Biohuman

Chapter 833 Barracks Trip: Savior Rookies + Toll

Energy materialized around Fae like butterflies. Well, that's what it seemed to look like for Lee Seng as he and Keng watched. The chaos all around them wasn't disappearing and the Cage Crawler seemed to have no intention of stopping. The ground erupted underneath River and none of the seniors could have seen it coming.

Fae screamed for River, reaching out for him as white wisps flew off his body. The butterflies grew everywhere all at once and in an instant, the entire group was pulled to safety.

'Is this Fae's power?' Lee Seng wondered.

[Savior River and Savior Fae have pushed past their Soul limits!]

'They're gaining their first tail.' Keng thought. The entire group appeared in the air. Fae grabbed River and butterflies began to explode out of Fae's body as the entire ground ceased to exist.

'That rookie  detected that this would happen before we did?' Fen wondered.

"Sir, we need to do something now before it can stop!" Fen shouted. Zixin nodded.

"Savior Leaders, can you help me with this?" Zixin asked.

"Roger!" Lee Seng and Keng spoke in unison. They raised their hands up towards Zixin.

"I'll distract him. Rudy, Ena, the Savior Leaders will push us to victory." Zixin informed them.

"Yes, sir!" The group shouted.

"Let's go!" Keng shouted. They fired Zixin out first, who swirled in pure flames. Zixin raised his sword and let out a sharp hissing noise between his teeth.

"Inferno's Rage!" A large fire spirit grew around Zixin. A large flaming sword appeared, swinging straight for the Crawler. The attack was enough to stun the Crawler who was midway into its full field void attack. The Crawler screeched in pain as Rudy and Ena began to turn to the Savior Leaders.

"Let's go!" Lee Seng shouted. "You're next!" Lee Seng pushed Ena and Rudy straight for the Crawler. They soared past Zixin in a second, barely lifting their weapons for the attack. A large silver dome closed itself around the others, keeping them suspended in air as Fae held onto River for her dear life.

"Lily." Keng called Lily out.

"Don't gotta tell me anything! Coloratura." A colorful energy wrapped around the silver dome. The dome's energy intensified, swelling as Zixin's heat energy pushed into the dome. The dome shook as Rudy and Ena lit up. Rudy slammed a punch into the Crawler while Ena spun in the air, slashing downwards at it. A bright white light exploded, lighting the entire forest and sky as a high pitched scream echoed.

The light dissipated and Lee Seng and Keng couldn't detect anything. Keng split from Lee Seng, moving towards the front of the dome to see the result. Zixin floated in the air as steam came off him. Rudy and Ena were on the ground where a large rusted cage was left.

"We did it?" Nixie asked.

"I don't sense anything." Fen answered. "What's the status?" Ena kicked it and jumped when its rusted body twitched.

"Ah!" Ena shouted.

"It's dead." Rudy stomped on the rusted cage, expunging the remnants of void energy. Butterflies continued to gather, drawing Lee Seng's attention to Fae and River.

"Sir…" Fae gasped. "Wh-what's going on…?"

"We're going down." Lee Seng told everyone. He lowered everyone onto the rough ground and expelled the orb. Lee Seng, Keng and Lily rushed over to the two foxes. River was already wrapping in energy while Fae was just starting. "You're evolving. Here, you can move away from River, Fae."

Lee Seng and Lily gently helped Fae and River. Lily brought Fae to a safe place as butterflies continued to flutter around her. Lee Seng gently set River onto the ground. River's eyes shook. They asked him what was happening.

"You'll be fine, River." Lee seng told him. "Your journey's beginning. You're both gaining your second tails. We'll be here until you come out, alright?"

"W-what if… What if something bad—" River began to conjure the first thing that came to his mind.

"Nothing will happen." Lee Seng interjected. River's energy hardened and his hand gripped Lee seng's.

"Can you… hold my hand until I come ba—" River's body completely hardened, cutting off his question. Lee Seng nodded and felt River's energy harden around his tightly gripped hand.

"Breathe, Fae." Lily whispered. "You'll come back much stronger! Your magic will grow!"

"H-how can you be so… Excited, Miss Lily?" Fae asked. "I…"

"It's alright, Fae." Lily smiled. "Let yourself grow to protect River and the others like you did earlier, 'kay? I'll be here when you wake up." Fae smiled and nodded. The energy hardened around her, putting her into a deep sleep.

"The rookies are growing." Fen commented. "You don't see two doing that at the same time. I wonder what set it off."

"Their hearts." Lily answered. "I'm sure it was their desire to protect and not to be protected."

"True warriors." Zixin landed on the ground. "My men will search around for any casualties. I know Mr. Valentin is handling the soldiers on the way. Find survivors and bring them to the doctor."

"Yes, Captain." Zixin's men saluted in unison before disappearing. Zixin sheathed his sword and let out a sigh. He was still burning. "I'll have to stay here and lower my temperature…"

"Want help?" Keng asked, playfully. He drew the rune for Ice Prison and slashed it before Zixin could say anything. Zixin was immediately enveloped in a large ice pillar. The ice melted in an instant, releasing a bunch of steam.

"H-hot!" Evan shouted, trying to use Ritsuka as a shield. Ritsuka and Evan stumbled backwards as Lee Seng shielded them.

"I was about to say it would only make things worse…" Zixin sighed.

"Too late!" Keng swiped another rune and watched a ball of water appear around Zixin. It bubbled and evaporated in an instant. Keng continued to write runes, quickly modifying it to work with what was happening in front of his eyes. The evaporated water regrew, freezing and unfreezing. Turning from ice to air back to water and ice. Keng did this for a while until Zixin wasn't immediately evaporating everything.

Keng poked Hydrosphere into the ice bubble and pulled the water into the blade. Zixin let out a gasp as he wiped his face. He shivered as he turned to look at Keng.

"I think… You overdid it, Keng." Zixin's teeth chattered. He wrapped his tails around himself, warming himself back up as he shook.

"You're not burning hot anymore." Keng smiled. "You're now just hot." Keng began to laugh and Zixin forced laughter through his chattering teeth.

"Go fuck yourself." Zixin spoke in Mandarin. Keng grinned bigger and spun on his heel.

"What should we do now?" Keng asked. "Lee and Lily are occupied. Should we look around for survivors, too?" He looked at Ritsuka and Evan.

"Sure." Ritsuka nodded. The golden orb disappeared around their human friends and Keng nodded.

"Alrighty! Let's go this way!" Keng picked a random direction and jogged away.

"Hey, you move faster than both of us combined! Slow down!" Ritsuka shouted, running after Keng. Evan followed after leaving Lee Seng, Lily and Zixin with the two evolving Fox Spirits.

"You can go, Captain Zixin." Lily spoke. "We can watch them."

"Being a captain has taught me to appreciate when your team does most of the work for you…" Zixin sighed. "But, you're right. I should look around. There were already four teams here, so we should account for however many managed to come across the Void creature. I'll order some soldiers this way to take watch."

"Don't worry about us, Captain." Lee Seng smiled. "We're enough to deal with any low ranking beasts." Zixin sighed and nodded.

"It doesn't hurt to be safe." Zixin disappeared, leaving them to watch their members.

"Thirty-one soldiers were found in the forest. They were injured and remnants of the Void beast are still within their systems. What we know from past experience is this is normal. We'll need the healers to be brought out and expunge the negative energy." Fen reported. She stopped and looked around the room. Zixin, Rudy, Nixie, Ena, Lee Seng, and Keng sat in the small room. Fen sighed and continued. "That being said, we've lost some soldiers… At least seven of them are gone… Whenever the soldiers wake up, we'll need to ask questions and see if they remember anything. The death toll… It could be higher."

"Do we have every soldier here, yet?" Zixin asked.

"There's still groups out there. It's nearly night and some are just arriving." Rudy answered. Zixin sighed and nodded.

"We'll need to do a roll call. I want a list of every person here. We'll split up and go over who's in the infirmary as well. Then we can see who's currently missing and go from there." The seniors nodded, leaving the three Saviors with thoughts.

"In the meantime, I guess we should be on alert." Keng stood up.

"Who knows if there's more of those things around…" Lee Seng sighed.

"We'll keep an eye out for it." Fen commented.

"Should we look for any traces of the energy, Leader Lee and Leader Keng?" Lily looked at the twins.

"Let's put a protective barrier up tonight." Keng answered. "It'll allow whoever enters the radius to be known to us. The three of us will know anything that happens."

"All nighter…" Lee Seng yawned. "Yay…"

"It's just for tonight. After we figure out who's missing, we can move on from there." Keng patted Lee Seng.