“You have to save them,” Emily said.

I gave Jason a look. He already had a shotgun on his shoulder, grenades in his belt, and a long sword on his hip. Jason was still fresh and ready for a fight, but his energy-enhanced steel sword wouldn’t cut Mythril.

“We aren’t at the level needed to deal with Mythril,” I said.

That had been a humbling experience. My full metal jacket rounds hadn’t done a thing.

Jason was calm and stoic in the face of this utter disaster, far better than the sobbing Emily.

“Why are they marching them across land to the Mega City? I don’t get the point.” Jason said.

That was a good question. World Gov had air superiority, so why not immediately transport them?

It was a good thing we had someone who knew World Gov and worked with them in the past.

“To flush out traitors to the new World Gov-backed Vampire Hunter Association. It’s a standard tactic. I’m sure there are honey traps on Vampire Hunter forums looking for volunteers to help save the leaders. World Gov would love to slaughter any resistance to their new puppet. Reaching out in person isn’t safe; no one knows who to trust in this situation.” Ember said.

“Should we expect an emissary to come and ensure we toe the line?” I asked.

“If you plan to attack a convoy during the day, I can’t come with you,” Ember said.

“Yeah, I also feel like sleeping in,” I said.

“So that weakness is true,” Jason said.

“I understand that the bloodsucker won’t help but you, Atom. We were friends.” Emily said.

That wasn’t really true. Emily tolerated me and put on a front because I was Jason’s brother. I saw her sneer behind my back and turn her nose up at our culture. Emily had called me a hedge mage to her friends once or twice.

Her eyes were red from crying, and only one of Jason’s t-shirts hid her modesty. She didn’t seem to understand the situation. We weren’t our Father; we couldn’t rush in there guns blazing and expect to get anywhere. Drones with Mythril chassis weren’t new. However, effective energy absorption outside a lab like this new variation wasn’t an affordable option until recently. The normal means to destroy them wasn’t available. The Ents should have pulverized their inner workings, but the drones sliced them with powerful lasers and drained the energy from the air. Those drones had nothing to fear except for wizards, grade 5 mutants, and above. Anyone below those lofty weight classes couldn’t handle it.

It wasn’t that the drones were strong; they were extremely durable and recovered energy. They were also unmanned and manufactured. Every mage or inquisitor killed wiped out a massive investment from the mage college or vampire hunters. This was an economic and military problem; it would take an economic or military solution. Cheap, ready-to-use soldiers were needed to combat this new development.

What was cheaper than Mythril drones and almost as effective as Mythril drones? A necromancer might be able to solve the problem. Animated corpses of mutants could be combined into grade 5 equivalents, but we weren’t in Louisiana. I couldn’t remember the last rumored necromancer. Mage solutions might include golems, but the energy drain was still problematic.

Enhancement used energy to improve the body to deal with various situations.

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

“How long will it take to march the Vampire Hunter leaders to Jackson Mega City?” I asked.

“This plan was in the works, but the tactical side was hidden. I would estimate 3 months; the plan was to make a reality show about it. World Gov’s entertainment department wants to milk every cent out of them. That will also give World Gov’s spies time to root out every bit of insurrection from the Vampire Hunter Association.” Ember said.

I did some calculations. There were plans in the works from old anime and a few novels to completely overhaul our training. Resistance seals and gravity rooms were more pen and paper ideas lost in childhood notebooks than plans in the works. Father beat our asses when we were kids attempting to get a half-botched seal formula to make a gravity room. Since then, we haven’t tried it.

Father never used a gravity room, but he was the kind of man who trained slowly and steadily. He didn’t have prisoners of war to rescue. Even if we managed to rescue them, what then. The drones wouldn’t go away; they have already proven themselves effective. If we managed to save the convoy, that would put us on World Gov’s radar.

On the other hand, did I need an excuse to bloody World Gov’s nose or the government? The Android worshippers needed to be taken down a peg or two.

A smile tugged at my lips, and my blood couldn’t help pumping. It would be great training to our maximum every day eating nothing meat and eggs. We had enough money in our savings to buy the ingredients we needed to push our training through.

The training wasn’t enough; we needed the right type of diet to push our gains to the next level. Crossing the PL 1000 limit wasn’t enough; we needed to get strong enough to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat.

Even then, what will we win?

I glanced at Emily crying, with Jason holding her fists clenched in the way he does when all he could do was grit and bear it. His expression was the same when the Vampire Hunters Association’s collector increased our tribute.

“Let’s say by some miracle we managed to go ourselves in 90 days, defeated the drones, and recaptured the VHA’s leadership. What happens then?” I said.

Emily hiccupped, and Jason gave me a look.

“Mythril ammunition,” Jason asked.

“No, not even the VHA managed to get enough Mythril to make a difference,” I said.

Ember chewed on her fingernail. She closed her mouth and hid her fangs away when I looked. It was cute.

“By some miracle, if you managed it. A team of Magna Meisters would hunt you down.”

“So my father is doomed,” Emily said.

“They are as strong as wizards and stronger than Grade 5 monsters alone. A team would be difficult to deal with.” I used my cube and measured Jason’s PL at 153, a bit higher than mine. He gave me a look and then sighed. “Are you suggesting we try what Father punished us for?” Jason said

“You catch on fast. We don’t have a prayer in our current states.” I said.

“We would have to focus solely on improving our power; it would set back our concealment months or even years. Not to mention the drones’ ability to drain energy. With our concealment weakened, they will bleed us.” Jason said.

That was a big problem, but I had a workaround for once. She was standing beside me. Ember’s body was a treasure trove of concealment techniques. Sensing her let me develop my own concealment quickly. Keeping our power contained while ramping it up would be a neck-and-neck battle, but we could do it. Jason will sense my techniques and naturally adapt his energy to keep up. That was how we grew up.

I let my contained aura emerge, and my skin glowed under a deep red light. Throughout our last fight, my control had tightened again. Sensing Ember’s control helped me a great deal. Jason’s eyes widened as he unleashed his own aura. The massive blue mass of Jason’s personal energy slowly changed, becoming crystalline in places before shrinking nearly to his own skin. We didn’t hide our techniques from each other because if we did, then our growth would slow.

Jason looked from Ember to me and nodded. “I will use my savings to order barrels of Rainbow Croppy. We’ll need them if we want to get every inch of gains. Where do you want to build the training room?” Jason said.

“It's already half built; the stone shed I finished last week has plenty of room and is mostly uncarved. We can put up a fence to help hide our energy. I think we need to do more than just gravity. Random temperature changes could help.” I said.

“Let's not kill ourselves or get too crazy before we see what kind of gains we can expect,” Jason said.

Emily slowly stopped sobbing and stared with hope in her eyes.

Ember rubbed at her temples but hadn’t said anything that would probably wait until later. The vampire hadn’t withdrawn her rapier and tried to kill us, so I didn’t think she was a honey pot.

“I don’t recommend calling anyone for help or revealing your plans. You never know who is a traitor.” Ember said.

My mind wasn’t on that. Most people would be useless when we actually set out. We had to gain strength and dip into energy techniques we weren’t ready for. Jumping into a whole new weight class also wouldn’t be easy. We were giving it a trial run of a week; it would be a bust if we didn’t make significant gains during that time.

Fighting Jason for hours at a time was going to be mentally exhausting. We only sparred a little between our projects and jobs on the farm. Gaining tons of power before locking down concealment was a recipe for disaster. By doing this, we could ruin our chances of mastering concealment. If that happened, then many techniques would be off the table.

All the same, Emily was my brother’s girlfriend, and if World Gov could overturn entire regimes and put in their puppets, then they would own the world soon enough. They had already killed off many of the wolves. Clearly, this was a power play.

Jason made a few orders and guided Emily to his bedroom to give her a full breakdown of our plans while I showed Ember to her room.

“I didn’t say it before, but thank you for your kindness. This journey has been stressful, and I’m happy to finally rest after so long.”

After I cleared out her room and put up a new set of blackout curtains, she turned in for the day.

I made my way to my own room and laid down. For half an hour, I stared at the picture of our family back when we were together. Our mother smiled with Father while Jason and I were too rambunctious to sit still. She left one morning pregnant, crying and speaking nonsense, and then Father went after her years later. I haven’t seen either of them since. We were five when she left and 15 when Father left. The old man restrained himself for a decade to train us right.