Owen woke up not sure how much time had passed. Remembering the situation he shot upright and began scanning the surroundings. Briar's explosion had devastated everything and every monster that had been on the street had been killed in its blast. Owen could only stare in awe, before he sent texts to each of his friends helping out with the gate's.

It didn't take long to hear from several of them, stating they were still fighting or in between looking for groups of monsters. He gave himself a moment to stretch, before excitedly looking through his notifications. Skipping past the countless amount of kill notifications, his eyes opened wide at seeing he had gained 2 levels.

*You have gained 2 levels

You have 4 unallocated stats points.

Your class Polymath's apprentice has leveled up. you gain 1 stat point in mana, strength, perception, agility, dexterity and luck

You have gained the title Monster Slayer for slaying more than 100 monsters in a single fight. This title grants 3 strength and 2 resilience.

Your title Monster slayer has upgraded to Monsters Bane for slaying more than a 1000 monsters in a single fight. This title grants 10 strength and 6 resilience.*

Owen was taken aback. He didn't believe he had actually killed that many monsters in this fight, maybe more than a hundred, but a thousand? There was just no way unless it counted Briar's attack as his own. He was left feeling entirely overwhelmed, but he quickly pulled up his status.

*Owen: Level 19

Vitality = 14

Mana = 24

Strength = 26

Perception = 15

Agility = 19

Resilience = 22

Dexterity = 15

Luck = 10

4 unallocated stat points*

Taking into account all of his bonuses from items and titles, he was sitting on an incredible stat pool for his level, especially since he had unlocked the title system early, which by itself gave him a whopping 30 stats points in the last several days since unlocking it. He also realized that the spear he was using so frequently didn't take advantage of his new strength at all, sure he could make stronger stabs, but something like the electric bastard sword was much more suited, even if for whatever reason he hadn't unlocked any more of the polymath skills yet.

Deciding he needed to test out his new strength, he scoured around the area, searching up any and all gate locations he could find on the internet to see if there were still any monsters hanging out in the area. Having no luck, he decided to start rushing towards Peggy who was currently closest to him. He was surprised that he didn't run into anything on his job over to where Peggy was still fighting. The streets were torn apart and cars flipped on their sides, as he ran, a figure stepped out into the street that he didn't recognize. Curious he slowed down, calling out to them he began to offer his help, before realizing he actually did recognize them.

The appearance was nothing like either time he had most recently seen them, but for whatever reason he recognized the energy signature of the person standing in front of him. "Hey, Jared, glad to see you are doing okay, can I help you with something?" He asked hesitantly. Jared slowly raised his hands, before pulling down his hood. "It appears you've been thriving despite killing everyone that had been close to you." The venom in Jared's words would've startled him, but Jared had spoken much the same when they had last seen each other. Owen wasn't sure why but the accusation didn't bother him anymore.

As he had grown with the system his confidence had grown somewhat as well, there isn't a lot more terrifying that fighting monster that could kill you at any moment, as his worries of the past had been made to seem, so much less important. He understood now that he had been a coward and it was partially his fault for letting his old coworkers walk all over him. But things had changed, he had found his calling or at least a rough goal and Jared wasn't going to be able to stop him.

Owen sighed at the words Jared practically spat at him. "Sure, I could've joined your team, but even doing that wouldn't have guaranteed anyone would've stayed alive, in fact, I think the only reason I survived was that I was by myself in the beginning. Which is much more dangerous than traveling in a group. I'm sorry, but your failures aren't going to have any effect on me anymore." Owen said as he started running towards Peggy again. He saw a flash of movement and immediately jumped back.

A sickly looking dagger had been thrust towards his heart as he went to run away and Jared stood holding it with clear insanity in his eyes. Owen was now on guard as Jared still stared at him, Owen tried to move past again, but Jared moved into his path holding another of the same dagger. "What is this Jared, are you trying to kill me or talk to me?" Owen asked genuinely confused. He was getting nervous as Jared seemed ready to kill him if he tried to run, but he otherwise wasn't moving. "You ruined my life," Jared spat again and Owen felt more presences show up nearby. A quick glance around, let him clock more than three other people standing a distance away, trying to block any possible escape.

"You took everything and so I will take everything of yours." From out of nowhere, Jared pulled a human body out and threw it to the ground at Owen's feet. Owen felt a cold sweat on his back as he slowly, while keeping an eye of Jared, turned the body over. His father's face stared blankly up at the sky, with gouges torn across his chest, legs and arms. There were several locations of the body where it looked like he had gotten stabbed, that had turned a dark black coloration and Owen felt like he was going to throw up. Using keen eye, he felt some relief, but not a lot.

*Connor Cain - Level 6*

So, he wasn't dead yet, but he was on some line between life and death as his father's body showed no signs of breathing. "What the hell did I ever do to you, you need to fix this!" Owen howled as he prepared to attack, but didn't move yet. "You don't know what you did to me? We started working at the same company at the same time with the same qualifications and yet the management had liked you more and promoted you first. Everyone seemed to like you and think you were the best despite you never having done anything for them, while I slaved away trying to get in their good graces."

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"Then the woman I liked at our job, liked you more and turned down my advances, leaving me to try and trick her for months. Everything you are and have done has been against me and you act like none of it matters. Everything I wanted out of life, you took from me before I could have even had the chance of taking it for myself. You wondered why I hated you, it was simple, you were everything I wanted to be and yet you acted miserably." As Jared screamed out at Owen a red aura started to gather as he explained more and more why he hated Owen. Owen himself was concerned, but still more angry than anything else. Jared had wanted to be him? Owen hated his life, because he wasn't where he wanted to be and he certainly hadn't stood out in any way at his work.

He could tell something wasn't right with Jared's mental state, as more and more things were shouted that had just never happened. The only thing that did and that mattered, was Jared having attacked his dad, that couldn't be forgiven easily. Owen decided enough was enough and charged at Jared. He used keen eye during the charge and was almost shocked enough to stop his attack.

*Herald of Envy - Level 30*

Owen had originally began charging with fists, but as he saw the level, he pulled out his spear in preparation. Jared's words had become unintelligible as it turned to mostly screams and in faster than the blink of an eye, he disappeared, reappearing directly in front of Owen stabbing forward with both daggers. Barely having the chance to dodge, Owen managed to weave out of the way and swung the broadside of his sword at full speed towards his opponents chest. Owen could sense the others slowly moving in closer and made distance as his sword crashed against Jared's chest.

Using keen eye of the others surrounding him, he was even more surprised as he recognized their energy, but they looked entirely different. Each of them were hairless, with large scarring across their face, leaving their eyes a ghostly white, without the pupils. Black veins were straining as if trying to break out of their skin and Owen paled at the skills identification.

*Scion of Envy Level 20*

Thankfully out of the three, that one was the highest, but both Sara and Kyle had somehow been transformed into these weird zombie creatures, despite having seen them lying dead in the tutorial. Briar suddenly reformed, looking like holes had been poked in them from all over, and pushed Owen aside as a red flash of energy stabbed where he had just been. Jared was looking more and more like the scions as his body seemed to flake away from the energy. Leaving his hair to fall out and his veins to bulge with a black blood.

Owen and then began to dance as attack after attack was thrown and Owen slowly broke apart Jared's defenses. He wasn't trying to kill him if possible, that would not be something he was comfortable with despite the attack he had done on Owen's dad. He wanted to try and cure Jared of whatever was going on to see if it was possible to cure his dad as well. But the goal of trying to beat the sense into Jared didn't seem to work a after a minute of them dueling, he had completely changed into the form of one of these scion enemies. The red energy began to fade and sections of flesh and energy began tearing themselves out of Jared, before turning to ash.

Barely still able to move, Jared still tried attack Owen who was more puzzled than anything else. The scions had never attacked or interrupted the fight and the attacks had no strategy or anything behind them. He was still worried for his dad, but now he was getting worried for Jared as his body was falling apart. Eventually the body stopped moving and Owen got a kill notification, but something seemed wrong about he whole encounter. He felt and intense energy burn behind him and he barely managed to dodge in time as his own father was now surrounded by the same energy Jared had.

*Herald of Envy Level 6*

Owen felt tears running down his face as his father's body began shouting at him. Red energy tore apart his body at an even faster rate than it had Jared's. The attacks weren't fast enough to threaten Owen at all as he grabbed his dad and cried as it slowly got burned up by the red energy. He felt the same energy appear on one of the scions and this time, without hesitation, he launched himself forward and slashed them each into several pieces. He felt like an energy had appeared inside his body as he thought of Jared and this weird envy character. He then thought of his friends as he felt like he rage began to pool over.

He had thought they were friends, but they were leeching off of him and when he had needed them, they were nowhere to be found. He would show them the same mercy he had shown the scions. He could sense Briar trying to stop him, but a swipe of his sword cause Briar to dodge back and reappear on Owen's wrist. He wouldn't let Briar turn away from him as well. It was time for him to serve out justice.

The ground cracked to his every step as he was left to his thoughts on the march towards the first traitor. He realized more and more slights had slipped past his mind, while he had been around the traitors and it was unforgivable. They would know his wrath and then he would teach them death.

He felt himself get a system notification, but it wasn't important to him right now. Eventually a woman appeared in front of him and simply pointed at him. Owen didn't recognize the woman, but she dared step in his path? Who was she to think she could step in his path and prevent his wrath from pulling down the world around her and crushing her into paste. Then everything went black.

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Aesona was angry. It was a controlled anger, nothing like her inheritor was being forced to experience. The seven sins had used the opportunity of someone her inheritor had known take create an opening and try to steal her inheritance from the boy in the moments of his death. He had already been close to death as well. The wrath he had been feeling had burned through his mana and vitality, before being fueled by his lifeforce. She had thought he would be strong enough to fight it's effects, until she realized that Wrath themself had appeared and tried to force it's own inheritance to take root inside of the poor boy.

She had blasted Wrath out from the boy and brought him to her realm temporarily. She was forced to leave the sin alive as he actions in mortal worlds were limited, but she had never seen such a bold move to steal an inheritance for the mere chance at godhood. Waving a hand, she refilled the boy's resources and watched him woke up in less than a moment. He looked confused for several seconds as his new surrounding were nothing like when she had knocked him unconscious, but before much time had passed his eyes met hers and she smiled.

"So, you are my new inheritor, don't tell me this means that boy Xerxes is dead."