Garret had been sitting down on a rock, examining the bags of crystals their team had. He was trying to see if there were any intermediate tier crystals they could had to their collection. Since they were being tested on the amount of crystals they could collect in a week, not quality, it was better to keep the intermediate ones for themselves.
"Found another one!" Garret said before tossing an intermediate crystal over to Amy.
She caught it then put it in a different bag for their own personal use. She was sitting on a shorter rock next to Jerry, and glanced over to him.
At their little makeshift camp, there was a single simple tarp tent set up with a small fire in the center, and they were all sitting on rocks surrounding it.
"These are bound to be those burningsnake crystals, I bet you could make a really strong piece of gear with them," Amy said with a smile as she lifted one in the light, "So, what do you plan on making with these? Another shield? Oh! What about a whip? Surely you thought my advanced tier whip is pretty impressive."
"Um…" Jerry whispered, not really knowing how to respond.
He had been concerned about Earl this entire time. While he didn't particularly like Earl, he knew that Earl was under Duke's protection, and if Duke got upset, then there were bound to be consequences for him. Jerry himself was meant to be under Earl's control after all, and yet these guys didn't seem to realize, or care for what Duke thought.
"… Aren't you guys worried?" Jerry hesitantly asked, "About Earl finding out you guys abandoned him…? What if he tells someone?"
Pierogi was tending to their supplies, before snorting in laughter, "That guy? If he pulls anything then what is he going to against the four of us with all of our beast gear?"
"That is if he's still alive," Garret pointed out, "I personally think its dirty we just left him there with all of those beasts, but he did play dirty first, so I'll consider it fair."
Amy then leaned in to Jerry, a wicked smile tugging at the corner of her mouth, and spoke with strangely soothing words, "Look, when we're on top of the world, no one's going to mess with us. We'll make everyone else our play things, and we'll deserve it because we climbed our way up there. You too, we saw how you were treated."
Thinking on it, Jerry began to smile. Perhaps he would help out this new team, and he wouldn't be treated like the designated scapegoat of the team again.
Once Garret was done looking through the crystals, he started to examine the beast weapons, namely Layla's bow and arrows. He held the light blue arrow up, noting that it had a snowflake like arrowhead.
"Well, we don't need to guess what this one does," Garret teased, then looked over at Pierogi's direction, "Didn't that girl use this very same arrow on you?"
"Get that thing away from me!" Pierogi shouted, waving their hands indicating for Garret to put it away.
"Calm down, I just need to see how many—" Before Garret could finish his words, the arrow left his hands and shot into Pierogi's legs, instantly freezing them into place.
"What—!?" Pierogi shouted, taking out the paleneedle rapier from their waist.
Amy similarly took out her whip, and Garret stood up alert, when a figure had suddenly landed in the center of their camp, extinguishing the fire, and causing sand to fly everywhere.
"Shadow void!" The figure shouted, before shadows spread out from under their feet and formed a dome, surrounding the camp.
Suddenly, their entire camp was now enveloped in darkness, and the once bright sunlight had now vanished, covered by the mysterious dark purple mist.
[MC 40/100]
The sudden change in environment caused the group to slightly panic. They didn't know if the newfound shadow walls were keeping them stuck in here, but before they could act further, Erin moved first.
Swiping her hands out at Garret's direction, he instinctively lifted his hands up to block the attack.
[- 2 HP]
[HP 68/70]
Amy swung her whip at Erin's back, hoping to catch her off guard, but Erin had simply grabbed the whip with her bare hands, not even turning around.
"Huh!?" Amy exclaimed in confusion.
That was when her eyes followed the hand that caught the whip, and saw that Erin's watch listed the number 5.
"You're one of those high tiers, right?!" Amy yelled out, "You're here to punish us for being weak!? Because we can't fight back!?"
[-5 HP]
[HP 63/70]
The whip had burned Erin's hand, but she had one goal in mind. Yanking the whip, Erin dragged Amy into the air, caught her, then tossed her to the side.
Right as she did that, Erin was then immediately grappled by Garret, preventing her from using her arms.
"Well guess what? Look what happens when we all team up together," Amy spat out, smug about herself.
Erin smacked her head into Garret's nose, causing his grip to loosen, and allowing her to escape.
She quickly turned around and threw out two blood swipes at him, which had cut into him.
[-2 HP]
[HP 61/70]
'Are the rumors really true? She's using red lines, but there's no way for someone to change their ability!' Garret thought.
Erin was looking around, searching for where her rapier had gone. Without it, she wasn't able to fight very well as she wasn't experienced in hand to hand combat.
'This is something Quinn would be more experienced in,' Erin thought.
Finding Pierogi still encased in ice behind Garret, Erin used flashstep to sprint past him, and right in front of Pierogi. She reached for the rapier around their waist, but when she yanked it out, it had dissipated into smoke.
"Wow, you really thought that was the real me?" the Pierogi clone teased before disappearing, matching the same rapier Erin held moments prior.
Twisting her body around, Erin saw two Pierogi clones about strike at her with their swords, but before they did, Erin created a shadow blocking the attack
[- 6 MC]
[MC 34/100]
As Erin had used the shadow to block the attack, it used up her MC points. While on her way here, she had used shadow control to create a roof over her head. Since it had taken her 10 minutes to arrive, it costed her 10 MC points. Then it costed her another 50 to create the shadow void. She was limited in how much she could use her ability, so she needed to think smartly.
Erin jumped back, gaining some distance from Pierogi, but as she did, an arrow had shot into her shoulder. A distance away from Erin was Jerry who was holding Layla's bow. He was standing a bit behind Amy.
[- 11 HP]
[HP 50/70]
He wasn't holding it confidently, but the 50% chance to hit had activated.
'I can't defeat them all by myself, they'll just overwhelm me,' Erin thought before sprinting over to him.
Amy had recovered from getting tossed, and shifted the wind around the sand to blow in Erin's direction. She was hoping with the sand blowing into her eyes, Erin would get blinded by it. Then, for good measure, she lashed out her burning whip in rapid succession, using her ability to accelerate it, creating a tornado of fire.
Utilizing flashstep again, Erin had quickly sprinted past the whip, avoiding every hit. Once she was almost near Amy's face, Erin stopped for a mere second, before using the shadow to protect herself from the whip. It got caught in the shadow, almost like it was in slow motion.
[- 12 MC]
[MC 24/100]
'What the—?!' Amy shouted in her mind. She had never seen an ability like this before.
As Amy tried to pull her whip out of the shadow, she saw Erin's eyes turn from icy blue to blood red.
[Daze activated]
[Daze successful]
In that moment, Amy's body froze with paralysis. She had expected Erin to have done something to her. A punch, a kick, or any form of attack, but instead, Erin had ran past her, and, with the momentum of her sprint, jump kicked into Jerry's chest.
He let go of the bow, collapsing as he did.
Grabbing the bow and quiver, Erin ran back to the walls of the ravine, and threw it as high as possible.
"CATCH!" Erin yelled.
It didn't exactly reach the very top of it, but thankfully, Layla had her telekinesis to catch it in the air in time. Smiling, She was now able to provide firepower from above.