I lifted my haladie and charged forward.

Then, I paused, because I saw one of Alpha’s potions on the ground. It was greenish with swirls of red and blue, and I couldn’t tell if it was the helping or the hurting kind of elixir.

I tried to use Eye of the Saboteur on it, but all I got were question marks.

I picked it up, looking over my shoulder at Rexen.

“Can I drink this?”

Rexen studied it for a second before shrugging his shoulders.

“Iunno.”

I yanked out the wand of supreme unlocking and hit the potion with the Spell, the arcane lock dissolving and the cork pushing itself out and onto the ground.

“Screw it,” I said, and tipped it upside down into my mouth.

I felt warmth fill my muscles and watched as my Health and Stamina bars nudged upward to about a quarter more than they were previously at. Apparently this was the drinkable kind. I noticed my Arcana bar flashed, but didn’t move at all because it was already full, but had to assume if I’d been in need, it would have refreshed that as well.

“Alright!” I cheered. “Time for some patented tomfoolery!”

The fire was all around us now. Well, it wasn't just fire—it was a swirling vortex of flaming spiders, an arachnid apocalypse right out of the shittiest B-Movie disaster flick playbook possible. Despite the fact that I was in a different, much more magical world, it was still surreal. The scope of the conflict, the frantic energy, the screams, roars, and the terrifying chorus of skittering arachnids, staring at all of it with my two sorta-actually eyes. It was a scene of absolute, terrifying chaos. And I was right at the heart of it all.

I was about to yell for the eggs when I heard their familiar pinging. I glanced over my shoulder, seeing them bouncing in one direction, their mirthful ricochets slicing into the swarm of spiders. Their whirling became more erratic, more deadly, as they continued their ferocious onslaught.

Ducking under an incoming stream of fire that spurted out from where webs were on normie spiders, I noticed frightfully how—in this bonkers burning bedlam—these creatures’ movements were almost imperceptible. Then I realized something else. Because of the insanity of the situation, I was far from defenseless. If it would work for them…

Oh hell yes! Moment of truth time, bitches!

Suddenly, I wasn't just fumbling through the battle anymore—I was carving my merry way through it. The massacre around me was goddamn intense, but with the confusion and masses of bodies, my Sneaking Skill was coming in clutch. The spiders could sense me, sure, but in the midst of the havoc, they struggled to keep track of my movements.

I found myself slipping in and out of the spider’s sightlines, slicing into their carapaces before vanishing again in the fray. My B-Rank Level-Whatever-the fuck Sneaking was making a difference, keeping me from being overwhelmed, allowing me to navigate the battlefield without drawing the ire of the entire horde.

The real game-changer, however, was the chance to utilize a new ability that had been lying dormant in my skill set—Nightfall Strike. The power of the attack depended on the victim being unaware, a state of obliviousness I was suddenly very fucking adept at inducing. It was like the sweetest, deadliest surprise, and imagined it might take the form of a shadowy fire bursting forth from my weapons whenever I struck from stealth.

With my newfound confidence, I decided to test it out on the next unsuspecting spider. Slipping into sneaks, I closed the distance between myself and one of the smaller pyronids. As I neared, a cool shiver ran down my spine, an indistinct pulse radiated from my haladie—apparently Nightfall Strike was ready.

Leaping out of the shadows, I struck. The blades bit into its back, rending through it like a spoon through oatmeal. The spider screeched, then was cut off by not having a fucking screecher anymore, its flaming form convulsing as it collapsed in a heap. What was left of it anyway. The attack was potent, amplified by the damage boost from my ability. The Nightfall Strike left nothing in its wake but scorched and shredded spider remains. It hadn’t had a dope visual effect or anything, but it was hard to argue with the results.

"Did you see that, Arjee?!" I whoop-whispered, trying to keep my joy contained while dancing away from another spider. "Tell me you fucking saw that!"

"Yes, yes, pupil," he replied, his tone barely masking the gleeful thrill in his voice. "You’ve certainly mastered the art of lurking. And bringing death to spiders. As expected of one of my select few apprentices."

As I continued my kung fu chaos waltz, clearing a path towards the biggest spider, I felt a sense of exhilaration I hadn't felt since starting this adventure. I almost lost my shit laughing as I took in the tumult unfolding before me. I could see now that the homies were wailing on the ginormous lead spider like he’d just tried to steal an old ladies purse.

There was Saban, smashing his hammer around like a kid high on pixie sticks. Every swing sent tremors through the ground like it was made of pudding. His idea of fighting a giant spider was evidently demolition derby-style and all I could do was gawk.

Rua, sword the size of a surfboard, was working that Behemoth Blade like she was cutting up a goddamn Christmas ham instead of a living halloween hell decoration. There was magic pumping into it from somewhere, and the runes along the edge lit up the place, sparking off the blade and frying the spider's shell, stinking up the place like bad seafood barbeque.

And Edwig, fucking Edwig. The blob-shaped, sweater vest-wearing, nerdy magic researcher was playing puppeteer with his Unseen Hand spell. That poor spider was getting pushed around more than a freshman on senior prank day. I noticed that he’d pause every so often and cast a Spell of some kind on Rua’s sword, which was where the amplification was coming from. I didn’t know what it was, but trusted that between the two of them, they probably knew what they were doing.

The rest of the campers? The brave, dumb fucks were trying to play hero, flinging themselves at the spider with the grace of a bunch of monkeys at a banana festival. Me, though? I was about to charge in there, ‘cuz y’all know I can’t be left out of a jam-packed injury jamboree. But, this was when I smacked right into the most annoying obstacle of them all—Alpha.

The smug pasty dwarf—fresh from his near-loss in duel before we’d been rudely interrupted—had just popped up out of the blue. Just my luck, caught in a monstrous mosh pit with a grudge to settle.

I instantly held up one of my wands—you know, I wasn’t even really sure which one at the moment—but Alpha just looked past me and sprayed three whole spiders with his acid shit. They chittered in hilarious pain before dissolving into flaming nothing, and Alpha spun, blasting another few into similar straits.

“He is still strong,” Rexen said, and he almost sounded impressed. “Still has time on his Citizen Surge.”

“Well…” I started, not quite sure what to say to that. It appeared that he was actually helping rather than doing the big bad guy move of choosing an inconvenient time to have our one-on-one.

I slashed another monster that got too close to me, and found myself standing next to Alpha as I rolled out of the way of another attack.

Just fucking great. We’re surrounded together.

“Get the fuck out of here,” Alpha said to me as I cut down a spider that leaped in our direction. He punctuated his statement with the defensive cloud of his hydrochloric hate shield. I sidestepped, not wanting to get chemically cremated, and just snorted at him.

“Why?! Afraid I’m going to—” I ducked from beneath a leaping spider’s attack, but wasn’t able to dodge as another latched onto my forearm. I roared and began shaking it off frantically. But it stayed lodged, so I started stabbing it like a madman until it stopped moving and was able to pry it off. Meanwhile, Alpha was still at it with his Spells.

“Yeet!” He shouted, hitting two at once with a blast of acid. “Yeet! Yeet! Yeet!” Each douchey exclamation was delivered with all the cocky seriousness of someone who has never once in their life stopped to consider how stupid they looked. Still…it didn’t stop him from utterly demolishing anything that came within range. The acid splattered too—so any spiders hanging out next to their best friend often received a healthy dose of residual damage, which greatly dissuaded them from trying to get closer.

However, as we slashed and splashed, the horde kept coming, and I was really starting to tire out. My Stamina was getting low—dangerously so—and I wasn’t sure how much longer I could keep this up. To make matters worse, I noticed that every bite added a bit more of a gunky green tint to my Health bar, and that seemed…not super good. A poison effect of some kind, I’m sure, but it was weird that I didn’t get a notification for it. Oh well, fuck it.

I was breathing like an out-of-shape racehorse, my attacks were getting slower, and my patience was wearing thin. I shot a look at Alpha, who seemed to be as energetic as he was stupid—which meant he still had stamina in reserves. Fucking Citizen Surge.

“Hey!” I shouted at him.

He looked back, just having finished doing his little wall of acid maneuver.

“What?”

“Gimme one of your Stamina potions or whatever—I’m fucking fading here.”

“Fuck off,” he said, and turned back to the fight at hand.

“Ooh, you little shithead,” I hissed. “I know you’ve fucking got some, and—”

I was interrupted as two spiders glomped onto my torso at once.

“Fuck this!”

Rather than fight them at their advantage, I belly flopped onto the ground, suplexing them into the dirt and then stabbing their idiot brains in half with the haladie. Then, seeing as how trying to use Sneaking was useless at the moment, I hauled off with the wand in my hand, and blasted more of the buggy bitches to bits with crackling electricity magic. It wasn’t until I’d killed about five that I realized how lucky I’d been to have been holding the wand of lightning ball. I hadn’t checked, and it would have been super embarrassing to hit them with a firebolt or worse, unlocking.

But they didn’t stop. Wave after wave surrounded us, and as a result, drew me farther and farther away from the battle I actually wanted to be having with the big one. I could see from my vantage that several more of the crew from the camp had joined Saban, Rua, and Edwig, and were enjoying the just desserts of lookin’ fly as a motherfucker as they assisted in ruining that huge bastard’s day.

“Those are my cookies!” I bellowed, and tried to fire over the writhing mass of personal space invaders to get a cheap shot in on the big boy. But, one of the smaller ones leaped at one of the non-spidey combatants and I accidentally hit it by mistake. It dropped out of the air, and the elf—I think—that had almost been murdered gave me a salute, before continuing to fight.

“God dammit! I wasn’t trying to save someone, I was trying to look cool!”

But, I was interrupted by being clocked in the chin by a spider, and it reset me to being pissed off in the opposite direction again as I killed it for its insolence.

And on it went. I couldn’t even keep track of how many spiders fell before me as I convulsed in the swarming sea of them. However, my Stamina being almost depleted eventually caused my movements to become sluggish, and more and more of the monsters were getting solid digs in. Blood flowed from about a thousand different wounds and my muscles screamed. I’d already been exhausted, and now I was fuckin’ beat. But, because occasionally the fates saw fit to reward me for being a motherfuckin’ ultra stud, I got a notification.

Condition: Fatigued

Fatigue I

• Abilities and Skills suffer -5% efficiency while under the Fatigue I condition effect.

Another message populated then, and I grinned from ear to ear.

Because of Fatigue I, Loon’s Bombastic Beatdown Aegis has temporarily reached Tier I effects.

• Strength Attribute increase [+4 multiplied by 100%]!

• Dexterity Attribute increase [+4 multiplied by 100%]!

• Constitution Attribute increase [+4 multiplied by 100%]!

Strength: 38 (Fatigue I)

Dexterity: 38 (Fatigue I)

Constitution: 88 (Fatigue I)

“Arjee,” I said, seriously, despite my smug grin.

“Pupil,” Rexen responded, nearly matching the sincerity of my severity—though I couldn’t tell if he was being genuine or simply adopting a tone for funsies.

“I’m going to need you to warn anyone without eight legs that they should get as far away from me as possible. It’s gonna get fucked up.”

Rexen surprised me by merely saluting, and flitting away—presumably to heed the caution I’d tasked him with.

Alpha was still standing by me, handling the spiders. He laughed.

“What—you a fucking werewolf now?”

I shook my head.

“Fuck you,” I said. “I don’t care if you live or die—so do whatever you want. But you heard me, dipshit—get the fuck outta here if you care about yourself at all.”

He just laughed again, and didn’t make a move other than to keep fighting.

Well, no one could say I didn’t try to warn him.

I focused. The feeling. Simmering just below the surface. I’d been holding it back for nearly the entire insect insurrection but now I didn’t have to. Every fang and every stab, every bruise, just making me angrier and angrier. I couldn’t even consider the idea of how cool it was to uncork the dick punching of a lifetime on people like the Hulk—because that would set me back too much. Instead, I married the sensation with the furiousness of how I still felt about the world I was trapped in. The system. The bullshit rotting diapers who had pulled me here. My losses. I channeled my trauma and pain and sadness to a razor’s edge, and then I released it.

Primal Rage.