First Subsidiary Mission

Regis took aim at the mutated beast and two beams of bluish light were released from canons mounted on top of his gloves. The beams were so fast that Regis could hardly see them and just milliseconds later, pierced through the chest of the mutated beast.

'Gruhh!'

The creature let out a grunt and immediately lunged at Regis. Regis shifted backwards with an even greater speed with the help of his hoverboots. The two holes on the body of the mutated weren't very deep, but red blood flowed out through them.

Regis fired his two canons from different angles immediately after shifting back. The mutated beast was somehow able to leap out of the path. The beams drilled into the bark of a tree, charring away a large part of it.

'Grahhh!'

The mutated beast let out another grunt while a dagger glowing with different brands of colours stabbed it from behind in a region between two of the overgrown lumps. Alex had successfully launched his sneak attack. The mutated beast swiped its hands towards Alex instinctively, but the target had already put up a few meters between them.

When the beast turned towards Alex, Regis was able to see the area around the stabbed part melting into a blackish liquid. Regis focussed the aim of his glove-canons towards the wound and fired once again.

'Grahhhh! Grahhh! Gragh!'

The grunts this time were much more painful and irritating to the ears. Without waiting for another attack, the mutated beast leapt towards Regis. Regis shifted sidewards and narrowly dodged the claws of the mutated beast.

Alex who took cover on a different tree branch threw his dagger at the beast. The dagger drew an arc in the air as it left a long but shallow cut on the mutated beast's torso.

"The stab was good, but it is not as critical as it looks. Try to stay away from the beast." Regis heard Alex's voice at the same time as the dagger cut the beast. It sounded just like Alex was standing right beside him, but Regis didn't turn around.

A blackish puss dropped on the ground while Regis could somehow identify the pained expression on the twisted face. Regis fired the two canons at the beast. It twisted its upper body to dodge the attacks, but one of the beams hit it squarely in its chest, while another scratched the side of its stomach.

"It may try to escape right about now."

Regis nodded and focussed on the beast once again. It leapt towards Regis while flailing its claws in the air.

'Zingg! Zingg!'

Two beams hit the mutated beast, overlapping with two of the three holes in its chest and dug deeper into its flesh. This time, there was no grunt instead, the beast extended one of its arms, grabbed a nearby tree and pivoted itself away from Regis and Alex.

Regis paused for an instant, taken aback by the sudden change in the beast's trajectory, but the previous warning helped him overcome the shock and he immediately fired two shots in rapid succession. The first beam drilled through the rear of the knee of the beast, while the second beam which followed right behind the first beam deepened the hole and came out of the kneecap of the beast.

At the same time, Alex's dagger cut through all the fingers of the hand that was grabbing the tree.

"Oh f*ck! Get out of there."

Regis immediately fired at the beast rapidly. Alex immediately ducked and tried to get away from the mutated beast.

'Grahhh!'

The mutated beast roared in pain and leapt towards Alex in a last-ditch attempt.

'Puchii!' The beast paid no heed to the threat posed by the beams hitting it. The assailant was in front of it and it would soon reach the assailant.

Alex found himself in a pinch. The mask could help him determine the trajectory of the beast, but he himself was not at a level where he could capitalize on it and come out unscathed. If he just retreated backwards, he would run into a tree before he was completely out of the beast's range.

'Looks like I will have to get a surgery soon.' Alex decided to take the path that would cause the minimal damage albeit comparatively.

"Move backwards." A scream reached Alex's ears and he immediately made up his mind to retreat. Regis charged forward. Since the beast had completely ignored his presence, he felt as if he had a small chance of helping Alex. He immediately shifted his balance a little forward.

Alex retreated and soon enough, his back was against the tree. He could see the claws of the unhurt hand of the beast approaching him chest. Just when the claws were a few inches away from him, he saw something hit the head of the beast.

'Bang!'

Regis's fist connected with the beast's skull. With both it's feet in the air, the beast had no way to counteract the force and was pushed a few meters away before slamming in a tree.

Regis's strength stat was now at 1.7, which was higher than most of the cadets from his batch. Paired with the speed provided by his boots, Regis was barely able to generate enough momentum to push away the beast.

Immediately after that, Regis fired a beam of light from his outstretched hand towards the beast. Alex took in a deep breath while looking towards the beast and clenched his dagger.

"This amount of damage should begin taking a toll on the beast soon enough." Alex's mask reasoned that the injuries and corrosion that the beast was carrying on its body was enough to cripple it for the rest of the fight.

And proving that the analysis was correct, the beast toppled towards the injured kneecap when it tried to get up again.

Regis immediately fired his beams towards the beast in succession as fast as the gloves allowed. Alex's dagger also drew arcs in the air as it left cuts of varying sizes on the beast. The skin of the beast around the cut rapidly turned black before melting into blackish puss.

"Whew! This one was really tough. Whatever, one of our subsidiary missions is completed." Alex said while tapping on his watch.

Regis also tapped his watch to see what his subsidiary missions were and there in the list of six missions, was one to hunt down a mutated beast that looked similar to the corpse a few feet away from him.

The lights in Alex's mask glowed once again and he turned towards the direction indicated by his mask. Alex let out a small sigh as he indicated Regis to go towards that direction. Regis followed behind wordlessly.

After covering some distance, Alex slowed down and walked forward carefully. After walking some distance, Regis could faintly hear a pattern of sounds that felt a bit familiar.

"They agreed to meet up." The familiar pattern of metallic sound was one of the sound-signals they were taught in the camp. Although the Asceptus were mostly built similar to humans, there was a certain range of frequencies that the humans could hear and they couldn't. The sounds created in this range were used for communications between humans while in vicinity of the Asceptus.

Regis had heard no such sound signals produced by their side, but soon remembered the messages that felt like Alex was standing right beside him and nodded to himself. This was a feature of the scout mask which could compress the sound waves and project them through a distance not needing any sort of medium to travel.

After some time, Alex and Regis were able to see two of their fellow cadets making their way towards their direction. Both sides immediately stopped as soon as they were able to see the other group.

Regis recognised the two cadets. One of them was a girl who went by the name Mirjena Milla. She seemed to be wearing a full body armour while another was a boy whose name seemed to be Avner something who had on gloves similar to Regis and a chestplate armour.

The two groups looked at each other for some time before Alex stepped out. Soon after, the same metallic sound reverberated in the surroundings, but in a different pattern. It was the armour that was creating this sound according to the wishes of the girl wearing it.

The girl also took a few steps towards Alex and soon both of them met in the centre whereas Regis and the other guy stood at their places, keeping an eye out for external threats. After a brief conversation, Alex returned.

"Well, we got the location of our second subsidiary mission, but at a loss."

"Loss?" Regis asked.

"Yeah, since the scouting ability of my equipment is the highest among the provided equipment and it keeps a record of nearly all the things that were in a range of hundred meters from me, I knew the location of two of their subsidiary missions." Alex replied.