Storming the Tower

Skeleton demons were crawling all over the outside of the pylon. Some of them were clawing at the front entrance, others were trying to climb up it, but helplessly fell back down and crumbled, which made a mess of themselves.

I fully expected that the moment we’d land, they’d turn all that clambering on us.

“My apologies, but we won’t be able to land at the front door,” Mella advised.

“Why are they even around that stupid tower thing?” Indena questioned. “It’s like they heard there’s a black friday sale at the top or something.”

That was a good question. These skeletons obviously were instinctively coming here, so they had to have had a reason as to why.

“I presume they want the mana this pylon can provide the air. These cursed mortals are quite devoid of it at the moment, I’ll have you know.”

Even though the pylon wasn’t online at the moment, it still had a lot of mana energy stored up in it. I was actually surprised the Reaper wasn’t already here, but maybe he prioritized stealing souls over pure mana.

“Can they really sense mana inside there?” I asked, trying to link up to the tower to get the exact amount it had.

“I can,” Mella answered.

If she could do it, then it stood to reason that they could too. That was a skill I probably needed to learn.

Mella landed us just a couple hundred meters from the pylon’s entrance. We were hiding behind some sort of exhibit sign.

“Nazalian geo-mana extracting plants?” I read off the sign. I guess they called the mana from within the planet geo-mana. A pretty cool name for it, if I may say. But it also shows that the humans do know what these are. Maybe that’s how the skeletons figured it out. “These aren’t Nazalian, but I'm surprised the humans know what these do.”

It didn't surprise me though that they'd treat these like some tourist attraction. They were impressive up close, and mysterious from a distance. They’d probably be even more amazed if they saw them active and all glowy.

“They've probably seen things like it before,” Indena suggested. “Anyways, we’re not here to sightsee. We got demons to send back to Hell.”

“Right,” I said with a nod.

Indena lit up her flame aura, and I cast Stardust Aura on her so she'd actually be able to deal out some light damage to these dark creatures.

Mella gave us an opening when she spawned a few spirit animals to scatter around to take some attention away from us.

That left my own preparations. I activated my combat mode, but not to its max. It was stressing my body too much to the point that it forced it to 15% efficiency. I wouldn’t be doing any of the crazy cool stuff I did before, but I wouldn't be out of the game.

I had just enough strength to wield my spear and charge in along with the others.

Indena punched out a skeleton, sending bones flying through the air. Her flaming fists brawled it out with several of those spooky things until one snuck up behind her.

Mella sent out a shockwave of energy that blasted a skeleton away from Indena’s back, but also snagged Indena a little and caused her to stumble.

“You should pay more attention, fire mage,” Mella remarked.

“Shut up!” Indena shot a finger gun of flame past Mella's head, hitting a skeleton that got around her. “How about you watch your own back?”

While they were clearly getting along, I raced in and used my weapon to slice at some skeleton legs!

*Swish!*

The skeletons collapsed. Many of the more motivated ones quickly rolled around to try and get their bodies back in one piece.

That's when I sliced my spear again, cutting them all apart even further until they were scattered everywhere. That kept them busy long enough to let the others move up with me.

“Good work, but we've got more!” Indena announced.

This time while charging, I stuck my spear out and stabbed one of them right through the rib cage! The tip of my spear pierced right through some sort of glowing blue and white orb hidden in his heart.

*Fwish!*

*Peeeew!*

Suddenly, the skeleton's body began to violently shake. Cracks formed on the surface of the bones, but a vibrant blue light filled in the crevices they made. I jumped back, afraid that he was about to self-destruct.

His entire body was soon swallowed in bright blue rays, but he didn't explode. The blue glow faded slowly, and from his chest bloomed a pulse of light. As it expanded across him, healthy skin was regenerated to its rightful place.

Finally the pulse of light finished its journey, revealing the man’s true human form had returned.

“Oh my gosh!” I lifted my spear up. “Guys! My spear can change people back to normal!”

“Huh!?” Indena looked over in shock. “Woah…”

“Amazing,” Mella uttered. “So it is possible to save them.”

Mella did mention that there was a shell of darkness in the people. The stardust Spear of Destiny must have been able to break through it and return them to normal.

I had the power to change people back now, so I got right to work saving souls!

My spear jabbed into every skeleton I saw! At least a dozen were returned to their human form, and there were plenty more here that needed this treatment.

This was exciting! Finally some good news!

“Oi, Shrimp! Stop!” Indena grabbed one end of my spear and held me back from saving anymore people.

“Let go!” I tugged. “I need to save them!”

“How about you take a look at the people you're ‘saving.’”

Out of spite, I almost didn't want to look back. But forgoing a mild tantrum, I turned and saw a bunch of naked people collapsed and freezing in the snow.

Indena was making some sort of magic flame hover over each of them so they’d keep warm, but it wouldn’t last forever.

"Now what are we supposed to do with all these guys? Just leave ‘em here?" Indena questioned.

This was a problem on so many levels. We'd have to find something to cover those people up, and we'd need to have some way to get them out of here, otherwise they'd be in range of the nova.

"Oops…" *sniffle* "I was just trying to help them..."

I was tearing up a little, but Indena wiped those tears away.

"I don't blame you. But you gotta make sure that you're helping people isn't going to leave them worse off. We'll save them once it's safe to do it."

That was a good point. This wasn't some game where people would just vanish and turn into a tally mark on a scoreboard after we rescued them. We actually needed to make sure they had somewhere safe to recover fully afterwards, especially in a case like this.

"I'll gather some clothes for them." Mella jumped on her broom. "Allow some of my familiars to gather these souls together."

A few big birds spawned along with an elephant with a platform on its back. The birds carried the people up to the platform and the elephant protected them up high from a few of the skeletons, who I guess didn’t turn back when I stabbed them.

Meanwhile, Mella raced off on her broom to gather something to cover the people up with. While she was doing that, we continued onward to clear a path to the door.

"You know something weird I noticed?" I spoke up.

"What?" Indena asked.

"Some of the skeletons didn't change back when I stabbed them in the chest. Why is that?"

Indena hadn't a clue. It was odd though. Maybe my spear wasn't strong enough yet to change them all back? That's all I could think of at any rate.

~☆☆☆~

Finally a path was clear for us to get inside. The front gate was very well protected by a security puzzle, much like the one from pylon 83 last year. I was a little better with my math skills, so I quickly interfaced with the control panel and worked out the equation.

“Math…I hate math,” Indena commented.

“It shows in your intelligence,” Mella said.

“Every word you speak makes me hate you more.”

While those crazy kids were having a sassy tug of words, I got through the security barrier and the door unsealed.

“Alright, it’s only going to stay open for a few seconds, so get inside now!” I announced.

Skeletons were hot on our trail, so we needed to get up there on the double.

Everyone marched in, but both Mella and Indena looked absolutely flabbergasted at the interior of the pylon.

“Holy crap…” Indena remarked. “Talk about futuristic.”

There was a big sci-fi charm to all these structures, but seeing some of the buildings that humans had on the surface, it almost made me feel like these otherworldly designs were made a lot more artistic than practical. There were lots of details in the metal walls, and very pretty lights all over that just screamed beautiful to me.

I saw them every day though growing up, so it’s nothing out of the ordinary. I just had a newfound appreciation for it is all.

Mella closed her eyes and stuck her nose in the air. “Usually, man made structures that manipulate so much mana are considered grave violations to the spirits. But I don’t sense their ire being drawn by such a place as this.”

“These places were made to protect and sustain nature, so that’s probably why,” I answered.

“Fascinating,” Mella uttered, taking initiative and heading for the elevator. “Come. We must reach the top of this tower.”

Wait, does she know where she is going?

“Who put you in charge?” Indena asked.

“Can you not hear that voice? It calls us to climb the spire.”

“Woah, are those the spirits talking to you?” I asked.

“What? Foolish girl. Are you deaf?”

Wait, does she mean…?

“Young Mistress Asamo, I request you come to the control room at the top of the tower at once.” I heard over the tower intercom. “I repeat…Young Mistress Asamo, I…”

That was the tower AI sending out a message for me. He must have activated when I passed through the security barriers.

“Oh…” I frowned at Mella. “You made it sound all mystical and stuff.”

“Yeah, what the hell was that all about?” Indena supported.

Mella had a pouty face, like she was disappointed in us.

“Now that we have criticized the way I talk and missed obvious environmental cues, may we proceed?” she gestured for the elevator.

The elevator was nice and ready for us to head up it, so we all ran in and I set it to stop at the right floor with the control room.

Suddenly I shivered. The last time I was in one of these pylons, the tower AI was trying to kill me. In all the excitement outside I’d almost forgotten about that.

“You alright?” Indena noticed my quivering.

“Um…” but I couldn’t answer. The fear was too much.

“Hey, things are gonna be alright,” Indena smiled, nudging my shoulder. “We’ve got your back, and we’ll fix everything back to normal.”

It was nice knowing they were here. Weird in a way too, but nonetheless I was happy to know I was making friends who would support me. It didn’t get rid of the fear, but it gave me the courage to stand up to it. At least, until we got to the control room.

If this tower AI was corrupted too, we’d be in a lot of trouble. I could only pray that it wasn’t, but the anticipation was awfully terrible.