“…Brock?”

Her voice was feeble, almost quieter than a whisper, and he could see her eyelids drooping further and further every second. As he looked between the woman he didn’t think he’d see for a long time and his dissected sister, Brock felt a deep rage flaring to life in his gut. Whoever had done this… they were going to pay.

They were going to die.

Automatically, Mio rushed up to Jane, poking and prodding as she checked over her wounds. Brock dashed toward Carrie, noticing how she had already fallen unconscious and the final vestiges of conscious desperation had fled from her aura. He didn’t even need to check for wounds, as they were openly displayed.

Blessedly, she was still dressed, albeit only in her bloodied undergarments. It was due to that that her injuries were highlighted all the more. She was covered in cuts, small and large. Seemingly, they were along random parts of her body, so Brock had no idea what the slicer was trying to achieve. Maybe torture, but that begged the question about what the culprit even wanted from them.

Like his sister, Carrie also had a cruel incision straight down her abdomen, although unlike the former, her organs weren’t readily visible, instead having been patched up by a set of crude stitches. Still, they were placed too far apart, and Brock could catch the barest glimpse of Carrie’s innards as they rested up against her flesh.

Upon closer inspection, it also appeared that the stitches themselves were made of some kind of sinew.

She was soaked with her own violet blood, the stuff pooling beneath her and reeking strongly of iron. Oddly enough, by the way the blood had begun to dry, the wounds seemed to be relatively old, yet they had barely healed, having only just begun scabbing. Brock gritted his teeth and wrapped his singular arm around the woman’s waist.

“Sorry about this.”

With one large haul, Brock managed to slide her up and off the hook, earning himself a spurt of purple across his cheek. Carrie whimpered, although remained unconscious. Delicately, he laid her across the ground and turned to Mio, “You sense anyone?”

A shadow rose up to the operating table and deposited some sort of kit from its folds before retreating. Mio hastily opened it up and pulled out a stitching needle and thread, “No. There’s no one else here apart from us. And the Skin Walkers trying to dig past the rubble back there.”

She nodded to Jane, “help me get her back together.”

Brock spared a glance for Carrie before stepping over to his sister. He grimaced as he looked at her state up close and the organs that pulsated within her. Mio grabbed one side of her incision, and he grabbed the other, and together they brought them to the centre of her torso. Breathing out, Mio began threading the needle through her skin, slowly closing the wound.

It was a lengthy affair, and occasionally Brock spread out his feeble aura senses, but it came back negative every time. He could hear the ravenous growling of the Skin Walkers progressively getting louder as they dug further and further toward them. Still, it was a pretty big separation, and they should be long gone by the time they got in.

“Alright,” Mio put the needle through flesh one last time before tying it into a knot and slicing the end with her knife. She tossed the remainders aside and pulled out what looked like a blowtorch, “Hold her still.”

Brock furrowed his brows in immense concern but obeyed and placed his forearm across his sister’s chest, pressing down to keep her from moving. Mio nodded gratefully at him, and she brought the item close to the stitched up incision. There was a brief second where Brock was blinded as an aqua plume of flame lashed out the end and began to sear Jane’s skin.

Her eyes shot open, glazed and unseeing, and Brock pushed down harder as she began to squirm and scream soundlessly. He felt his stomach sicken at her pain, but he knew they needed to do it if they wanted to get out of here and keep her alive. The stench of burnt flesh hit his nostrils, and Brock resisted the urge to gag as Jane finally passed back out.

Mio finished up a few moments later, having traced a line of charred flesh up where the stitches were. The wire itself had seemed to have broken under the heat, but thankfully, Jane seemed to be permanently reconnected.

Brock wiped the sweat and blood from his sister's forehead, “Should we do Carrie too?”

Mio glanced behind them at the blocked off tunnel, and nodded hesitantly, “Get her up.”

It took another five minutes or so, but Mio completed her restoration of Carrie’s abdominal dissection too. They opted to leave any other wounds for another time on both the women, as there were too many, and none really had the potential to be life-threatening or hinder their escape.

There was a plethora of equipment, probably all belonging to the two captives, and Brock quickly swiped it all into his ring. He couldn’t fit it all, however, and just opted to leave the clothes and armour behind to fit in the weapons and other stuff, like pouches of those strange berries and other armaments.

Mio opted to take Jane over her petite shoulders, showcasing the deceptive strength that the System afforded her, and with a bit of effort, Brock managed to hold Carrie over his own. While she wasn’t exactly heavy, he could still feel her body weighing him down, although not by much.

Brock inwardly was quite impressed with Mio’s medical skills, considering she didn’t look to be that much younger than him, only by a year or so. It made him realise he should probably shore up his own medical knowledge and learn how to do stuff like that in case it was ever needed. Hell, he’d probably use it on himself quite often.

I get injured enough for it.

He hefted Carrie and adjusted her position on his shoulder as he turned around toward their designated tunnel of egress opposite their entrance. But Brock froze instantly, and Mio stiffened beside him. They were hidden by the dark shadows cast by the low lip of the tunnel, but clearly, a figure was standing there, unmoving.

Brock heard Mio heave out a quick breath, and he prodded the area with his weakened aura senses but was left astonished. There was… nothing. The figure’s aura was entirely undetectable. It seemed to be hidden, even within their Inner Self. It was much like the masking effect shadows seemed to have on Mio’s own, although this wasn’t the result of a Technique.

It was purely aura control.

“What… are you doing with my possessions?” the voice was oddly familiar to Brock and clearly masculine. It owned a weird gargling quality to it, however, and sounded to be echoing.

Brock gritted his teeth but ultimately chose to keep his fury in check. Right now, it’d help no one. Slowly, as to not prompt movement from the hidden man, he bent down and gently dropped Carrie off his shoulder. Mio met his eyes from the corner of her own, and he nodded subtly to the resting woman.

He cracked his knuckles and stepped ahead of the women as Mio used the shadows to haul Carrie over her other shoulder, her knees buckling slightly, “Why… why do all of this shit? What the fuck is wrong with you?”

The man stepped forward into the light shining from the bulbous red globes above. A cruel grin marred his face, along with an abundance of excess flesh growing atop every portion of his body. Thick veins of crimson ran along his skin, and his right eye glowed the very same colour.

But most of all, he possessed a face Brock recognised, “You don’t wish to know who I am first?”

His grin widened as Brock’s eyes followed suit, “…Ryan?”

A stream of red blood rose up from the pulsing flesh beneath his feet, leaving the meat grey and husked as it coalesced into a crystalline axe of crimson in Ryan’s hand, “Correct. Now, I wonder what you look like on the inside?”

His voice had a note of curiosity.

“Like shit, probably,” Brock snorted, the noise devoid of any humour. His own blade shot out of his sleeve in readiness the next moment, “So, you gonna tell me why you did all this?”

Behind him, Mio began inching back around the other side of the operating table. Ryan began to walk forward, the gleaming edge of his blade dragging behind and carving a bleeding divot along the fleshy flooring beneath them.

“Because sometimes, fulfilling a promise requires effort; sacrifice.” The muscles in Ryan’s legs flexed massively, “It promised me. It promised me her.”

The delusional man exploded forward, raw Strength alone enough to surprise Brock at his sheer speed. He twisted out the way as an axe shattered the place he was standing prior, the air keening only inches from his face and whispering to him the power the strike possessed.

“Mio, go!” Brock called out to the woman, watching her begin to sprint away the best she could before another swing of Ryan’s axe took his attention away, “Alright mate. Show me what you g-”

Midswing, the axe abruptly shattered to shards, sending several razor-sharp daggers zooming toward him. Cursing, Brock twisted around, dodging the first volley, although the second saw him caught in the thigh and stomach, and his bracer blocked one going for his head.

Ryan lunged in for a punch and Brock saw it coming from a mile away, spinning under the blow and slashing his blade across the man’s thigh before his elbow reared upward and smashed into his chin. A crack resounded. His opponent stumbled back, and Brock was surprised to see a plate of crimson cover the bleeding wound and stem the blood flow entirely.

Brock dashed forward as Ryan’s stumble ended, and met his fist into the man’s nose. He felt the cartilage crumble beneath, but a hand snatched his only wrist and he was tugged forward. Bile spewed from his mouth as a knee struck his stomach, and Brock’s world spun as an elbow came down on the back of his head, knocking him to the floor.

His foe loomed above him in his blurred vision, and Brock could sense the telltale energy of an Augment as blood morphed into a hammer held high above Ryan’s head. The weapon adopted a glowing crimson sheen. Grunting, Brock forced himself to roll out of the way as the hammer collided with the ground, and his foot caught Ryan in the shin, although it did no damage.

Brock barely managed to rise to his feet before the hammer once again attacked him, this time from below, and he felt the blocky end smash into his stomach. Blood sprayed from his mouth and he was shot backward, impacting into the operating table his sister had been upon and tumbling over it.

He desperately grasped onto a scalpel as Ryan leapt down atop him, a jagged crystalline dagger now held high, and before he could strike, Brock’s instrument found itself dug into his foe’s eye. A sickening pop resounded and white goo streamed down Ryan’s cheek. He screamed in agony.

Brock gritted his teeth at his own pain and pushed Ryan off of him, before mounting him instead. His fist rained down again and again and again, earning a wet crunch each time his attack landed. Finally, Ryan’s aura revealed itself as his frustration rose, and Brock was astounded to detect someone hitting level 85.

His own stat total had long exceeded level 100 in F Grade, but still, it was quite a feat to be that high in levels alone.

Unfortunately for Brock, that meant his Strength was incredibly high, and as his adrenaline numbed the pain, Ryan slugged Brock across the cheek and rocked him off and to the side. Brock slapped against the ground as Ryan stood shakily, and he lamented on the fact he had no Augments or Techniques to use as his brain slowly unrattled itself.

A foot slammed into his gut the next second, and Brock rolled backward, smacking into the wall of the cavern behind him. Idly, he noticed he could no longer hear the sound of the Skin Walkers, either because of his deafening tinnitus or because they had left when their leader arrived. Through blurred vision, Brock saw both of Ryan’s dirty bare feet trod before him.

A hand grasped the collar of his leather jacket, and Brock rose upward, meeting Ryan’s eye level, which was a little higher than his own, “There’s a bigger world out there than you can ever imagine, Brock. There are things that make us look like ants; worthless. History that trumps even the greatest of calamities of Earth’s past.”

He snarled, spittle landing on Brock’s cheeks.

“Look at you. You don’t even understand the being you hold within your chest, yet you dare try to circumvent the promise of one?” He sneered, and although Brock could gather the hostility and note of reverence within his voice, he could barely understand what was being said. Ryan’s eyes met his own.

“You are pathe-” Suddenly, Ryan screamed out in agony and clutched his head, and Brock was dropped back to the floor. Quickly, he regained some of his bearings and hauled himself up to his feet. He felt dizzy, and ready to drop, but he held steadfast.

What he didn’t expect when his eyes settled on Ryan, however, was the tears streaming down his cheeks as he continued to scream. No longer was there that furious insanity within his eyes, just boundless sorrow and regret. And dread. Pure dread.

Ryan’s mouth twitched, as he tried to speak in between screams, “…Please… kill… me…”

…Ryan? That wasn’t Ryan before?

He screamed once again, his body convulsing, “…please…”

Brock gritted his teeth and summoned out the blood dagger from his ring. It was still in the same state of melting it had been when he put it inside. Tightly, he gripped the handle. Hissing out a breath as Ryan’s horrified gaze began to fade and be replaced by whatever had taken him over, Brock brought the dagger overhead.

With one final glance at his old coworker’s eyes, the blade struck downward and pierced him through his neck.

The ground shook as the man fell to his knees, and Brock took a few steps back, glancing around panickily. There was a brief period of weightlessness before everything exploded in a viscous blur of red.