The warg’s back legs bunched up. It bounded into the air towards Cowl, its legs raised to spear the man before he could escape.

Cowl dropped from the sky, spinning as he fell and carving a thick line through the warg’s side. It sailed through the air above him and let out a screech of fury. It landed on the sand behind them – and only a short distance away from Vanessa.

“Shit!” Angel cursed. The gears in his arm clicked and the grappling hook shot out from his palm. It sailed through the air and slammed into warg’s side, burying a short way into the creature’s flesh.

Angel immediately tugged on it and twisted his arm as he dashed to the side. The cord retracted and he launched into the air, swinging in a wide loop. The warg tried to spin and face him, but the Seeker had too much momentum.

The cord retracted until he was only a short distance away from the warg. Angel tilted back and redirected his momentum, swinging upwards onto the creatures back and ripping his barb free.

It whistled back into his hand with a hiss and a puff of steam. He grabbed a cannister and slammed it into his arm midair. He landed on the warg’s back and thrust his palm against it. The air crackled as a wave of magic ripped out of his palm.

Tendrils of frost twirled out across it, slowly expanding across the monster’s entire body. It let out an enraged shriek, but Cowl didn’t give it a chance to retaliate. The warg, already slowed by the frost creeping across it, was unable to dodge the Hunter as he shot across the sky.

The masked man buried the massive sword deep in the warg’s head. It staggered and toppled to the ground, the life seeping out of its body and staining the sand green.

Cowl pulled his sword free and flicked the ichor off it. He twisted a small circle off the handle and the blade shrunk back to its normal size. The Hunter put the circle back into his pouch and returned the sword to his side before sliding off the bulbous monster. Motes of blue energy rose up from its corpse, splitting roughly into two streams. One flew to Angel while the other went to Cowl. The energy tingled as it entered Angel’s chest and he drew in a sharp breath.

The eyepiece lit up as his status page brought itself forth.

Race: Human

Name: Angel

Level: 27 [14%]

Status: Foreign Entity Detected

Information accuracy: 100%

Strength: 11 [+1]

Intelligence: 19

Nimbleness: 17 [+1]

Toughness: 5

Comparative Rating: Minor Threat

Weak point(s): Heart, Neck, Arteries… (100/100)

Element(s): Steel, [Unknown]

Magicore: None (40% Attunement)

“That was a big one,” Angel said, shuddering as the last traces of the chilly energy faded away. “Didn’t think I’d be fighting something twice my strength.”

“Hardly,” Cowl scoffed. “Levels are a measure of how much magical energy something has, not its strength. They’re related, but not linearly. This was stronger than you, but it wasn’t double your strength. That magitech you’ve got on your arm is hardly weak. The System just doesn’t account for it.”

“That does make sense,” Angel said. His mechanical arm whirred and shifted to its blade form. He scanned the creature for a moment, then started digging into the spot a short distance behind the creature’s head. He grimaced as blood covered his arm, but his efforts were rewarded when he heard something clink.

His hand shifted back to normal and he wrapped his fingers around a small orb. He ripped it free, shaking the greyish green blood off with a disgusted grimace before hopping down from the creature.

“That’s a lot of work for a little money,” Cowl said, glancing at the blue orb in Angel’s hand.

“Cores have more uses than just money,” Angel said, tucking it into his pack. “I’ll take your disinterest as confirmation that I can have this.”

“Suit yourself,” Cowl said, shrugging. “It’s not worth the effort.”

Vanessa swallowed, watching the warg’s body warily. She edged around it, not taking her eyes off the creature.

“Are you sure it’s dead?” Vanessa asked.

“Does it look alive to you?” Cowl asked.

“It’s dead,” Angel said with a small chuckle. He wiped his arm off in the sand, scrubbing it until the green liquid was completely gone. “You okay?”

“Yeah. It didn’t get me,” Vanessa said.

“I know. But I’m taking it that this was the first time you’ve been close to a monster.”

Vanessa nodded.

“The next one will be easier. It helps to know how to fight against them, but you’ve got nothing to worry about,” Angel said. “Cowl’s whole job is hunting these creatures for money. He’s killed more monsters than you’ll ever see in your life.”

“You aren’t half bad yourself,” Cowl said with a slight nod of respect. “Most Seekers just run from monsters. It’s usually safer that way.”

“All the best loot is in the catacombs where you can’t get past the monsters without a fight,” Angel said. “Necessity breeds learning like a stale pool of warm water breeds Bloodflies.”

Angel examined his arm to make sure all the gore was cleaned out of it. He grimaced as his clothes stuck to his skin. Without the wind to cool him, the sun was more of a menace than any monster ever could be.

“Shall we continue?” Angel asked, grabbing the board from his back and tossing it onto the ground. "I want to arrive well before nightfall."

“Yes. We should be pretty close now,” Cowl said, his wings sprouting.

They both glanced at Vanessa. She gave one final glance at the monster’s corpse before activating her skates and giving them a nod.

The three sped off with Cowl at their head, leaving the warg in the sand behind them. The remainder of the trip to Dune Valley was entirely uneventful. The dunes grew larger and deeper until they were practically mountains.

The sun hung low in the sky by the time Angel got his first glimpse of Dune Valley. The city was precariously perched atop a large dune. Massive metal supports sprawled across the entire sandy hill, holding the city aloft.

A massive, curved disk of shimmering silver metal was held over the top of the entire city with trusses and bars. Thousands of slack wires hung from the disk, dotted with flickering lanterns. The impossibly tall buildings towered over the city’s short walls, casting a shadow long past the base of the dune that it was perched on.

The gates to the city were about fifty feet in the air above the ground. A large, steel plate sat on the ground before it, partially covered with sand. Iron chains with individual links the thickness of a man’s head ran up from each corner into a huge pulley system in the air above them.

Cowl’s wings retracted into his back as he led the other two onto the plate. A few moments passed. Then the platform rumbled. The pulley started to turn, steam rising up from exhaust vents as gears churned along it.

The platform rose into the air one shuddering link at a time. It took several minutes for the metal plate to finally grind to a halt as it grew level with a small outcropping before a rather plain looking gate.

They walked off the platform and the pulley let out a rattle as it slowly lowered the platform back down behind them.

“No guard at the gate,” Angel observed, glancing around the entrance. “No annoying merchants either.”

“The gate is automated,” Cowl replied, leading them inside the city. “Nobody comes to Dune Valley for anything other than business. It’s a wretched, ugly city with nothing of value.”

“Sheesh,” Angel said. “What did it ever do to you?”

Cowl just grunted. The main road was about as wide as some of the side streets in Bronze City. It wound and curled around tall buildings with barely enough room for the three travelers to walk side by side.

Dune Valley wasn’t as dark as Angel had expected. There must have been thousands of lanterns scattered throughout the city streets, not even counting the ones suspended in the air above them. The air was chilly and frigid, likely due to the massive piece of metal blocking out the sun overhead.