Chapter 54: Ch. 54 – War on the Horizon

I sat out in the woods, down the road from Mount Weather while I created metal to make armor for Lexa and Echo when they arrived later today. Raven was back in the mountain, working on building surprises to use against the army with a couple of members of the Engineering Team. All the advanced preparations were being completed today and the large rover was packed away with everything that we would need.

 

An hour or so before midday, I sensed an approaching source of mana, so I knew Lexa and Echo were getting close. I combined the small bars of metal into full ingots and gathered them together while I waited for them on the side of the road. It did not take long before the small rover came into sight and Lexa pulled over in front of me.

 

"I don't usually pick up hitchhikers, but you look worth the risk," Lexa teased through the open window.

 

I chuckled and retorted, "I hope you have room for my baggage."

 

"Yeah, just load it in the back. Echo, will you get the door for her?"

 

Echo shifted to the back of the rover while I picked up the twenty ingots with a wave of my hand and had them float behind me as I walked around the vehicle. I sent the metal into the rover ahead of me, one at a time, and stacked them up neatly on one of the benches before I climbed in. Echo was already sitting back in her chair while Lexa was looking at me with a wry smile.

 

"What level of Naru Darc did you achieve? You have double the amount of Shadow mana that I have?" she asked.

 

"It's complicated... Did you meet Asad?" I replied.

 

"Who?"

 

"Again, complicated. I'll explain it later, but it isn't that important right now."

 

"Alright, later it is," Lexa agreed with a shrug and then drove off, heading towards Mount Weather. "So, is that the metal for the armor that you're creating for us?"

 

"Yeah, but I'll recraft yours and a set of swords for you before you attempt the Naru Darc trial. I figured out a way to make Blessed Metal," I said, holding up my left arm with the white metal bracer.

 

"I need to practice more, but I just haven't had the time," Lexa complained. 

 

"Well, if we make it through this new disaster, you'll have plenty of time to outclass me with my powers," I chuckled.

 

"I plan to," she retorted. As she pulled up to the main entrance of the mountain. "I'm meeting with Kane, Indra, and Roan, so why don't you start on Echo's armor? Neither of you need to be part of this decision."

 

I sighed, knowing that they were going to be launching the missile, and remarked, "The choices that we are forced to make."

 

"No one ever said that life was easy, so why should our second ones be any different?"

 

Lexa parked the rover, and we all climbed out of the vehicle. With my Wind Domain, I caught a rare tender moment between Lexa and Echo, where they shared a kiss and Lexa traced her fingers along Echo's jaw. I let them have their moment, retracting my Domain as soon as I noticed it, then focused my attention on the metal bars and carried them out of the truck with my power.

 

The main door was open, but under guard by Skaikru and Grounders alike since there were still teams out hunting. No one stopped me because I was too well-known these days, especially bringing in a load of floating metal behind me. Wick, the head engineer stationed at Mount Weather, had begged Raven to get her to persuade me to make as much of the metal as I could, so there was already a cart waiting for me to stack up the ingots. Lexa and Echo followed me inside a few minutes later and then we all walked to the elevator while I pushed the cart.

 

Lexa exited the elevator early since the command center was on the second level while Echo and I had to ride down to the bottom floor. There was only one place inside the mountain that was underutilized, so I had set up a little workshop in the old Harvest Chambers which was being converted into a hydroponics farm, though it was a slow process starting from nothing. 

 

"Sorry, I know this place isn't the most comfortable for you, but I don't have a bedroom anymore after the reorganization of the clans," I said quietly as I lead Echo to my little alcove.

 

"They took your room?" Echo asked, surprised.

 

"I offered it. Raven doesn't sleep much, and I sleep even less, so there wasn't much sense in having the new residents move twice. She has been on the crew working to turn this into a farm while I've been checking in people, creating metal, or lending my powers in some other way to our cause," I sighed. "Here we are."

 

I stopped us at what looked like a solid wall, but with a wave of my hand, it opened into a makeshift living space with a large cot set up in the far corner, a table and chairs, and a pair of workbenches in the front. It was easy to tell Raven and mine apart since hers was covered in tech while mine was covered in a few potted plants and pieces of armor with an armor stand right next to it.

 

"You're a very strange pair to choose to live like this," Echo remarked as she looked around our room.

 

"It's not that bad. We don't really need much," I replied, pushing the cart to my workbench.

 

While she looked around, I pulled out some leather and set it on the workbench. Most armor smiths would find working the metal as the hardest part, but I was the opposite since cutting the leather strips that would hold the pieces together was the most difficult for me. I really had no room to complain.

 

"Come sit over here," I said, motioning to the chair by my workbench, while I pulled up two ingots.

 

Echo walked over and sat in the chair as I started flattening the metal with my power. It was actually a simple matter of fitting the metal to her body then folding back the excess to strengthen important spots. After that, I would use the pieces of leather to make buckles where simple flexibility was not enough, like connecting the chest piece to the back piece and securing the bracers, pauldron, greaves, and cuisses.

 

"About what you said the last time that we saw each other..." I started off.

 

Echo chuckled, "I was wondering when you would ask. It seems Lexa knows you better than I do, since I assumed that you would address it immediately, or not at all."

 

I sighed, shaking my head, and asked, "So, she already knows that you confessed to me?"

 

"Your ego is not that large, Octavia," she retorted. "I told you, it's common to have multiple lovers with such a difference in strength. Personally, I think that you are annoying, cocky, childish, and are one of the laziest people that I've ever known... but, I also know that you are caring, passionate, and will do anything to make those around you smile and relax. When I thought that you were going to die, I realized that I relied on you and cared about you deeply... and I just didn't want to regret not telling you."

 

"And Lexa doesn't mind you feeling that way about me?"

 

"If you two spent any time together, she'd likely have the same feelings herself. You both have a fairly similar teasing nature; the only difference is that she only shows it to those she is closest to. I don't expect anything to happen between us, but I needed to tell you for my own sake."

 

"You've changed a lot since we first met," I said with a soft smile.

 

"And you have not at all," she retorted.

 

I chuckled while shaking my head. Echo was not the type to show affection or vulnerability, so the rare tender moment could not last for long. Still, it was a good sign to me that those old walls and scars that she had developed while under Nia were slowly being removed.

 

"Cute... I see why you ended up with my brother during our past life," I teased.

 

She made a disgusted face and replied, "Don't tell such obvious lies, even if Lexa says them as well."

 

I chuckled and finished fitting the armor on Echo. I had her move around and tested her flexibility with the new gear. She was pleasantly surprised by the lightness of the armor and the complete range of movements that she had.

 

After I finished her armor, we sat down at the table, and I taught Echo how to play Texas Hold'em Poker. Raven joined us about an hour or so later and joined the game. There was little for us to do until Lexa appeared with news of the damage dealt by the missile, so we just waited in our little room.

 

It was late in the evening when I finally sensed Lexa coming down the elevator. Raven and Echo had started drinking with dinner since it was a luxury that we would not have any time soon, even if we survived the battle. They were fairly toasted at this point while I was still proving immune to effects, but I drank along anyways.

 

"At last, the party is complete," I announced as Lexa approached.

 

"Mmm... party," Lexa hummed with disinterest while she sat down in the chair.

 

I poured her a large glass and pushed it towards her. "You did what you had to, for our people."

 

Lexa took the alcohol and took a large gulp, then coughed as the burn caught her off guard. It did not stop her, and she finished the entire cup before sliding the glass back to me.

 

"It's hard to get an accurate number, but we estimate that Iseto's army still has anywhere from ten to fifteen thousand people. Iseto survived as well; we have confirmation through the drones. Kane has picked a narrow region along the main road where the Trikru border is. Depending on how quickly they pick up and move on, we should have three to four days to set up our defenses," Lexa explained as I filled her drink and passed it back to her.

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"Well, that's better than the fifty thousand plus," I sighed.

 

"Ever the optimist," Lexa replied with a weak smile.

 

"Someone has to be," I retorted, tossing my cards into the pile and standing up. "Come on, I'll make your armor."

 

I kissed the top of Raven's head as I passed her which made her grab my hand for a moment, giving me a smile. She and Echo kept drinking while Lexa and I moved over to my workbench. Unlike Echo's, I made hers without any leather since Lexa could manipulate it similarly to me once she infused her own mana in it after I retraced my own.

 

By the time that I was done with her armor, Raven and Echo had finished off the second bottle of alcohol, leaving both of them very drunk. Instead of letting them simply sleep off the effects, Lexa and I just helped carry them to the elevator and then outside where the large rover was already waiting for us. Kane had also been waiting for us, so we helped the drunk pair into the backseat then talked with him away from the truck.

 

"Those two okay?" Kane asked with concern.

 

"Yeah, they just had the majority of the vodka that I grabbed from you yesterday. Might as well let them have their fun since they decided to follow us on this fool's errand," I replied.

 

He sighed, "There is a dish and portable computer that Raven can set up which will give you access to the drone feeds. Everything that our teams built for you, and the remainder of the hydrazine, is packed away in the back."

 

"Thanks, Kane. It's been great working with you again. Take care of all our people," I said, patting his shoulder.

 

"I'm thankful for everything that you've done, both of you. I wish there was more that I could do," he replied.

 

"Then keep the peace and help Luna. My people have never known true peace and unity. You'll have your hands full in the future," Lexa said with a light smile.

 

"I'll do everything that I can."

 

"I know you will," she agreed with a nod.

 

"May we meet again," I said, holding out my arm towards him.

 

He took it without hesitation and replied, "May we meet again."

 

There was nothing left to say, so Lexa and I walked back to the rover and climbed in. The snores in the backseat drew both of our attention, where Echo and Raven were already asleep and snuggled up together. Both of us had to suppress our chuckles of amusement since we did not want to wake them. 

 

I started the truck and drove off into the darkness. The drive would only take a few hours, so we let them rest while we were on the road. None of us would be getting much sleep once we started setting up the defenses.

 

"So, while they are passed out, who was the Asad that you mentioned earlier?" Lexa asked quietly.

 

"He claimed to be a member of Tori's Pantheon, Lord of the Shadow Realm and King of the Dead. Apparently, he is the judge of the Naru Darc trials and picks our opponents," I explained.

 

"Is that why you were able to get so strong?"

 

"I imagine so."

 

"At least he gave us some kind of break then. Maybe the next time that I attempt the trial I'll be able to fight more than one opponent," she said with a sigh of relief.

 

"Don't count on it. He's an asshole! He picked a Rock Giant straight out of 'Grand Master of the Five Elements' as my second opponent. Apparently, he had expected that I would barely be able to defeat my first one, but I got lucky with my strongest spell which distracted my opponent long enough to decapitate him. Without the Blessed Metal swords, I would not have stood a chance if I had to rely on coating my weapons with my mana."

 

"Considering that you are on the level of a Four-Point Naru Darc, he did do you a favor whether you believe or not."

 

"By nearly killing me," I retorted, rolling my eyes. "Besides, the Shadow Realm is not the only place where we can gain Shadow mana. There is natural Shadow mana in the world around us; you just need to draw it into yourself, and you can build your rank without fighting in there."

 

"You can sense Shadow mana?"

 

"You can't?"

 

"No," Lexa sighed while staring out the window. "I've spent so much time trying to manage the Coalition that I've barely had time to train like you. Every time that we meet, I just find myself further and further behind you."

 

"You were stronger than me when we first met," I said, encouragingly.

 

"Barely, and you had surpassed me by the time we took down Mount Weather."

 

I sighed, "Well... I could not sense Light mana until I transformed, so maybe that's why I can sense Shadow mana. Asad called it a Dusa form, albeit an incomplete one, but it must be something that you'll be able to achieve in time."

 

"Hopefully, but we'll have to make it through this first," she replied.

 

Our conversation died down and the only sound was the light snoring in the back seat. Lexa drifted off at some point, but that was probably for the best. I put in my headphones and listened while I drove through the night. 

 

When the sky started to lighten, I found a narrow stretch in the valley that the main road went through. Lexa woke up as I slowed to a stop and looked around with a frown. Although it was the narrowest spot that I had found, it was nearly ten miles wide and heavily wooded.

 

"I know, but it's the best that I've seen in over an hour," I sighed.

 

"Can you cover this much space in a day or two?" Lexa asked with disbelief.

 

"Maybe, but do you really think we need to? We know he's coming for us, and he'll sense us from miles away. He wants a challenge, so why don't we give him one?"

 

"What do you have in mind?" she asked.

 

"I've always loved building sandcastles," I said with a grin. "Why not build a real one? With the hydrazine we'll be able to set the whole forest ablaze, driving them to fight on the road and whatever space we clear if we need to, but you know exactly why he has these powers. This fight is meant for us, so why don't we even the playing field?"

 

Lexa chuckled, "Remind me to not get on your bad side, but I like it. Now that just leaves one question... what are we going to do about these two?"

 

Both of us turned around and looked back at Echo and Raven, who were still passed out across the back seat, cuddled up with Raven on Echo's chest. 

 

"Personally, I'm all for leaving them like this; it's like a fantasy I never knew that I had," I chuckled. "But I also don't want to miss them waking up."

 

Lexa shot me an evil grin while she replied, "I got it."

 

She opened the door then slammed it shut with her still inside, rocking the whole truck while also providing a loud bang. The best part was that both of them reacted differently to being startled away. Raven clung to the person that she was holding while Echo shot upright, bringing both of them eye level with us.

 

"Nice of you to join us in the waking realm," Lexa teased with a smile while I chuckled in amusement.

 

Upon seeing the two of us, they looked at the person that they were holding with momentary confusion. Instantly, they pushed the other away, but then their hangovers reared their nasty heads, if their expressions were anything to go off of. They were both left grimacing while clutching their temples as Lexa and I laughed at their discomfort. I reached out my hand and channeled my healing spell into Raven then Echo since it was easy to dispel a hangover at my current level.

 

"Well... even if I die in the coming fight, it's been a far better life this time around," I said with a broad grin.

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