The Goatman was most certainly not a man in a fursuit. The setting sun and burning buildings obscured my sight by quite a lot, but I could tell blood and terror from an act. The Goatman began to chop away at the crowd. The single creature was killing dozens of people by the minute. Whatever the hell was going on was destroying everything in sight. I started to look for a way out. The Police Station was still a little under a mile down the packed roadway. Not only would I have to get past the Goatman, I’d have to get past whatever else waited between here and there. On top of that, what would I do when I got there? What would Reynold do? The answer was clear. Get away from the crowd.

I darted into an alleyway, leaving those less fortunate than me to be packed like cattle in a slaughterhouse for the executioner. I navigated a thin alley, and then another. As I passed one specific turn, I heard a call for help. I looked into the alley, seeing a woman face down in the ground. Her hand was out stretched and her face was raised as she called for help. On either side of her, 2 small winged creatures were kneeling down and biting at her sides.

Pacific Coast Vampire - Level 100 (Stats capped at Level 20)

The creatures certainly didn’t look like any vampires I had heard of. The resembled black gargoyles if the stone was replaced with black leathery skin. One of them sat up from its meal and looked at me. A face with no eyes stared a hole through my entire body. I backed up a step, my feet crunching on the alleyway gravel and causing the creature to rise. It started to give off a series of clicking noises. As it did, I saw black shapes that had previously gone unnoticed begin to move along the sides of the buildings. These 4-5 foot tall monsters flew down from the buildings and landed just a few feet around me.

I held my breath, waiting for it to come. They didn’t bite. I stared at them as they clicked furiously at each other. Whatever they were saying to each other wasn’t good. It was strange how they seemed to be both looking at me and not looking at me at the same time. With their eyeless faces close up to me, a thought crossed my mind. They were blind. Were they using echolocation? Hell, if these creatures were blind…wouldn’t they be able to hear my heartbeat or something?

I froze without moving. Suddenly, a pair of humans dashed into the alleyway, obviously running from something. They came across me and surrounding vampires, seemingly unaware that anything was off. One of them gave off a shout. “Hey! Are you guys okay?!” That was a mistake.

In a quick dash, the vampires glided towards their new prey, landing on the man in an instant. The other one tried to run, crunching gravel as he did so. More of the bat-like monsters descended from the high rise apartment buildings, feeding on him as well. I took the opportunity to make my own escape, being very careful where I stepped.

I made it out of the alleyway, stepping on to the new large street. It almost looked like a carbon copy of the last main street. San Diego was starting to look like someone had stepped on an ant hill and every person began running out of their small apartment rooms into the open.

I found a small corner store gas station just a short sprint away. The scariest thing was that you couldn’t see 90% of what was going on. Smoke filled the air and hordes of people and stalled cars blocked any decent sight lines. If I wanted to make it through this, I had to get somewhere safe. I had to get somewhere where I could bunker down for however long it took for this chaos to get a manageable level.

The only problem was that this area, in an undetermined amount of time, would get 5x as difficult. That’s what the box said right? Fuck. What do I do?

I found myself standing on the sidewalk looking like an idiot. I could go to a gas station here, bunker down, and die later. I could stay here and cry, and die now. Or, I could run south to get the hell out of this zone and die then. I counted the options on shaking fingers to try to steady my racing thoughts. “Why do all these options end in death?”

As I ran through my brain for a fourth option, an earth shattering roar was heard overhead. It was so loud than many people just fell down. Dozens of windows in the large buildings shattered and broken glass rained down on the people. I wasn’t sure what magnitude of earthquake just happened, but at least the buildings were still standing. I, like everyone around me, looked into the sky. The massive flying creature above us began to cast a shadow, blocking out the already nearly gone sun.

The creature looked like a flying whale. The green, algea and grime covered underbody, met a black skin color about halfway up the creatures sides. It had no wings, making the whole flying thing a bit impossible. The creature looked like something out of a japanese monster movie. Someone had taken a humpback whale, blown it up to the size of a large football stadium, and sent it flying around San Diego.

Bal’vin - Level 130 Colossal

Was colossal the species? That seemed like a pretty generalized name. I watched the whale as it sailed through the sky, moving across San Diego and towards the ocean. Some form of black glitter seemed to fall from the body, shining oddly in the setting sun and flames of the city. When a nearby man let out a scream, I realized it wasn’t glitter.

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Urchin Bombardier - Level 60 (Stats Capped at Level 12)

The black sea urchins that descended from the body of Bal’vin were the circumference of a basketball. Many of them landed directly onto the people in the crowd, not out of any particular aiming, but just the sheer density of human bodies in the street. Those that were unfortunate enough to get hit by one of the falling basketballs were immediately killed or immediately wished they had been. The Urchins that landed on the street began to shoot black spikes from their bodies into nearby people.

I saw one landing near me and made a quick reaction. I grabbed a nearby trash can lid. The creature hit the ground with a thud. A sick cracking sound from the Urchin’s spines breaking from the impact filled the air and joined the hundreds of similar sounds. The creature fired at me and I raised my make-shift shield. The spine immediately went halfway through the metal. “Fuck.”

I tossed the useless hunk of metal at the creature and ran. I had to get out of the danger zone. The one thing the stalling in the middle of the sidewalk helped me realize was that there was not anywhere safe in the city. I had to get out of here. From what I could see, no cars were working. There wasn’t anyway out of here in traditional means. I’d have to go…well…I suppose the oldest traditional mean. I’d have to walk.

I darted down the street, avoiding people and urchins and whatever else was out there that I hadn’t had the pleasure of meeting yet. I made it to a street running North/South and gladly took the latter option. Chula Vista would be a bit easier than this mess. I was silently jealous of my parents who were still cooped up in small-town Oregon. They’d probably be fine.

As I bolted down the street, a trio of Goatmen stood in front of me. A circle of dead bodies and dismembered limbs were strewn about around the creatures. Each of the Goatmen made direct eye contact with me. My eyes went wide. I tried to turn around, only seeing the flying silhouettes of the vampires. I was cornered. If I couldn’t go North/South…I’d have to go into a building. I bolted into one of the high rise office buildings on my right. The Goatmen followed me, albeit rather slowly, and the vampires from behind me seemed to fly towards the building as well.

I moved my way up the stairwell, seeing floors of empty stairwells and cubicles. That was odd considering that most office workers would still have been at work when this all happened. I made it up to the fifth floor and decided to take a breath when I heard the sound of something following me from down below. “Fuck.”

I kept moving up, floor by floor. As I made it to the 8th floor, I saw a ‘Break in Case of Emergency’ case that contained an axe. Isn’t that odd? Humans are weird like that. Deadly weapons were in the weirdest places. I smiled at the convenience and wrapped my jacket around my hand to punch and broke the glass, a noise that was accompanied by a creature’s scream from down below.

I drew the axe and looked at it. “Prehistoric Axe (1C)”. What the hell did that mean? I ignored my questions and moved up. The building was 18 stories, and I damn sure couldn’t go back down.

I made my way up to the top, wheezing and entirely out of breath. I fucking hated stairs. I made a silent prayer that, if all this went away, I’d never complain about the stairs in my apartment again.

Even at the top, I heard the sounds of creatures moving up the stairs from below. I took a deep breath and opened the door to the top of the building. I shut it behind me, realizing there wasn’t any lock. Anything that came up would easily just walk out onto the same rooftop as me. My assumptions were proved right.

I stared at the door, axe in hand. I watched as the door was pushed open and a large Level 115 Goatman stood in front of me. His axe was bigger and most definitely built to kill.

The creature moved forwards at me with a roar. I took a step back, my feet on the edge of the rooftop, looking at the now nighttime sky. The streets below me were covered in fire. Even the moon seemed to be aflame with the orange glow from the city. I looked back at my attacker. I had one chance at this. One hit from that axe would kill me. I had to make this count.

“Hey! Goatbitch! Come get me!” I taunted the creature. I wondered if it could understand me. The huff of air out of its nose told me it probably could. “Come on. You scared? You scared of me?”

The creature roared and dashed forward, his axe overhead. I waited. I waited. I imagined the war movies with the grizzled vet ordering the trigger happy private to hold. The creature got within a foot from me. I rolled left.

The creature swung down with its axe and found no body underneath its blade. It only found empty air. The creature lost its balance and descended down to the streets below.

I laid on my back and breathed a sigh of relief. I watched the stars in the sky. Without the lights from the city, the areas where the smoke was not obscuring the view were full of brighter stars than I had seen since I had moved here. It was beautiful. My view was quickly blocked by another of those blue texts.

Congratulations! You have killed a creature (22) levels higher than yourself! You have gained +440% experience!

You are now Level 5!

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Please open your Profile to select your Active Skill!

Please open your Profile to select your Passive Skill!

Please open your Profile to assign (18) available Stat Points!