Invincible Earth! : Volume 1

As Lance turned to see who the 2 new members of their team, a wide look of joy first appeared on his face before morphing into one of absolute terror.

In front of him were 2 Yu Yans, identical to the last pore on their faces. That same beauty was mirrored perfectly.

One of the Yu Yans smiled at him while the others lips contorted into a thin line after recognizing who it was.

The smiling Yu Yan stretched out her arm to Lance saying, “Hi, I’m Yu Ying and this my twin sister Yu Yan. I heard that you pinched my sisters face when she tried to console you? She always does this, any stray dog or cat that she sees anywhere will not be left alone until it has been petted or consoled by Yan here.” She giggled as she said the last part.

Lance felt his face burning as he shook her hand. Stray dogs and cats? He had looked like that?

Seeing Lance blush, Yu Yan sighed as she also stretched out her arm. “Lets start afresh. We are even on the same team so we will have to work together. Your loss of composure might also be partly my fault. Both of our Intrinsic Natures come under the “Infatuation” category, although there are some differences between them. Both of us have been trained since young to control it, but it still spills out sometimes especially taking effect on creatures who are feeling negative emotions. Don’t worry, as you seem to have improved enough to not be affected now.” Yu Yan gave a slight smile as she finished speaking.

Lance still felt a slight urge to go blank, but he could control himself this time. Seeing this, he felt proud again to have put in the work and become stronger. He shook her hand and gave a small smile, opting not to speak as he still didn’t fully trust himself to be completely cool.

It was a marvel that even if the girls were wearing the standard IE training coveralls, hints of their perfectly toned and fit bodies with curves in all the right places were visible in their movements.

Darius and Entsy also introduced themselves, with the girls blushing in turn after realizing that the famous Gaia and Spring were in their team. They gushed over them and walked beside them asking them questions about cultivation leaving Lance to trail from behind.

The two had grown quite famous due to the fight and their consistent high scores.

Lance first felt an intense jealousy seeing this but remembering the scary look of fury on Yu Yan’s face in their first encounter, he felt that maybe the present situation was overall safer for him in case he messed up. This though didn’t help in decreasing the jealousy though.

In this fashion, the team of 5 followed the ball to another clearing about a kilometer away. In this clearing were placed pods identical to the one he had been in when he had woken up in the infirmary.

The pods were placed in circles of 5. In the center of each circle was another glass ball hovering above a stone pedestral.

“Please enter a pod. You will have 30 minutes after entering in a virtual environment to see the mission particulars and plan a course of action. Good luck initiates.“, instructed the ball.

Lance and his group of 5 took a deep breath as they momentarily got mesmerized by the swirling stars in the glass ball.

Their actions in the Pentagon would decide whether they would emerge from the pods as carps that had transformed into dragons.

…

Snapping out of the mesmerizing sight, the team proceeded to submerge themselves in the pods.

After they had done so, the stars in the ball blinked as each of them found themselves falling asleep.

Lance woke up in a blank white space. It reminded him of the scene in the Matrix where they loaded stocked up on guns.

As he looked around, he found that his teammates were also present. The last thing he remembered was passing the test. After that, everything seemed to be a blur.

In front of each of them, a floating screen came into existence. On it were the words:

“Welcome to your first Initiation Mission. In roughly half an hour, you will be transported into the labyrinth that exists below the Pentagon. Your mission is to find the notes on the experiments of the famous scientist, Nikola Tesla. The mission key is a dossier that contains these notes. Any one of your team touching the dossier will result in immediate passing of the mission and teleportation out of the location.

Items provided:

1xBarrier. This will protect you from gunshots when worn. Roughly 100 bullets from assault rifles can be blocked by the barrier before it loses effect.

1xExit Key. Crushing this talisman will result in immediate teleportation out of the mission location. You will still pass if your teammate obtains the mission key.

Please remember that death is possible in the mission.”

The message ended with these chilling words.

Lance felt at his waist to find a small pouch with two items inside: a small shiny ball the size of his nail with a chain around it and a round red pendant adorned with a few gems.

After he was done reading, he observed the two new additions to once again feel afraid seeing the familiar Yu Yan there.

A similar conversation ensued. Lance had a feeling of deja vu throughout as Yu Ying seemed to be oblivious to their location and said similar things, such as Yu Yan’s care for stray dogs and cats.

Yu Yan’s apology shocked Lance a bit, but their conversation was cut short as a giant timer appeared above their heads.

Seeing the timer, Darius got a serious look on his face as he said:“We don’t have much time. From the seniors, I know that each and every mission will put us in situations that will require us syncing our INs to full effect. Let us use this time to figure out some strategies. I am “Gaia” Darius. My IN is earth. Depending on the distance between the earth and me, my power is amplified to a certain degree. For now I only have two abilities: increased strength and gravity manipulation. As for the latter, I can only double the gravity in an area of 10 feet around me. State each of your intrinsic natures so that we can start planning.”

No one complained seeing Darius taking the lead. Apart from being famous, Darius had the natural ability of a leader with his calm demeanor and tactical planning.

“I am “Spring” Entsy. After a short pause, I can either accelerate rapidly or kick with a force of 1500 kg. I can also jump on surfaces increasing momentum before unleashing a kick.“, said Entsy, stoic as always.

Hearing these two, Lance was amazed. He knew that they were strong, but didn’t know that they had such fantastical abilities. He was even slightly envious.

He punched Entsy in the shoulder, saying, “Damn Entsy! 1500 kg! That means you are stronger than all of the initiates right?”

“Kicking once will result in my leg bones breaking.“, answered Entsy, opting to look into the distance.

There was a silence after hearing this.

…

After the brief silence, Yu Ying spoke.

“Both of our INs are called “Infatuation”. They work in different ways but you only need to know this: any normal human being who looks into our eyes for a certain period of time can be controlled by us. If Lance here looked into my eyes for 3 seconds, I can make him go jump off any building. As for regular humans, 1 second is enough. With our power now, each of us can only control one human for 1 hour before completely exhausting all of our stored energy.”

Lance shivered hearing this. This seemed to be a power right out of fairy tales. He decided to never look into these two girls eyes for any purpose whatsoever.

Sensing the gazes on him, Lance realized that it was his turn. He had no idea how to explain his power as he himself did not know how it was triggered.

“Umm....I don’t know my IN. I can output a huge amount of power, but I don’t know how its triggered.”

The rest nodded, expecting that this was the case. This was actually pretty common in unknown INs, as the owner had to go through a period of adjustment before they could actually sense and know for sure what their IN was.

The 5 got down to planning, seeing that there were only 25 minutes left.

Regarding the Pentagon, Lance only had a little more information than the others. He knew that it was one of the most securely guarded locations around the world. The most advanced of technology would be present, ranging from motion sensors and pressure sensors to even DNA and retina scanning.

They decided that their first approach would be to find a safe place to hide and plan their next step.

Depending on the information shared so far, Darius had proposed 2 plans and Lance 1. Lance had always loved strategy games, and this seemed like one big chessboard which piqued his interest.

Darius’s plans were:

1. If the storage room is close enough, pool all barriers and advance towards it. The whole point was only to touch the dossier after all.

2. Hypnotize a high ranking officer to find out the location of the dossier before acting.

Lance’s plan was only this: to act as cautious as possible. With the amount of firepower that would be present, their barriers would mean absolutely nothing. He disliked Darius’s first plan for this reason. It had been many decades since the notes had been taken, so it was entirely possible that they would just be in a storeroom. Hence, getting the information would be the first objective before trying to reach it sneakily.

Donovan had spoken about hidden objectives. Lance suspected that one of the objective was not to kill anybody, just like in many PC games like Hitman. After all, the primary reason behind the existence of IE was to protect the earth, and having the deaths of innocent people who were just doing their duty on their hands would not speak well of them.

Everyone looked at Lance in a new light after he said this. This was definitely something that they could not have come up with on their own.

As the timer counted down the last minute, Darius said:

“Lance, I may have assumed the role of captain right now, but you have the best analytical mind among us. Thus, we all leave the decision making to you. Direct us however you see fit. Don’t worry, just do your best. We won’t blame you no matter what happens.”

Darius came forward and raised his hand. “Do all of you agree?“, he asked.

Each of the team member came forward without hesitation to place their hand on Darius’s, nodding and showing their support for Lance. Yu Ying even gave him a smile but his hair still stood on end remembering what she had said about their INs.

Seeing this made Lance almost teary-eyed. With just one sentence, these people trusted him so much to lead. He vowed to do his best and make them win.

He placed his hand last, and as the cheer resounded in his ears, his chest puffed up with pride.

“Go, Team Lance!”