System Programmer Chapter 9: Surrounded

Everyone's eyes grew wide hearing Joshua announce they were more serpents coming.

"How many are there?" Eric asked.

"At least three. We have a few minutes before they catch up to us." Joshua said.

"What are we supposed to do? There is still no land in sight. This could be the end of us." Lydia concluded, a hint of fear in her voice.

"Calm down, sis. We're not dead yet." her sister said while putting her hand on Lydia's shoulder.

"We'll think of something, just keep moving at full speed for now." Catherine ordered.

The twins nodded and resumed pus.h.i.+ng the boat forward for about a minute but then…

"STOP! There is another one coming right in front of us." Catherine yelled.

The twins immediately slowed down the boat. With a snake in front of them and three behind them, the situation was looking grim.

"How the h.e.l.l are we going to escape this? If anyone has a plan, now would be a good time to share it." Eric asked.

"Hold on… Catherine, there is something weird in that direction." Joshua said, pointing his finger.

Catherine nodded, a new ma.s.s had just been detected as the twins stopped the boat. They were barely on the edge but it appeared to be… land? It was hard to tell. It wasn't anywhere near the walls of the cavern.

"Let's go that way. We'll have to hope it's what we think it is." Catherine said.

Low on options, the twins began to push the boat full speed toward the direction Joshua had pointed out. As they got closer, the signal became more clear, it appeared to be some island in the middle of the lake.

"Hopefully we can take refuge there." Catherine mentally told Joshua.

"It has to work. We're out of options." he replied.

They weren't sure how the snakes tracked their movement, but they adjusted to their direction, even kilometers away.

'Maybe they can sense the ripples in the water?' Joshua thought, biting his lip.

Luckily the island wasn't too far off and with the twins moving at full speed, it soon appeared in sight. It was a relatively large ma.s.s of land and although it was surrounded by rocks, various pa.s.sages going inside could be seen.

Unfortunately, this is when the first snake caught up to them. Worse it appeared in front of them, blocking their way to the island. Even though they were less than a hundred meters away, the head of the giant snake was standing in the way, almost taunting them to approach.

"We need to bypa.s.s this thing quickly, the others are right behind us." Catherine started. "Lydia, Cynthia you two keep going at it at full speed. The rest, we'll attack it together, we just need to make it move out of the way."

This was risky but they had very little time left. If the other snakes appeared they would be screwed.

Everyone was tired by the whole escapade but they all prepared their last reserves for this action.

The boat sped forward aiming straight for the island. The snake opened its mouth and charged, clearly intending of swallowing the party. Joshua and Catherine launched their attack together, Catherine used electrified water and Joshua added his own lightning on top of it. Those strikes. .h.i.t the creature's skin causing it to slow down a bit and yell in pain. Eric followed up by throwing a fireball, which exploded in the creature's mouth. The monster's face was covered by smoke due to the explosion but was still moving forward. Finally, when it was near the boat, Boris struck it's fang with his morning star, breaking the tooth. The finally caused the creature to yell in pain and back up a bit, allowing the boat to reach the land.

As soon as they reached the island, everyone jumped off the boat and ran toward one of the many openings in the rock. The snake tried to grab one of them, but luckily it missed. The creature shrieked in anger. Joshua observed the creature from a safe distance. He saw that the tooth Boris had just broken was being remade and something hit him. The way the tooth was regenerating was similar to how he was healing up his body after being damaged, the snake was pouring energy into the broken part to restore it.

'This thing is a spirit!' he realized. That would also explain why he couldn't pa.s.s through it.

"Is everyone all right?" Catherine asked.

The others nodded.

"That was waaaaaaay too close." Joshua said.

"Let's advance until we're totally out of its reach." Cynthia said.

The others agreed and the group moved forward toward safety, reaching a point where the creature had no more chances to hit them. The rocks surrounding the island were just a thin wall and after a few seconds, they emerged into the inner part of the land. It turned out to be a forest made of giant mushrooms. Joshua had never seen anything like it and had the impression to be a Smurf.

"Lalalalalala..." he hummed quietly.

The others put down their sacks and sat down, the whole ordeal had left them exhausted. Catherine was checking out the area with Luna, she didn't detect any lifeform apart from small animals. It looked like they would be safe for the time being.

"Joshua, can you scout the area, please?" she asked.

"Of course, give me a moment."

Joshua flew away and soon had made the tour of the place, the island had a diameter of about a kilometer. The entire place was covered by a rock wall with various small openings. The mushroom forest covered most of the place apart from a few clearings. He frowned when he realized that while the island itself was safe, one of the serpents was patrolling around it. They might have gotten away for now but they were trapped in here.

He reported his findings to the party. Eric s.h.i.+vered when he heard Joshua's report.

"These beasts seem to be abnormally intelligent. I'll doubt they'll leave." he said.

"They have to sleep sometimes… Maybe we can make a move when the patrolling one falls asleep?" Lydia suggested.

"Maybe… but I wouldn't count on it." Eric replied.

"We'll think of something, but for now I think we should rest. It's already late in the afternoon. Let's make camp on the island for today." Catherine suggested.

The others agreed, they should restore their energy as soon as possible while observing the situation and forming a plan.

While the group was unpacking for the night, Joshua decided to talk to Catherine about the serpent. He chose to speak mentally, he wanted to confirm a few things first. He started by explaining how he had seen it regenerate his missing tooth and how he couldn't traverse the creature's body.

"The way it healed was exactly the same way I do. Could those things be spirits?"

"It's possible. If they're high rank enough, they shouldn't have trouble maintaining a physical form."

"But… doesn't that mean they could drop their form and traverse the wall like I'm doing? I don't think they can or the first snake would have gone through the wall instead of going around it."

"Hmmm... That's a good remark. Honestly, I'm not sure why it didn't do that, but based on your description, the probability that those things are spirits is pretty high."

"So… do you have some kind of banishment magic or something? Maybe throw tons of salt at it as you did with me once."

Catherine rolled her eyes and smiled a bit.

"That only worked because you were unranked back then, with you current power you could dive into a mountain of salt and be unaffected. But to answer your question, I do know a spell that banishes spirits. However, those snakes are very powerful. I doubt it will work unless we manage to weaken them first."

Joshua nodded while making a smile.

"I see… Well, Honey, I've learned a valuable life… I mean ghost lesson today." he said.

"And what may that be?" she asked, afraid of the answer.

"I'M FREAKING USELESS IN BATTLE!!!!" he yelled throwing his arm in the air.

Catherine sighed and patted his shoulder.

"Don't be too harsh on yourself, the progress you made in the past month is impressive. Those snakes are not the type of opponent you would face in a normal situation."

"That's as may be, but they're just the first obstacle we've met since we're down here. I doubt they will be the last and we're already struggling with them. There is no denying I'm currently the weakest member of our party. I need to fix this as soon as possible."

Catherine couldn't refute this. She wished she could have summoned Joshua sooner but there was no use to cry over spilled milk.

"I understand, you're right. Joshua, I think we should have a look at the techniques you've been using. You haven't developed new ones since you ranked up. Sure your lightning strike became more powerful, but I believe someone with your creativity should be able to develop better techniques now that your soul is powerful enough. Allow me to help you with this."

She entered the soul world and joined up with Joshua there. For some reason, he had replaced his clothes with a kimono.

"Why are you wearing those bizarre clothes?" she asked.

"I thought we were going to have a training montage to power me up. I figured I should dress appropriately." he answered.

"I'm not sure what you mean with a montage but I'll do what I can to help, it's in everyone's interest."

"OK then, please teach me, Madam!"