The meager meal of the Cavern-Crawler gave Ren a burst of much-needed physical energy, but his Aetheric core remained a barren desert. He spent another day in the grotto, meditating, slowly coaxing infinitesimal drops of pure Aether from the deep rock. It was a painstaking process, but by the dawn of the fifth day of his ordeal, he had recovered perhaps ten percent of his total reserves. It wasn't enough to fight, but it was enough to run.
He knew he couldn't stay. The GAMA patrols would be methodical, their search grid tightening with every passing hour. He had to keep moving. He had to get to the Storm Beacon.
He left the relative safety of the cavern system, emerging into the grey, windswept twilight of the Shattered Peninsula. He moved with a newfound caution, a hunter's stealth born of true vulnerability. He was no longer the storm; he was a whisper on the wind, his Raijin armor a second skin of mottled grey that blended perfectly with the rock and shadow.
He traveled for hours, his destination the distant, needle-like spire that Zephyrion had shown him. The terrain was a nightmare, forcing him to climb treacherous cliffs and navigate deep, wind-scoured chasms. The constant physical exertion was a drain on his already-taxed body.
It was near midday when he felt it. A faint, almost imperceptible shift in the Aether around him. It wasn't the chaotic hum of the peninsula, nor the disciplined thrum of a GAMA patrol. It was something else. Something cold, precise, and utterly alien.
"Ambush," Zephyrion's voice was a sharp, sudden hiss in his mind. "There. To your left. A cloaking field. Not GAMA technology. It is Pagoda."
Ren froze, dropping into a low crouch behind a jagged outcrop of red rock. He extended his senses, and now that he was looking for it, he could feel it: a subtle, shimmering distortion in the air about fifty meters away, a patch of reality that was just a little too perfect, a little too still.
He had been so focused on the GAMA patrols that he had forgotten the other, more dangerous player on the board. The Pagoda had not retreated after their Reaper drone was destroyed. They had adapted. They had sent a ghost to hunt a ghost.
Ren remained perfectly still, his mind racing. He was in no condition to fight a Pagoda agent. His Aether reserves were a joke. His single desperate blast against the skiff had proven that raw power was costly. He needed to be clever. He needed to be invisible.
He watched the cloaking field for long, tense minutes. Nothing happened. The Pagoda agent was patient, a spider waiting in its web. They were likely waiting for him to stumble into a more advantageous position for them.
They don't know that I've seen them, Ren realized. That is my only advantage.
He had to draw the hunter out. But how?
He looked around, his eyes scanning the terrain. The ground here was littered with loose shale and sharp, flat rocks. An idea began to form, a desperate gambit that relied on his unique skills.
He focused his will, not on a grand display of power, but on a dozen tiny, precise applications of his kinetic arts. He sent out invisible threads of will, touching a dozen different pieces of loose shale scattered around the cloaked position of the Pagoda agent.
Then, he waited for a strong gust of wind.
When it came, a furious howl that swept through the canyons, he acted. He simultaneously activated all twelve kinetic threads, giving each piece of shale a tiny, sharp lift, just enough to be caught by the gale.
The effect was instantaneous. The gust of wind, now filled with dozens of pieces of flying, razor-sharp rock, became a localized shrapnel storm. It tore through the area, shredding the tough, leathery plants and kicking up a massive cloud of dust.
And it found its target.
The cloaking field wavered and collapsed as several pieces of the sharp shale ripped through its projector. Standing there, now revealed, was a figure clad in sleek, black, form-fitting armor, its face obscured by a reflective, insectoid helmet. It was a Pagoda Infiltrator. And it was holding a long, wicked-looking rifle, not a GAMA pulse weapon, but a crystalline sniper rifle that hummed with a dangerous, esoteric energy.
The Infiltrator, its position revealed, reacted instantly. It raised its rifle, aiming not at Ren's current position, but at the spot where the kinetic energy had originated.
But Ren was already gone.
The moment the shrapnel storm had hit, he had used the cloud of dust and chaos as cover, sprinting not away from the Infiltrator, but laterally, circling around to a new position behind a different set of rocks.
The Infiltrator fired. A beam of sickly green light, a "Soul-Decay" beam according to Zephyrion's frantic warning, struck the spot where Ren had been hiding, causing the very rock to hiss and dissolve into a black, bubbling sludge.
The hunter was now the hunted. Ren had revealed the assassin and had a momentary advantage. But he was still weak, and he was facing a foe armed with technology specifically designed to kill Spirit Masters like him. The quiet war in the shadows had just turned hot.