The exclusion zone crept up on them, the way it always did. A smattering of closed-down shops, the rest struggling, or plastered with scammy advertisements, capitalizing on the cheap land. Potholes in the road. Burned-out vehicles and wrecks no one had bothered to collect. The further they went, the worse it got. The roads tangled with weeds. Shop windows gaped open to the wind, shattered glass scattered around them. Kicked-in doors hung off hinges. Shapes flitted in and out of the shadow, never quite visible but too close for comfort.

A single sign in bright yellow warned them off at the barrier. WARNING! EXCLUSION ZONE. ENTER AT YOUR OWN RISK. To either side, the tangled remnants of what had once been a chain-link fence laid, torn apart by combat classes or wayward monsters. Beyond it, the exclusion zone began in earnest. Buildings laid crumbled, or bombed-out, gaping windows blackened, walls layered with graffiti. A centipede monster coiled past, longer than Rowan was tall, barely sparing them a glance as it coiled into the empty window of a half-toppled shack. Thick with plants, the road crumbled away entirely in several places, where old battles had torn it apart.

Kaidu turned and led them through the zone, confident. Gripping his rake, Rowan followed, guard up. Beside him, Ikara skipped, whistling under her breath.

She caught a glance of Rowan and laughed aloud. “What are you all scared for? It’s just a little exclusion zone. I’d put the danger at about a two out of ten.”

“You live in an exclusion zone. You wouldn’t understand,” Rowan muttered. Motion twitched at him from a sagging electric pole. He spun, pointing the tines.

A squirrel stared back at him, beady black eyes glittering, head tilted inquisitively.

Ikara giggled. “Watch out, that squirrel might get you.”

“Shut up,” Rowan grumbled. He lowered his rake.

The squirrel grinned wide, revealing a mouth of sharklike teeth, and leaped off the pole at them. Midair, it grew rapidly larger, ballooning up to the size of a dog.

Rowan swiped at it blindly, startled. It grabbed the rake and jumped off it toward him, undeterred.

“Unspool!” Ikara jumped forward. Thread, doubled over onto itself, rushed out from her pockets. She wound it over her fingers in a moment, the motions practiced and smooth. With another gesture, she threw the thread out at the monster. Midair, it couldn’t change directions, and slammed into the thread. It tangled around it. The monster struggled, but before it could escape, Ikara spun her wrist around it, tangling it further.

“Spool!”

The thread tightened, whizzing past her fingers and back into her pockets. Caught in the tangle, the monster fought, but only tangled itself worse. Thread dug into its fur and held it tight, its limbs twisted, head off-kilter, tail tied to its back.

With a ziiing, the thread pulled taut. The monster let out a pitiful whimper, completely immobilized.

Ikara nodded at Rowan and Kaidu. “If someone would do the honors?”

“You need the Exp more,” Kaidu said.

“Then, here goes,” Rowan muttered. He dug through his bag, searching. What’s the best tool for this? I want to kill it quickly…

“Hurry up? The thread isn’t super strong or anything, it’s just ordinary thread looped over itself a few times,” Ikara said.

“Right, right.” Rowan pulled out the garden shears. He leaned down. The monster wriggled, eyes wide, whole body tense with fear. It made one last attempt to escape, struggling with its whole body, but the thread held it too tight. Taking a deep breath, he pressed the shears to the underside of creature’s neck and snapped them shut.

Hot red blood rushed out and streamed down his hands and wrists. The monster kicked once more, then laid still.

Ikara twisted her wrists again. The thread came loose. The monster’s corpse fell to the ground.

“Spool.” Ikara freed her fingers from the thread with a quick shake as the thread came to life and whirled back into her pocket, whizzing some unseen container.

Kaidu gave her an appraising look. “Ever tried piano wire?”

“Never had the opportunity. I can strangle some monsters to death with just thread, and hold some others long enough for someone else to swoop the kill, and thread’s cheap and directly in my class skills, so I’ve stuck with it. Besides, there’s not a lot of piano wire out in the good ol’ GSEZ.”

“I’ll buy some tonight. Worth checking if your class equipment affinity extends to wire.”

Ikara nodded. “Thank you kindly. Might do at a higher level if it doesn’t count for thread affinity now. I haven’t bought half the equipment affinity tree yet.”

Speaking of equipment affinity… Rowan glanced through his bag of rusty old garden tools. I should sharpen what I’ve got. If I put a good edge on the spade or the hand claw’s tines, I’d have a pretty serious weapon. Hell, even the rake could use some edges. And the shears… He clicked them once or twice. The spring creaked, and the mechanism caught, gummed up by the rapidly drying blood. He leaned down and cleaned out the spring and the blades on his shirt, but it still caught a little where it had rusted over the years.

If Dad had taken better care of our home-use tools like he had his fancy job tools on his fancy truck… He sighed. No point getting frustrated over it now. For goodness’ sakes, I could’ve been the one cleaning them all this time, but I was so sure I was going to be anything but a support class…

“So! Let’s get started,” Ikara said, clapping her hands together.