'I'm working as fast as I can.' Solus replied, having a hard time not staring in amazement in front of the "ancient" relic.
The energy core was comprised of several concentric Adamant spheres, each one imbued with a different enchantment. The final result looked like a silvery gym ball that allowed the different pseudo cores to cooperate as if they were part of a power core.
'By my Mom, the Awakened of Urgamakka were geniuses. I wish we thought of something similar back when we were at the academy.'
'Focus, Solus.' Lith was now fighting a 3 meters (10 feet) tall Gargoyle that resulted from the merging of several smaller constructs.
By pooling up their mass and power thanks to Inxialot's blunder, the Gargoyles had taken a form capable of resisting Lith's water spells and of overpowering him with sheer might.
The cold kept the titan from shapeshifting, but it was still as strong as Feela the Behemoth.
Luckily for Lith, it was also much dumber. He adjusted his size to match that of the creature and used each attack that he landed or blocked to form a new frost layer that further slowed down his enemy.
'Okay, sorry. I needed to find the exact point to compromise all of the pseudo cores at the same time, otherwise-'
'Act now, explain later!' Lith was now one against three stone giants and without his armor, each hit he took made him cough out blood.
'Sorry!' Solus lifted War and pierced through the energy core until the hilt of the blade hit the most external Adamant sphere.
Due to the big size of the core, War's tip barely reached the innermost layers. On top of that, Solus had aimed the lunge so that none of the runes on any of the many pseudo cores would have been damaged in the process.
Her plan had been to rely on War's Counterflow skill to stop the energy core while also leaving to Lith something to study to understand the threat at hand. The moment the angry blade struck, the Gargoyles spread throughout Urgamakka froze in place, turning back into harmless statues.
Solus returned in her Monocle form while Lith retrieved the energy core and brought it outside to study it. The city was now covered in black stones from the Gargoyles' shattered bodies that the Awakened pulverized just to be safe.
The only trace left of the struggle was the damage on their armor since all it took an Awakened to heal from any wound and recover from exhaustion was the time of a few breaths.
"I told you that you jinxed it." Phloria said while cleaning herself from the black goo.
"I don't think so. Something is really off here. The golems were nothing much, then they became almost unstoppable, and then weaker again." Lith said. "I think there's a mastermind behind this attack and a crazy one at that."
"No, it's actually my fault." A pretty girl with honey-hued hair and blue eyes said while turning into a bright shade of purple. "I'm Emya the Hippogriff and during the attack, I used Life Maelstrom on a few golems to fry their pseudo core.
"I didn't know that they shared a hive body or I would have never done something so stupid. The Gargoyles were actually one single construct split into many parts so the Life Maelstrom ended up boosting their abilities instead of destroying them. I'm really sorry, guys."
She gave bows left and right while inwardly cursing the Council for putting a Lich in charge of the mission. Emya was one of the Council's envoys sent to sow discord or help the exploration team according to the circumstances.
It was their duty to make sure that everything went smoothly and to alert the Council representatives in the case anything that threatened the safety of the apprentices happened.
Their presence ensured that the test would be a real challenge. Not too easy but not even so hard that someone had to die of friendly fire. With the war with Thrud nearing, every single Awakened was a priceless treasure.
The Council had punished Inxialot by putting him in charge of the test solely because the envoys worked as a safeguard against his insanity. They were both his wardens and the apprentices' guardians.
"Don't worry. Everyone can make mistakes." Trevan the Nightwalker said and most of the expedition nodded at those words.
He was actually pissed off like everyone else, but his master had been crystal clear that the mission was not only to explore Urgamakka, but also to fraternize and learn teamwork.
'If not for the elf, we would have got wiped out less than an hour from our arrival. To make matters worse, no one thought about regrouping or coming up with a common strategy. Heck, we didn't even bother sharing our communication runes.
'We were isolated from each other and forced to fight on our own against a common enemy. If this was a battlefield filled with smart enemies instead of a bunch of ruins defended by old junk, we would have all died.
'Emya made a mistake, but it only emphasized how stupid we have been. If this happens again, I can kiss my legacy goodbye.' He and many others actually thought.
"Do you mind if I take a look at that? Despite my looks, I'm quite the scholar." Estor the Treant stepped forward while pointing at Lith's prize.
"Why? How do you look like?" Lith asked while holding War's hilt in his hand so that no one could touch it.
"Like a 5 meters (16'5") tall oak with fists bigger than a bull." He sighed. Just because of his size people usually assumed that he was more brawn than brains.
"So what?" Lith shapeshifted into his full Tiamat form, standing over 20 meters (66 feet) tall, enjoying the shock on the faces of his colleagues at the sight of his seven eyes, his four wings, and his violet aura. "You look cute to me."
Lith used the ruse to take everyone by surprise and force the Awakened to reveal their real nature. He discarded as potential allies all those whose faces turned into grimaces of envy or rage.
Fear, awe, and surprise, instead, were acceptable reactions. What he really looked out for, however, were respect and curiosity. Only a few matched those requirements and a young girl wielding an oddly familiar staff was among them.
"Let's set a few ground rules first." He said after reverting into a human. "You can study the energy core, but this thing is mine. Finders keepers. Also, whatever you do, don't touch the hilt of my blade unless you want to die."
"I'm fine with those conditions, but you are going overboard." Athung stepped forward to act as the representative of the humans. "Examining someone else's equipment is rude, but not enough to justify violence."
"Debatable." War's voice sounded like a metal screech that sent shivers down everyone's spine.
"It's not me that you have to convince. I wasn't threatening you, just warning you." Lith's words made those closer to the angry blade take a step back, fearing that it might attack them.
The Awakened split into small groups and took turns studying the energy core. A few hours later, after everyone had taken a look at the ancient relic with their respective breathing technique, Lith experienced his first Spirit Array.
