Endzone: Simulated Apocalypse

Amidst the horde amongst horde of buff security mutants, Cyanide and Kirika hid underneath a table inside one of the many rooms on the floor, just like they had once did in the security office on the level above. This time, however, the stakes were far higher, and the enemies far stronger and more plenty.

Each of them wore black security outfits that contrasted with the normal workers' white lab coats, and held heavy firearms in their hands. If Cyanide and Kirika screwed up one tiny bit, they would be gunned down by several light machine guns together. The alarm was dangerous, summoning more powerful mutants, but at the same time, Cyanide had no doubt these mutants would provide more XP and item drops.

It was like the Scarlet Hour, in a sense—high risk, high reward. If Cyanide could find some way to take advantage of this, that would be great, but…

"Listen closely," he whispered to Kirika, taking advantage of the alarm's noise to communicate. "We're going to need to take them down one by one. To do that, we need to utilize our Invisibility skill well. There's four right in this room with us. I'll take care of the far two. The ones right next to us are up to you."

But to his surprise, Kirika smirked.

"No need. I can take them all."

Cyanide narrowed his eyes. "… You die, you die."

"Heh. Just you watch."

With a confident grin, Kirika slipped out from underneath table, and brought her katana's sheathe right up in front of her face. Then, slowly, she pulled the blade out, green eyes shining brightly. The four buff mutants in the room turned to her in surprise and drew their weapons, but it was too late.

Green strands of energy weaved around Kirika's body as she dashed towards them, and sliced her katana upwards.

"Way of the Tempest — Aerial Strike!"

A powerful green gale shot out of the glowing blade, sweeping the four mutants high up into the air despite their size. Once they came back down though, Kirika was screwed.

But what if… they didn't come back down at all?

Immediately dashing closer, she followed up with a second attack.

"Take… this! Way of the Tempest — Spinning Gale!"

Jumping up into the air, she spun around gracefully with her katana, cutting the four mutants and keeping them levitated using the wind generated by her blade. Once she was done, she reared her katana back, and just as the four mutants, now injured, were on the verge of death…

"And now, the final act: Way of the Tempest — Excelion Skewer!"

She thrust her blade forward like a spear, deadly and precise. A howling tornado that swept up tables and lab equipment alike soared towards the four levitating mutants, cutting through their metal limbs and armor with ease. It was swift, and was fatal; it was a Weapon Art Combo of the Wind Affinity.

Cyanide, who had been watching the battle unfold while using [Inspect] on one of the four mutants, could only blink in surprise as its HP was reduced to zero along with all three of its peers. He wasn't exactly 'impressed', but more so simply surprised.

The four mutants' bodies vanished into shards of light, and Kirika calmly sheathed her blade once more as the XP flowed into her body. Then, as the furniture and equipment crashed down back to the ground all around her, she flashed Cyanide a wink and a thumbs-up.

Cyanide, however, kept his glance set on the door and was about to tell her to quickly go invisible, but surprisingly enough… no mutants came.

What a joke. That much noise didn't attract a single guard?

And not only that… the alarm… seems to have ceased?

Cyanide, narrowing his eyes, peered out the door hesitantly, and saw that the mutants outside had all reverted to being normal white lab coat ones, though the number had certainly increased from before.

'What's going on here…' he thought, perplexed. This made no sense. Why would security decrease if they caused such a big commotion taking out those four guards?

Still, he wasn't complaining. If security was lowered, that meant he and Kirika could clean up the mutants on this floor easily without tripping another alarm.

Or at least, that's what they thought.

After stealthily taking down the white lab coat mutants right outside their door, Cyanide accidentally stepped on a tile on the floor. It looked no different from any other, but it was in fact a hidden trap. As soon as he stepped on it, he knew, since his foot sank a little into the ground.

And the next thing they knew, all around them, the alarms rose once more.

Out from the ground came the same security mutants from before, rising from black pools that came from seemingly nowhere and holding heavy weapons in their mechanical hands. Cyanide cursed, and the two hurriedly veiled themselves in Invisibility once more as they escaped to somewhere safe.

At the very least, the rooms they've cleared out before were still empty even though the alarm went on. They also knew how to disable the alarm—just kill a couple of these more powerful mutants—but the only problem was how they were going to identify which tiles of the floor they could step on and which tiles would trigger the alarm.

"So. Any ideas?" Cyanide asked Luna, who was busy accessing all the different cameras of this floor.

"Hm… it seems there is a central control room directly across the middle from this room, but getting there will be a hassle," Luna said after a while. "If we can make it there, though, not only can you disable all the alarms, you can likely also acquire a Level Three Security Pass. The leader of command of this place is there—he seems powerful."

Unfortunately, Cyanide couldn't run an [Inspect] on said leader through Luna's cameras, but it made sense. Still, the question remained: how was he going to reach there, in the midst of this alarm?

"Psst! Cyanide, over here," Kirika whispered sharply, and Cyanide turned to see her standing on top of a desk, pointing at a vent grate that was just barely out of reach for her.

Cyanide, though, was a different matter.