The group found four points where the extraction rate was around fifty percent of the maximum; there were several others, but the extraction rate was between ten and twenty percent. Meaning at one hundred percent. They could extract one gram of concentrated ether per second, but under the current conditions where the crater destroyed a lot of the land, and the piles of rubble were on the way, they had to set for that.

  “... For now, you four will enter extraction and storage mode while we will keep an eye on the perimeter,” Amanda said to the other four members of the group once she made up her mind. “We will join you once the sabotage and assault team finish their respective missions.”

  The battle suit of everyone had turned green, and they emitted some pulses of energy to find the spots where they could drain ether. Once they changed to the storage mode, the battle suit created something like a backpack on their back once it turned blue and decreased all of their other functions. At the same time, it began to work like a magnet that began to pull ether from the land. Dylan blinked several times when he saw many small light blue particles leaving the ground and being absorbed by the backpack.

  “Sabrina, Dylan, keep your eyes and ears open,” Amanda said. “The second in command also must help the other teams, so don’t expect that he will warn us all the time.”

  “That is such a mean thing to say,” Felix said. “Putting that aside, good job of starting the extraction sooner than expected. The other teams are facing some difficulties, but they will probably do better once they receive this good news about your success.”

  Dylan heard that in the past and on Earth, most soldiers of the same rank would receive the same treatment. He thought that it would make more sense considering that currently, they use a system based on more merit with proper rewards. Maybe that was why he thought it made sense that the soldiers would feel even more motivated to work harder on their missions after hearing that their allies, whom they had never fought side by side, were doing well. It was because their success was everyone’s success.

  In any case, while Dylan wasn’t feeling much nervous, even though he sustained some damage, he still felt a bit worried… because their job could be done in a much better way if they could use the piles of rubble to get a larger view of the environment. Still, that was dangerous, since they didn’t know if the enemies could be under that massive pile of junk as well.

  “... Dylan, you have some reserves, use the energy to repair your battle suit,” Amanda said once the group heard the sound of many bullets coming from the East side of the ruins, where the assault team was.

  Amanda was being cautious, but Dylan honestly thought that she was worrying too much. With one gram of concentrated mana, they could repair one percent of the battle suit. It wasn’t a bad rate, but they also could do the same on the dreadnought without using mana, but wasting some extra time.

  In the end, Dylan sighed in his mind and obeyed his orders. The last thing that the group needed now was to argue about such a minor thing. Besides, they were getting a ton of ether, considering that it was their first mission in a long while. They needed to make it end up being a huge success to raise the morale of the entire crew.

  Although Dylan was thinking along those lines, the sound of gunshots and explosions was starting to get more intense and happening more often.

  “Focus on our surroundings and have faith in our allies,” Amanda said once she realized that everyone was looking in that direction too much.

  Those four doing the extraction had only to stay still for the storage mode to work, so it was hard for them to stay focused for so long. Ten minutes had already passed since they started that work, after all.

  After twenty more minutes, the tension was getting even higher… bullets were still being shot left and right in the distance, and they didn’t receive any news coming from the second in command. He must be more than a little busy now…

  “Captain, we have a problem…” Dylan said when he saw some dust emerging from the ground and coming from the direction of the gunshots.

  Amanda focused her eyes in that direction and found several of those weird life forms coming. That was more than a bit suspicious… If they could find the presence of humans, why were they targeting the extraction team? The answer couldn’t be good.

  “Extraction team, many enemies are coming from the East, and they are trying to ignore the assault and sabotage team, probably because they can feel the reserves of ether that you all have,” Felix suddenly talked to all of them. “Keep your guard up and do everything necessary to get rid of the enemies.”

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  “They want ether, but they can’t extract it from the environment?” Amanda asked.

  “We will obtain the answer to that question once we check the bodies of a few of those creatures,” Felix replied. “That is all.”

  Amanda sighed… she could see at least ten monsters coming, and they didn’t have even one minute to prepare for it. They just have to do it… it was a bit risky, but she had an idea of what to do.

  “Sabrina, go hide behind the piles of rubble and attack when you see fit,” Amanda said and then handed her two pistols. “Hurry up.”

  Sabrina hesitated for a moment, but she quickly obeyed. Dylan could only imagine that she was a pretty good sniper but good enough to use pistols instead of rifles? There was only one way to find out.

  “We are too slow them down as much as possible, Dylan,” Amanda declared as she unsheathed a rapier at her waist. “I don’t want too much pressure on you and on Sabrina, but we need to stop them no matter what.”

  Even if it costs our lives, Amanda didn’t want to say that to him since Dylan had already lost his parents on a mission, but they had to show that much determination. In any case, Dylan passed her his blazing pistol since the enemies were too big to be stopped with the rapier alone, even though it looked as sharp as a giant needle.

  “Change to Sprint mode,” Dylan declared, and then he grabbed his daggers.

  Dylan Ulrich - Sprint Mode

  Health: 100%

  Attack Power: 07

  Armor: 03

  Adaptability: 04

  Movement Speed: 27

  Ether Stored: 451 g

  Weapon: Dual Daggers (100%), Katana (100%)

  Sub Weapon: Freezing Pistol (10)

  Amanda didn’t like the idea that Dylan would fight the monsters up close like that, but they didn’t have time to argue. The monsters were less than five hundred meters away, after all.

  In the end, they stepped forward a bit more and then readied themselves to fight. When the first two enemies had gotten close, each one of them chose a target, but Dylan’s target had their head exploded by a shot that came from the side, and the enemy didn’t have the chance to react… Sabrina was quite good.

  Amanda attacked hers with a bullet in the face, and then she stabbed the wound with her rapier before moving to the side and avoiding being hit.

  The next three enemies approached, and then Sabrina killed another. The second jumped to bite Dylan’s head off, but he bent his body forward and moved slightly to the side. Thanks to the Sprint mode, his speed increased enough to dodge the attack, and he stabbed the neck of the beast with the two knives. The creature agonized on the ground while trembling.

  Dylan didn’t have time to check if Amanda killed her target, he assumed that she did since he heard two shots, and then the final five enemies entered their range… all of them jumped at the same time in one way or the other to kill those two.

  After swinging his daggers backward, Dylan pierced and hit the chest of two beasts. He moved to pass between them, but they still pushed him back while his daggers cut through their flesh and slowly killed them. He felt that his arms would be ripped apart, but he only fell on his butt at the last moment when the bodies hit the ground.

  Dylan looked to the sides and saw the heads of two monsters exploding, and at the same time, Amanda skewered the head of the final beast with her rapier. The momentum of the creature pushed her backward, but she endured by lowering her posture. She had some strength despite her slim body.

  “Phew… Sabrina, enter storage mode as well,” Amanda declared as soon as she recovered. “We won’t be able to pull this off if we try to save all the ether from this spot. How is the current extraction rate, everyone?”

  “50%,”

  “49%,”

  “45%,”

  “46%,”

  That was good. That meant that they would be able to get a lot of ether before they had to retreat. The more they drain the ether, the rate was supposed to drop, but they got lucky since it wasn’t dropping fast.

  “We don’t have any other option in this situation, second in command,” Amanda declared, and the conditions are right for it.

  “I agree. Keep up the hard work and make adjustments if necessary,” Felix showed up on the monitor of everyone while nodding. “The number of enemies isn’t decreasing, so we might call off the mission a bit sooner, but your group did a good job. We just need the storage team to get some more samples, and then we can call the mission a success, even if we don’t use half of the time of the mission.”

  Dylan didn’t know if that would be a good idea, but it was better than suffering casualties. Even more than mana, knowledge, and materials, they lacked manpower.

  In any case, the number of gunshots decreased a bit, but they always kept coming from the same distance. Thanks to it, Dylan wondered what they could find in that direction and what attracted the monsters to it. Maybe it was something that would be useful to them. However, they couldn’t be greedy, and they didn’t have time to do anything else aside from following the mission.

  “Everyone, how is your progress?” Amanda asked, looking pretty impatient.

  “2.850 grams of ether have been successfully collected.”

  “2.633 here.”

  “2.559.”

  “2.501…”

  Considering how much the whole team was using for the mission, they barely recovered enough to cover for the costs of the eight hours of work. It wasn’t half bad considering that they only worked for a little more than one hour, even more so when Sabrina was charging in order to use her guns.

  “Which reminds me…” Dylan said in order to stop Amanda from worrying endlessly. “You said that those guns were left by my parents, but all their research didn’t make some progress after their death?”

  “No, they created those weapons themselves… I am certain that they made progress in modifying the weapons as well, but they… before they could pass the knowledge to others,” Amanda explained. “Also, on paper, not a single operation was initiated in those fifteen years, but that isn’t completely true… we had to test a lot of technology in those years in order to make sure that everything would be perfect here and now.”