I thought about Kristi's offer, and why she was being so generous.

As nice as it sounded, I definitely didn't want to be financially indebted to the Strand family. This was exactly how the prad corpo families got people on perpetual contracts, tempted delvers with nice weapons and armor and then outright owned someone contractually, and legally put a gold collar on them.

I thought about my awful day and my options.

Adler and Donutz's words echoed in my mind—something about their mark funneling liquid mana to me?

I mentally pulled up my stats, expecting to see the same pathetic numbers as always, not really trusting in the words of the bikers.

| Name: Alec Benoit Foster

| Species: Human | Level: 3 | Core Affinity: Reconstitution | Health: 71/100% | Reconstitution: 1/100% | Depictomancy: 24/100% | Syntropic Fusion: 32/100%

WHAT?!

I stared at the numbers in shock. My Reconstitution had gone up 1%. Depictomancy had jumped from 4% to 24%! Syntropic Fusion had nearly doubled!

Holy shit.

Donutz's binding loop was actually working—it was funneling mana to me from their higher level pack, making my skills reload faster than they ever had in my entire life. In one day, I'd gained more skill percentage than I usually did in months.

The realization hit me like a sledgehammer. As much as I hated to admit it, the bikers' claim mark was helping me. For the first time in my life, my skills were actually reloading!

One percent Reconstitution!

An anchor, a bridge to keep me from death. With one percent I could be killed and still wake up. Yes, I'd be a living corpse basically, but still it was better than the pure absolute nothingness of not being alive.

I looked back at my phone, at Kristi's offer of shop-bought armor, and typed my response:

[Alecai🌲:] No.

[✨Stellaris]: No? What do you mean no? Free armor, Alec. 🫴 For someone with no cash to their name, that's a pretty good deal.

[Alecai🌲:] I've got to go

[✨Stellaris]: WHERE

[Alecai🌲:] Highway 69

[✨Stellaris]: WHAT?! Are you completely insane?

[Alecai🌲:] I need to make another healing bracelet or two. Maybe talk to the Lynx. Maybe she can help me understand what's happening to me.

[✨Stellaris]: Nothing is happening to you except magical influence and severe emotional trauma! You're not thinking clearly! ALECCCC!!!! Talk to the lynx?! Wtf You're going to get yourself killed!!! Don't do it!

[Alecai🌲:] You're not the boss of me.

I typed and turned off my phone screen. I didn't have time for sleep. My fucked up, half-dead body could more or less function without sleep for weeks.

Time to push myself again. Time to fight.

This time, I actually had someone to fight for.

A husky girl with sky blue eyes.

I gathered my few belongings and quietly made my way out of the temple, leaving the orange robes folded neatly on the bed. Nobody bothered to stop me.

Sister Zheniya was nowhere to be seen, and the other devotees had retired for the night.

Outside, the cool night air felt like freedom after the suffocating atmosphere of predetermined destinies and severed attachments that the temple offered.

My phone was buzzing with messages but I ignored it. I got into my Pontiac and drove out of town.

The tunnel rangers let me out without issues—their job wasn't to stop people from leaving town, it was to prevent sus characters from bringing dangerous things in. Things that could threaten the safety of the Strand family.

The town setup made sense now—Ferguson was a mountain Citadel, a pocket of safety for the Strand patriarch and his many daughters.

I parked the Tempest at the edge of Highway 69, the familiar rusted warning signs casting eerie shadows in the moonlight. Above, violet stars and the shattered moon twinkled between drifting clouds.

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The grassy field stretching toward the dungeon's invisible boundary seemed to shimmer with an otherworldly luminescence.

I pulled out my phone, using its flashlight to retrace my steps from earlier. The pale beam cut through the darkness as I walked along the edge of the field, occasionally calling out to the empty air.

"Hey, Magnetic Lynx! Your vest probably has 'Trainee' misspelled on the back!" I shouted, watching for the telltale ripple in the air that would mark the dungeon's boundary.

There—a faint distortion, like heat waves rising from summer asphalt. I was close.

"I bet you applied for a position at three different stores before settling for the Superstore!" I added for good measure, and the ripple intensified slightly.

Perfect. I began my systematic search for more of the blue-tinted grass, methodically combing through the alien, magical flora that had sprouted near the dungeon's edge. It took nearly twenty minutes, but I finally found what I was looking for—another patch of the healing grass, this one larger than the first, with even more of those intensely blue flowers scattered throughout.

I gathered armfuls of the stuff, enough to make multiple bracelets. Sitting cross-legged in the moonlight, I activated my Syntropic Fusion skill again and again, taking my time to weave the grass and flowers into increasingly elaborate patterns. My skill mana bar dropped steadily—32%, 18%, 7%—but I pushed through until I had three completed healing artifacts.

[Congratulations! You have created: Basic Healing Bracelet (Poor Quality)] [Effect: Regenerates 0.7% Health per hour] [Duration: 3 hours, 42 minutes]

[Congratulations! You have created: Basic Healing Bracelet (Poor Quality)] [Effect: Regenerates 0.6% Health per hour] [Duration: 3 hours, 18 minutes]

[Congratulations! You have created: Basic Healing Necklace (Poor Quality)] [Effect: Regenerates 1.2% Health per hour] [Duration: 4 hours, 8 minutes]

I slipped the bracelets onto both wrists and the larger necklace down my head and around my neck.

Immediately, waves of soothing warmth spread through my battered body. The constant ache in my ribs began to fade, and I could actually feel my cuts and bruises starting to heal.

My health bar began to tick upward ever so slowly.

I leaned back against a nearby boulder, watching the numbers climb and finally allowing myself to relax. The healing artifacts were working better than I'd dared hope, and with the bikers' mark funneling mana to my skills, I was actually becoming functional again.

73% health and rising. Not bad for a supposedly worthless level three human.

I closed my eyes, my mind drifting between being awake and asleep.

The distant rumble of motorcycle engines approaching from the north, accompanied by the telltale glow of five headlamps cutting through the darkness jolted me back from my power nap. My moment of peace shattered as the sound of five bikes grew louder.

Shit. The Skid Marks had found me.

But before I could even consider running towards my car, a thunderous boom echoed across the valley from the south, followed by the distinctive hum of an anti-grav engine. I looked up to see lights streaking across the sky—the silhouette of a pink, van-style Strand Glider approaching at high speed, its magitek engines casting an aurora of colors against the clouds.

The Glider touched down in the field about twenty feet away from me, its landing thrusters scorching the grass and blasting heat into my face as the engine wound down. The driver's side door slid open just as I stood up, my tourist-trap Highway 69 hoodie fluttering in the wind.

Raptor amber eyes blazed with fury as the girl within spotted me standing by the dungeon's edge.

"ALEC!" Kristi yelled. "THERE YOU ARE! WHAT THE FUCK DO YOU THINK YOU'RE DOING?"

Before I could answer, the motorcycle engines reached us.

Five bikes roared into the clearing. I recognized them all—Captain Adler, Donutz, TurboFluff, Bark-n-Bite, and Tequila Sunrise. But unlike this morning's drunken encounter, they were stone sober now, and each of them had drawn weapons.

Adler leveled what looked like a modified crossbow at Kristi, while Donutz had produced a sleek magical pistol that hummed with contained energy. The others spread out in a loose semicircle, cutting off potential escape routes wielding various guns.

"Well, well," Adler purred, her weapon trained on the pink flying van. "If it isn't Princess Strand, come to play knight in shining armor for my human!"

"Get lost, Silvertail," Kristi snarled, her own claws extending. "And get those weapons off me before I…!"

"You'll what?" Donutz laughed, her eyes glinting. "Call daddy? We're outside Ferguson's precious barrier, sweetheart. Your family's jurisdiction ends at those fancy obelisks."

"He doesn't belong to you!" Kristi spat. "Piss off to whatever hole you assholes inhabit in the wildlands!"

"Says the beerch who's clearly been stalking him," TurboFluff interjected. "What's your game, Strand? Planning to claim him yourself?"

"That's enough!" I shouted, stepping backward toward the dungeon's edge. Both groups turned to look at me. "All of you, just... stop. I don't belong to anyone. I'm NOT property to be fought over!"

"Alec, stop, don't move any further back!" Kristi warned urgently. "You're right at the boundary! One more step and the dungeon will—"

"—swallow you whole," Adler finished, her weapon still trained on Kristi but her attention now focused on me. "Little tater, you really don't want to go in there. Not alone, not at night, and definitely not at your level."

"I'm aware. Listen up! Here's what's going to happen," I said, my voice steadier than I felt. "You're all going to lower your weapons, get back on your respective vehicles, and leave me the fuck alone. Or I take that step backward and none of you get what you want."

Both groups stared at me in shock.

"You're bluffing," Donutz said, but there was clear rising uncertainty in her voice.

"Am I?" I shifted my weight slightly, moving closer to the boundary. "I've had a really, really bad day. I got claimed by five assholes, was smacked around by raptors, and apparently am under some kind of magical influence that's making me question my sanity. So I'm all out of fucks."

"Alec, please," Kristi said, offering me a scaled, violet hand. "Don't do this. Whatever's wrong, we can figure it out together. Just... step away from the edge!"

"Listen to the princess," Adler added, her usual swagger sprinkled with concern. "Look, if you're pissed about me smacking you too hard this morning, we can talk about it and you can smack me back. But going into Highway 69 alone? That's suicide, even with your fancy resurrection skill. Once you go in, you get separated, cut off from our world, get stuck in an infinite loop where each death drains your level. We won't be able to find you inside, won't be able to bring you back!"

I was about to respond when both groups suddenly went rigid, their faces askew with pure terror as they stared at something behind me.

The temperature dropped noticeably, and I heard the distinctive whir of electromagnetic fields powering up.

"So," she said, her voice a grinding mix of metal on metal, "you're back. Are you ready to face me this time, tree-soul?"

"N-no," I uttered, trying not to freak out. "Just getting some more healing grass from the edge of your domain, see?"

"You're starting to annoy me with your taunts," she said, a large, metal hand wrapping itself around me, rust-covered metal claws sliding across my chest. "Do you know what I do with things that annoy me, human?"

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