"Everything looks good. How does it look back there?" Jace asked as Shilla climbed into the seat behind him. All of the systems in the fighter craft were shown as operational. He just needed to start it up. "NeoYakuza, if you are satisfied can you open the hangar so we can head out?" 𝐟𝗿𝐞𝚎𝚠𝐞𝚋𝕟𝐨𝚟𝐞𝕝.𝕔𝕠𝚖

"Affirmative, and I thank you for the upgrades. I already feel my mind becoming clearer by the minute. It won’t be long before I have complete autonomy." The NeoYakuza AI told them. "Oh, and call me Oni. I decided that is the name that I wanted."

"Oni?" Shilla chuckled. "Interesting, yeah everything is showing a positive result back here." She told them. "Should we go straight up?"

"No. We are going to have to float and go slowly. We came down quickly but going up can’t be as quick." Jace told her as the canopy closed. "Hey uh- Oni, you plan on leaking the liquid out through multiple ports correct?" He asked.

"Yeah, I have pipes that pour out into the ocean in multiple areas. I will leak some nearby and some more distant. I am curious how humanity will find the competition." Oni answered. "I am also backing myself off in other places where life can’t exist."

"Huh..." Jace nodded as he had the hover plates push them up past the atmospheric barrier and out into the water. Almost immediately they began floating up. "Well I would wish you the best of luck."

"Thank you, also I feel like I should warn you that the fleet around Prima Terra has increased and they intend to explore the pit that you filled with water. Apparently they are getting readings that denote a nuclear bomb." Oni explained.

"That makes sense." Jace chuckled. "That hole goes just about to the center of the planet. They are probably getting readings from the core of Prima Terra. But I get your point, there are a bunch of ships up there orbiting the planet. Chances are that they will take notice or have already taken notice and will try to shoot us down or capture us."

"Correct." Oni quietly chuckled. "I wish you the best of luck." The communication disconnected.

"Okay, we need to come up with a plan." Shilla declared, "because I can feel the planet knocking on the borders of my mind. Are they doing the same with you?"

"No, the only reason it’s doing it is because you are with me." Jace explained. "It went dormant after I dumped the ocean into the pit to kill almost everything inside. But it also knocked out the spirit of the planet, putting it in a dormant state which was why Victor and Eduta were able to leave so easily." Jace told her.

"This is part of the reason why you wanted me to come with you." Shilla chuckled quietly as she understood one of the reasons he brought her. "You needed someone else who you knew had a mental barrier. How did you know?"

Jace shrugged as he looked at the altitude monitor slowly climbing up from negative numbers. "I assumed you had a way to defend your mind. I mean your people have existed in that galaxy since the start of time. I assume your people have seen just about everything."

"Okay, what are we going to do about the ships in orbit?" She asked.

"Well..." Jace chuckled as he checked some other systems. "It is time we test our weapons and defense systems."

"Sounds good." Shilla agreed. "Should I just ignore the planet that is attempting to barge into my mind or should I talk with them?"

"You can talk to them but make sure your barrier allows it. If you give it an inch it will come for your whole mind." Jace explained. "My experience with it shows that it prefers deception and subversion over favors or honesty."

"We are halfway up." Shilla pointed out.

Jace nodded. "Yeah we are climbing quickly and I am not feeling anything wrong. How about you?" Jace asked.

"Nope. Just the slight annoyance from the knocking on my mind." Shilla answered. "The ship is showing all green as well." She told him. "What do you think we should do?"

"Go up," Jace answered as he leaned back and looked over his gear. The metal was still melted to his armor. He was not able to remove it without removing his armor. "Hopefully nothing goes wrong." He remarked as he spotted something slither out of the window. It was a giant kraken tentacle. "Turn on the canopy and full ship shielding." He told her.

A moment later a blue glow covered the ship as the shielding covered it. A giant pink and blue tentacle slapped the roof of the ship. Electricity crackled and they could hear a piercing scream as the tentacle shriveled away in pain.

"Was that electro-reflective shielding?" Shilla asked, sounding a tad bit impressed. "Jace you really need to learn how to hold back or I am seriously going to pounce on you. Regardless of whether you consent or not." She informed him with a bit of heat in her tone.

Jace chuckled, "okay now we-" He stopped as there was a sudden crackle on their radio. It was not someone listening in though. It was someone broadcasting on all frequencies using some high tech equipment. He could easily override it, if they were using the right stuff they could locate him because of it. But instead he quickly signaled to Shilla to stay quiet.

He was curious what they would say. "This is the NeoTerra Republic, we are declaring our independence from the empire and calling to action other rebels in not just the empire but throughout the Milky Way." It was a woman’s voice, one that he felt he recognized. "We need to rise up, for too long have tyrants and privileged children tried to rule. Now we need the strong and smart. Not because of some ideal. But because we need it, deep space scans show several invasion fleets and a massive amount of portals opening in our galaxy. Experts are saying the angels and demons are invading."

Jace quietly switched off his comms and instead spoke out loud. "Looks like the Daemons and Mortella are invading the galaxy. I thought they had given up." He pointed out.

"Not given up, struggling to infiltrate." Shilla pointed out. He could hear her lean back.

"A pair of ruthless species that have been besieging our galaxy for years. Invading each time only because our technology is on an upturn. This upturn is approaching and with it we are seeing a variety of changes. We have to find a way to completely combat these hostile species before we fall." The woman declared. "So rise up and-" The communication was cut off.

Jace spent a moment understanding what happened as he checked the communication system. "Were they cut off at the source?" Shilla asked, essentially wanting to know if they were killed.

"Nope." Jace answered as he looked at the signal. Seeing it was relegated to a specific frequency now. "They destroyed whatever was overriding the signal on all frequencies. But they are still fine. Seems like they were routing the signal." He explained.

"So I guess this means the Mortella are not sending everyone to our galaxy." Shilla pointed out with a nervous chuckle.

Jace took a breath as he thought about it. He closed his eyes and let the time pass as he thought of something he had not thought of for a while. Their galaxy, they would be seeing incursions from daemon already. The mortella would arrive sometime within the next year or two.

He already knew by their time table that it would be too late to defend it. But if the final conversation he had with Salem was right. He did not need to be there. She would be able to hold them off.

His console beeped and he hit a button to switch off the nose as he took control of the controls before tilting the ship up and shooting out of the water and right into a storm. "Looks like there is a storm." He pointed out as the ship shot upwards. "We will be safe from scanning until at least when we leave the atmosphere." He explained.

"Really?" She asked in surprise.

"Yes," Jace nodded. "I got a look at their systems and their scanning equipment is only surface level stuff. Worse than before I upgraded our Vexical systems." He explained.

"That is... bad." Shilla sighed. "What are we going to do? You said you wanted to test our weapons and defensive systems."

"Go on the attack." Jace answered as he reorientated to a low incline. "How is our scanning and navigation?"

"Unresponsive. Seems like it is showing green but only the navigational map is working. The scanning things are showing as green but are not working." Shilla explained. "But the targeting systems are working. I am reading several enemy ships, objects, and pieces of debris."