With the effects of particle suppression in place, to say we made light work of all the tightly packed together Undead would be an absolute understatement…it was a slaughter fest.
Partway through the battle, Dad ended up stepping back into the safezone to catch his breath and recover now that I had arrived, which wasn’t that surprising, considering I quickly learned that I had been missing for three days. During that time, Brenden and our Father had been fighting practically non-stop.
From what I gather, the implosion turned explosion not only eviscerated all the nearby Undead, but it also launched anything caught by the blast of air I had been caught in and moved them as a herd, all in whatever direction the wind carried until they were so tightly clustered together that they well…became stuck.
From there, it was easy pickings, as without the presence of particles, even Duke-Grade Undead were like chickens to Brenden with his maxed-out stats.
So when my Father’s progress maxed out for the final time, he and my brother retreated to the Safezone, where my Dad, under Brenden’s guidance, rose to 6C without difficulty, and from there, it became a power leveling game, with my Dad burning the XP Booster I had given him.
As the final Undead fell to my claws, I noticed my Father stepping out of the barrier with a cheeky smile plastered across his face.
"You made it to Alpha-Rank, I see... It seems I wasn’t really needed here then; I hope you were smarter than Brenden with your stats and whatnot. Wish you had waited so that I could have given you a ticket for a sufficient Circulation Skill before ranking up, too." Swiping my claws through the air, I cleaned off the blood on them before storing my weapons away and meeting my Dad and Brother.
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"Bah, no need to waste good items. Your brother and I amassed quite a few Beta and even Gamma Coins, so purchasing a Skill wasn’t an issue; the one I got even scales, so I was able to max out my stats at Non-Rank before moving to Alpha." My Father said as he checked me from top to bottom for any injuries, and once he saw none, he nodded.
"So, where were you? It’s been three days, and you only now showed up?" Brenden asked with a harumph.
"Mm, mild inconvenience, hit a wall going over 200 mph, had to chug down a Beta Elixir, just a regular day in my life." With a shrug, I pulled out a Beta-Grade elixir for each of them and handed it over.
During the short time Dad was fighting, I noticed his Talent, which was very similar to Brenden’s, happened to be stronger than I remember it being in Alpha, so I assumed that Brenden had given him the Alpha-Grade Elixir.
"Been holding out on me, I see; how many of these things do you have?" chirping happily like a newborn chick, Brenden popped the vial and downed the Elixir in one gulp before squirming about in glee.
"I got five from finishing the Second Quest, so two more left, one for Emilia and one for whoever I please." Rolling my eyes at my brother’s antics, I held out my hand and stopped Dad from drinking his.
"Wait until you hit Beta, or else it could be dangerous," I said, earning me a nod before I inquired about his level.
"Thanks to that booster you gave me, I only need two more levels, and then I’m good to Rank up, but I assume you don’t want me to…"
"Correct, you need to get the most out of your Circulation skill; that way, even under particle suppression, so long as you steadily consume the Alpha-Grade particle water I have in abundance, you can stay at the Peak of Alpha when back on Earth."
"Makes sense that way; even if we end up in a brawl, I will have the edge with my stats." Unlike Brenden, who was slow on the uptake, my Father was sharp and immediately understood my reasoning.
Turning around, I examined the tunnel and noticed that I was the sole person disabling his opponents; in the case of Dad, it was pretty much expected for him to kill off the Undead, but Brenden was another story altogether.
And when he noticed me glaring at him, my little brother shrunk back like a frightened turtle.
He knew EXACTLY what I was about to complain about.
"Listen, it was kill or be killed; ok, I had no other choice; they were everywhere and…"
"And you are fighting with Peak Alpha Stats; I don’t wanna hear excuses; go collect all the Undead I crippled so that Dad can get his final levels, and we can leave," Walking over, I grabbed my brother by the back of the neck as if he were a cat and with a little help from my augmentation skill, hurled him through the air, and into the tunnel.
"FUCK YOooooouuuuuu!" he screamed before disappearing into the darkness.
"That was unnecessary, Taylor,"
"But funny, you gotta admit that part, Dad," I said with a smirk, making him chuckle.
"I’ll give you that."
"Plus, it’s not like there is anything left nearby that would be able to hurt him, even without particles present; he has a large supply of Particle water in his inventory; I made sure of that…"
---
Thirty-five minutes later, Brenden begrudgingly returned dragging along well over a hundred limbless Undead, all tied together with rope, making him almost appear as an OX pulling a cart since his muscles were expanded from his Talent and he looked at least three times bigger than usual.
---
An hour after Brenden’s return from the depths of the tunnels, the three of us decided that it was time to go; Dad had maxed out his level in the Alpha-Rank and only needed to complete his Cycles before ranking up.
Sure, we could have stayed in the Undead Caverns longer, but time was up; it was already April 18th, and we only had two days remaining to traverse around 1600 miles.
"So how are we going to do this? What’s the plan, Taylor?" My Father asked as the three of us sat down at the dinner table to converse.