The Ghost System

The soldiers were at the entrance facing off with the intruder, but from a glance Rhys could tell that they were fighting a losing battle. Against the power of the intruder's gravity manipulation they were being thrown around like rag dolls.

While the soldiers were busy distracting the intruder, thousands of students were trying to breakthrough the reinforced Gymnasium walls, a task that was proving to be harder than anyone thought it would be. The gymnasium was meant to be an impenetrable fortress from the inside and out. Even though the intruder managed to break in, the ordinary students were not up to the task.

Rhys struggled through the sea of frantic students without using his power, pushing his way towards the stage where the instructor was still standing over Sampson.

The thousands of retreating students were running together towards the back of the hall like a stampede and Rhys had to push with all his might against the crowd, earning himself a few sizeable bruises.

He was finally able to grasp onto the side of the platform, holding on for dear life and panting as the people around him continued to bash into his side as they charged.

"Instructor!" Rhys yelled over the thunderous sound of thousands of boots on the floor.

The instructor was sweating profusely and his eyes darted from Sampson to the battle at the front of the gym. Rhys glared, annoyed that the instructor, the person who was meant to be guiding them, looked just as panicked as the students.

The instructor met Rhys's gaze. He darted to the edge of the platform so he could hear Rhys better.

"Where are all the soldiers?" Rhys shouted above the deafening noise.

There had only been about twenty soldiers in the gymnasium to begin with, which had concerned Rhys from the very beginning. This was a college but it was also a military base. It was practically a small army and yet there were only twenty soldiers to protect thousands of students… something wasn't right.

Beads of sweat rolled down the man's face. "They're not here." His own words seemed to frighten him. "They're all at the head office…"

Rhys looked up at him in disbelief as he barely made out the instructor's words over the noise.

"What the hell are they all doing there?" Rhys's face scrunched up in horror. A massacre was about to go down in the central gymnasium, but the fighting power was on the other side of the campus.

"Everyone thought the intruder was going after confidential documents from the main office or even the higher ranking heads of the MCP!" The instructor tried explained. "That's why the majority of the soldiers were sent to defend the General and the main office, while a few low ranking ones were just meant to guard the students until the intruder was caught."

A foul taste filled Rhys's mouth as this revelation. The military was more concerned about their precious files and cabinets than the students who needed protecting.

Maybe it would have been a different story if this gym was filled with juniors or seniors, maybe even sophomores could make a difference… but the juniors and seniors were all off campus and only a few of the sophomores were actually present. The military left untrained freshmen to defend themselves.

"Contact them!" Rhys demanded. "Tell them that the intruder is here and is about to attack the students." He wanted to curse at the stupid instructor but held himself back.

"I can't!" The panic in the man's eyes skyrocketed.

"Why not?" Rhys was close to exploding.

"I physically am not able to! For security purposes, the only way to make contact with the main office is through telepathy from specific individuals among the soldiers. The guy who was able to contact the main office among this batch of soldiers is already…"

Rhys followed the instructor's gaze to a dead soldier, lying bloodied on the floor. If Rhys wasn't mistaken it was the first guy who got killed by the intruder.

'Shit.' If he was the first one to be killed, there was a much higher chance that he didn't contact the main forces before he was offed.

["This is worrisome."]

"Maybe he contacted the office before he died?" It was still possible, right?

"They would have been here by now if they knew." The instructor shook his head solemnly.

Rhys was silent for a moment, racking his brain. Backup wasn't coming. The students could not get out of the gym. It was only a matter of time before the last soldier died and the intruder started looking for Rhys among the students. The system told him not to fight because he wasn't ready yet.

His options weren't great, but he thought of something.

"Where exactly is the main office?"

The instructor stared at him in shock for a moment but a relieved smile quickly lit up his face. "Yes, That's right! You have that ability. You can get outside easily and go get help from the other soldiers." Relief flooded the instructor's face.

Rhys nodded to confirm that was his plan.

"You have to go past the library and get to the Entrance hall where all the freshman signed in on your first day. At the back of that hall is an underground tunnel that leads to the official sector of the campus. Once you're in the tunnel you should be able to find your way."

Rhys had a general idea about where it was, but hearing the instructor he realised that it was very far away. If he ran it would still take about thirty minutes. And judging by how many soldiers were left, the students didn't have thirty minutes.

A wretched scream echoed from the front of the hall as the last soldiers were lifted off the ground and pulled towards the intruder. The intruder's gravitational ability was quite terrifying because of its disturbingly large range.

"Go now!" The instructor shouted desperately. Rhys finally let go of the side of the stage and allowed himself to be pulled backwards by the stampeding crowd.

Rhys caught a glimpse of the man pulling out a weapon from his side and jumping off the front of the platform, leaving Sampson an a healer by themselves.

["What is the point of that? He is much weaker than the intruder, he is not even a soldier and yet he's trying to put up some kind of last stance… pathetic."]

Rhys didn't think it was pathetic, but he didn't have time to watch this little fight that he knew would end badly.

Instead, when the pull of the crowd had taken him as close to the back wall as he could possibly get, he crouched low on the floor, he got on his hands and knees and crawled forward, winding his way past peoples legs and outright shoving them aside when they got close to trampling him. He was using the other students bodies' to block any view of him doing this.

He scuttled forward until he arrived at the gymnasium wall. He easily passed through the wall, as he did he could understand why the other students could break through it, it was at least one and a half meters thick of gem-enforced metal.

The night air was cold and the surrounding green area was quiet. If he had not just come out from the gym, he wouldn't believe that there were thousands of students clamouring against the wall trying to get out.

Right now all the students were in one place. They were all gathered together nicely for the intruder to inspect. When the guy realised that Rhys was not among them, he would go after Rhys.

[Spectral form used +10 Exp]

Rhys stepped inside the wall and spread out his body so that he occupied the largest space he could. Then he phased back into his physical form.

The thick wall tore apart like butter. Of course Rhys's body wasn't big enough to completely tear open the wall, but he had created a small opening.

"It's opening! The wall's finally opening!"

"Make it bigger!"

"Push through!"

The exited cries from behind the wall spilled out.

Rhys repeated his method until he had created a sizeable hole for the students to get out. Immediately, students stormed out from the hole, tripping over themselves as they tasted sweet freedom. Everyone was running off in different directions and Rhys took this chance to start on his own mission.

Get to the main hall. Alert the military about the intruder. Have someone else take down the gravity manipulating executioner hunting him. If the system said he wasn't ready, then he wasn't ready. The next best thing was to find the strongest in the base who were capable of taking this intruder down.

As he ran, Rhys turned back to see that the hole he created had gotten bigger. The force of all those students pushing through had made the already damaged metal more malleable. Rhys smiled knowing the more students that got out meant more confusion for the intruder inside.

His plan was simple and accomplishable. His problem was time, and the fact that he didn't know how exactly his hunter was tracking him.

In situations with unknown variables, he needed to prepare something more.

'Open the System shop.'

There would definitely be something useful in there for him to protect himself with.

["Well, Well… Let's see."]