“Okay, that’s enough.” Xue-Xin intoned, her expression flipping into a serious mask as she withdrew her aura. “If you won’t bow, then I’ll have to use other ways to make you mine. Stand still.”

Tyrone barely heard her as he surged to his feet, the absence of the aura throwing him off balance. Unsteady without the weight of the aura pressing down on him, he fell against Sam and gulped down air. His head felt like it was being pressed by a vice, the headache was nearly as bad as the one he’d awoken up to not just a couple of hours ago.

He watched in wonderment as Xue-Xin traced a complex symbol in the air. There was little else Tyrone could do, the wind in his sails completely exhausted. The pattern Xue-Xin traced took form as ice flowed from her fingertips, the shapes reminded him of calligraphy, but she wrote the tangle of words in an awkward looking star shape. Once she was done, she pointed a finger towards him and the floating ice pattern flew at his chest, the pain was instant and intense.

As the pattern burned into his flesh a pitiful yowl of pain escaped his clenched teeth. Tyrone expected to smell his flesh being burned away, but as he glanced down, he could see that the pattern wasn’t burning him but giving him an extreme precise frostbite mark. His brown skin blackened as the pattern became one with skin. She had branded him.

“Oh, you glare at me with such hatred.” She fanned her face with one of her hands, a curl on her lips. “Why? That’s not a cattle brand or a curse. It’s a gift. My gift to you for being such fun. Many would die or slaughter their dearest beloved to receive a blessing from a dragon as powerful as I.”

Just as she finished speaking a prompt appeared in front of Tyrone revealing the truth behind the stinging mark on his chest.

Warning! You have been marked!

Xue-Xin of the Highest Grace has marked you with her symbol, placing you under a Draconic Geas!

His mind raced as he looked over the prompt and expanded its details.

Draconic Geas: This unique curse gives the caster free access to your location, health status, and current level whenever they please no matter how far away you are from them. As the geas grows in power over time the caster can even forcibly summon you to their location. While under the geas you are prohibited from harming the caster as they are prohibited from killing you themselves. Through the link of the geas, the caster may order you against your will, with enough willpower you may reject these orders, but this will be painful. Though not all is bad, depending on the power and fame of the caster, this may grant you certain privileges, increased fame, and a clearer path to your own power and fortitude within the Labyrinth of Realms. Take heed, Draconic Geas’ are a power spell formed by the caster’s very own soul mana and therefore cannot be removed unless by a dragon equal or of greater power.

“With this gift,” Xue-Xin continued oblivious to Tyrone’s death glare. “You will be under my watchful eye. With my blessing upon you, other dragons should leave you alone. Though some may approach you, curious about why my scent is mingled with your own. That should be fun to watch. After I’ve gotten fully settled in my newly acquired land, I may summon you to my side and offer you a quest. With that class, I am very curious about how strong you might grow. Perhaps you’ll be useful to me in the next coming years. I’m not as greedy as my brethren, I could reward you greatly if you...”

“Fuck you!” Tyrone roared. He’d never been so angry in his life.

She’d forcibly placed him under her power, making him her property. In Tyrone’s eyes he saw that prompt as just being colorful flavor text for magical slavery. His blood boiled hotter, but there was nothing he could do. She was hundreds of levels above him, so high he couldn’t even see her level when Botnik scanned her. Whenever that happened in videogames that meant that person was leagues above you. As he glared at her, one thought branded itself into the grey matter of his brain as he recited it like a mantra. “Get stronger, kick her ass into the dirt.”

“Hmm, level up a hundred times and I’ll consider it.” Then her lips flattened. “Or I’ll flay you alive. Now go, I’m not going to babysit you. Leave my domain, grow stronger, I’ll call upon you when I need you. Oh, one more thing…”

With a casual wave of her hand in his direction, a pale green aura surrounded him. He gasped in surprise as a cool breeze enveloped him and all his hurts and aches disappeared. Glancing at the battle log, he was suspicious of what she’d cursed him with now.

Xue-Xin has cast Rejuvenating Glow upon you! Heath, Stamina, and Mana are all fully recovered.

“W-why?” He blurted in shock as his wrist recorrected itself. It was as if someone had hit rewind and all the bone fragments clicked back together like puzzle pieces.

She turned away, at a snap of her fingers a strange lectern-like structure appeared in front of her. “Go, now. To all of you other humans you may stay or go, it matters to me not. I’m going to demolish this gaudy abomination you call a building and construct my new lair.”

Dismissing their existence entirely, she turned away and pressed a sequence of buttons on the now glowing lectern and the frozen corpses of the spiderlings along with their queen began to crumble into dust and flow into the lectern. Tyrone gawked in amazement as parts of the building itself began to break away and flow into it as well. It was as if she was Thanos snapping the building away.

In a mad rush Tyrone urged the others to their feet and started directing them towards the rear exit. Scooping up Botnik in his arms he was relieved to see that it was at least in one piece, but it wasn’t in pristine condition anymore. The screen that displayed its face was now cracked more than an iPhone screen, but thankfully the slime fluid inside wasn't leaking, it kept flickering in and out, and muttering a jumble of words on repeat. As Tyrone held the drone closer to his ear, he was even further relieved once he understood Botnik was repeating that it was initiating its self-repair.

“How long does it take to recover from a dragons’ backhand?” Tyrone wondered.

“Tyrone help!”

Snapping to action, he ran over to the others who were in the middle of trying to hack away at the thick webbing. Currently Sam was trying to hack into them with Ivan’s sword, but the sticky substance was being stubborn and sticking to the blade more than being cut apart.

“It won’t cut! Tyrone, it won’t cut!” Jenny grabbed onto his arm and shook him; the poor woman was entering into hysterics. “What do we do? I don’t want to die. Not like Ivan… he was a jerk, but she killed him so easily and I couldn’t even move!”

“What are you imbeciles doing?” Tyrone steeled himself not to be startled as Xue-Xin appeared besides them, her face twisting in disgust as she watched Sam drop the sword in fear.

“The spiderlings clogged up the stairwell with their webbing, it’s going to take us a while to cut through it.” He threw a protective arm over Jenny who had buried her face into his chest as soon as Xue-Xin spoke.

“You’re all just children, aren’t you?” Xue-Xin sighed. “Move out of the way.”

Sam scrambled to the side as she raised her hand which now had a small pile of powdery snow in it, then with a huff she blew the glittering snow onto the web. The webbing creaked as the powdery snow instantly froze it like liquid nitrogen. With a flourish she turned away to stalk back to her magical lectern, swaying her hips like an overconfident runway model.

“Try it again Neanderthals.” She quipped. “And remember Tyrone, I have my eye on you.”

“She has her eyes on him!” Ericka shouted.

After smashing through the flash frozen webs, they’d all run down the stairwell like the devil was on their heels. It was surreal as they ran across the parking lot and could see other animals and strange beast fleeing for their own lives, no doubt sensing the presence of an apex predator that would be Xue-Xin.

Once they crossed the property line, Tyrone received a few notifications, the first few put a smile on his face but the last one set him right back on edge.

Great work! You have completed the quest: Escape from Sergeant Mills! You have been rewarded: 100 xp and 1000 credits!

Nice job! You have completed the quest: Cluster of Death! You have been rewarded: 50 xp and 100 credits!

New quest available: Momma’s Boy 1. Info: You have your mind set on one thing, make sure your mother is okay. This will be the most treacherous wellness check you’ve ever done! The city is a cesspool of destruction and unnamable beast lurk the streets. Are you willing to risk life and limb for your dearest momma? Will you reach her in time? Rewards: 1000xp, 2000 credits, and a mother’s love (aww)

Accept this quest? Yes? No?

Tyrone mentally slammed the yes option.

“You heard her; we all did!” Ericka continued to belt. Her and Jenny had entered a heated argument once they’d crossed the property line. “I’m not going anywhere with that man; he’ll lead the monsters right to us!”

They were safe now but some of the employees were bent over panting in exhaustion. Tyrone was surprised that he wasn’t one of them, but ever since boosting his stats with the class bonus he felt barely any exhaustion from running across the football fields worth of land that they needed to cross to be out of Sergeant Mills. Ignoring the argument, he checked up on Botnik and grinned at the loading bar slowly ticking full.

“Dammit Ericka! We can’t just leave him; besides he has a weapon.” Jenny stomped her feet. “Have you not noticed the crazy animals around here, we could use a guy with a magical spear thingy to help us. Plus, he’s the strongest out of all of use probably!”

“Uh, guys? Maybe we shouldn’t be drawing so much attention to ourselves out here…” Sam said in a harsh whisper as he craned his neck around at every noise.

The sun was setting, and they were now just standing in the street, with nothing else but trees and what used to be a golf course but did not resemble a rain forest across from them. The sudden disappearance of the beast they’d seen rushing out of Xue-Xin's zone made it a bit eerily on where they could be lurking now.

Tyrone looked over his status and noticed that he still had two points left over from his level up, then without hesitation he pumped the points into his Luck stat. He had no clue what he might run into out in the new transformed world, but he knew he’d need luck to survive the worst of it. Looking up into the sky, he grimaced at the setting sun. They’d need to find some kind of shelter soon; he really wasn’t in the mood to fight any monster in the dark.

“Ivan was right,” Ericka was on a roll now. “He didn’t trust that guy from the start and look what happened to him! He got him killed…”

“Alright guys, I’m heading out.” Tyrone said jumping into the conversation. “My mother lives in Minneapolis, so that’s where I’m heading. Anyone going that way is free to join me.”

“But I live in Plymouth!” Ericka snapped. “That’s the opposite direction of where I’m going.”

“Good for you?” He shrugged and turned away from the annoying woman. “Anyone else?”

Turning to the others, he was a bit disheartened when no one met his eyes. It seemed most were afraid of him since that stunt with Xue-Xin. Though he couldn’t blame them for that, it was an insane experience. Meghann didn’t even acknowledge his existence.

“Sorry, Ty.” Sam sighed. “I don’t live in the cities… I’m just trying to get home to my partner, y’know? Haven’t been able to reach anyone since the quake...”

“Yea, man. No worries, I understand it-OOF”

Looking down, Tyrone was surprised to see that Jenny was hugging him, trying her best to squeeze him with all her might. His eyes widened when he spotted tears budding at the corners of her tightly shut lids.

“You saved my life back there!” She belted. “At the elevator and again when that snow dragon lady popped up. She would have killed us all if not for you. I wish I could go with you... But I can’t. I don’t have a class, my place is over in Plymouth, and the city is…”

“Yea, I know.” Even from here they could easily see the city skyline and even more easily see the countless pillars of smoke and that some of the buildings were toppling over. The city was a hell zone.

“Here, have these.” Jenny said as she pulled out a small bundle of snacks, she no doubt scavenged from the vending machines. “Some water bottles too. You’re going to need it.”