(TPOR) Chapter 151: EMP (Patreon)

Something in the air didn’t feel right. He was breathing normally. Air flowed into his lungs and out, mana filled him and left, yet something was off.

Zed came to a sudden stop. It took the others a step or two before they stopped too. Since he was no longer the one leading the exodus, they couldn’t be blamed for their delayed notice.

“Something’s wrong,” he said.

“Of course something’s wrong,” Oliver said. “Why the hell is the exit so far?”

“Not that,” Zed disagreed. “Can’t you feel it. It’s been there for a while but I wasn’t paying attention.”

He focused, watched the motes of ambient mana around them. Something was different about them but he couldn’t put his finger on what it was. He raised his hand, moved an open hand through the air as if wading it through water. It felt… charged.

He frowned, then looked at Trevor.

“Can an awakened see ambient mana?” he asked.

“No.”

It was Shanine that answered.

“Well, I can’t at least,” she added. “Why?”

“Nothing you should worry yourself about, love,” he assured her, then turned to Oliver. “Is it just me or is there something wrong with the mana here?”

Oliver hoisted Chris in his arms. He held her up like a prince would hold up a princess now. She was no longer screaming but took her pain in groans and gasps. She was wide awake but too pained to do much. Somewhere along the trip Oliver had explained what was happening to her. Zed had a feeling that between her injuries, the adrenaline shot running through her system, the threat of danger, and their presently ongoing attempt at escape, she was more bothered by the least important piece of information: finding Zed fully functional and realizing she’d lost the spar to him.

Oliver took his time to look around as well. Zed could feel his aura seeping out of him, reaching about to feel the ambient mana. When it was drawn back into him, Oliver shook his head.

“I don’t feel anything,” he said with a shrug.

Zed rubbed his jaw. “You sure? Because I could swear it’s like having something at the tip of your tongue.”

“Could’ve sworn,” Shanine said.

Zed turned to her. “What’s that?”

“You said you could swear but the correct phrase is you could’ve sworn.”

“Oh, that,” Zed said unbothered. “Don’t let it get to you, it’s just English. I’m more bothered by—”

“—The mana,” Ash interrupted. “We know, but we can’t find what the issue is. Isn’t our escape supposed to be very important?”

“Definitely,” Zed nodded, then resumed his hurried steps.

He would’ve felt more comfortable running but he didn’t want to raise any unnecessary worry in anyone they passed. Trevor was still quiet in their escape. No one had said anything about the help he’d offered them earlier with the Olympian and Zed wasn’t ready to have a conversation about it. At least not yet.

They were still walking down the path when something happened. The ground shook beneath their feet and the entire ship seemed to sway. Shanine fell from the loss of balance. Oliver and Ash staggered slightly before realigning their legs beneath them. They stood strong, firmed their stance. Trevor caught himself against the wall.

Zed didn’t even sway.

“Tom, how far is the exit?” he asked Trevor.

“Not far,” Trevor answered. “At this pace, we’ll be there in five minutes.”

Zed checked the timer and frowned.

“We don’t have five minutes.”

· Time remaining: [00:04:31].

They had just lost almost fifty whole minutes from a single turbulence. It meant only one thing. Whatever danger he was supposed to be escaping, it was already here.

“We’ll definitely have to pull a Hou—”

A wave went through him. It moved through him like a shockwave, charged the hair on his skin so heavily that his hair stood on edge. Judging from the way everyone around him tensed up and Chris let out a short yelp of pain, it was safe to say he wasn’t the only who had felt it.

“What the hell was that?” Ash asked.

“I don’t—”

A notification appeared in front of Zed, silencing him. He read it and paused.

· [Electromagnetic Disruptor] has used effect [Electromagnetic Pulse].

· [Electromagnetic Pulse] has applied effect [Electromagnetic disruption].

· [Electromagnetic disruption] does not take effect.

“Why the hell are we being hit with an EMP?” he found himself asking, turning to Trevor. “What the hell is going on?”

The lights around them flickered momentarily. It drowned them in a world of darkness for a second or three as they went off. Then they came back on. They weren’t white as they had once been now, they came on a bright neon red. It was clear as day and deep as blood. It ingrained within them a sense of alarm. All it needed was a loud blaring siren to inform them that they were well and truly in danger.

Everyone stood still, unmoving.

“You’d think there’d be a siren or something,” Zed said finally.

Oliver turned to Trevor. “What just happened?”

“The power’s out,” Trevor explained. “Something happened but I don’t know what.”

“When last did something like this happen?” Shanine asked, worried as she got to her feet.

Trevor shook his head in disbelief. “Never.”

“Do you think that wave we felt had something to do with it?” Ash asked.

Zed stomped past all of them, led the way. “We got hit with an EMP,” he said. “Clearly, someone’s trying to take out the ship. If we have no power, how are these lights on?”

Everyone followed after him.

“The ship must be diverting power from the mana generator,” Trevor explained as they continued walking.

“What’s that?” Shanine asked.

“It’s a secondary source. It’s chuck full of mana collected from the ambient mana outside the ship. We use it to power the suits. In times like this, the ship is designed to redirect power from the generator to charge the ship. If we’re using it this quickly, then I assume we’re supposed to be airborne.”

“Airborne?” Zed asked, confused. “I didn’t even hear the ship come on. I didn’t feel it leave the ground.”

“It’s stealth based,” Trevor said. “It’s designed to do everything without anyone noticing.”

“Even those inside?”

Trevor shrugged. “If those inside can’t note what it’s doing, I think it’s a safe bet that those outside can’t—”

Trevor staggered and dropped to his knee. His body shook heavily, trembled like that of a man dipped naked in the snow.

“Trevor.” Zed took a step towards him and paused. Beside him Shanine fell heavily. It was as if her body gave out on her.

Then a weight dropped on him. It was only for a moment but he felt it. It was like the effect of the EMP but somehow worse. It went through him, somehow pushing aside anything in its path.

Oliver dropped to his knee a moment after and Chris fell from his arms. Ash was faring no better. Zed didn’t need to ask what was happening, his notification kept him abreast.

· [???????] has used effect [Mana Pulse].

· [Mana Pulse] has applied effect [Mana disruption].

· Your [Mana] is too high.

· You have resisted [Mana disruption].

· Your [Wil] is too high.

· You have resisted [Mana disruption]

· [Raw Mana] has resisted effect [Mana disruption].

· [Mana disruption] does not take effect.

There was still so much Zed did not know about his own body. It was stupid to think that he was yet to test the limits of the body the mana surge had blessed him with. Going through the notification, there had been a part of him that had expected [Mana blessed] to be a reason he was still standing when everyone else had gone down. It was surprising to find that his very being was the reason he still stood. His mana itself was resistant to the effect.

He would be lying if he claimed it didn’t give him a bit of a confidence boost.

Unfortunately, while he proved resistant, the ship did not.

If the last hit they’d taken could be called turbulence, what happened to the ship now would be called an earth quake.

The entire ship went dark and Zed didn’t need sirens to know that they were going down.