We will definitely get back to more mundane pursuits and some fun sometime soon, we need that - but for now based on Earth’s current situation and our collective mood, Jeff and I are suited up for combat and we’re standing on an elevated ridge on the Moon. The gravity is still only a sixth of Earth, but somehow Mana has enabled a breathable atmosphere that’s almost the same as Earth’s.

  The animals and plants look very familiar and if it wasn’t for the blue and green planet looming in the distance and the low gravity, I could be fooled into thinking I’m on Earth, other than the airborne parasites that collect harmlessly on my armor. Unlikely they could successfully attack me even without it, but the thought of them trying to worm their way inside me is still a bit disturbing.

  I’m not sure how, but someone has already done the hard work of clearing out a Zone and establishing a MIS Hub on the Moon that allows people to use the Mana Siphon teleportation network to bring more Adventurers here. It’s exactly the beachhead we need and already there are hundreds of them, mostly Mythic Class, fighting together to clear out more and more area to claim another Zone that will enable us to build another MIS Hub and upgrade the Settlements.

  I trigger Omnipresent and filter for powerful Monsters, but there aren’t any above Level 150 anywhere near here. Unlike Venus where the Mana seems to be concentrated in a very vertical food chain with powerful apex predators, this one seems more horizontal or at least a much broader pyramid that hasn’t produced anything like the Ravager Manta.

  Fortunate, really, that it panned out this way.

  While I’ve got Omnipresent triggered I keep an especially close eye on one of the dots on my minimap - Logan. It feels like he’s way too young to be here, especially without me, but he’s with a group of older Mythic Class Adventurers and he’s the highest Level one in the Party. My Marked for Glory Skill is still helping him along and I can’t help but be impressed by the way he handles himself and how efficient his fighting style is.

  Overall someone has done a very good job of creating ten person Parties joined together into bigger units. Each Party seems to be a good mixture of Classes, ages, and even gender balance. They seem to be mowing down the Monsters with less trouble than I’d anticipated and even cycle back regularly to the MIS Hub to restock or take a quick breather.

  “Totally lighting them up… I love it!” Jeff exclaims, and I can’t tell if he’s referring to our own Lunar invasion force or Logan. Maybe both.

  “Yeah.”

  “Anything that needs us here?” he asks, and I zoom out and update my Omnipresent filters in my mind’s eye.

  “A few around Level 200, nothing above Level 220 at the moment.”

  I create a Portal to see what we’re dealing with at those Levels and although it’s dark where they are, we can easily make out the Lunar equivalent of dinosaurs. Tyrannosaurus Rex, Triceratops, and Stegosaurus derivatives are most of what I see that’s up near Level 200. They’re all massive and threatening, but unlikely to cause real problems to the human forces we have here as long as they’re aware of the danger. And these Monsters are definitely no threat whatsoever to Earth since they’re land bound.

  “Maybe left unchecked, one day… but not now that we’re onto it,” says Jeff, and I agree.

  Everything’s under control.

  It’s weird.

  “You checked the rest of the solar system?” Jeff asks, looking up at the sky..

  “Yeah. There are a few potential problems for Earth from Saturn and Jupiter just based on Level. When I investigate through Portals they’re mostly Elementals or other Monsters that look a lot like the Ravager Manta and drift through the currents, but I’m not really sure how to approach fighting on a gaseous planet. I guess the same way I tried to tackle the Ravager Manta in space?” I ask, not really having a great answer.

  “Seemed to work,” agrees Jeff, then his expression hardens. “In fact, after a while you ripped those fuckers up like a blender.”

  “Maybe I should spend some time just jumping from target to target, figuring out what works. Hit anything that might endanger Earth. Then, if that job feels done and there are no immediate threats left in the Solar System, maybe I’ll take some time to explore a bit in the Universe. Or maybe spend some more time on Earth?”

  I feel like I’m at a crossroads, but I know it’s my own doing and my own mentality that’s brought me here. There’s no real situational crossroad, nothing external. Although, I do finally feel like we’re on top of the Influx’s impact on Earth and there are increasingly more powerful human Adventurers to keep things under control so that I don’t have to.

  We watch our human forces from a distance, silent other than the distant noise of combat. I’m so used to the far away flashes, noises, smells, and ripples of Mana that I cataloge them automatically in my mind as they roll in through my Perception. Nothing dangerous to me, not here.

  “I still think humanity needs to find other planets. Maybe it doesn’t have to be me that finds them, though?” I ask without looking at Jeff, trying it out to see what he says. My thoughts are far in the distance.

  “Maybe,” he answers. “But who else can do what you can do?”

  “Sometimes I think we’ll never find out if I’m always the one doing it,” I reply.

  Jeff huffs in amusement at me, and I’m not sure I really believe what I just said that either. There’s plenty of danger to go around, so it doesn’t have to just be the crap I get myself into that stretches our best combat Classers to Level and invent new techniques. There are a lot of paths to push them to higher Levels, but the path I’ve been walking has already proven that it’s hazardous to people’s health.

  “Maybe… I should wait around for a while. Wait until you or someone catches me in Levels so there are more of us. Maybe we should wait for a lot more of us to get at least to their third Tier of Legendary Skills, so we can take on the fucked up shit in this Universe together.”

  Jeff gives me a look like I’m an idiot. His wide, rolling eye whites and big grin stand out against his dark skin.

  If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

  “Nobody’s ever going to catch you, Bronwic. You’re a fucking freak and I love you for it. Who else is getting to Ascended Class anytime soon? I spend a lot of time in combat and we’ve even spent a bunch of time together taking on shit that should have killed me, and I’m not really anywhere close.”

  “What about Logan? What about some of those kids? They’ve got Classes that are going to rival ours or even surpass us if they manage to make it.”

  “You going to hang around for five or ten or twenty or fifty years to find out?” Jeff asks with an eyebrow raised. “It’s not like after the Influx, bro. It’s still dangerous as fuck on Earth, but not like before the Mana Siphons. Not like what we had to go through. Especially not like what you had to go through.”

  “Are the Mana Siphons a mistake?” I ask. It’s something I’d considered and still wonder about. Am I somehow preventing humanity from reaching its potential by robbing us of Leveling opportunities at the same time I’m trying to save it? Levels and Classes are so important in the Universal order of things.

  “Fuck no! Those things are going to save hundreds of millions of people and make sure hundreds of millions or billions more babies make it to be adults one day. They give everyone some space and saftety to make a life for themselves - and that includes giving combat Classers opportunities to hunt that can take them as far as they want, eventually. That’s not my point though dude, and I think you know it.”

  I use my enhanced Perception to watch Logan blast a hole right through the middle of a car sized, cricket-like animal with a head resembling an alligator. Without pausing even to Loot it, Logan then blasts himself high into the air with kinetic energy as he calls heavy, powerful blasters to his hands. With uncanny accuracy he deals out death to all the Monsters below him, the blasters’ damage output vastly increased by his Class abilities and Skills. As good as he is, as good as Logan will be, I wonder if his Class will ever get him to the point that Xypharoth or Hvitserkur are within his reach. I wonder if any of the Adventurers I’m watching will get to the point they can clear out an entire world of its most powerful Monsters. Humanity needs them, but is it realistic to think that if I don’t pick up the gauntlet, someone else will?

  “You done realizing you’re Superman and we fucking need you?” Jeff asks as a massive boom sounds in the distance. “The Silver Surfer that flies all over the Galaxy saving our ass? You know I’ll have your back all the way, Bronwic. Batman and fucking Robin, baby. The dynamic duo. And once in a while, but not too often, you can do your Clark Kent thing that you want to do.”

  “You’re not too good at keeping this superhero stuff straight, are you? Are you Arthur or Lancelot in this story or just Robin?” I ask him with a grin. You’ve always got to love Jeff’s enthusiasm and unfiltered truths. Well, his version of them at least.

  “Shut the fuck up, bro.” There’s no heat in it and he absently ignites one of his patented Fire and Wind Affinity ‘firenado’ combinations infront of us for a couple of seconds, until whatever it is he’s seen out on the battlefield resolves itself and he releases it to gutter and flame out.

  “You want to clean up a solar system with me?” I ask him. I’m not even sure if it’s a good idea that he comes, but if we’re going to be a dynamic duo then the clue’s in the name. Duo.

  “Can I be Green Lantern?” he asks, looking up and to the side like he’s checking with a higher power.

  “Green Lantern? Seriously?”

  “Yeah! I want to let my imagination go wild on those motherfuckers. Like nothing they’ve ever seen!”

  I laugh and nod.

  “Sure mate, no problem. But… I think I’ve got to do something after we finish before I can move on and I’m not sure you should be there with me.”

  We lock eyes and I can tell he knows exactly what I mean.

  “When the time comes,” he says.

  I nod and open a Portal to Saturn.

  Once through, Jeff and I spear through the turbulent gases of the atmosphere on the back of his Griffin, sealed in our armor. It’s no surprise that the massive creatures here all have some form of tough, flexible wings to help them navigate through the currents. In a few hours of observations, they’ve never harmed another of their kind or even hunted anything else. They actually seem more like city sized winged cattle that graze on the Mana, gases, and the environment. Or maybe blue whale is a better comparison.

  Orkvolii (Level 340)

  Health: 190890/190890

  Mana: 25210/25410

  Conditions: Colossal Resistance, Legendary Regeneration, Mana Absorbtion, more…

  “Should we leave them?” Jeff asks me over our GPC.

  “What do you think?” I ask back. “They don’t seem aggressive, but what happens if a herd of these makes its way to Earth?”

  “I don’t know, but there aren’t many of us who can take something like this on. If there were a lot of them, we’d be in trouble.”

  “Saturn’s a fucking big planet. They’’re spread out, but there are hundreds of thousands of them. Maybe more. At one kill every two seconds, which is seriously pushing it with all my Skills ramped up and some Luck, not to mention a huge mental toll, it’s over a month of hunting them without stopping.”

  I do some filtering with Omnipresent and see there are a few larger groups that I might be able to catch in a chain reaction with Resonant Strike, but it’s far from straghtforward.

  “It would probably take me five or ten minutes to take one of these things down unless I can find a trick. I’m not going to be much help, but maybe you’re looking at this the wrong way. Maybe it’s the greatest Leveling opportunity in history!” Jeff sends.

  I guess from that perspective he’s not wrong, and certainly if I can get enough Levels to get access to my next Tier of Skills that’s going to increase my ability to handle more trouble. I switch Omnipresent over to Jupiter, where a similar situation exists although the creatures there are far more aggressive and battle for territory both horizontally and vertically. There’s probably twice as many high Level Monsters there than there are on Saturn.

  “Jupiter will be more dangerous but at least I’m confident the things I’m killing actually would pose a danger to Earth if they headed our way.”

  Jeff doesn’t say anything. I think he knows me well enough to know at a certain point I make up my own mind and he probably doesn’t want me to blame him for the downside of whatever choice I make. I sit there and think for a while before Jeff finally breaks the silence.

  “Don’t be fucking stupid Bronwic! If I had the opportunity in front of me that you have, I’d spend three or four months driving my Level as high as I could while also protecting Earth. But I’m going to have to go back to killing the shit that’s on Earth and fall further behind you.”

  I guess Jeff wasn’t worried about sharing his opinion after all.

  What’s left for me on Earth? Tatiana maybe. Carter and the family for sure. Uncle Ant and some others. Jeff. I can keep an eye on all of them with Foresight to make sure they don’t get into too much trouble.

  Babysitting everyone and killing things that don’t give me any XP doesn’t seem ok, not with so many dead strung out behind me. It’s not the way to get to the place I could face off against The Taskmaster head to head or The Ancients of Oblivion Shroud. Levels, and especially my Levels with my Class, matter. Someone has to step into the pointy end of humanity’s interactions with Galactics and the Universe who has the ability to take no shit.

  The Legendary Strike Forces can handle any outliers with the Mana Siphons in place so I’m not needed for that anymore. I look out to the horizon as we rocket through the air on gaseous currents and consider. I don’t want it to be blood and death all day and night every day for months on end.

  “I’ll give it six months. One day on, one day off. Let’s see how far I can push it.”