“This is far from the worst of it,” the young medic said, as he began stitching the wound in my shoulder. He was slim and looked no older than nineteen or twenty, with floppy black hair and slight rabbit-teeth. Private Smith had gone off to find someone more senior, though it had been over ten minutes since he’d gone.

  I was sat on the floor near the cars with a bared torso, watching the evacuations ahead of us as the others keenly watched the kid poking me with a needle. That was a weird one, innit? People loved watching this kind of stuff. I know I’d spent a fair amount of time scrolling social media for those pimple popping vids. There was a morbid satisfaction in it.

  We’d pulled our cars to the side of the two-lane road, surrounded by terraced housing – a row of at least four houses built next to each other – stretching the length of the road. There were shops to the right, brickwork slightly crumbling. The emergency vehicles and military transports blocked that side of the road off, making sure no-one else could go further into London. I could see police and soldiers going door-to-door, trying to convince people to leave their homes.

  “Central London was worst hit from the USP initiation itself, from what I know,” Private Griffin continued, as he pulled the needle through my skin. I winced but did my best to hide it. I needed to become tougher. Couldn’t be wincing at a small needle. It sounded stupid, but I guess I would need to get used to pain.

  “You guys deployed pretty quickly,” Kian said. “The battle only started like three or four hours ago.”

  “We were put on alert the moment the System started initialising. I’m only a grunt in the field but I imagine the higher-ups started planning from the beginning. That’s what they get paid to do.”

  “Don’t think anyone’s getting paid anything for a while,” I said. “Is the whole city being evacuated? All the cities?”

  “I don’t know. Doubt it though. Evacuating an entire city isn’t really feasible.”

  “What about up north? Do you know anything about the attacks?”

  “There’s been whispers. Communication lines are down, so we’re back to radios and cables, and those are reserved for the higher-ups in the military. What I’ve heard is that they’ve taken much of the north-east and east. All the way from Edinburgh to Hull and stretching inland as far as Leeds. We’re being told they’re moving into Scotland to the north, Leicester to the south.”

  I wasn’t the best at UK geography, but I had a vague idea of where each city was. That was probably a good ten to fifteen percent of the UK that they already controlled. How had they managed to take so much, so quickly? I didn’t get the chance to delve any further as Private Smith was finally coming back, an older soldier by his side. Griffin applied the last of the stitches and tied it off.

  “There. You should be good,” he said. “The stitches should dissolve over ten days, but you might want the wound to be looked at before then anyway.” He took his leave of us, saluting the older gentleman as he walked away. I moved my arm around a bit, testing its range and at which points it would hurt. It was okay though, no major pain or anything, and at least the wound was cleaned up. I stood up, Carmen offering me another t-shirt and hoodie, which I pulled over my head as Private Smith and the older man arrived.

  The older man had a clean-shaven, gruff face, with small black eyes above jovial cheeks that looked like he enjoyed the odd drink or three.

  “I’m Corporal Baddock,” he introduced himself.

  “I’m River,” I replied with a handshake.

  “Sorry for the wait. Needed to find out from HQ how to deal with you. We’re getting transport arranged. We’re going to take you to HMNB Portsmouth. Your friends, too.”

  “HMNB?”

  “His Majesty’s Naval Base.”

  I’d never been to Portsmouth. I’d never actually been to much of the UK outside London. Most I knew about Portsmouth was that it was a city on the south coast of the country and had a football team that was quite successful in the noughties, until, like many other clubs, shady owners came in looking to make a quick buck.

  “And what’s the plans for me there?”

  Baddock smiled. “You think they’d tell me? My only orders were to arrange transport to get you there.”

  Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

  “Well, I’ll go with you. But I have some conditions, and I need your answer before I go anywhere.”

  “What conditions.”

  “I need the government to do something for me.”

  Baddock raised an eyebrow. “Other than keep you safe, you mean?”

  “Yeah. Other than that.”

  “What is it you want?”

  I gave him a rundown of my demands. Nothing crazy. I gave him Kian’s family address, and told him to make sure they’re safe and transported to the same place as us. They might not have wanted to come with Kian, and he may not want his older brother with him, but as long as his mum and younger brother came, we could keep them safe. I made the same demand for Charlotte’s brother. Release him from prison and bring him to the same place. The last request I made was for them to arrange for Carmen’s parents to be located and taken somewhere safe in Hong Kong. Might as well see how far I could push this leverage.

  “That’s all? Anything else you want to throw in there?”

  “That’s all,” I replied. Then I couldn’t help myself. “For now.”

  Baddock gave me an apprehensive look.

  “Remember to tell them that I don’t go anywhere unless they give me what I want.”

  Baddock and Smith walked away in the direction they had come from as we waited. Carmen came over, reached up to give me a kiss and a grateful smile. I winked back at her. Mary and Tom also gave me grateful looks. Charlotte bounded over, and gave me a massive hug around my neck, making me wince with the sudden jolt to my shoulder. I hugged her back, Kian standing behind her, nodding at me like best friends do. He knew he didn’t need to thank me, nor say anything. And I knew he’d have my back at some other point. That’s how our friendship worked.

  The corporal returned several minutes later, Smith in tow.

  “You have your wish. We can deliver on those who are here.” The corporal looked over at Carmen. “We can’t make any promises for Hong Kong, but the message is being relayed to our friends there.”

  “That’s good enough,” Carmen replied.

  “We’re gonna take our cars,” I said to Baddock. “We’ll follow your transport.”

  “You’re gonna be a headache, aren’t you?”

  “I’m not trying to be. I’d just rather travel with my friends than in a transport surrounded by soldiers.”

  “Well, you’re going to be surrounded by soldiers soon enough. Might want to get used to it. How about I send Smith here with you, and he’ll get you to where you need to go?”

  “That works. He can drive the brown SUV, with Mary and Tom. We’ll follow behind.”

  Smith actually seemed pleased with the arrangements. I wondered whether that’s because he wanted to get to somewhere safer too, or he just wanted something to do other than flag people down. It didn’t take long for us to get in the cars, and be on the move.

  ***

  As I sat in the passenger seat of the car with Kian driving and the three women in the back, I checked my loot. I’d only gotten another 91 SE for Nathan’s lackeys. I decided to get the [Gravity Circle] | [Level 3] for 120 SE. It had worked quite well at the house, but it needed to be more powerful. The level three added another 0.1 metres to the range, but also 0.2 seconds to the duration. I wondered if the further levels would go up similarly. A metre increase in range every ten levels and a second increase in duration every fifteen. Now, I was curious. I’d have to max this out as soon as possible.

  One thing bothering me was that my rank was still the same. Common, Rank D. How many kills or quests would I need to start ranking up? From the others, I knew there were maximum levels based on rank, so I needed to rank up as quickly as possible. That was something I’d need to make clear to whoever was in charge once we got to the naval base, without giving away my advantage. Or perhaps it was any mana-stone user’s advantage.

  “We can’t just focus on me,” I said to the rest of them in the car. “I’m not one hundred percent on this, but I think any mana-stone will allow you to choose any abilities.”

  “What makes you say that?” Kian asked.

  “Just a hunch, to be honest. From what I’ve figured out of my gem, the mana threads only allow me to control time. The bracer controls space. I don’t think Nathan would have been able to do all that back there with just controlling space. I wouldn’t have survived in there with just my control of time. At least, my current control.

  “I just feel the mana-stones are more important than we realise. That’s why it seems to be the hardest of the quests.”

  “Do we want to try and go for the mana-stone quest first then?” Charlotte asked.

  “No,” I shook my head, looking back at her. “We wouldn’t be able to complete it anyway right now. I’m thinking we spend the next thirty days with the army, and we all get ourselves to Rare, Rank S or even Epic, Rank F. Whatever it takes.”

  “Is that even going to be possible?” Carmen asked. “We don’t know what spawns there are going to be or how much SE we’ll get from it. Not to mention others will be thinking the same thing.”

  “It’s a good point,” I said, looking at my girlfriend with a smile. “We’re just going to have to try. And see what quests come up as well and take as many as we can.”

  “So, we get the defensive structures, then go for the mana-stones?” Kian said.

  “First, I’ll go after the Champion here. Whoever it is. If I can figure out my artifact as well, and assuming they don’t have one, I should be strong enough to take them out one-on-one. And then we go for the mana-stones.”

  “What win condition are you thinking of going for then?”

  “It’s going to be flags or the Champions, right? I don’t think either is going to be easier. You’ll have to assume they’ll have a strong defensive force. We just need to make sure we’re stronger. If I’m right about the mana-stones, and you guys get kitted out, then each of us should be strong enough for a Champion each, even if they have mana-stones as well.”

  “I think we’re gonna need more people using the System like us. People we can trust,” Kian said, turning his head towards me.

  I met his eyes. “Yes, we will.”