Nara sees the creature leap through the already shattered window onto the street and slams on the gas as Je-won dashes toward it, knife at the ready.

Before he can reach it, it leaps again, right over his head.

Nara’s car slams into Je-won’s parked behind her, then she throws it into drive, front tires spinning as she begins to take off.

She’s going to make it, he tells himself, watching the monster descend, headed right for her. She’s going to make it.

But she doesn’t. The monster somehow alters its trajectory while in midair and lands on the hood of her car just as it’s gaining speed and in the same instant slashes with all three of its arms at the windshield, exploding it inward.

The car comes to a sudden halt.

Nara is screaming.

Je-won rushes the creature as it raises its arms to strike again, no windshield to protect his sister this time. He doesn’t realize he’s screaming too.

He reaches the car, lifts the knife, and uses his strength and momentum to thrust it into the monster’s side.

It doesn’t penetrate, the oil-slick skin somehow deflecting the blade. Je-won’s momentum works against him and he crashes onto the hood behind the monster then falls to the ground, his head knocking into the asphalt and making his vision flash purple.

He hears the car being shifted into park, then a car door opening as he pushes himself up, dazed.

He sees Nara getting out. “No!”

But she doesn’t listen. She’s clutching her pizza peel, and slashes at the monster with it.

It looks ridiculous, but the result is anything but, and chills Je-won to the bone.

The monster isn’t mute, it turns out. It finally makes a sound, and both he and Nara fall to their knees, hands over their ears at the awful noise.

It does no good. The cry it lets out is not high-pitched, but like that of a building collapsing, and their hands can do nothing to prevent it from penetrating their ears and every inch of their being.

It is large, but even still, the volume of sound far outstrips something that size should be able to produce.

As suddenly as it started, it stops, and Je-won looks up to find the monster glaring at Nara.

Its three silver glinting eyes are not human, not remotely, but he still sees hate in them.

“Bastard!” comes a cry and then something hits the monster with a quiet thud and falls to the car’s hood with a louder thunk.

It turns its skull-head to appraise its attacker. Like a bird, it twists almost one-hundred and eighty degrees.

Topher stands beside the car from where he’d thrown the cleaver, and now stares in frozen horror at the monster.

“Oppa!” Nara calls and Je-won turns just in time to see a pizza peel flying at him.

He stands, catches it, and continues the motion, swinging it at the beast. Though his knife hadn’t affected it, this had hurt it, likely because of whatever Nara had done to it. He is counting on it to do so again.

It lands in the thing’s side and continues through, opening a large gash, oily smoke oozing out of the wound.

Its head snaps back in Je-won’s direction, its three boneless arms already moving for him.

But this time, he’s faster.

He cuts the arms, two with one stroke, and they fall to the ground, still squirming as the monster roars in pain. Fighting the effects of that terrible noise, feeling like his ears are going to start bleeding, like his body will burst, Je-won leaps out of the way of the third attack and spins, bringing the pizza peel down again on the creature’s final arm as it begins to raise it for another assault, severing it cleanly and carrying all the way through the front quarter panel of Nara’s car and down into the asphalt where it narrowly avoids slicing his foot off.

He yanks it free with ease, jumps onto the hood, nearly slips off, then brings the peel down with all his might on the giant monster’s head just as it tries to face him.

It parts like he’s separating dough, goes all the way through its skull-head, into its torso, silencing its rumbling wail, and out its genital-less groin.

Two halves of the monster fall to the ground as the swing’s momentum takes Je-won from his feet.

He slams into the hood, then topples off, landing in one half of the monster’s corpse.

It padded his fall, at least.

Everything is silent, save for his labored breath and the idling cars.

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The sky above is bright and blue, and does not seem to fit the scene.

Nara leans in, obstructing his view. “Wow,” is all she says.

A new message appears floating in front of his face.

Congratulations, you have been awarded a new title: ﴾The First Slayer﴿

[https://i.imgur.com/4PDj1c4.png]

Je-won gets to his feet, looks over at the monster’s corpse, down at the pizza peel, then up at his sister. “You joined the system, then?”

“I had to help.”

“And you did. My knife did nothing. This did.”

She smiles and moves to hug him, but cries out as she stumbles.

“Your leg,” he says, dropping the peel and rushing to catch her.

“I’m okay. It’s not broken or anything. Just strained. You weigh a lot more than you look.”

“I’m sorry. I should have been more careful.”

“You were protecting me.” She looks up at him, and in her expression he sees the little girl she once was, looking up to her big brother, back before she thought it was her job to keep him safe. “Thanks, Oppa-san.”

He smiles. When she was little this is what she would call him, partly because she watched anime and would get Korean and Japanese confused, but mainly to annoy their mother.

He glances at Topher. “You okay?”

Topher isn’t watching them, but standing by the monster’s split corpse, staring down at it.

“Hey, Toph,” he calls when the boy doesn’t respond.

Topher looks up. “What?”

“Are you hurt?”

Topher looks down at himself, at the numerous cuts covering his arms and legs, the dried rivulets of blood streaking his skin, then back up at Je-won. “No.”

Je-won chuckles. “Well, we should get you home. I imagine your mom is worried and will want to get you to a doctor.”

A buzz comes from Je-won’s pocket.

“Jason,” Nara says, eyes wide. “We have to pick him up.”

Je-won nods, pulling out his phone. The screen is cracked. “It’s Aunt Ji-yeon,” he says, then puts it to his ear. “Hey—” he begins, but is cut off.

“The school was attacked! I have to go get Jason.”

“No! We’re almost there,” he lies. “We’ve got him. You stay there.”

“But—”

“Listen to me,” he says firmly. “Do not leave. Do you understand? We saw one of them. It’s not safe. We will get him. We’ll be home in a few minutes.”

“Have him call me when you pick him up. He’s not answering. His phone must be dead again.”

“Yes, he’s always playing games on it,” Je-won says, but feels fear form in the pit of his stomach. He looks at the corpse of the monster. What would something like that do to a school? The school’s police officer, Cal Winston, is a good man, but the most he’s ever had to deal with were rowdy teenagers. “I have to go. Jason will call you soon, then we’ll be home.”

“Be safe.”

“I will. Love you.” He hangs up.

“I’ll get him,” Nara says.

“No. You get Topher home.”

“But—”

“Nara, please.”

She shakes her head. “I am not bringing him home. His mother hates me. And Ben might be there. I’ll get Jason, you take Toph home and then check on Mom and Grandma.”

“I can walk,” Topher offers timidly.

“No!” they both yell at him simultaneously.

“The school is going to have cops and a bunch of people,” Nara says. “I’ll be fine.”

Je-won sighs and rubs his forehead. “Fine. I’ll take him. But straight to school and straight home.”

“Ne, Appa.”

“Are you sure you’re okay?”

“I’m fine. Stop worrying about me so much.”

“Not possible.” He quickly hugs her, then motions to his car at Topher. “Come on, I’ll get you home.” He resists telling Nara again to be careful. “See you soon,” he says instead.

“Aren’t you going to loot it?” Topher asks, now kneeling beside the monster. “I tried, but I guess throwing the cleaver didn’t count, so it’s not letting me. Hey, maybe you can invite me to your party! I bet it has something like that.”

“You joined?” Je-won asks.

The boy’s eyes flick toward Nara, then quickly dart away.

“You didn’t,” Je-won says to her.

“I didn’t, actually.”

“I wanted to help,” Topher explains. “I saw her join. She was fine.”

Je-won shakes his head. Topher is a smart kid, but he is still a kid. And they tend to think they’re immortal. “We don’t have time to loot it. Get in the car.”

“You just need to touch it.”

Je-won begins to protest, but Nara kneels down, winces, then reaches out and touches the corpse. Her face scrunches up. “It feels like snot.”

“Cool,” Topher says. “Did it work? What’d you get?”

“Something called an imprint. It—”

Reality itself seems to twist up in impossible patterns and the corpse becomes mist and then nothing at all.

Nara stands and stumbles back, Je-won steadying her.

They all stare at where the corpse had been.

Je-won is the first to recover. “Okay,” he says, gently pushing Nara toward the driver’s door. “Go now.”

“I’m going, I’m going.”

Topher gets in Je-won’s car while Je-won waits to make sure Nara’s car can drive.

She waves at him then rolls her eyes.

He gets in his own vehicle. “Ready to go home?” he asks as he makes a three-point turn and heads in the opposite direction.

Topher shrugs. “I guess. But this was fun. We should do it again.”

Topher’s house is only a few minutes away, and Je-won doesn’t get out. He waits until Topher is safely inside, then texts Nara. Get him?

His phone buzzes just as he’s pulling away.

Yep. All safe. Heading home now. See you there.

Je-won lets out a sigh of relief, and speeds off toward home.

[https://i.imgur.com/4PDj1c4.png]

“Then after going home and making sure everyone was okay, then getting that second message saying the next attack wouldn’t come without warning,” Je-won finished, “I came back here to clean up.”

“Seems risky,” Zoe said. “Can you really trust what it says?”

Je-won glanced at Dexter. “That’s not the only reason I came back.”

Dexter averted his gaze. “Thanks,” he said quietly, forcing the tears not to come. Je-won was too young to be his father, but he was like a parental older brother, and though Dexter was uncomfortable expressing it, he appreciated the man looking out for him. Je-won had helped him get through some tough times.

“When did you have time to bake pizza?” Zoe asked, looking at the nearly empty pizza box. She and Dexter had gone through it while they listened to Je-won’s tale.

“It was in the warmer. Forgot to turn it off. Somehow it didn’t get broken in the attack.”

“Well I’m glad you’re all okay,” Zoe said. “But I can’t believe you fought a monster.”

But Dexter could. He knew something about Je-won’s past few others in the town did. He hadn’t always been a restaurateur.

Je-won chuckled. “I didn’t have much choice. And Nara helped. Without her ability…” He trailed off, a slight frown on his face.

“It’s odd though,” Zoe said. “Why would it attack the pizzeria?”

“I don't know. There wasn’t any pattern to the attacks. None that I could discern. But we don’t have all the data. If there is a pattern, I’m sure it will emerge soon enough.” He turned to Dexter. “I’ve had some time to explore the system. I think it’s our best chance at fighting these things off. Nara’s ability proved that much. I wouldn’t ask you to join, but you already have. And I know…” he trailed off, his eyes flicking quickly in Zoe’s direction. “I know it’s something you might be interested in. So, what do you say, little brother? Want to fight monsters with me?”