Justin was just as determined as ever to become one of Earth’s elite fighters, and it was strange to think that he might already be one.

All we have is off the back of Xavier’s power. I want to show him we have power of our own now—that we can take care of ourselves.

Xavier wouldn’t be able to take them all with him when he flitted about the world, clearing the invaders away. They’d always planned to, at some point, split the party and their efforts here on Earth. It didn’t make sense to have the entire party along if it would slow Earth’s mightiest Champion down.

Howard led the way into the temple. It looked like some weird, stout pyramid with a flat top. All they’d seen so far in The Moon Sky Dungeon was werewolves—which he had to admit was pretty awesome.

Out of all the things that they’d discovered existed so far, he honestly hadn’t expected werewolves to be one of them.

Do vampires exist too?

As cool as that might be, he wasn’t sure he actually wanted to meet one.

He couldn’t sense whatever was inside the stone temple. Many different structures blocked the use of Aura Sight. He wondered it their Seed Sanctuary would.

How did werewolves even make a temple, anyway? From the looks of things, he easily imagined this place—this island dungeon—to be in an eternal night, watched over by a giant full moon constantly looming over them in the sky.

It must be hard to stack stone with clawed hands…

Then again, maybe dungeons weren’t made by those that inhabited them. Yeah, that made sense. This place was the System’s doing. Either it fabricated it entirely, or took it wholesale from someone else in the Greater Universe.

The moment they entered the tower, his Aura Sight blew up. The space reminded him a little bit of the necromancer’s throne room. He shuddered at the thought, remembering the thousands of zombies they’d faced.

At least we gained a good number of levels.

Justin was Level 31 now. He’d kind of hoped to be a higher level after how many enemies they’d dealt with, but those zombies hadn’t been worth as many Mastery Points as others—probably because they were minions, and weren’t actually all that strong for their level.

He shook away those thoughts and focused.

Howard walked about ten steps into the temple from the entrance, then activated his Bulwark spell. Siobhan laid down her Divine Beacon, the brilliant white pillar growing up from the ground.

“Siobhan and I will hold here,” the former cop said. “Justin, you’ll dive bomb the wolves. Siobhan, teleport him back if he gets into trouble.”

The first of the werewolves were already running toward the Bulwark spell. There were perhaps twenty wolves in the temple—though it smelled more like some sort of animal’s den than it did a religious space—and one big, glowing aura at the far end.

A massive werewolf that walked on all fours. It looked as though it was more bestial than the others, which was saying something.

{Alpha Werewolf - Level 40}

Of course that’s what it would be called.

The Alpha Werewolf was huge and looked terrifyingly strong, bulging muscles shifted beneath taut skin as it casually strode forward. It was hairless, which was another sort of terrifying. Shouldn’t it be furry, like the other wolves? It was maybe the size of a bus, which begged the question—how could a human, or another humanoid race, turn into that?

Justin sprinted forward, past Howard and Siobhan and their makeshift staging area.

He grinned as he leapt straight up. He’d been increasing his Strength attribute over the past few levels to enable him to jump higher. Well, that wasn’t the only reason he’d been increasing it—he wanted each of his sword strikes to deal more damage—but it was a definite perk.

Justin couldn’t help but release an excited laugh as his wings sprang from his back. God, every time he did this, he couldn’t believe how lucky he was. Yes, the world had gone to hell—almost literally—countless millions of people had died, and his mother might very well be one of them… but in moments like this he could forget about all of that and just live in the moment.

He was flying, for god’s sake! If that wasn’t something to take a moment to enjoy, what was the point of life in the first place?

Throughout the entire Moon Sky Dungeon, the party hadn’t had a chance to deal with the werewolves without Xavier’s mental influence. Now, Justin appreciated what Xavier had been doing for them, letting them powerlevel at an insane rate, but it was a lot more fun when the enemies attacked back.

It also meant that he had no idea what these werewolves were capable of, so he didn’t expect the closest ones’ eyes to start glowing a silver that looked awfully familiar—like that of the moon hanging in the sky outside.

Or even like how Xavier’s eyes get sometimes.

Then the bastard things shot moonbeams at him! Since when could werewolves do that? Now he was wondering if he should be careful to let the things scratch him. Surely the curse, or disease, or whatever the hell these beasts had been afflicted with to turn into bloody werewolves, wouldn’t be transferable? Right?

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Right?

Though Justin hadn’t been expecting the barrage, it was easy enough for him to avoid it. He swerved, rolled, and flipped in the air with a grace an Olympic gymnast would struggle to manage, sending Airstrikes down periodically any time he could sight one of the enemies and was in range.

Justin couldn’t help but grin when he discovered that a single one of his Airstrikes was strong enough to one-hit the werewolves.

I’m stronger than I thought!

So far in this dungeon, they’d been trying to spread the Mastery Points out evenly between them all, so they’d been careful not to use their strongest attacks.

Justin didn’t bother swooping downward. His Airstrike cooldown was only two seconds now. He just kept slicing it through the air whenever he had the opportunity. The Alpha Werewolf had twenty minion wolves, so Justin wasn’t able to deal with all of them before they got to the others.

He glanced back at Howard and Siobhan, making sure they weren’t in any danger—they were fine. It was hard for the enemy to break Howard’s defences. Actually, Justin figured it was probably impossible.

An idea struck him then. The Alpha Werewolf, up until this point, had simply been observing the spectacle. Justin didn’t understand why so many floor and dungeon bosses did that crap. Can’t it see that it’s outmatched? Shouldn’t it be using every opportunity to take them down?

Maybe this dungeon boss wasn’t the smartest dog in the kennel.

Let’s see how strong this thing really is.

He sent an Airstrike down at the musclebound, bus-sized hound. The Alpha Werewolf was Level 40, whereas Justin was only Level 31. But the difference was that Justin had lots and lots of titles—nowhere near as many as Xavier possessed, but enough to make a significant difference, especially after he’d gained Homeward Bound and the First Dungeon of Earth titles.

He should be able to take this thing on his own.

“Justin!” Howard’s voice boomed from the other side of the temple.

The former cop probably didn’t want him to engage the alpha until all the minion wolves were dealt with.

But Justin was confident this wouldn’t be a problem.

His Airstrike sliced through the Alpha Werewolf’s flesh with incredible ease. It let out a whine of pain then snarled something fierce. He didn’t think he’d heard a beast snarl that loud before. The sound echoed about the temple almost as though it had been designed with snarl-boosting acoustics in mind.

I can more than take this thing.

Justin remained in the air. His wings had grown to what he imagined was their full length. He looked like some sort of avenging angel, come down from the heavens to slay the wild beast.

Is this really my life now?

He’d come a long way from baby duck wing, that’s for sure.

The Alpha Werewolf’s head swivelled toward him. Its eyes glowed sliver. Justin knew what was about to come next. He reckoned right now, Siobhan was watching him like a hawk, waiting to see if she would need to summon him back and out of danger. Howard, too, was probably glancing up at him as he fought. The man had a powerful protective spell—Martyr’s Defence—that allowed him to take the damage of a strike from one if his allies.

That won’t be necessary.

The moonbeam came. The noise was deafening. Justin swerved out of the way, but the damned thing was following him. The Alpha Werewolf’s head was panning toward him like an automated turret with a targeting system.

Rubble fell around him, and it took him a moment to realise it was the temple’s ceiling.

The other werewolves’ moonbeams hadn’t been strong enough to take down the temple. Apparently this one’s was.

Justin only grinned all the more as a crazy idea came to him.

He tucked his wings, whirled around, then swiftly changed direction.

I’m going to make the bastard bury itself.

If Howard and Siobhan had Communication Stones connected to him, he could imagine that right now they’d be screaming in his ear.

Justin flew over the Alpha Werewolf, its eyes still aglow, the silver beam of violent energy still flowing from its eyes. The beam hit exactly where he intended it to it—right above the dungeon boss’s head.

Clearly this werewolf isn’t as smart as the necromancer.

Rubble fell from the ceiling, tumbling down to the ground. Justin wondered how much crushing damage it would all do. He grinned, glancing over his shoulder to look at the Alpha Werewolf.

Then his eyes widened as he saw the wolf leaping straight up into the air. The bus-sized bestial bastard was practically flying straight for him, and the rubble that was falling from the ceiling wasn’t harming it at all—it was just… bouncing off.

Justin whirled around and slashed another Airstrike spell straight for the massive beast. His attack sliced through a huge chunk of falling stone and followed through, hitting straight where the Alpha Werewolf’s maw was wide open, teeth gleaming in the moonlight streaming from the now half-open roof.

A bright light enveloped Justin as his attack hit.

Siobhan’s summoning me back.

The white light clouded his vision and tried to rip him away.

He didn’t want to be ripped away. He was certain he could take a hit from this beast. Hell, he was faster than it—he could easily Slip Dodge out of the way. Instead of simply sinking into the spell as he might usually, Justin gritted his teeth and fought it. He’d seen Xavier do this before. He valued Siobhan’s assistance and knew what he was doing would probably look petulant, but he didn’t care.

He wanted to prove himself.

He felt some sort of magical barrier he was pressing up against, and pushed through it with his will. When he pushed as hard as he could, the barrier was dispelled, and he was still up in the air above the beast.

And it was still flying through the air, its massive leap carrying it toward him.

It was also dead. Like, very dead. Justin blinked, more than a little surprised by the damage his second Airstrike had caused the Alpha Werewolf.

The bus-sized monster fell back to the ground when its momentum was stilled by his strike. Its body was in two pieces. Justin’s Airstrike had somehow cut it in half.

That was only the second time I struck it.

The kill notification filled his vision. Justin glided back to the ground. Another notification swept into his vision, too—he’d gained another level.

And they’d finished the dungeon.

He looked over to where the others were standing. All the werewolves they’d been facing were dead.

Justin blinked. He knew they were strong, and the levels they’d gained, plus all the titles… they’d made the trio even stronger, but for the longest time they’d been standing in Xavier’s shadow, unable to really test their abilities, as he’d been taking out everything for them—not that he could complain! It was just…

Had they really come so far without him even realising?

Justin landed softly on the ground in front of Howard and Siobhan. He retracted his wings, then dispelled them.

Xavier was leaning against a wall. He must have slipped into the temple to watch. He pushed off the wall, a small smile on his face. “I don’t think I’ve been giving you guys enough credit.”

The Moon Sky Dungeon was defeated. The titles rolled in. Now, it was finally time for them to plant the Seed Sanctuary and go off and find their families—clearing all the invaders from Earth in the process.

And I’ll actually be able to help.

It made him wonder about the survivors back at camp. That John Hammond guy seemed to have a good head on his shoulders. They wouldn’t be able to grant the survivors the same titles that they possessed, but that didn’t mean they couldn’t powerlevel them.

They may only be Level 1 right now, but with our help, they could become the world’s elite.

Justin couldn’t wait to see their fortress bloom to life.