After Kumo ended the skinwalker, the class chosen took off running back the way they came. With Shell having the mental connection still up, it was quickly decided that they would appeal to the city above for a garrison of guards to help end the threat.

  It wasn’t that they weren’t confident in ending the creatures themselves, but it would be much easier in a larger group with people who knew the caves a bit better.

  What sounded like an army was running after them and even though they were quite a bit ahead of the monsters, they could feel the tremors. A horrifying cacophony of various voices and laughing echoed up through the tunnel.

  Vorin, Zuls, Kumo, and Yu were in the back while Synexus, Prith, Shell, and Gene led the way back up following the lit trail of plants. One wrong turn would mean a fight. One falter and the horde of vile creatures would be upon them. The stakes were no doubt high.

  When the four in front ran past an especially dark side tunnel, more laughs rang out followed by a trap being sprung. Dirt and pebbles started to fall in front of the group which only meant one thing: a cave-in.

  All the class chosen had increased speed thanks to their stats and they intended to use it. Each of them went into a full sprint to get ahead of the falling debris. Synexus activated Body Transmutation to make his body lighter while increasing the strength of his legs following the traits of the light rabbit. Gene clung to his shoulder with every bit of force the owl could manage. Prith activated his skill to increase his agility for a few seconds. Shell used her water to glide forward as if on a wave. Kumo used a strong breeze to give the entire group a tailwind. Vorin and Zuls continued pushing their bodies as much as they could.

  Just as the cave-in began in earnest, the party was nearly where they needed to be. Synexus with Gene, Prith, and Shell were all able to make a final push to clear the trapped area. They turned their heads around to make sure the rest of the party would make it. That’s when a hand shot out of a shadow and grabbed Vorin’s leg.

  He tried to shake off the shadow’s grasp, but another hand shot out and grabbed him with a better hold than the first. Kumo, Zuls, and Yu all turned to free their party leader from the monsters. It didn’t take long for Kumo to sever them. Unfortunately, they were stalled long enough. As they began moving towards their friends again, the entire cave roof collapsed. Dust, dirt, and rocks were everywhere. It had shaken the whole cave.

  When the air cleared thanks to another breeze by Kumo, they looked at the blockage before them. It would take them a few hours to clear it even with their skills and enhanced strength. The sounds of the horde behind them were getting louder and choices needed to be made. A moment later, the sweet voice of Shell shot through their minds.

  “Are you okay?”

  “Yes, we are all fine. Just trapped with a mass of enemies approaching. What about on your end?” Vorin answered quickly with a slight tinge of embarrassment in his words since he was the reason they had not made it to the other side.

  “We are fine. However, it does sound like we will have enemies on our side as well. Synexus is working on a way to get you four out.”

  “That’s good. Don’t risk yourselves. If the enemies get too close, be sure to abandon the digging efforts and find a side passage. We will try to hold off the horde for as long as we can.”

  “Alright. Synexus said to stand clear of the wall by a few feet in case he has to blow it up.”

  “Tell him not to use explosives! That could bring the whole cave down on all of us.”

  “He said he has a plan to mitigate the chances of that happening. It’ll take time though.”

  A plan was in place, and each side had their jobs. Fighting the horde would be difficult with only four class chosen, but it couldn’t be helped. Vorin began working on a plague that could work against the skinwalkers. Kumo started to conjure a fog and with her new upgrades it now would go down the cave system and target the horde coming at them to deal some damage before the battle began. Zuls summoned her bonded and stood ready to fight. Element, her bear, started working on digging them out with his ability to manipulate the ground. Yu started preparing the mana for her fire vortex spell. It wouldn’t be the most useful in this space, but it should thin out the horde quite a bit.

  On the other side, Prith stood ready to protect the others from their incoming enemies while Shell helped Synexus with his plan. She was using her water to help soften certain spots of the tunnel while he was Genome Perfecting tree seeds.

  Reaching in, he was altering their genetic instructions to grow in a very specific way while also using Element Modification to make the resulting trees harder than steel. His plan was a simple one. He was going to make the trees grow into a brace for the tunnel and then use Progress Garden to plant highly explosive variants of liing plants in the middle of the blockage. With it being a tight space, the seeds would automatically detonate creating an explosion to clear their path and get them back to their friends. His only hurdle was quickly changing the instructions of the seeds. When he grew Anexi, his ship, he had weeks to do the meticulous editing needed. Now, he only had minutes.

  On Vorin’s side, the battle had started. Most were weakened by Kumo’s fog when they reached them. The skinwalkers didn’t have a high vitality to begin with and were easily dispatched. Gales of wind, cloud blades, Tempest Surges, lighting strikes, flame lashes, a flame vortex, and a blizzard raged on the horde. Their numbers were falling quickly. Vorin himself hadn’t joined in yet and Zul’s companions except for Snowfall were standing by to take over when Kumo, Yu, and Snowfall ran through their resources.

  To their amazement, the skinwalkers kept coming from down the tunnels. Each one looked like a deformed human they had touched. Most were crawling over their brethren to get a chance at the party. It didn’t seem to faze the horrifying monsters at all that they were being cut down at an accelerated rate.

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  Even with their impressive numbers the battle was going well and there was hope they could clean out this infestation by themselves. Vorin was keeping a careful eye on the battle but heard something behind him towards the blockage. When he turned around, he saw roots breaking through along the walls before forming tree trunks every three feet or so. He shook his head at the thought of how ridiculous Synexus’ abilities were sometimes.

  “Captain, have the trees broken through to your side?”

  “Yes, Shell, they have. They’ve gone about ten feet onto our side on both sides of the tunnel.”

  “Perfect. Prepare for an explosion at your back. You may want Kumo to prepare an air cushion.”

  He turned to Kumo. “Kumo, can you create a pocket of air behind us in front of the blockage!”

  Without turning around or answering, he felt a breeze pick up behind him.

  “We’re ready, Shell.”

  Right as he finished his thought the wall next to him collapsed to reveal more skinwalkers in a secret tunnel. They had been flanked.

  More laughs broke out among the new arrivals as they poured out of the tunnel. Vorin, Zuls, and her bonded turned to start fending them off. They hadn’t reacted quickly enough however, and the new horde had already overrun them. Just then Synexus’ explosion went off causing a huge release of force to hit against the pocket of air that Kumo had created. It overpowered the air and the class chosen with the horde flew back down the tunnel into Kumo, Yu, and Snowfall.

  Moments later Synexus, Prith, Shell, and Gene emerged from where the blockage was and started their own attack to clear their friendlies of the skinwalker scourge. Sounds of distant enemies still rang out behind them and they knew their rescue needed to be quick.

  Jumping into battle Shell started to play her ocarina while pushing skinwalkers off her allies with waves of water from her bag. Prith cut and sliced with legendary precision to help eliminate their enemies while not hurting their friends. His blade vibrated with power as he flooded it with his mana to swiftly cut throw anything that got in its way. Synexus grew several binding vines that pulled the skinwalkers from Vorin and Zuls. He also grew several razor grass seeds in the horde skewering dozens of the monsters. That was when he got an idea.

  “Kumo! Get ready to blow them back!”

  She nodded and summoned a gale worthy of a tempest that took the entire horde off their feet and pushed them back several feet. Just as she did, more explosions rang out above them in the cave ceiling. A massive cave-in came down on the horde crushing hundreds and blocking them out.

  Yu laughed before turning around and casting fire lashes at the remaining skinwalkers. Once the last one fell, they all took a deep breath. It wasn’t over yet though.

  “We need to keep moving and get to the surface. This is an infestation on a scale that can’t go undealt with. We need to inform the city above before more people fall to these monsters.”

  Everyone agreed with their captain and right before they took off running. The light from Synexus’ plant faded and they were cast into darkness.

  He quickly rectified the situation by growing more with Instant Growth, however, when the lights came back to flood the cave, they weren’t alone.

  Each party member now had a doppelganger standing right beside them. A perfect copy with their equipment and all.

  They jumped back in surprise except their copies did the same. Their voices even matched without any sign of the slightest variation.

  Eyes darted around the circle trying to find any sort of flaw, only to find none. Zuls broke the starring contest.

  “This is freaky!”

  “Right? You monsters are terrifying!” The other Zuls answered.

  “Okay what do you mean, you monsters? You’re the skinwalker!”

  “Are you serious? You’re the skinwalker!”

  “You can tell right, captain?” They said in unison while turning towards the two Vorins.

  “I can’t tell. They are too much like us.”

  “You mean you’re too much like me, monster.”

  That led to both Vorin’s pulling their scythes.

  “Woah, everyone put down your weapons. We don’t want to be hasty.” Synexus spoke out.

  “Wow, I can’t believe the monster version of me wanted to stop the bloodshed.”

  “Nice try on covering your identity. How about this. The real ones want to escape the tunnels, the clones don’t. So, let’s all start running up the tunnel regardless. Eventually the clones will have to reveal themselves to stop us.”

  Everyone in the group nodded and as a group of 16 they took off running. While they ran the group was thinking of anyway they could prove the other was false. Synexus was hoping the skinwalkers would stop the group from leaving ultimately revealing themselves, however that hadn’t happened.

  “I have a way we can get rid of our shadows. From the stories I heard as a child, skinwalkers are unable to copy the soul which means they don’t have our skills.” Yu spoke up as they all made their way up the tunnel.

  Coming to a halt the group turned to look at her.

  “Alright, then all we have to do is go around the circle and have the real one perform a skill. My skills aren’t great for this sort of thing however.” One of the Vorins spoke.

  “I can start.” Kumo said.

  She turned towards the wall and fired a cloud blades and then jumped into the air to cloud walk.

  When she was finished, they all turned towards the other Kumo. After a few seconds she hissed and tried to charge the real Kumo who quickly put her down.

  “I can go next.” Zuls said before she let out a roar of fire and then turned her fingers into ice claws.

  The fake Zuls died shortly after that.

  Yu went next and soon there was only one Yu left standing. Prith was able to prove himself by using a mana blade to slash a huge gash in the cave wall. The other couldn’t even scratch the surface. Shell summoned a wave and played a flawless tune. Her copy was struck down.

  That left Vorin, Synexus, and Gene. All three would be difficult to prove. Gene didn’t have any skills, many of Synexus’ skills could be copied by the skinwalker, and Vorin’s could be dangerous to test on anyone since he had to cut someone to prove it.

  Ultimately, they made each Vorin deliver a small plague to Prith and then heal him. It ended up being unneeded, however, because the first Vorin to go, tried to stab Prith in the eye with a scythe and got a sword stabbed through them instead.

  Synexus ended up being able to prove himself by taking a seed out of his Progress Garden and growing it in his hand. Shortly after, a blade of razor grass grew underneath his imposter and skewered him.

  After establishing the real Synexus, he touched both Genes and determined the fake. The imposter owl was quickly dealt with.

  “Well, that was awful. We don’t have time to stop if more decide to copy us.”

  “You’re right, Zuls. Let’s get up top as fast as possible. We will need to fight this horde coming from the surface first.” Vorin pointed to the incoming mass of bodies coming at them. Except on further inspection, they were humans. Or skinwalkers pretending to be humans.