Early morning Calux and Seraphiel met during breakfast with Celine and they had a friendly conversation just getting to know each other while speaking of mundane things in general.
Once they were finished, Celine had to of course be a responsible parent and give her warnings to these 'children' since it was essentially their first actual rift, and as they knew, rifts can be unpredictable.
"Kids, as you know, rifts can be unpredictable, and although I'm certain you will be fine if anything extreme happens thanks to Nyra, one can never be too careful with your surroundings, there are beasts in those rifts that can sneak attack, use shadows, poison, and other kinds of sneaky attacks that can get you while distracted."
"It is important to be aware of your surroundings and not get comfortable even if you can't feel any presence."
Calux and Seraphiel both nodded in agreement, they knew they couldn't be careless.
Usually the groups to enter rifts consisted of 4-6 people, however in this instance only Calux and Seraphiel were going inside as a team.
Of course, these two little monsters added up to easily a 4-6 man team without even adding Nyraxis into the mix with how strong they were individually.
I tested Calux yesterday, and I was pleasantly surprised, the fact that he trained against five constructs that had a rank above his own alone puts me at ease knowing that he has faced worse odds than what he should face in any C rank rift, even if they face an Elite Boss..
His swordsmanship is definitely a tier or two above my own, and I've trained for years to master my art...
"Yes mother, I alone can face at least 3-4 beasts at a B rank level, and that is without Nyra, I'm not particularly worried."
Sera still couldn't believe the power output that Calux had shown, his element alone was scary enough, he could basically kill someone at the same rank with his spatial banishment alone, that didn't include his sword skills which were akin to a Sword God.
..
Arriving in front of the rift, Seraphiel and Calux were met with two B rank awakeners that were guarding the rift.
They had leather armor and a sigil that was represented by a wolf in the background and two small iron swords crossed between each other at the bottom, this was the sigil of house Voidbane, a house that thrived in swordsmanship.
"Greetings young lord, we were informed of your arrival. Please be careful, as only two people will be going in, where the suggested entrance count is above four awakeners."
"Best of luck to you both."
Calux was happy with the guard's words.
There was no arrogance in his words, only caution, that is something he liked about their family's army, there was always humility engrained in their minds.
Calux looked at Seraphiel, and she just nodded back at him as if reading his thoughts.
She was ready, ready for her first rift experience, and ready for her first team experience with Calux.
They had barely been introduced less than twenty four hours ago, but she could feel as if she had known him her entire life.
She felt comfortable with Calux, as did he with her.
It was something strange, they instinctively trusted each other after a few hours of conversation.
Crossing through the rift, they were instantly shown a screen of the Apex Network.
--
Welcome to the world Fenrix.
Mission Objectives:
- Clear the corrupted wolves inside Volkov's Lair.
- Kill the Elite Boss: Corrupted Volkov
--
Calux saw the screen and grinned, then looked at Seraphiel.
"I guess we are lucky, an Elite Boss means there aren't as many beasts and they are stronger, this should be fun."
Seraphiel felt chills at the sight of Calux's smile.
Is he a battle maniac?
Or is this because of the hellish training he endured in that skill of his?
As always she lost herself in her thoughts and just smiled a bit nervously.
"Well, I'll definitely be tested... Unlike you, I haven't fought beasts before."
"Well technically I haven't fought beasts, those constructs in my skill were all made of void, so I've never actually killed before."
Seraphiel thought for a second and it made sense, although he had more combat experience in theory, he had never killed either.
"Well, to our first hunt!"
She lifted her arm and closed her fist as if declaring victory.
Calux couldn't help but think about how cute she looked.
How cute.
Feeling his amused gaze, she was more aware of what she had done and just wanted to hide between a rock and not come out in a year.
..
Walking into the cave that was a few meters from where they had spawned, you could feel a strange miasma in the cave, this was a clear indication of corruption that was something that every rift had in common.
These rifts connected to places that had been lost to corruption, now the question Calux and Seraphiel didn't know was if these were within their universe or outside of it, since all they knew was that this was someone's way of 'invading'.
After walking for a minute or two, they could hear howling of at least two wolves, and the fact proved right when three intimidating wolves, ten feet tall were suddenly in front of them.
These wolves looked a lot like Dire-wolves, they had four gigantic fangs two on the bottom and two on the top that looked extremely deadly if they were to bite someone.
However, a stand out was clear, they had red lines covering part of their fur, red eyes, and an awful miasma came out of their mouths.
Seraphiel quickly got into action by creating two constructs, they looked like armored knights, one had a spear and the other held a type of great sword.
Although she had the capacity of expanding to five minds, creating five humanoid constructs put a strain on her mana that was not something necessary unless in a situation where numbers were really needed.
Calux took out Void Edge from his inventory and the moment the blade appeared, Seraphiel looked at it with sparkling eyes.
"I'm so envious of you! That weapon was tailored made for you!"
Calux smiled, and played with the sword in his hand giving it a few rotations in his hand as if testing its weight after not using it for almost a day.
"Ready?", he asked Seraphiel.
"Of course, I've never been more ready for something in my entire life!"
Awoooo.
The sound of the wolves charging into battle was heard, but Calux and Seraphiel had only big smiles on their faces.