentrated but straight, unmoving beam. A blinding yellow and white lasts for a moment before it stops.

. He looks to where it landed. The spot glows bright red for a moment then folds down like cloth revealing a mirrored-surface.

“1,” the robotic voice announces.

A flap falls down on another wall, *ZZZ*

Two beams of light appear, the initial one and the new one both fire at the same time. The mirrored surface reflects the beam onto the wall at random but missing Sam by a wide margin.

Two flaps fall down on the wall where they’re glowing bright red, revealing yet more mirrored surfaces

“2”

Another flap falls down on the wall, Sam lets out a quiet sigh and begins the process.

Some time passes, countless number of holes appear on the wall as if it's an assortment of mirrors and lasers. Sam has sweat pouring down his body from exertion, a trickle of blood coming down from his nose.

“665”

One more flap falls down, Sam looks at where it falls. It’s right in his secure zone.

*ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ*

Countless beams fly through the air, they countless collide with mirrors and bounce around colliding with more mirrors on the other surfaces, a dazzling sparkle happens as several beams collide together which is when,

‘Stop’

Sam staggers on his feet as he looks forward. These beams once they reflect more than 10 times they somehow combine and create a sort of heavy mass that sucks him towards it.

It even affects him through the stop period, Sam quickly gets away from the mass that he refuses to call a black hole entering the safe spot.

*ZZZ*

The beams stop as he is left panting in the few remaining safe zones.

More flaps fall down as the room expands by itself, “666”.

Sam stands up and focuses himself, “Ok let’s go.”

This process repeats itself until finally.

“999.”

Sam watches everywhere for the beams in this giant room, it’s not the first time it has shifted so he knows where to stand. The beams sizzle the air as they fly about, the scene would be beautiful as they all combine together into a single several times over but they create a large mass that pulls him in.

3 of them combine together while Sam is on the other side of the room, three more combine creating a large one before the final four are sucked into the gigantic mass but just as they’re about to combine together.

The room becomes dark as beautiful explosions of pure energy go off, almost like stars coming into life for a moment, then dying in a burst of heat.

All the lights flicker to life, revealing a mostly clean room, much larger than he started with except with a few scorch marks confirming what has in fact happened.

“Due to energy requirements being higher than 3.14E49, test is unavailable with current power restrictions.”

A red wall slides away, revealing a red platform.

Sam blinks several times, “Do I pass or is there more testing? What is going on?”

Nothing. The room is silent.

He walks onto the platform after being left with no other choice, everything shimmers and he’s taken to a new area, he expects to see the familiar red circle on the ground but doesn’t.

Sam looks around, there’s a glass roof that’s very triangular, like it’s going up to a point. It’s entirely pitch black on the other side of the glass. He looks closely at the glass and spots that it’s actually something moving on the other side of the glass.

He walks forward a step and an orb that looks like a monster egg floating above the ground appears before him. There’s nothing else that has appeared, so he touches it.

His eyes suddenly go wide, ‘Ah shit, I forgot to use it…’

The egg transforms into a black liquid and binds itself around his skin before invading beneath it. His skin feels like it's being torn apart and replaced before another layer is torn up and replaced, this feeling travels down to bones and even further.

He would yell in pain but the black substance has immobilised his body, “Compatible secondary mind found, operation begin!”

Sam can feel his body returning to normal, he wants to look at his body more but he doesn’t have time as above him he can hear glass shattering.

He looks up and spots the liquid falling down on him, it’s a dark liquid but he’s more worried about the black wiggling masses in it.

One of the masses flies towards him with incredible speed, it swings around and comes back from another angle. Sam dodges it both times but finds it hard underwater, he’s holding his breath looking for anything that looks different or out of the ordinary in this unusual situation.

He spots a glowing white wiggling mass.

Sam makes a mad dash for the different mass, it avoids him while all the black ones try to attack him.

He dodges with great difficulty, not letting a single one touch him and corners the white mass, somehow ever since this black substance touched his skin his only thought is this task, he knows that he needs to get this white mass.

Sam reaches out and touches this white mass which sends a jolt of signals all over his body accompanied by a waft of energy, energy from the outside that is coursing into his body, yet not his mana-cloud...

The white mass and the monster egg orb seem to communicate, the black liquid shifts colour into a pure white as it comes out and forms a layer over his skin changing his appearance.

His skin turning in to an alien-like appearance with an artificial leather substance, large reflective crystal-like structures appear on his joints, his head is entirely smooth with his nose disappearing.

He looks at all the masses around him, he’s about to move forward when suddenly,

*SPLASH*

Sam looks downward and notices the ground is falling away, he hears a screeching noise come over his mind as he feels like he’s falling.

*BANG*

Sam punches out, giant thin spikes come out of his fist and embed themselves into the walls surrounding him kicking up dust disappearing in an instant.

A familiar red glow of the platform is around him. Sam feels a tremendous headache hit his mind as his body suddenly feels hot.

He looks internally and notices a transparent white dome surrounding his mana cloud… but his mana cloud isn’t a cloud any more as it’s shrinking, becoming almost solidified in the process. The devourer is hiding itself as the mana cloud is collapsing ever smaller.

Sam feels excited about this, it means that he’ll be able to reach stage 1 once he cracks the pure mana orb and creates the first mana thread, once it connects to the first ML-Gate this will bring down a mana-field and the ether.

Simple.

This first ML-Gate will typically become the gate to invoke the mana passage/field through the ether, the thread will seek it out and provide a connection initially. There’s just 1 more recommendation to wait for.

Sam looks around at where he is and feels speechless, he’s at a testing chamber again but this one is old, broken down and abandoned compared to the last one. Broken windows, swampy floors with mould and algae.

That’s not all though, the charred remains of a body atop a shield is to one corner while there are flame scorch marks everywhere.

Sam looks to where the testing door is and notices a door sealed shut, an orange flashing light is above it. He looks upwards before noticing that his skin is still that strange alien white skin suit look.

He rubs his arms and feels his face, it’s weird yet comfortable as he feels himself up even his eyes can be touched. His abilities feel enhanced, but this space doesn’t feel safe.

Sam walks over to the body and confirms the identity, it’s Benny. He had many goods on him that he looted from the rooms, lots of valuable relics inside a storage bag. Sam doesn’t have time to go through it as he takes the shield and leaves the body.

“Sucks for you, I got no idea how I’m ok… I’ll send your goons my regards.”

Sam walks away ruminating; perhaps if he didn’t open the door when he did Benny would be alive but what was he even doing in that door? No helping it now, he’s just stuck with this weird suit.

He walks up to the door before trying to climb up. An orange light shines over Sam before switching to green. The doors take a moment to slide with one side stopping halfway. The alien looking person walks through the broken doorway.

Sam looks around at the room where he cannot see the edges, they’re beyond the previous maximum he encountered.

Several lights come on, some flicker off while turning on.

“Prime Specimen #a-VF3 Omega, Result Needed: Unknown.”

Sam recognises the voice, this time the speakers are much more broken and barely legible, yet spoken cleanly.

“1203.”

Sam hears the voice and suddenly countless black spheres appear in the air.

He runs away from them and finds that his movements are incredibly quick, he’s able to run to one of the far walls in only a moment whereas it would have taken him over a minute previously. The couple hundred metres’ distance is crossed in less than 4 seconds.

The feeling is amazing, he feels amazing as he can feel his body changing as energy courses through it. He can feel something change behind him, two sets of white wings have appeared on his back but he doesn’t have time to play around with them as he dodges about the room.

The beams and black spheres appearing and bouncing about the room, he’s able to gracefully and easily dodge all the beams but they were never really trained to fire on him, it might just be luck or it might be that he has learnt the innate pattern.

Either way he’s dodging by instinct, relying on his own innate feeling to guide him right now.

The room suddenly goes quiet as things shut down, Sam pauses and looks around the now quiet room.

*CRASH*

His alien-looking face faces the crash, and he spots it, a wall has fallen down reveals the red platform behind it.

He stands still, waiting for anything to happen, his wings twitching behind him as he adjusts to their feelings.

“Test..,” a cracked and broken voice comes over the room, “Testing conditions fail to meet safety requirements, power requirements unmet. Containment field breach imminent.”

Sam quickly runs over to the red platform, he finds his vision shifting before he lands on a platform much like before. He pushes the quiet discontent about déjà vu out of his mind and looks around, where he finds much the same room.

A triangular roof that goes up to a point with a squirming mass of black liquid around it.

Sam takes a step when the energy flowing about his body runs amok, he kneels on the ground as a pedestal appears from the ground containing a monster egg looking orb. This time a strange floating liquid within it. A much larger, more elaborate orb.

Sam looks internally and can see that his entire mana cloud has stopped shrinking, it has now compressed enough that it will sustain itself; he isn’t sure what has happened to the devourer beast but that’s not his problem. The timer is still there and the little worms are floating about so it's fine.

A strange outside energy floats about as Sam controls his internal energy with exercises…

—