John knew it would take hours for everyone to sleep off the exhaustion they'd accumulated in the portal world, and he didn't dare spend that time idle. With his Mana Sense measuring a good kilometre in range, he felt safe going out and doing some tests.

Things didn't exactly start off great on that front. He managed to find an isolated blue monster in short order using the usual Mana Sense/Soul Vision technique, and cornered it in the front garden of a house at the end of a curved cul-de-sac a few blocks over from the house where his party had crashed. The thing looked like a praying mantis that had taken inspiration from that old Slenderman game, standing tall and spindly and pale, with a blank face and serrated saw-arms that folded up like a flip-knife. It rushed towards him the moment he came in view, moving surprisingly fast.

His main intention for this excursion had been to see how the Voltaic Chain aspect of the Adamant Defence would work, so he activated the Spell and stood unimpressed before the charging monster, gleaming metal arms crossed, chrome eyebrow arched in challenge.

It lunged as soon as it was in striking range, serrated arm lashing out whip-fast. Even so, John could have dodged it even without Accelerate as a crutch. He didn't. It aimed right for his forehead, and it took every bit of willpower in his body not to flinch. Considering his current low Aura, this was going to really suck if it didn't work as well as he hoped.

To his relief, the monster's attack bounced off his head with a metallic clang, like a heavy gong that had been slapped by a stick. What was not so relieving was the staticy buzz that accompanied the bolt of lightning that zapped out from the point where the monster had struck, forming an electrical arc between him and the biped mantis. John had a vivid memory of a power line glitching back when he was young, creating a giant, roaring explosion that lasted for seconds, and this was at least twice as loud as that. It went on for ages, too, pumping excess power into the mantis was blackened and smoking. Only then did the bolt wink out.

+1000 Aura

He winced as the sound echoed, and several roars replied in the distance. Switching to Mana Sense, he wasn't at all surprised to find that multiple signatures were moving towards his current location. Not a lot in comparison to some of the ridiculous situations he'd faced so far, but he didn't want to get bogged down. He sighed, and his shoulders slumped.

Really should have seen that coming, he thought as he started to walk away, hands shoved in his pockets, falling back on the nonchalant demeanour he'd been steadily perfecting. Still couldn't be seen to be running from an enemy. At least the Armour works, though. Didn't feel a thing.

Leaving the smouldering corpse of the mantis monster behind, John moved on. He subtly laid low for a bit, his route just happening to avoid any of the monsters converging on his former position. It wasn't that he was particularly afraid of the blues and greens out there. He was just cognisant of the fact that it probably wouldn't be wise to get locked into another big battle and draw more and more monsters, ultimately endangering the comrades he was protecting.

There was a bit of temptation to engineer a scenario where he came to their rescue in an impressively flashy and cool manner, but he decided against it. Too many variables that could go wrong.

Unfortunately, the second battle he chose went worse than the first, if anything. Another few blocks over, a green-souled monster that seemed to be trapped in a cramped corner shop drew his ire for the fact that it was tearing through the ice cream section at the back of the store with furious swiped of its clawed hands. It resembled a hideously overweight pig with semi-translucent skin, tadpole-like things multiplying within its viscous innards like cells undergoing mitosis, swimming around between its organs and bones.

Without thinking, John fired an Ultimate Shot right at the monster's head.

And there he learned a problematic feature to his Combined Ultra-Spells: once you merged a lot of Spells together, it was easy to forget, in the moment, just what you'd added. In this instance, there wasn't much problem with the various elements that streamed out from above his wrist when he clenched his fist. They weren't silent by any means, but he was sure the shop would have somewhat muffled the Tempest Sphere and Electric Shock aspect of things. It certainly wouldn't have been as bad as his test with Adamant Armour, at least.

But as the Ultimate Shot sped across the small shop and obliterated the pig monster in rather impressive fashion, John was provided with an unwelcome reminder of one particular Spell he'd added to the mix.

There was no chance of the shop containing Thunderous Roar.

He might as well have set off a bomb, then formed the smoke into an arrow that pointed right down at his location. The sound was like a physical force thrumming through him. He was surprised it hadn't turned his bones to dust. The only consolation was that the shot hadn't travelled far enough to let out anything more than a quick peep of noise, but it seemed to echo forever, more an absurdly loud gunshot than a true rumble of thunder.

+1000 Aura

Once again, monsters answered with shrieks, screams, roars, and more. Once again, Mana Sense told him monsters were converging on his location. Once again, he casually strolled away with his hands in his pockets like he totally meant to do that and there was nothing embarrassing going on here.

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After that, he settled into killing monsters mostly the old-fashioned way. Armed combat didn't get much more old-fashioned than a sword, in human terms, unless he ended up with a magic wooden club some day. It didn't strike him as the kind of thing that looked cool, though.

Mana Blade on its own was a formidable weapon even at Level 2. Working in conjunction with Skills like Accelerate, Flash Step, Air Step, and Precognition, he was able to pull off some really flashy shit. He practised on doing a 'teleports behind you' trick, where he Flash Stepped behind an enemy then plunged the sword into its back from behind, without looking. That got him a lot of Aura once he had the move down.

He settled into a patrol around the house where the others were resting, setting himself the challenge of guarding a certain distance of the place. He even said it aloud, cementing the quest for the Aura system to judge: "No monsters shall step within one hundred metres of my comrades while they rest," he declared in the most ominous, threatening voice he could muster.

+200 Aura

It was a lot trickier than it sounded, as there was a fairly dense population of monsters in the area, and he found himself constantly Accelerating back and forth, relying on Flash Step and Air Step at times when the time dilation Skill was on its cooldown, unable to utilise his ranged Spell lest it draw more monsters and inevitably lose him the challenge as they piled on from all directions.

As usual, most of the monsters were blues, a variety of twisted animals, animated objects, and eldritch abominations formed from a multitude of random materials biological or otherwise, and they were dealt with easily. Greens weren't exactly difficult, per se, but they generally required more finesse—also, he found that they didn't drop any loot, and wondered if that was a phenomenon exclusive to the portal.

Having been reminded of loot, he took his giant scythe out for a spin. It was a little awkward to use, like his Level 2 Duellist Skill didn't quite know what to make of it. As expected, though, the System loved it, giving him double the Aura of a regular kill every time he took an enemy down with the edgy weapon.

In short order, he had enough Aura for a new Combine. His first instinct was to add more to Adamant Defence, since that was the one he'd already decided to prioritise, but in the circumstances he couldn't really use it for the same reason he couldn't use Ultimate Shot. So he decided to add something to Mana Blade, quickly scrolling through his menus for something that seemed appropriate.

To his surprise and chagrin, he realised that he'd steadily bought up much of the lower levels, and he didn't want to risk anything higher in case it cannibalised his Mana Blade for its own ends. Ice Grasp was the obvious candidate from what was left at Level 2 and below, since Astral Projection, Illusory Clone, and Phantom Hand didn't seem like they'd do much for a blade.

Then again, Phantom Hand and Astral Projection could end up creating a blade I can detach from my arm and use from a distance, and Illusory Clone— John cut off his own thoughts with a huff. There was no use speculating right now; Ice Grasp seemed a much safer bet.

7000 spent Aura later, he had the Aurora Blade, Level 3. Before, the Spell had created a ghostly blue-ish blade that extended from the end of his arm, like if Wolverine had a single wide sword instead of three claws. The new Spell had kept the general function, but now the blade itself looked like it had captured the Northern Lights in a sword-shaped shard of glass, its surface faintly white like frost on a window. An after image of icy mist followed the blade wherever it went; he could feel the chill radiating from it.

The next cut he dealt with the blade created an encroaching tide of ice that steadily froze the monster's body stiff around the wound, eventually locking it in place. Grasped by ice, I guess, he thought a little wryly as he parted the monster's head from its shoulders. He really started to lean on the ice puns after that.

"Freeze! Oh wait, you already have."

"You look like you need to chill out."

"Cool off. Permanently."

"Wanna see my best ice-breaker?"

And so on. Incredibly fucking lame, in his opinion, and he couldn't help thinking almost anyone on Earth would have figured out a much better way to act cool, but somehow the system loved it, showering him with extra Aura every time.

He spent a good few hours sprinting back and forth through the suburban neighbourhood, along the high street, through the car park, across the small local park, over fences and gardens. Aura rolled in, and he liked to think he spent it somewhat strategically. Aurora Blade kept its admittedly cool name with the addition of Dominate, another Level 3 Spell which brought the resulting amalgamation up to Level 4 and gave it an aspect that essentially rendered blue monsters catatonic, and stunned greens long enough they might as well have been, since they typically died quickly after.

At some point, he became sure the system was nudging the monsters to challenge him. They seemed to be constantly moving towards the general direction of the house, one or two at a time, but never in a way that made it completely impossible for him to get to them and defend his arbitrarily chosen boundary. It brought to mind the events of the portal world, how things had seemed so coordinated, a scenario made to be possible to beat.

Thoughts like that started to dampen his mood, adding a tinge of bitterness to the taste of victory that came with every monster kill. Before long, he was struggling to enjoy it at all, feeling more like a chore set up for him, even though he'd been the one to impose the gimmick on himself in the first place.

But he only came to a stop when the black veil rolled over the burning sky once more, darkening the world by a couple of shades. He turned, glaring into the distance, and there, of course, was the gaping abyss hanging over Central London, leaking oily black ichor in great streams.

What was it doing down there, with that awful tar-like substance it was pouring out? He didn't have his bearings that well in this side of the city, but he reckoned the thing was probably over the thames. Was it infecting the water, somehow? Why did it only show up at 'night', too?

So many questions. That was the theme of all this apocalypse bullshit. Question after question.

John sighed, slumping his shoulders, and made his way back towards the house.

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