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1051 Words
When the final orc fell and started to dissolve, she checked her readout and saw that she only had seven percent mana left and signaled the team behind her to retreat.
Her handlers.
Her power armor’s protectors.
They would watch her kill herself in combat, but the second she died, they would immediately move in and claim the power armor.
It was far too valuable to allow Minkalla to absorb it, after all.
She was disposable.
Or at least, she was until she had bound with the armor.
Now that that had happened, she had become one of the elite Paladins, and that was a status few could match.
Even knowing that and experiencing it for the first three floors, she wouldn’t have wanted them to step in and save her.
More than one of the Paladins had their armor bind right at their moment of crisis, and she had been willing to take that risk as well.
If she’d been the third Paladin Cadet to fail to bond to this armor, she wasn’t entirely sure what would happen to the suit. But she personally would have been kicked out of the program, and with how much of her life she’d poured into the organization, she would likely never recover from that.
As she retreated to her handlers, she opened her chest and took the straw in her mouth, then started taking large gulps of the protein smoothie. The suit was built for an immortal, so it didn’t carry anything so mundane as food for the pilot, and frankly Kepler made pretty good blends of the stuff.
At the same time, the mechanics in the group started inspecting the suit, to make sure its self-repair functions were still working and integrated well after its bonding.
Valerie herself had nothing on her; she couldn’t if they wanted to increase the odds of the armor binding. And despite the armor already becoming a growth item, they didn’t change their plans mid delve.
Looking at Darren, the Tier 14 leader of the team, she asked, “How are things looking?”
Not glancing up from his pad, the man nodded slightly. “Good. Things seem to be stabilizing. Your integration with the armor has risen to seventy three percent.”
Hearing that, Valerie clenched her fist. “f*****g finally.”
Darren looked up and shot her an evil smirk. “Don’t get too excited. That’s dead average for someone who is bound with an item because of a floor reward. Good, but you’ll need to work harder to fully integrate. You still have potential to grow, don’t squander your time.”
“I know the stats, but it feels so much higher than the seventy percent mark.”
Pausing, she watched the other mechanics start to channel the tens of thousands of mana to refill her armor’s reserves and asked, “What’s up ahead?”
“Giant birds. Lightning and fire mostly.”
Despite that being a less than ideal combination, Valerie nodded. “I’m going to fight them.”
Darren looked up, and she could see the sigh he restrained. “That is not recommended. It’s a non-optimal match up with the floor theme.”
Valerie disagreed. “We can do it.”
Darren didn’t argue further.
Valerie was already a full member of the Paladins, which meant she was officially in command.
While he was technically a higher rank than her, his responsibility and authority started and ended with her power armor. So long as she wasn’t deliberately risking her power armor’s recoverability, she had the authority to pick and choose her engagements. And even that small technicality of control over her vanished now that she was no longer a cadet and was bound to the armor system.
Despite the readings only indicating a small increase in synchronization, she felt it in her bones.
The two of them were merging.
Becoming one entity.
Binding in more than just in spirit.
“I’m taking the fight.”
And that was the end of that discussion.
“Our reports indicate the monsters are faster than average but have slightly weaker bodies in compensation. Also, their elemental attacks are mostly based around their wings and claws. You are being officially warned to retreat at thirty percent mana remaining, at a minimum, to ensure damage stays within repairable parameters.”
That last bit was said in his official capacity, and she responded in an equally official manner. “Understood. Thirty percent.”
As the mechanics finished their work, she shut her opening and readied herself to engage with her new enemies.
Darren then said the same thing he had hundreds of times before. “Bind or die, cadet.”
Not bothering to send the response back through her AI, she said to herself. “I chose to bind.”
The call and response were as old as the Paladins themselves and was another part of the superstitions regarding the process. Just because she had already bound to the armor didn’t mean she was finished. She needed additional growth item floors if she wanted to reach the heights she was aiming for.
Better to not jinx it.
With a full charge of mana, she activated her thrusters and flying enchantments, taking off with a burst of speed.
She could fly with just her Concept, but she felt that it wasn’t the right course of action when she was trying to deepen her tie with the armor.
Valerie did use her Concept to part the air before her as her speed quickly passed the sound barrier while she flew into the next ruin.
It was a plain with waving grass and a ceiling she couldn’t see or sense with her sensor suite or spiritual sense.
More of Minkalla’s spatial shenanigans, she was sure.
She did see the two dozen person-sized eagles banking to attack her and noted them as they appeared on her screens.
The normal Heads Up Display from the power armor was integrated with her AI, but it did have redundant backup screens just in case her AI was suppressed, in Minkalla or elsewhere.
For a less experienced pilot, she might not be used to fighting blind, but Valerie and every other cadet had practiced for this a million times.
Their training was long and brutal.
- Writer
