Dent rubbed his eye with his metal hand, as the cool feel of the material helped soothe the ache. A glance at the clock told him it was nearing evening outside of the Tower, and it would soon be the end of his shift. Not that he ever adhered to or was asked to stick to the set schedule. Sleep sounded nice… but with how tense things were with the two parties out on other worlds, he might do a bit of overtime.

  He turned to the Architect. “Theo is still napping, which is unlike him. There seems to be a slight time offset. That world is maybe… two hours behind us?”

  Chuck nodded and turned his eyes away from the screens he had been staring at. “As long as he is using the coffin, I am not too worried. The bloodbath and need for rest could be some form of jetlag.”

  The swordsman shrugged briefly. Believable enough.

  “That leads me to a question I have for you, however.” The Architect turned in the chair, his wireframe form flickering slightly. “I know you don’t remember anything about your life back on Earth, but you understand concepts from there, correct? Such as jetlag and… space?”

  Dent frowned and tilted his head to the side. “Yeah, I guess so. I know what a plane is, even if I can’t remember ever being on one. Same for space. An infinite void filled with planets and stars. Why’d you ask?”

  After drumming his fingers silently on the desk, Chuck turned back to the monitors. “The entity with Jackie asked her about space, which isn’t exactly a concept within the System. The Sea can be translated as Space depending on the parameters of each world, but…”

  “You’re suggesting the entity might have come from one of the linked planets?”

  “Too many unknown variables to make a guess at this stage. It is unlike anything we’ve come across so far. Generally, such incidents work out in our favor.”

  “Generally,” Dent repeated. He turned back to his own screen and rubbed his eyes again. Whatever the entity was, it seemed too early to roll any dice to see how lucky they were.

  Sally hit the ground and rolled, bouncing down a rocky hill until she got lucky and her foot caught the edge of a flat stone. She twisted and hopped down the rest of the incline, landing with a slash of her dagger. Two Radochs fell down, clutching at deep wounds through their necks.

  A light thread circled around her left forearm, resetting the broken bone with a click. As blood ran down the side of her face, a wave of tumbling zombies washed past her, blocking the rest of the bugs from attacking her.

  Getting to the nearest alien craft was a little more of a slog than she had imagined. Not that she wasn’t grinning from ear to ear, of course. After the first two Radoch squads, more enemies had been drawn to their warpath, turning this into a near-constant battle.

  The heavy metal figure of Humphrey landed a dozen feet away from her, pulping two crawling zombies as well as the remains of a bug. His arm-mounted cannon fired, blowing smoke and dust in the wake of a round ball of metal that obliterated one of the nearby roaches.

  “Friendly fire,” Sally complained, giving her crushed pals a brief pout.

  Edward slipped up beside her. “You called?”

  She glared at him and the hill behind them both. “Why was I the only one to fall?”

  The demon shrugged. “You shouted something about this being… ‘Sparta’ and then were dragged off the edge by the Radoch you kicked.”

  With a sigh, she brought a flaming skull out into her hand. “The most depressing part of being immortal is that my pop culture references will always be dated, based on when I joined the System.”

  “You could just stop trying to be funny.”

  “I’d rather die.” Sally flung the skull out. “Or be re-dead, I guess.”

  Edward muttered something under his breath, but she didn’t catch it. Instead, she watched as he hopped over the pile of confused corpses still crawling around the ground. He lunged forward with his rapier, piercing through a Radoch. Her flaming skull hit another bug further back, exploding and causing four more zombies to crawl up out of the muddy terrain.

  A partially dried lake wasn’t the smartest of routes to take, but she had imagined it being narrow enough to jump across. Unfortunately, the bugs had decided to use it as a trench and… possible mud bath? The sticky terrain was churning with the Initiate level roaches covered in clods of wet earth.

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  Worse, the sun was starting to set. With the destruction going on around this world, the atmosphere saw fit to cause the natural illumination to have a darker red tone. The tree cover here was sparse, but the color of everything had also become muddier and darker even without shade.

  Sally used Meat Hook to pull herself out of the mire and into the group of fresh zombies. While her horde wasn’t as effective as in most worlds, she was creating an army, nonetheless. Every Mortis Bomb, Summon Zombies, or Escape Fate produced a few, and she used the abilities on repeat when available. If anything, they acted to hinder the Radochs, making it easier for the three of them to keep the advantage.

  Most Initiates appeared to be in the Level 20 range. If her small group of Outsiders remained sharp, then they’d have little issue slaying any number of them. Soldier rank Radochs were around Level 30 - again, not too problematic. They had come across a few bugs in leadership roles with a Renowned rank, but that might be separate from the other ranking method as their Level hadn’t been much higher.

  Not that she cared for the roach hierarchy that much, but it was at least a vague indication of how strong the elite fighters or true leadership might be.

  The only thing they had going for them currently was numbers, and that didn’t mean much against someone like-

  Sally turned away from her opponent just in time to see the wash of green fire engulf her from the right side. Rather than the expected burning sensation from the flames, it instead felt like acid was eating through her skin. White light blinded her. The pain flooded her system, only to be replaced with a calm euphoria.

  For a second, she thought that she had returned to the Omen.

  Gradually the light faded away, and the gloomy pit of mud and death filled her vision again. She popped the cork from a healing potion. As she raised it to her lips, she could see that most of the skin on her arm was gone, a patchwork of bloodied green scraps barely covering damaged muscle.

  “They’s always said you’s was tough to kill,” a voice hissed out, coming from the direction of the blast.

  This Roach was taller than most, but was hunched over to almost average size. Two of their arms held small artefacts glowing a sinister green, while the other two hands were making spell-casting gestures. Dressed in a hooded cloak, their white eyes glared at Sally with cold indifference.

  “True,” she replied, a grin widening on her face. “I’m probably more of a cockroach than you are, buggy.”

  As the warmth of the potion sank through her, the magical life thread circled around her body, helping patch her regrowing skin back up. The Radoch pointed a finger toward her, and a green bolt of energy shot toward her.

  She sunk back away, disappearing within a group of new zombies - one of which took the bolt for her. A crater of undead flesh melted away from her pal’s torso, melting their flesh away. Sally ran her tongue across her sharp teeth and used Quick Death.

  Energy ran through her gathered horde as the shamblers turned to sprinters, their undead glares swiveling to this caster bug. At once, they ran and stumbled through the mud toward the Radoch.

  Sally watched from within the shadows of the roving bodies. It would be nice to get some out-of-the blue assistance from Bully. The Mail part of the System had a ten-minute delay, so even if he came up with something useful for the situation, it wouldn’t get here in time. She had already told him to work on more big-picture problems, anyway.

  She was a little too past the point of relying on acts of god to get her out of situations. Especially after becoming part-god.

  Skeleton Key twirled in her hand as she joined the last of her pals, slotting into their charge. The ones at the front fell to the ground as the caster sent a spherical burst of energy around them. A cannon blast behind her signaled that the other two were probably tied up in their other fights, allowing her the space to fight this stronger foe.

  She swerved to the side as a beam of green light pierced several zombies, burning holes through their torsos. The thick mud wasn’t helping, as even her faster pals struggled to pile on the roach like they would any other target. Sally snapped her fingers, and roots grew up in the fertile soil behind the spellcaster. Sunflower-headed zombies dug out through the mud, toothed maws gnashing.

  The Radoch dropped the artifacts it was holding, and a long staff appeared in its hands. Rather than cast another spell, it turned and lashed out with the weapon as if it were a greatsword. Green light burned in the air, leaving behind an acrid smell as the weapon tore through the newer zombies.

  With each one felled, an orb of green light hung in the air. Floating close to the Radoch, Sally could only assume that it wasn’t good news. It reminded her of Theo’s blood orb skill. She pulled a skull from her belt but hesitated in approaching the bug at full speed. The times she’d gone against a powerful caster were few and far between, and even then she had other ways to avoid going directly against magic.

  The skull burst into flame as she lobbed it over the last of her horde. One of the green orbs of magic zipped out away from the roach and collided with the Mortis Bomb, causing it to detonate in the air, ineffectively.

  Sally grinned and drew out her new crossbow. Now she saw a route to success.

  Jackie exhaled through her nose as she continued her narrowed glare at the map in front of her. It was difficult to see a route to success. While she had guided the group toward the path of least resistance, the bugs had clearly seen that as a challenge.

  Now the fuckin’ roaches were converging on the Outsider’s location like they had found a new source of food. They weren’t so organized to have such a competent response; she was sure of it. Rather, it was more like they could sense the power of the trio.

  No sooner had Sally and her goons killed the first group in their way, everyone within a mile radius had swiveled to face them and started moving in. Perhaps they were that militaristic.

  Either way, this was still the easiest route to one of the spaceships.

  “Ya see,” she murmured, pointing at the large screen. “Sally ain’t the sorta gal who gives up. She has the annoyin’ audacity to get the solution or answer she wants, no matter what.”

  After an extended silence, she turned in her chair to scowl at the unresponsive entity.

  Only to see that it was no longer there.