“Dude, this is awesome!”

“Damn fucking right,” Brock howled over the whipping of the wind. His hair ruffled in the force of the breeze, “who said business was a shit class?”

Together, Brock and Harry soared high through the air and left the low dunes of the outback behind, the motor of their jeep growling loud as they sped across the stretching expanse of desert. From the excitable shouts the two continued to let wild, it was clear that they were enjoying the newfound speed they now had access to. To either side of them, the endless red was reduced to a mere blur.

As their vehicle landed and the suspension jolted them to the left and right, they laughed uproariously.

The duo had vacated Alice Springs almost as soon as they’d got their grubby mitts onto the absolute monster of a jeep the next day. It’d been more than enjoyable to rev the vehicle's engine and speed out of town in search of the so-called ‘Sky Bandit’. The beast had harried the residents of the town for far too long, and as per the agreement, it was their job to show it who’s boss.

He felt that after some further negotiation, he was getting a better end of the deal than Jordan was, and why the fuck shouldn’t he? He was the one risking his life despite the other guy’s assholery, after all. He’d managed to snag a few supplies as well as the jeep – mostly just food and water – and they’d agreed on better living conditions for those living within the town.

As it was hard for Brock to facilitate that while he was gone, he’d forced Jordan to grant Shards to his more productive citizens while he watched. The upgrade to their Ascendancies had gone without a hitch, and slowly, they were working toward a more balanced society. Jordan hadn’t seemed too enthused about it, Brock knew he saw some value in their empowerment.

And so, once that was out of the way and Brock made another idle promise about the man’s death, he’d zipped on out of Alice Springs.

Initially, the office worker had assumed that he was leaving Harry behind, but the boy had fervently insisted he tagged along despite the older man’s reasoning that it was going to be dangerous as all shit.

His brother, on the other hand, had resolutely given his stance on going out to fight the beast, saying that Brock was the ‘dumbest person on planet Earth for agreeing to do so’. Although he had imparted a small troves worth of different contraptions and weaponry for usage and testing against it, all of which were currently were stored within the few remaining slots of Brock’s spatial necklace.

Along with a handful or so of specially made weapons just for the bird.

James had also offered Harry a touch up on his armour before they’d left, moulding it to be a tighter fit and repurposing some of the larger pieces of protection from Ur’Kahn’s ring into greaves and bracers that fit the both of them. Brock had neglected to wear a chest plate in favour of some reworked motorcycle armour he’d managed to convince Jordan to grant him from their stores.

His brother had added some metal plating – greaves and bracers included - to it and altered a lot of the outer fabric to promote more airflow in face of the heat, and overall, Brock was happy with his protection. Regardless of his alterations, it had already possessed a plethora of tears and holes – as it had been pulled from the wreckage of an old ranch – but he’d done an admirable job of repairing it.

Of course, he’d left the helmet unworn. Partially because it had been crushed by a wooden beam, but also because he’d had one on before, and they made him feel stifled. Back in the present, Brock swerved, just barely avoiding was appeared to be a three-headed emu.

Few beasts had dared to challenge the two as they’d blown through the expansive countryside, and those that did were promptly slain by an explosion of molten hot Sparks. Well deserved, if you ask m-

A trembled occurred in the distance, and Brock frowned.

During the hours since they’d left Alice Springs, he had noticed a consistent series of trembles that happened in the distance, and he wondered if the System had migrated the issue of earthquakes to Australia by shifting the tectonic plates or something.

While Brock had felt extremely nervous about leaving James behind with Jordan, he’d decided to place his trust in the strange ethereal heart that inhabited him. Regardless, he knew the man was well aware of the power gap between them, and until a month passed by – the deadline they’d agreed upon – James should be safe.

Jordan was an asshole, but he wasn’t dense. He knew that if he killed James and Brock actually came back, he would die. Without a shadow of a doubt. If he didn’t, however…

Then his brother’s fate would be up in the air. Whether Jordan would see more benefits in control than he did in James’ abilities was the matter in question.

“So where are we going?” Harry spoke out to Brock’s left, though the sound was rather dulled by the hissing of the winds. He knew he should have chosen the one with the roof.

Brock deliberated on his words. He was fairly certain that neither of them were anywhere near strong enough to face the Bandit yet. He thought an accurate comparison to their current strength would be if he had challenged Ur’Kahn without the Vial of Combat that he’d provided. While also lacking any weapons and his Augment.

Needless to say, he’d have died before he’d even see the blow that had killed him.

But currently, that didn’t really even matter all that much, as he didn’t have the slightest clue as to where he’d actually find the monster. It’d be pretty fucking lame if I got to a high level, then my brother died cause I couldn’t find the flying asshole.

In no way did it mean that his lack of knowledge of its whereabouts would stay that way, however. Unlike the fight with the sword-wielding werewolf, Brock now had a method to reliably increase his power. Although, in order to do that, he’d need to get to slaying throngs of beasts as soon as super-humanly possible.

His Ascendancy seemed to level far slower than what was the norm for some strange reason, so he’d need to kill things double time.

“Fuck do I know, mate? All I know is that we need to level a lot before we tackle that sky chicken.” He eventually said, and Harry nodded sagely, trusting in his judgement, “Otherwise we’ll get fucking pulped.”

Brock… would be lying if he didn’t admit that he was worried about the ensuing fight. The pressure the beast had exuded in both of their encounters had been far above anything he had felt from Ur’Kahn. Hell, it was far above everything he’d met so far.

If he was honest, he’d pin the Sky Bandit probably somewhere in the low 60s. Ur’Kahn’s power was supposedly the rough equivalent of someone at level 42, although he assumed that to be inaccurate since he was an Alpha. Despite even that Alpha status, the Bandit felt infinitely stronger.

For it to be so much as a remotely even skirmish, Brock predicted he would need to hit around level 30, maybe higher, his title bonuses counted. Each level below that would increase his chances of death by a metric shit ton if he tried to fight it.

But for now, he placed that out of his mind and focused on the freedom he felt riding like this through the desert. The racing winds were glorious in their heated bites and the speeds he was travelling at were enough to make his heart pound. If he crashed now, he wondered if he’d survive it. Harry sure wouldn’t, and the kid’s Constitution was higher than his own.

Brock’s mouth straightened into a line, and he eased his foot off the pedal considerably

Harry was sitting solidly at level 23, and Brock was certain that with the boys levelling speed he could easily reach his own goal of level 30 within the month, probably in even half that time. With his useful ability to administer a potentially vast variety of poisons and debuffs, Brock thought the focus for now should be to expand his repertoire of toxins.

Aside from the obvious offensive application, Brock wondered if the kid could learn to create antidotes or maybe even mix poisons to create new ones with varied effects. Luckily, they had found earlier that ingesting the stuff orally worked fine, so the process of gaining poisons wouldn’t be too difficult.

Stomach issues and bowel troubles were a different matter entirely, though they speculated that it would decrease in severity as his Vitality rose. Or at least I fucking hope it does…

He was a bit leery about the notion of letting a teenager willingly swallow all manner of poisons, but such was the way of the world now. Common sense didn’t exactly apply to as many situations as it used to.

You either learned to adapt to your surroundings and use whatever assets you were granted, or you died holding onto the old ways of civilisation. Brock was not going to be the latter, or at least he would try to, and he knew Harry wasn’t either.

Slowly, as Brock gazed out over the expanse, he realised that he felt a pang of regret within his heart. He’d departed from his brother without so much as acknowledging the existence of their mother. She had certainly been with him during the Tutorial, and while Brock could tell from his sibling’s demeanour that she hadn’t died with, it was obvious from previous experiences that she had been teleported elsewhere.

Whether that ‘elsewhere’ was a place of safety or one that would spell her gruesome demise was yet to be seen. Brock enjoyed gambling - though he had taken less of an interest in it recently for what he thought were obvious reasons - but his mother’s safety wasn’t a gamble he wished to bet on.

I just… really hope she’s ok…

He assumed that they could always speak of it when he returned with the chicken’s head, though he knew quite well that the both of them didn’t want to face the potential reality of her probable death. If the two of them had one thing in common, it was that they shared a habit of avoiding things that troubled them.

Brock had been forced to face that which he found horrifying in the jungle-city whether he wanted to or not, but that was only due to the fact that he’d lacked a choice.

It didn’t help his case that he felt he came out better because of it.

The locations of Carrie and his sister were also a point of major concern for him, although he knew that they would be able to handle themselves. In fact, in the case of his sister, he feared more for the monsters than he did her.

He had seen her fight in tournaments when they’d been younger and the woman was the devil in human fucking flesh. Whoever had ended up near her after the Tutorial concluded would basically be granted a guaranteed pass at survival. Especially if that dojo of ‘ninjas’ she had been training with were transported with her.

A call from Harry and his arm streaking across his vision broke Brock from his thoughts, “Hey! Over there!”

Brock glanced over to his right where a herd of those very same triple-headed emu monsters were tearing through the outback, the sound of their terrifyingly deep drum-like calls reverberating into their surroundings. A humongous shadow was slowly closing in on them.

…Are you serious right now?

Looming high above the speeding birds flew a serpent longer than three train cars put together. Craggy, orange scales cast a rugged shadow beneath it from the rays of the sun, and a maw populated by hundreds of spiny teeth hung wide open, inching ever closer to the herd of the creatures it seemed to be hunting.

Four powerful wings beat upon its back, and as a jet of grey gas streamed from its mouth and an unlucky emu mutant was caught in it for a solid few seconds, Brock watched it slow, its body quickly becoming stiff and unresponsive. Sluggishly, the monster began to turn to stone. Then, the horrifying head of the beast above slammed into the earth and devoured it, before continuing its hunt.

Brock blinked. Yep. That’s Australia in a nutshell.

While they were too far away for his aura senses to detect, Brock had developed something of an instinct for power, and the monstrous reptile seemed… surprisingly manageable. With a jerk, he swerved the vehicle to the right and gave chase. We’re gonna die.

“Harry! We’re so fucked!” Brock slammed down on the accelerator and launched them forward at a dangerous pace. Rapidly, they shed the hundred or so meter distance that stretched between them.

It only took about twenty seconds before they had begun closing in on the little event, the monstrous serpent stalking its prey at speeds that far exceeded what he was capable of running, even with his immense Agility. Despite their approaching presence, the monster didn’t give up on the emus.

The three slitted eyes that populated the side of its head that was facing them focused upon them, but otherwise did nothing. It seemed the beast thought the emus were a more worthwhile meal. Brock sighed.

…We’re going to have to fight it in the jeep. Brock glanced down at the steering wheel with a dull stare. While driving. Otherwise, we won’t be able to keep up. Or it’ll turn its attention on us, and we’ll be sitting ducks for its stone breath.

He huffed a breath. Fuck.

Brock threw a glance at Harry, gently steering the vehicle to edge them even closer to the chase as they roared forward, “Oi, you’ve seen Fast and Furious, right?”

There was a second of confusion before a wide smile broke out across Harry’s boyish face, his curtained hair flapping around wildly in the breeze like two silken flags. Immensely satisfied with his response, Brock tapped into his spatial storage device, his eyes flicking off the road and onto the menu that appeared.

In but a moment, one of James’ bulky firearms flickered into the teen's lap. A small mound of hemotoxins contained in mugs covered with discoloured clingwrap appeared beside him shortly afterwards. Brock knew his brother wasn’t going to be happy when he opened his cupboard.

It was for the greater good.

The contraption was a crude thing, one of bolted scrap metal and dull, mismatched plating. It sported a quartet of slim barrels and a belt-fed ammunition of long metal bolts that hung from the top and slumped down to the side of it.

Brock could see no room for the addition of gunpowder and assumed the item to either work off the same principles as a crossbow somehow, or some other method, like springs. They’d have to be some pretty fucking good springs…

A plume of grey gas impacted the ground, and as the reptile’s exceptionally large wings swept it all away, several emu statues remained. Gulping, Brock spared a glance for Harry, who was shattering the mugs atop the belt and coating the ammo with his hemotoxins. Brock’s eyes bulged out of his head, and he swerved a little.

“Don’t fucking smash them!” Harry flinched at the sudden noise and gave a quiet ‘sorry’. Brock hissed out a breath, “James is gonna be so fucking pissed…”

With one hand on the wheel and the other aiming high and to the flying monster, Brock channelled his Augment and watched as the power built within his paths, his skin soon beginning to smoke. Grinning, as his bones and veins began to be illuminated by a glow deep within, he let it free.

If their sudden appearance wasn’t enough to divert the beast’s attention before, then a twisting beam of flame was. Despite the way its sinuous body attempted to avoid the blast, the projectile the snake in its underbelly, carving cleanly through its scales and continuing onward into the sky. A massive clump of yellow blood splattered across the sands beneath.

In pain, the beast roared, forcing Brock to clasp both ears with his hands. Harry followed suit, and as the vehicle began to swerve right, the driver braved the noise and regained control. Blood trickled out of his ears.

As the deafening sound faded and the monster turned to face them proper, Harry finally hefted the large contraption atop his shoulder. With one eye closed and his other looking down the rough substitute for an iron sight, the kid traced the reptile’s figure through the sky. As it changed course and began streaking toward them, he pulled the trigger.

The air hissed, and the bolt blew a small hole in the monster’s wing. It didn’t even appear to notice it. Brock couldn’t even notice it either.

Keeping his focus primarily on the road as he channelled beam after beam after and unleashed them on the monster, Brock left the majority of the fight down to Harry. The air hissed ceaselessly as bolts populated the space between them and their opponent, his weapon unloading its ammo as fast as he could pull the trigger.

Sunlight gleamed upon the projectiles as they punctured into the beast’s scales and delivered their dose of poison. Some penetrated straight through the winds, and slowly, Brock noticed that the creature was starting to have some trouble flying as it zoomed toward them.

Unfortunately, that was where the easy part of the fight ended, and the true combat began.

The beast’s maw hung low, like a harbinger of death. Smokey projectiles began to fly toward them. Brock pursed his lips and bottomed the accelerator as low as it would go. This was such a bad idea.

Desperately, Brock was forced to swerve left and right as he dodged an onslaught of petrifying breath, the creature trying to finish the job before it even arrived upon them. Fortunately, as long as he stayed clear of them, they dealt them no harm.

“No shit sherlock…” Brock growled to himself.

From Harry’s own onslaught, only a few of the many he was firing actually hit and wounded the monster, with the beast using its innate airborne mobility to dodge them in concert with Brock’s frantic driving. However, which each successful hit, more hemotoxin was injected, and it was only a matter of time until the beast succumbed to its littering of small wounds.

Though, that would take a very long time.

The reptile finally caught up to them and swept overhead, engulfing the duo in its stretching shadow and forcing them to duck as the beating wind from its wings threatened to knock the jeep over. Harry called out in protest as the tip of the monster’s tail smacked into his weapon and pulled it overboard and onto the sands.

Cursing, Brock looked over at the creature’s nameplate. It was close enough now that it appeared in their sight.

[F] Australian Basilisk (LVL 33)

At least the System knows how to treat Australia right… by giving us even more fucked up monsters.

Ignoring the name, the latter part he’d heard of a dozen times before, Brock felt his confidence boost a little. The level certainly was manageable, being probably even lower than Jordan’s. Despite that, its sheer size and the petrifying abilities of its breath made it far more dangerous. He had never really thought about it before, but it seemed stats weren’t everything in this new world.

His eyes narrowed as the monster circled around them, more of the thick grey smog flowing readily from between its terrible fangs. Brock gulped and swerved, changing directions to put the creature on the back foot. By speeding directly towards it.

“Uhhh… Brock?” Harry called out, “we… we’re going right to it!”

The man in question let out a slew of expletives as the gargantuan monster approached them in turn, and he ran a nervous hand through his hair, “Just take the wheel.”

Brock stood in his seat and collapsed into the back of the vehicle, his hands set ablaze. Harry’s eyes widened in shock for a brief moment before he quickly leaned over and grabbed hold of the wheel in the older man’s stead. Glancing at the looming basilisk with fear, he assumed a position in the driver’s seat and kept the pedal on the floor.

“Brock! I… I only have eight minutes on my L’s!”

“You have eight min…” Brock threw a glance at his companion and his mouth moved soundlessly. Finding that he was left without words, he just chose to ignore the remark, “It's… it’s fine! We either die by your shit driving or the snake rips us in half!”

Brock punctuated his sentence by flinging a roaring ball of flame at the monster. It impacted its rock-like scales, leaving them blackened and charred.

“Real comforting…” the boy grumbled.

The basilisk was only a half a dozen meters away from them now, and it was closing in fast. Brock calmed himself to the best of his ability and once more began to channel the heated energies of his Augment. A throbbing headache formed as he extracted every modicum of power that it had to give.

A veritable surge built up in the pathways of his palm, the radiant energies illuminating the interior of his hand and arm from within. His skin began to turn red and wisp with smoke, but he held on. Quickly, the skin then began to peel. Steam joined the smoke.

The rumbling bellow of the basilisk resounded throughout the expanse as it propelled itself overhead and rewarded the jeep with a torrent of petrifying gas. Brock did his best to ignore the smog as it billowed over them and clung to their skin, the car already breaking past the area of fog.

Instead, he growled out furiously and aimed his stiffening appendage upwards as the reptile passed them by overhead.

It was akin to letting the waters of a dam loose as the build-up of energy was finally granted freedom. A deafening boom echoed through the outback expanse as an absolute flood of power roared through the air. The world became white for a moment, and tinnitus quickly replaced the boom in Brock’s ears.

He squinted his eyes as a bolt of ivory flame sliced through the air and cut cleanly into the monster without resistance. It continued until it blew out the other side and dissipated high in the sky. The surroundings were showered with pieces of charred scales, crisped meat and bubbling blood.

Ahead of him, Harry hissed with pain, his skin red, raw and peeling from the ambient heat. Brock fell down into his seat and huffed out a breath, “Sorry… mate…”

His attention was quickly confiscated as a raging tsunami of energy exploded through his pathways, gathering into his chest and promptly being plucked by the growing aura of his Ascendancy. The basilisk gave one final dying roar as its momentum carried it forward and slammed it into the earth. Limp, it rolled several meters and kicked up a cloud of dust that rose high above them. It didn’t move, even after the plume of dirt began to clear.

Wincing, Brock placed a hand on his pounding forehead and desperately resisted the urge to vomit all over his new vehicle’s seats. It had certainly been eye-opening as to the power his body could facilitate, and he noted that it seemed that there was a hard limit to the amount of damage the System would prevent from his own Augments. The flesh of his hand felt tight, looked raw, and was yet to stop smoking.

As for the armour that had resided there… the metal bracer was glowing red, but thankfully within the System’s ‘Augment safety net’. The chest of his motorcycle armour was looking rather charred but otherwise seemed fine.

“We did it!”

Harry looked over his shoulder and cheered, the action making him wince in pain. Quickly, upon seeing Brock’s widening eyes, he returned his attention back to the desert and frantically avoided a mound of stone.

“Just… get us to those mutant emus…” Brock called out to Harry in between throbs, squinting as his headache worsened further. I regret everything…

Harry said something quietly, though the man in the back seat couldn’t understand what it was over the roar of the wind, and they began to inch closer to the bellowing herd. A sound akin to the beating of drums filled the air.

Grunting, Brock accessed his ring and summoned a small, belt-fed pistol looking contraption, before chucking it to Harry. It looked pretty self-explanatory to use, and Harry instantly began shooting at the herd as he drove. Idly, it reminded Brock of Grand Theft Auto. He’d played that with his older cousin often when he’d been younger.

He hadn’t seen them since his dad had left. They’d been on his side of the family after all.

His past aside, he recalled one of the things James had told him earlier, involving the fact that guns seemed to not work properly anymore. Well, according to him they did work, but the damage they inflicted on monsters - and man - was abysmal no matter the level. His brother had no idea why, but a fact was a fact.

‘System no like guns’ was what Brock had learned there. Fortunately, James had found that making his own circumvented that issue. Which in turn made Brock learn that ‘System no like guns unless humans make new guns’. I have no idea how that works, but I don’t really care anyway…

The haphazard bolt-pistols - like the one Harry was using - seemed to be good for a distance of around twenty meters before they started falling off, and Harry was consistently killing the monsters they were chasing with two or three well-placed shots. From the boy’s aim, he often got two of those ‘well-placed shots’ them in one full belt.

One belt had 16 bolts.

Brock could even sense the boy’s aura slowly beginning to increase a few notches in power, indicating he had begun levelling up. The older man had taken most of the credit for the kill on the basilisk, so he lay down in the back seat and left it to Harry. A little nap would certainly be nice.

Absentmindedly, Brock noticed how his skin had started to turn grey and harden significantly in some places, though it seemed the effects of their time in the petrifying gas had already expended themselves. As he watched, he could see his skin slowly regaining its usual colour as his Vitality worked to counter the effects.

Brock wondered if there was some way for Harry to get the petrification power. Was it even classed as a poison? The boy himself appeared to be doing drastically better than him in the face of the gas with his higher Constitution, his skin having only darkened by several shades but remained otherwise fine.

Brock wouldn’t discount that he also had an innate resistance to poisons, courtesy of his Ascendancy.

The teenager in question soon finished off the monsters and they began to slow down, before finally rolling to a stop in the middle of bumfuck nowhere. They were still relatively good on gas, though the gauge had lowered considerably since they had obtained the vehicle a few hours prior. We can’t keep that up…

As Harry opened the door and stepped out of the driver’s seat, he stretched wildly. Evidently giddy, his eyes flickered left and right through the air, appearing to have accessed his status screen.

Brock could understand him perfectly. After killing such an asshole monster, he was rather excited to see his own gains despite the expectations that his level gain would be low. That was for one simple reason. He could feel that his Ascendancy was ready to select a Technique.

So, without further ado, he opened his own status.