~~~Lee~~~

Lee was covered in blood, and his clothes were ruined when he picked up his own brand new machete. "Fucking finally!"

"Keep it down," Jake said. "We don't know how many ticks might be left in here."

Lee closed his mouth but kept smiling. Even when he saw Saira frowning at him, or more likely, at his language.

The machete was perfect! He'd been worried after finding a few with melting handles, but the wooden grip on this one felt nice and solid. The blade was razor sharp, and he was going to make it even better.

After slogging through thousands of fucking ticks, he finally had a good weapon. Sure, they still needed to gather food, and he now wanted new clothes before they went outside again, but it was good. At least his boxers were still holding up...

Jake seemed to be the only one who shared Lee's enthusiasm as he gathered up box after box of arrows. He even had a couple of extra bows slung over his shoulder.

The others picked out weapons too, but they were all being downers complaining about being tired and hungry. Their clothes weren't even close to being destroyed either!

Lee already had his own duffel packed with extra machetes and smaller knives. Unfortunately, he had found no armor that didn't incorporate plastic in the construction. So nothing usable.

Instead of worrying about that, Lee focused on the blade in his hands. He wanted it to be something special, something better than he'd made before. That left him scouring his rune knowledge for ways to improve his previous enchants.

The two runes he'd used before weren't a bad choice. Making it tough and sharp pretty much covered the basics of any bladed weapon. But he wanted more. The problem was, what exactly?

He could make the weapon weigh less, but it wasn't all that heavy now, and he was pretty sure weapons needed some heft. Besides, he would be stronger soon enough.

Lee couldn't stop smiling when he thought of the cores stashed in his one intact pocket. It wasn't a lot; he'd absorbed most of his acquisitions already. But not all of them.

Jake had told them about the process of getting to F-grade, including how long it took and the fact that it would leave them helpless for the duration. Keeping that in mind, they had all held back a few points from whichever attribute was least important to them.

They could take turns ranking up, and with Jake here, it should be fine, but no one wanted to do that except Lee. Sure, they'd been out here for hours now, but it was like they didn't understand just how vulnerable they all were. Like they had forgotten the giant hawk...

He was tempted to ask Mar if she could make him invisible while he ranked up and then offer to watch over her in exchange. Or he could ask Jake... maybe as a trade for enchanting some arrows. Though he already owed the guy for his help so far...

Jake's fighting prowess should have sent every one of them clamoring to rank up. The man could have killed everything here by himself, yet they all wanted to wait till they got home. As if anywhere was actually safe... though, his enchanted apartment would be slightly safer. Why Jake even bothered with them, Lee wasn't sure.

He finally decided on the runes for his blade. One to make it tough, one for sharpness, with a third tacked on that should let him adjust the area of sharpening past the actual blade. Then one final rune to add the extra mana he would need to maintain the effect he wanted.

A battery rune hadn't occurred to him until he realized he would need it, and then the rune knowledge had supplied the requisite symbol. He needed extra power because he was tired of the metal getting stuck on something, even though it should cut right through.

With the new rune, he could project the sharpness out past the actual blade. Doing so would drain power, which was why he needed extra, but also why he needed a way to turn it on and off. Otherwise, it wouldn't last long without constant recharging, and it would be impossible to put away even in an enchanted sheath.

He was halfway through the third rune when the floor shook underneath his feet. Lee heard Jake yelling something, but he couldn't stop or look away from what he was doing. A nearby explosion vibrated against his eardrums...

Then, an eternity later, he finished the rune and looked up.

Not again...

The massive shape barreled down on him, coming on like a freight train to his frozen deer on the tracks. An exploding arrow lit up the monster for an instant and revealed it to be a tick. A tick to rival all the rest. The bloated abdomen was easily over twenty feet tall, while the horrifying mouth of barbs and hooks plunged in like a spear toward him, not redirected even slightly by the explosion.

Lee's shield sat on the floor beside him. He'd set it down to enchant the machete. It wasn't far, only a foot away from his reaching hand. A foot that might as well be a mile for all the good it would do him.

At least he wouldn't get swallowed this time—the tick didn't really have a mouth. Though getting impaled by the monstrosity coming his way would probably still kill him, but at least it would be fast...

He had one last desperate option... a terrible one that he feared might have the same end result of killing him.

Only, it wouldn't be just him that died... Sorry, Stanley, he thought, hand... reaching... up...

This narrative has been purloined without the author's approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.

~~~Jake~~~

Jake had joined this small group, mostly out of curiosity, but also to see what other people might be capable of. It was rather disappointing to find out that he was the only F-grade among them.

It was odd, too, because Lee had been hunting the night before, and Jake knew he'd picked up more than enough cores from the frogs. Maybe he'd shared them? It was possible, but unlikely. Lee was hiding something, that was for sure. What exactly he was hiding, Jake was still trying to figure out.

He knew there were some others at the complex that had reached F-grade. Some had gone hunting, but he'd seen a few scrounging the cores left behind by Alejandro... That was a dirty move, but if the man hadn't protested, then it wasn't Jake's place to make it an issue. Personally, he would have killed them. Or at least threatened to do so.

Despite their weakness, it was a solid team. They had a healer with Saira. Mar could be a good scout, though she needed some practice. Sandy was solid, and she would be devastating once she ranked up. Larry was... better than nothing. Probably. He was a bit too cocky for his actual skill level.

With Alejandro, they had a great tank, one that wasn't afraid of taking a hit, and Jake was looking forward to him ranking up as well.

Lee was the odd one. He wasn't a fighter. Clearly evident by his complete lack of skill with his weapon. But that was also where the oddity started, with his so-called enchants.

First off, the guy used way too much mana for each one.

Jake had been sensitive to mana since this started, and no one used anything close to that.

Secondly, he didn't think enchanting was supposed to be that strong. A damn dull ass piece of fence post had cut him like it was nothing. The knife Lee enchanted for him had so far cut everything he put it up against, and it wasn't getting dull. The van door should have buckled from the hawk's attack, but it hadn't even gotten scratched.

While it could be just the excessive mana pulling its weight, Jake suspected there was something else. He could feel it every time the man enchanted something, and then to a lesser degree when the hawk hit the shield and that symbol flared. It was a weird feeling that somehow felt... wrong. That was the best he could make of it for now. But he would figure it out, eventually.

Lastly, was the broken regeneration. It was strong enough that Lee acted as his own tank most of the time. It was a good thing he had that because the guy was so bad at fighting that he'd be dead if not for his regeneration. Jake had to give him props, though. He kept coming back for more abuse, despite the obvious pain.

The man was driven, that was for sure, and after his little outburst earlier, Jake was even more curious.

He was keeping his ears open as he collected the spoils of this trip, and cursed silently when he felt the surge of mana from the so-called enchanter. A stupidly ridiculous amount of mana. He should have told him not to enchant anything... Jake was fairly sure Lee making the shields had been what drew the hawk down on them earlier.

It was surprising that making the lights outside hadn't drawn something in, and that had been a trickle to what he was feeling now... Given that, it wasn't so shocking when he wasn't the only one to notice. Only it wasn't one of the group who did so, but a monster.

He both heard and saw it coming. "Lee, stop that!" he yelled, even as he funneled mana into an arrow. Lee ignored him. And then it was too late.

The monster charged past Jake, despite his own mana building for an attack, intent on Lee.

He fired the arrow... and it had almost no effect.

Jake could see that he'd done some damage, but the monster was just too big and its momentum carried it unerringly toward Lee.

The guy was toast. Sure, he had some crazy regeneration, but Jake doubted it would be enough when his entire torso was gone. Though, he was curious to see if it might be...

Alejandro came through in the clutch, blurring into the space in front of Lee an instant before the collision. He took the hit meant for the other man on his enchanted van door. A hit Jake doubted he himself would survive. But once again, the strange symbol lit up like a shining beacon and the door completely failed to break.

He didn't stop the charge—that would have been something else entirely. Still, they both avoided death for the moment. The impact sent Alejandro crashing into Lee, and they both flew back, crashing through a couple of shelves before slamming to a stop against the wall.

Jake fired his next arrow, this one pumped with as much mana as it could take without crumbling on the string. He wasn't sure if ticks had eyes or where they were and couldn't see anything that stood out, so he aimed for a leg joint.

That worked much better than shooting its face, and the lower leg actually blasted free from the body. The tick had ignored his previous attack, but the last one definitely got its attention.

It turned on him far faster than its bulk should have allowed.

One leg swiped at him, and Jake hopped over it as another arrow started glowing on the string. He ducked another swinging leg and hoped back to avoid the stomping follow-up.

Then his arrow was charged enough and Jake shot for another leg joint.

Jake knew the tick was at least F-grade, but felt like it was stronger somehow. Especially when it dodged his arrow.

Luckily, he wasn't shooting toward the others, and it exploded harmlessly among the shelves. Jake was already charging another as he back-flipped away from its jaws, then had to fire early to deflect a leg that came after him in midair.

In the distance, he saw Alejandro back on his feet and digging Lee out of the wreckage. His view vanished behind the bulky monster as it relentlessly pursued him, and Jake smiled.

He was still smiling when he took a glancing blow in exchange for blasting another leg from the tick. The hit sent him tumbling through the air, but he landed in an aisle and rolled across the floor before turning his tumble into a running sprint.

The bug chased on.

It felt odd that the only sounds it made were its feet and body destroying whatever merchandise it rolled over. No screaming when he shot it, and nothing that sounded like anger when he wounded it. Though it sure seemed pissed with the way it came after him.

His next arrow was deflected by its horrifying jaws and it detonated against the creature's bulbous abdomen. The damage wasn't as much as he would have liked, but enough got through to leave a small hole.

What came out of that hole was much worse. Eggs.

The eggs were the size of golf balls, slimy, and clear enough that he could see something squirming inside. There were also hundreds of them. Though he revised that estimate in the thousands after they just kept spilling out. It was possible that they were too young and wouldn't survive outside the mother, but Jake knew better than to bet on it.

He narrowly dodged another leg strike, then jumped off the spiky mouth to throw himself away. The long hang time before he came back down let him put two more arrows into the bug. He didn't have time to pack much mana into the arrows, but together they removed another leg.

Jake was still smiling when Alejandro caught up, and he yelled over the racket of the store's destruction. "This one's mine. You can have the eggs."

This was a real fight. Not like picking off frogs the night before, or killing the baby ticks. This was a life or death battle against a dangerous opponent that was doing its damnedest to kill him. He loved it... and he couldn't wait to fight that giant hawk when he saw it again.