Boulders fell from the ceiling and blocked off where Victor and his crew had come from. Though he could still hear something beyond the pile of rocks, something beating heavily.

  “That’s only going to buy us so much time. We need to move, and fast.”

  “What about your plan?” Daphne asked him.

  “That’s for when we come back. This cavern is the best position we have for an ambush, but that doesn’t mean we have to go in unprepared,” Victor told her. “We need to search for Seeds. Even a single one more will improve our chances.”

  “And what if we get caught in the end? I think we should make our stand now. When we’ve the time to actually plan,” Daphne replied.

  “If we find what we’re looking for, it’ll up our chances more than anything!”

  “A gamble, then.”

  “It is not-” Victor stopped himself. He could tell them now, but that would run into its own problems. No, he couldn’t risk that on his first time back, not when he didn’t have the knowledge of whom to really trust.

  His eyes drifted back over to Amadeus and Lillie, just before he stopped.

  “Trust me on this, please. We can’t take on an Angelo by itself,” Victor pleaded.

  The Englishwoman’s face was a stone mask before it cracked for a moment with a sigh.

  “Lead the way, then. But I hope you know what you’re doing,” she told him.

  Victor gestured to the others, and they followed along without wasting a moment. He traced the path up into another hole in the walls. His thinking was sound, least he thought so.

  If when they’d come here in the last Reset, they’d found the tiny keystone holding back an avalanche of rocks, then that same rockslide should still be here in this Reset. After all, no one had used it to bury a squadron of Metamorphs this time.

  He kept doubling over into different paths, looking inside before stepping back out. He wished Leo had his stone Seed back, so he could sense the caves ahead for him. But he wasn’t that lucky.

  Despite that, he did eventually reach a familiar looking hallway. It’d been years, so he only recognized the path when he came upon that familiar pit and rockslide on the verge of collapsing.

  Without another word, Victor pulled out his gun and aimed at the small stone holding back the avalanche. The bullet burst apart the rocks, and boulders fell to cover the hole almost instantly.

  While the dust cleared, Victor held up his gun in front of himself. He heard figures running around behind the dust clouds, so he kept himself primed. But no one came for him. In fact, he’d only heard them receding further back.

  “There’s some things back there,” Amadeus told him. He had one hand on his pistol and another outstretched.

  “Leave it. They’re gone,” Victor told him, starting to climb the piled-up stones. It was a quick scurry over to the other side, where the mining site presented itself.

  It looked much as it had before, and Victor hoped that wasn’t just on the surface. He rushed into the tents, searching through each of them until he came upon the carpeted room and the case inside it.

  Victor flipped it open and took out the Seeds without another word. As soon as he did, the hunger came back. That sensation of wanting to consume the Seeds himself. But that wasn’t his destiny.

  Instead, he pushed it towards Lillie and Ashley.

  “Take these, learn what you can do on the way back,” Victor ordered them. They immediately took the Seeds into their bodies.

  Victor could see Lillie’s eyes darting around in the air while they ran back, which made him wonder. Was she like him? able to see the screens?

  “C-Can we slow down!?” Ashley shouted from behind him. as she did, sparks flew out of her hair and flames erupted in the air around her.

  “Fire control. Tied to your emotions probably. Put that anger to good use, Ashley, we’ll need it,” Victor told her.

  “How do you know all this?” Ashley asked.

  “I’ll tell you some other time,” which would never come, hopefully.

  They circled back to an open area where Amadeus had blocked off the Angelo’s pursuit, only to find the blockade they’d created missing. The rocks hadn’t been displaced anywhere or anything, they were just… gone.

  They stopped right at the lip of the open cave, and Victor felt a chill run up his spine.

  Though it was somewhat quiet in the caves often, you could hear something underpinning the atmosphere. The chittering of legs and buzzing of wings, Even the splotchy movements of the Metamorphs.

  But the dead land ahead of them had none of that.

  “Amadeus, fire!” Victor shouted in a panic.

  Amadeus carelessly raised his hands in front of him and shot off several bolts of lighning, just as a boulder appeared out of thin air.

  This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

  It was headed for them, but luckily the group split apart just in time. the large rock landed and rolled, blocking off the exit behind them as an angel rose into the air. Resplendent wings shed feathers to the loamy ground beneath them, blood red and silver plate gleaming as the Angelo stood hovering.

  “Humans so bold to seek this realm, I grant you a death befitting, at the hands of Parvos!” the monster intoned. Victor fired off several shots at his face. Only a few hit, and they did barely anything to scratch the monster.

  “You will go first,” the Angelo told Victor.

  “Not a chance. Amadeus, his wings!” Victor shouted at him. Bolt of lightning dropped onto the feathered pinions, locking some into place. Parvos flinched at the pain, falling down to the ground. He grabbed onto one of the tall mushrooms for support while he stood up again.

  He snapped it off its shaft and threw it at the group. The size would’ve made it dangerous, but it grew even larger in flight. The group had to split further apart to even escape it, scattering across the caves. Victor rolled across the ground and came up in a crouch, with only his pistol in his hands.

  Parvos attempted flight again, but Victor wouldn’t have it.

  “Loki, you too! Aim for his wings, keep him grounded!” Victor shouted to him. he dropped his pistol to the side and took his AR-15 into his hands instead. While the Angelo struggled to get out of the middle of the open cave, he circled around the raised edge of the area and fired his pistol at the same time.

  “You are cooperative, smart. Then why come here at all?” Parvos asked him.

  “For your heart, you beast,” Victor fired a couple more rounds before ducking under a rock. There, he found Ashley hyperventilating. She grasped every breath like it would be her last.

  When Victor arrived, he placed a solid hand on her shoulder and made her focus on him.

  “Look here. Look at me! Ashley, we need you.”

  She shook her head vehemently.

  “Listen, we don’t have time. you’ll survive. That’s assured, okay? Me and the others won’t let it happen any other way. But if you want them to survive too, you’re going to have to help us,” Victor assured her.

  He glanced back over the rock to find that Lillie had gotten a hold of her powers. Daphne was beside her, talking into her ear as the girl furiously nodded along. Panes of light, weak though they might be, appeared in the sky to block the Angelo’s ascent.

  “You pick a Seed lost to the ground from conflicts long past. You desecrate my world, and for what reason?” Parvos asked her. He picked up a handful of pebbles, but once he threw them, they quickly enlarged into a hail of rocks that kicked up a dust cloud.

  Victor’s heart leapt in his chest. Did I…. please tell me I didn’t fail her again.

  But a light shone through, reigniting Victor’s hope. Lillie was coughing standing behind it, but it was there. Victor turned to Ashley, words in his lungs that he wanted to shout at her, but he knew they wouldn’t do him any good.

  “You’ve been doing great so far, Ashley, this is just another push, okay? Think you can do that for me?” Victor asked her.

  Her breathing slowed and Ashley gulped, nodding at him without a word.

  “I need you to attack the Angelo. Just enough to push him under those rocks,” Victor pointed towards a net of flora near the ceiling that cradled boulders in its midst. It stuck close to the rocks, but with enough damage, it could’ve given way to a deadly shower.

  “Yeah… I can do that, why couldn’t I?” Ashley chuckled half-heartedly.

  Victor and her popped out from behind the rock guns blazing. The initial attack got the Angelo’s ire, and he kicked a smattering of dirt and rocks towards them. Victor and Ashley fell backwards but stood their ground.

  Victor kept firing as Ashley screamed. Her face was red with anger, and the air rose a few Celsius around her. He stepped away as the rapidly heating air exploded into flames. But they never struck Victor or his clothes. Instead, they concentrated to a point in front of Ashley.

  She stood in awe of her own power, her hands shaking to contain the blast.

  “Shoot at him!” Victor shouted at her.

  She opened her palms as the blast of fire exploded across the caves. It hit Parvos in his side, exploding into a blaze half his size. His wings caught fire from the explosion. The Angelo tried to contain the blaze even under the barrage of cuts and bolts that Amadeus and Loki were throwing. They were positioned on a mushroom close by, so Parvos ripped it out of its roots.

  Amadeus and Loki hopped off the giant fungus while Victor kept firing at his face. The Angelo held the mushroom top like a shield, enlarging it with his powers. Amadeus and Loki rained fire on that mushroom until it collapsed, without the Angelo anywhere to be seen.

  Victor and Leo stayed behind with Lillie’s barriers, while the other three sought to find the Angelo. Every single one of them was on edge, hair raised and primed to fire at the first thing that jumped out at them.

  As their circle closed in around the fallen mushroom top, their fears grew. Nothing popped up, which forced them to further enclose the area around the centre of the cave. Victor stepped over a single branch. The ground shook in response. An armor piece exploded in size under the dirt, sending him and the others flying around the cave.

  He landed on something soft at the edge of the cave. Victor was sprawled across the ground, amidst a little bundle of flowers and moss, and he looked up to find the Angelo again in the sky, enlarging to his original size. He held Daphne in one hand and blocked Amadeus’ bolt with his left wing.

  “I am sorry. You shall go first,” he spoke to her. She tried to escape his grasp, scratching and pulling with her arms, but the Angelo was too strong for her. Once she realized the futility of the effort, she turned apologetically towards Lillie, whose eyes were wide with despair and legs paralyzed by fear.

  The voice of the Angelo may have been comforting, but the way he snapped her neck was anything but. Victor growled at the monster as he threw Daphne’s lifeless corpse beside Lillie, rising further into the skies. Lillie screamed in pain, grabbing onto the corpse. Victor wanted to rush over and protect her.

  That’s when he realized that the monster was growing even larger.

  If he let him enlarge any further, the Angelo might become too big to crush under the rocks. So, Victor made a stupid decision.

  “Ashley! Hit it with everything you’ve got!” he shouted with a hoarse voice.

  The woman was smouldering with anger, fire erupting around her like flares. At his command, that fire condensed into a super-dense sphere of flame, like a sun between her fingers.

  “Loki! Amadeus! Ground him!” Victor shouted one more order.

  As he did, he grabbed Leo and ran far away from the site. He kept running until the both of them reached the edge of the cave. Even from there, they could see the glow of Ashley’s flames. She let go of it an instant later, and the ball of fire seemed to almost teleport towards the Angelo’s face.

  But it didn’t hit him. No, it careened past him and towards the ceiling. The explosion burst apart into flames and the Angelo scoffed.

  “You are talented, bu-”

  He never got to finish that sentence. The first of the rocks hit his metal helmet with a clang. He would’ve escaped the next ones if it hadn’t been for Amadeus, who let loose a bolt that seemed more real than his others, pure white instead of yellow. It scorched the one of the Angelo’s wings and Loki cut another so far deep that bone exposed itself.

  The Angelo looked at the both of them in surprise, dropping to the ground abruptly.

  “No, I cannot! I CAN N-”

  Another bullet pinged off of his helmet, stopping his words. Victor looked on hatefully, as a building’s worth of stone crushed the Angelo in an instant. A sound like cracking thunder a thousand times over filled the halls of the cave, silencing all other noise for a few moments.

  And the monster died without ever getting its final words out.