followed Jacob along a winding path deeper into the city. Most of the main downtown had been reduced to rubble in the early fighting. The skyscrapers still stood but they sported numerous signs of battle. Windows blasted out, melted exteriors, even bullet holes. Any transported individuals didn't survive long in the fighting. Now the downtown center was the domain of monsters, or so I heard. Someone said they spotted a dragon roosting on top of the sears tower. Not sure I quite believed that.I wasn't about to go there myself to confirm or deny the allegations. Jacob finally stopped at a blank metal door below an overpass. He knocked three times, waited a few seconds, and knocked two more times.The door opened from the inside. There was no handle on the outside, not like that would stop anyone with magic or ability from just destroying the door. I followed Jacob inside. I didn't see anyone else. I decided to activate my talisman. A form seemed to waver into being

I finished off the last of the guards caught in the mist. It was laughably easy to kill them one by one. I secured their items while my mana recharged. A few storage rings, quite a bit of credit, and their weapons. The weapons I would sell, along with most of the storage rings. I would keep Obidiah's, it was another seven cubic foot ring.I was going into the last fight without my biggest advantage available to me. Area of Denial would cost me a thousand mana if I wanted to use it again so soon. I could wait but that would give the man time to recover. No, it was better just to deal with it now. I did recast Second Chance though.I walked towards the looming Black Dragon headquarters. It was time for this to end, one way or another.I kicked open the door and was surprised to find... nobody. The ground floor was empty and quiet. Only the soft hum of the mana generator in the background. I wasn't about to risk taking the elevator. Twenty flights of stairs i

"Can you keep an eye out for me? I have some items to go through.""I will try but I didn't sense that sand devourer coming so just don't get too distracted," Fiona said floating higher up.I nodded to her, pulling out the first book I got in Chicago. I flipped through the pages and determined it was worthless. I put it in one of my spare rings. I continued going through the books. About half of them turned out to be useless for what I wanted."Where did all the books come from?"I looked up at Fiona, "I stole them from the library in Chicago. I was hoping to further my knowledge about runes and armor crafting.""So does that mean you want to settle down and become a crafter?""No, I just thought it would help me. Can't hurt right.""So, anything interesting?""There are a few books that might be interesting, I will need to sit down and actually read them though.""Does that mean you are done sorting yo

Bella was able to keep up with the slower pace that the quads had to travel, the road too rough to go any faster.I asked Martin how long the trip would take."Not sure, this will be our first trip since the world went to shit."I looked at the man, expecting him to be joking, he wasn't. I groaned but it wasn't like I had anything better to do.We ran into a few wandering monsters, I let the others handle them for the most part, only involving myself if the creature became dangerous."Paul, why don't you fight the monsters?""No point, plus you three need to level more than I do.""Wait? How do you know we're at a lower level?""A skill I picked up called Identify. There are other variants of the skill but you should be able to pick up one in the Bazaar if you're interested.""So many things that we don't know," Martin said with a frown."The only advice I can really give is, experiment, try ne

I tested the effect by slicing my arm. That was a mistake. After my vision returned I found myself lying on the floor. I quickly healed the cut and stood up. That was definitely an effect I was going to add. It did require mana to activate though so I needed to find a control rune. I certainly didn't want it activating every time I touched something, it would drain my mana way too quickly.I settled on uruz, which had two distinct designs, the one I chose looked like an angled doorway and stood for gateway. The other one inguz stood for work. I added these to the Blinding Pain runes. When I tested it again it didn't activate or pull mana from me. I fed some mana into the rune and cut myself a third time. This time the effect activated. I was prepared for it now and managed to not fall on the floor.When the pain faded away I started carving the design into my staff. Spiritual Siphon, Blinding Pain, and the shrink effect. I had to add separate activation runes for t