“I count at least twenty enemies encroaching upon our position,” Alfred said.

“Damn it, damn it, damn it!” Anthony pounded his foot on the ground. “So much of the Mana is going to waste.”

“I don’t think we were meant to kill a level 55 monster, so the Pathfinder isn’t equipped for someone of our level to absorb all the purifying Mana of the Herax Turtle,” Bartholomew said.

“I’m knocked clean of Dao energy. You wouldn’t believe how much it takes to hold back thousands of gallons of slime for nearly a minute.”

Alistair looked at Alfred and his sister, who both were still recovering from the pressure and heat of the turtle. Only he, Alexandra, and Bartholomew were in fighting shape, which didn’t bode well for facing multiple teams. They exited the turtle near a river separating the forest from a swamp. Upstream, a waterfall crashed down onto the rocks, creating the river.

“Bartholomew, do you have any rockets left?” Alistair asked.

“My stock is down to four,” he replied.

“I can feel another level coming on,” Alistair said. “We just need to hold on a little longer.”

“We’ve absorbed a little under half of the available energy,” Evangeline announced. “We wouldn’t be giving our competitors an edge, especially with how many there are.”

Alfred shouted a series of numbers to his brother, who immediately reacted by firing his RPG into the sky. A moment later, a blue explosion took out a group of harpies from the sky.

“I’m inclined to agree with Alistair.” Alfred put a finger to his ear and said more numbers, and after each set, Bartholomew fired another rocket. Alistair envied the synchronization between the brothers, though he supposed they had a lot of practice. “I estimate we need between thirty more seconds and a minute to level up again.”

Alistair concurred with his assessment. At the rate his body was filling up with energy, he just needed forty-five more seconds. Those forty-five seconds weren’t going to be easy, however.

Just as Bartholomew fired his last rocket, the largest colony of bees Alistair had ever seen emerged from the forest behind them. They charged straight for them, only deterred by Bartholomew’s machine gun arms and Alexandra’s poisonous gas. Despite their best efforts, some still got through, stinging through toughened skin and armor with ultra-sharp barbs. Alistair thought he had built up an impressive pain tolerance, but the bees brought him into a whole new world of pain.

“God damn it!” Anthony shouted, swiping at the bees with brushes of silver-clear energy. Everywhere he touched, the bees crumbled into dust, but there were always more.

The bees weren’t their only problem. A mass of vines burst out of the cover of the forest, heading for the team. Alistair made out a group of tree people with bark-like skin emerging riding the vines.

Alistair punched the vines into oblivion and Alexandra cut hundreds upon hundreds of the green crawlers, but more always took their place.

From the swap side, there were at least a dozen enemies. Most were human or a close variant, but there were some metallic golems standing over three meters tall.

Level up! You are now level 28. +2 Agility, +2 Intelligence, +2 Charisma, +2 free Attribute points, +15 Upgrade Points.

“It’s 75% absorbed now,” Evangeline shouted over the cacophony of the battle. “Let’s get out of here!”

Alexandra healed Alfred and Evangeline in between cutting vines and slashing bees. She was leaning into the regenerative and natural toughness aspects of her Class more, and her [Healing Touch] improved because of incorporating her Dao Inspiration. He didn’t know exactly when she obtained it, but he could feel the difference in her attacks. There was at least one component related to her high Strength, another related to her raging, and a healing aspect.

“We’re surrounded,” Alexandra replied, ducking the swing of a golem. Her red aura was dimming down, a sign her [Barbarian’s Fury] was running out.

The two enemy groups weren’t only attacking them, but they also fought each other. Meter-thick vines dragged metal golems into the river, while the dryads were assaulted with lightning bolts and giant titanium clubs. The battlefield turned into an all-out blood bath, and Alistair spotted even more groups coming in the distance. Their commotion turned into a spectacle as everyone wanted to see what was going on.

“I see a potential avenue for escape,” Alfred said, pointing at the waterfall. “There’s a cave behind the waterfall.”

“We’re going to be eaten by another fucking turtle,” Anthony grumbled.

Bartholomew stopped firing his guns and ran over to his brother, picking him up like a princess. Out of the older brothers’ back, two rocket boosters emerged, the signature blue energy blasting him away toward the waterfall.

“Alistair, I got your sister,” Alexandra said, running over to the main group after she beat back another dryad’s mess of vines. She swiveled to Evangeline, who was fighting for control over the killer bees. “What’s your Constitution?”

“40? I think,” Evangeline said. “Why do you— ”

Without even hesitating, Alexandra picked up the petite woman… and chucked her. She grabbed Evangeline by the waist, hoisting her overhead and launching her like a catapult at the waterfall.

“What the hell?” Alistair exclaimed, watching his sister sail through the air and pass through the waterfall shortly after the Wood brothers.

“She’ll be fine with her Constitution,” Alexandra said. “Bartholomew will catch her. It’s our turn to get out of here.”

He had to admit Alexandra was right. The battlefield over the turtle’s corpse was reaching a fever pitch, and they had already absorbed most of the available Mana. If the newcomers figured out that they were the ones to take all the purifying Mana of the Herax Turtle, they would become the new targets.

Unlike Bartholomew, he couldn’t fly, but he could run fast. He had 126 Agility with all of his stat improvements, and even without [Dash] he could run over a hundred and fifty miles per hour for short bursts. He was so fast that he could run on water, which his younger self would have thought was the coolest thing ever.

Alistair surprised Alexandra by picking her up and running with her, deciding that she would be too slow on her own. He spared a moment of thought for Anthony, who was fending off some stragglers who decided to hunt after their team instead of fighting by the turtle. While Anthony seemed like a terrible person, he had been quite helpful to their team so far. In almost every culture, betrayal was the cardinal sin, since cooperation and prosocial behavior were impossible without trust and loyalty. By joining with Anthony, he had developed a slight feeling of camaraderie with the man. Alistair was confident in his own values and that he would stand up for what was right if he needed to, but he also reminded himself that almost everyone had their redeeming values. Very few people were entirely evil.

He heard a buzz in his ear as he rushed across the river in a fraction of a second.

“Ten meters,” a voice said.

Alistair was fairly confident he understood what Alfred meant, and he jumped to land ten meters up from the bottom of the waterfall. The falling water crashed on his back with the force of thousands of pounds, but his legs overpowered nature. He did, however, land on the side of the cave, bouncing off the sides several times. Not enough to injure his tempered body, but his shirt, which was already corroded from the time inside the turtle, completely fell apart.

She crashed face-first into the rocky bed of the cave, stumbling off of him, but her clothing was made of sturdier stuff. Instead of a wardrobe malfunction, he spat out a mouthful of rocks.

“You could have at least warned me,” Alexandra complained. After seeing him shirtless, she turned away, and Alistair thought she might have blushed.

“Sorry, I didn’t want to waste any time.”

Anthony came flying through the waterfall a second later, screaming like a little girl. “I swear to God you ungrateful bastards better give me your share of the drachma, this is unbelievable how much I’m getting the short end of the stick, I let you get the kill on the turtle and I get stuck fighting while I’m fresh out of Dao energy.”

“You still got the highest gains out of anyone here from the turtle, despite not even killing it,” Alfred said, who dismounted from his brother’s arms. “Anyone could feel that.”

“I need the most energy to level up out of anyone,” he rebuffed. “It wasn’t my fault it came to me. My bullshit Class restrictions make it harder for me to level up.”

Evangeline piped up from deeper within the cave. “I think I can say we aren’t in the mouth of a giant beast, at least.”

“That’s comforting,” Alistair said. “So, what’s our next move?”

“We’re going to need to find a place to rest for at least a day,” Alfred said. “My brother and Anthony have to undergo a tribulation.”

“What?” Alistair asked.

“We both reached level 30. That’s the stage where you begin the formation of the soulcore, a necessary organ for successive stages of cultivation. In order to form it, we must survive a tribulation handed down from the Heavens,” Anthony said. The others looked at him, shocked at his articulateness and lack of swear words. “Why are you looking at me like? You think I’m some kind of idiot that just got to where I am through sheer luck?”

No one deigned to give him a response. They marched inside of the cave, and they all spent more time than was probably necessary making sure they weren’t in an illusion or in the belly of a beast, not wanting to repeat the same mistake as last time. They stopped once they arrived at a ravine containing pools of silverly liquid and large stalagmites and stalactites.

Bartholomew and Anthony sat down and began meditating, closing their eyes as they focused inward on their Dao. Their powerful auras flickered and expanded, flooding the ravine with excess aura. After a couple of seconds of the torrential output, the auras receded back into their bodies, reforming stronger than ever inside them.

Alfred explained that the tribulation could take up to twenty-four hours and that they were not to be disturbed during the time, since it could mess up the process and cause irreparable harm.

While Bartholomew and Anthony cultivated, it left the others quite bored. The rest of them leveled up twice, so Alfred reached level 27, Alistair and Alexandra 28, and Evangeline 29. Alistair’s rank rose meteorically, climbing all the way to #98, which was still probably an underestimate because of the hidden nature of his Subclass. He was starting to feel like a big player now, which led to his inevitable curiosity that he hadn’t received a sponsor yet. Sofia had one even when she was in the low 500 ranks, yet somehow he and his sister didn’t have one despite being now #98 and #37.

Alfred explained more about the sponsor system to Alistair and Alexandra as they watched over the two level 30s. It started out as merely hints and suggestions that came through the Pathfinder AI after reaching level 15, but as they grew closer to level 30, the discussions became more and more detailed and the rewards ever greater until the sponsor showed up through a hologram to talk to them right before they were shipped off to Felons vs Fellows.

The sponsor of the Wood family empire was the Satharvon family, one of the 88 Progenitor Clans, though the representative was merely a low-ranking member of a branch family. The main Satharvon family was too large and prestigious to be dealing with the initiation of new planets, but they could hand off the dirty work to distantly related lines. In exchange for receiving special items, advanced information, and access to broken Talent Trees, Alfred’s father had promised the Satharvon representative unquestioned service and loyalty for the next hundred years. It sounded like a lot to an Earthling, but it was apparently a pretty good deal, considering a hundred years was a drop in the lifespan of higher realm cultivators.

Speaking of realms, Alfred explained the Foundation realm of cultivation to Alistair as best he could. The Foundation realm was split into four tiers, Tier 1 being from level 1-15, after which they gained a Class. Tier 2 was from level 15-30, after which they formed a soulcore. Tier 3 ran from 30-60, and Tier 4 from 60-100. Each successive tier gave more stat increases, culminating at Tier 4. The next realm after Foundation was Adept, and it involved forming a “Domain”, though Alfred had no idea what that entailed. All he knew was that it was exceedingly rare for the citizens of the Final Frontier Empire to reach the Adept realm, the statistic being less than one in a thousand. Atavius Meloi was only an Adept at level 155, and he destroyed half the planet.

London had been one of the cities burned to ash by Atavius, and the Wood family were the ones to bring England back from the brink, organizing the country from the ground up. Alistair was impressed by Alfred’s tenacity and grit, despite not being much of a fighter himself. He held himself with composure despite his talents being more suited for other areas.

Alistair split his free stats equally between Wisdom and Endurance. He didn’t want any of his stats lagging behind, and after seeing the “Jack of All Trades” Badge, he had decided he wasn’t going to be an ultra-specialist, like Alexandra. It was too late to go down that path anyway, lacking the requisite early-stage Badges. He could primarily invest in his Agility, Intelligence, and Charisma, while also having solid numbers in the other stats.

For his Upgrade Points, he invested half of them into opening a new Badge slot. It would take a while to fill the 100 points, but better to start now than later when he would really need the slot. For the other fifteen, he kept putting them in the Communion of Spirit Branch. After he unlocked Dead Warrior Whispers, Solid Spirit, and the next leaf, Soul Strengthening, he could reach the second level of leaves. Soul Strengthening offered {Soul Rampart}, a passive ability that absorbed part of the spiritual imprints of the dead into strengthening his own soul defenses, so he wouldn’t be as vulnerable to spiritual attacks.

He spent the next day chatting with Alexandra about trivial things, talking to his sister, and meditating on his Dao. It was one of the first breaks in fighting he had in a while if you didn’t count his time sleeping in jail. He had fun sparring with Alexandra as well, though his build was a hard counter to hers.

Anthony was the first to emerge from his tribulation. Eighteen hours in, a wave of his Dao of Time exploded from him, freezing everyone in place for a split second before it passed. Anthony woke up, looking more refreshed and put-together than ever before. His aura was more stable, more complete, lacking its once wild timbre. Despite being less energetic, Alistair could feel it was much denser and more powerful.

“Not so bad, Now let’s see my rank,” Anthony said, stretching his arms. “Are you kidding me? How the hell am I only third?”

Alistair checked for himself and found that Anthony was indeed a mere third place, Wandering Hobo still possessing the number one spot, number two owned by Carmen Romero.

“They must have also reached level 30 recently. They’re probably on this island as well, in fact,” Alfred said.

“There’s a new number four as well,” Alexandra noted. “Junkai keeps falling. Richard Atwood is climbing strong too. I think he was eleven before. He must have found an impressive opportunity as well.”

Another six hours passed and Bartholomew awakened at last, his Dao having a much more artificial feeling, as opposed to the ancient natural presence of Time. His aura was sleek and cutting edge, the knowledge that technology offered eternal progress yet the acknowledgment it was also used for war and strife. In a way, Alistair saw a similarity between that aspect of his Dao and Alexandra’s combination of strength and raging. Perhaps there was a unifying Dao of War underlying both of them? In any case, Bartholomew’s aura was terrifying in his own right, nearly a match for Anthony.

“I have reached rank #6,” Bartholomew announced. Alistair understood with all of their upgrades, they had to be one of the most powerful teams on the island. It was just down to finding the treasure and holding off the criminals, wildlife, and other teams, easier said than done.

Alfred, the scheming Englishman, always had a plan up his sleeve.

“You may have thought that battle gained us nothing,” he said. “But I placed trackers on all of the teams that crashed our party. And because they’re 98% reliant on technology and not Mana or the Dao, they’re nearly untraceable.”

Alfred gave a wide grin. “It looks like our golem friends found some buried treasure.”