A giant black scaled hand reached through the gateway, grabbing the flames as if they were a solid object. The scaled hand clenched then pulled itself out, revealing a monster Aaron had no hope of beating.

Demon Warrior: Level 18

The demon towered over them; its thick white antlers almost scraped the ceiling as it rose to its full height. The monster stretched its tree trunk-sized arm out into the fiery gateway and pulled out a massive black sword.

Before anyone could react, the demon leaped forward, smashing the corpse of a goblin to a pulp under its foot. It blurred through the air, moving almost too fast for Aaron to track, then it stopped its charge directly behind a muscular inmate. Why did it stop? The prisoner fell to the floor in two chunks, completely sliced in half. Oh. The attack was so fast that he didn’t see it.

As the man’s body hit the floor, the spell was broken, and Aaron was able to move once again. However, being able to move wasn’t very helpful against an enemy of the demon’s caliber, a fact he was soon reminded of. An inmate screamed and made a mad dash towards the exit. The monster’s pure white eyes widened with glee, then it once again surged forward at a high speed. Before the running man could even make it halfway to the exit, the demon had chopped off his head.

Finally, the guards took action, releasing a volley of gunshots at the monster. The low caliber rounds dug into the demon's hide, causing it to roar in pain. However, the wounds were not fatal; the bullets only penetrated a few inches beneath the skin. Before the guns could inflict too much damage, the monster disappeared in a burst of speed and began dispatching the gunmen.

Aaron’s stomach dropped as he watched the demon cleave through the guards. Each swing of the demon’s sword cut a guard in half. To make matters worse, it looked like the demon was capable of using [Skills]. Occasionally, its sword would flash red and accelerate further, cutting deep trenches into the ground. The monster was occupied with the guards for the moment, but after they fell it would come for them.

“Fuck this. I ain’t fighting that thing,” Aaron said as he rapidly searched the room for an escape route. The exit of the cafeteria was clogged in the press of bodies trying to escape; too many people jostled for position to make that a viable escape route. Plus, he would have to pass near the demon if he went that way. He had no desire to get even remotely close to that thing.

“There’s a back door in the cafeteria that leads to the kitchen; maybe we can escape that way. It’s normally locked, but we can probably knock down the door if we all work together,” Dan said.

Aaron pulled out the key he had stolen and nodded. “Sounds like a plan; lead the way.” Together they sprinted across the room, making sure to stay as far away from the demon as possible.

Just as Aaron reached the door, the fiery gateway in the center of the room pulsed, sending out a scorching wave of heat. The moisture was sucked out of the air, leaving his mouth parched and dry. One by one, a wave of monsters climbed out of the gateway, dimming the fire slightly. Their levels hung above their heads, a stark reminder of the hopelessness of the situation.

Imp Mage: Level 9

The growing crowd of small red imps burst into action, randomly launching fireballs into the crowd of prisoners trying to escape. There was no room to dodge. Each fireball landed, setting inmates on fire and breaking bones. The barrage of fire only grew more intense as more imps walked through the portal, turning the once peaceful cafeteria into a hellscape.

The sickening scent of burnt flesh wafted through the air, motivating Aaron to unlock the kitchen door. He had no desire to be burnt alive.

Aaron jammed the key into the door and wiggled it but found that the door would not open. Something was wrong with the lock. “Hurry up and open the damn thing!” Dan shouted, huddled close behind him.

“Shut up and let me focus. You yelling at me isn’t going to make this go any faster,” Aaron said as he wrestled with the old locking mechanism, coxing it into unsticking. Finally, something clicked within the lock, and the door swung open. However, by that time it was too late.

Three imps turned to look at him, displaying an uncanny amount of coordination as their heads moved in sync. Their pure white eyes widened in glee as they launched an attack at their newest target.

Three scorching hot balls of fire cut through the air towards Aaron’s head. He threw himself to the ground, just barely dodging them, but Dan wasn’t as lucky. Two balls of fire hit Dan square in the chest, launching him into the air. The third attack slammed into the wall with the physical force of a baseball bat, punching a small hole in it. Even from a distance, the intense heat of the fire singed his skin.

Before the imps could send another wave of attacks at him, Aaron dashed into the kitchen, not stopping till he was hidden behind a counter. Tony and Jess funneled in behind him, hot on his heels. Dan’s strangled cries of pain were cut off as Tony slammed the thick metal door shut and locked it from the inside.

“We should be safe for now. That door is made out of solid steel; I doubt even that big demon could bust through it quickly,” Tony said. The steel hinges of the door groaned as something slammed into it. Small tongues of fire seeped through the small gap between the door and the floor.

“Don’t jinx it,” Aaron said as he looked around the large room. The kitchen was a mess, bowls were upended, and skillets were left on the stove unattended. It looked like the kitchen staff had left in a hurry, which all things considered, was probably close to the truth.

The demons were too powerful to fight; running away was the only smart option. His skin was still singed even though he had dodged the balls of fire. Individually, he thought it would be possible to beat an imp if he had a gun, but he doubted he could beat them while they were all grouped up. Not in a fair fight, at least.

“What do we now?” Jess asked as she riffled through the kitchen supplies, grabbing a pair of knives. Tony followed her lead and grabbed a large cast-iron skillet.

“The same thing we’ve always wanted to do - escape. I’ve never seen the guards bring food in through the cafeteria, so that must mean that there has to be another way into the kitchen.” Aaron began opening all the doors in the kitchen, most led to deadens – pantries and janitorial rooms. But one small door in the back of the kitchen revealed a dark corridor that stretched off into the distance.

Tony hummed. “That must lead to the loading dock.”

“Are you sure?” Aaron asked. He had never seen the location himself, but he had heard that they received food shipments by boat there. Of course, it was just a rumor; he didn’t actually know how they received food shipments - the logistics of running a prison were beyond him.

“Yes, even after twenty years I remember; it’s how they brought me to the island. They stuffed me in between crates of food and shipped me here.”

Aaron smiled, a plan rapidly forming in his mind. “Well, let’s go steal a boat. We’re getting off this god-forsaken island.”

“I like that plan.” Tony rubbed the back of his head. “But, before we go: how do you use [Skills]? The system says I have a healing ability, but I can’t get it to work.”

“Just say the skills name, and it will work. That’s what I do,” Aaron said.

Jessica shook her head. “You have to visualize what you want the skill to do.” He tilted his head and thought for a moment; her accuracy was much better than his, so maybe she had a point. He resolved to try it her way next time. As much as he wanted to unload a stream of Mana Bolts right then and there; and test the new method of aiming, he knew he couldn’t. He had to conserve his mana; leveling up had only given him 30 MP back – enough for 6 attacks.

A green light surrounded Tony’s hand. “I see.” He healed a small wound on his hand. “Thanks for the advice.” The door shook again as small motes of flame filtered through it. “We should go, now.”

Aaron nodded. “Go on ahead; I’ll catch up in a minute.” Without much fanfare, they walked into the dark corridor, leaving him alone in the kitchen. He grabbed his chest in mock agony. At least hesitate a little bit before leaving me; what the heck?

He entered the janitorial closet and after a moment of searching grabbed a roll of duct tape and a magazine. He returned to the stove then pushed in the ignition. The burner hissed as it leaked gas into the room. He taped the knob into position then repeated the process with the other buttons. With one stove finished, he moved through the kitchen and prepared the rest of the burners as fast as possible. This was going to be a big explosion; he didn’t want to get caught up in it.

A bead of sweat dripped down his forehead as he shoved the magazine into the toaster and turned it on. Now he was on a timer. He had at most two minutes and 54 seconds before the room would explode if the burners released an industry-standard amount of gas – less if they weren’t well-calibrated.

He frowned as he remembered a distant memory: sleepless nights running through countless calculations – different ways of assassinating the mayor, each worse than the last. A gas explosion was one of the first methods he had thought of. However, he had eventually written off the method. It would cause too much collateral damage to be a viable solution, but in a situation like this – where he didn’t have to care about collateral damage, it would be perfect.

He grabbed a knife and ran through the kitchen. However, he stopped and did a double-take before he made it into the corridor. Hidden behind a half-opened metal door was a storage room with multiple large tanks of propane stored within it. He shook his head; no modern safety inspector would sign off on such a dangerous setup. However, the prison was built almost a hundred years ago, he doubted their safety standards were very high back then.

Though, he still doubted the need for them to use propane to fuel the kitchen. Alcatraz was off the main power grid, but they had a state-of-the-art generator hidden away in the basement to remedy that problem. Theoretically, it should be able to generate enough power to run the whole place without any problems. He had never seen the power go out in the couple of months that he had been here.

It must have been a holdover from the way they did things in the past - something that their complacency had led them to neglect to change. Under normal circumstances, it wouldn’t be a problem; an inmate had never broken into the kitchen before. He laughed. This stupid setup would be their downfall.

He took one last look at the kitchen then sprinted down the dark corridor as fast as he could, passing broken plates and over-turned crates. Someone other than Tony and Jess had been down this corridor recently – likely the kitchen staff. The walls blurred as he put all his focus into running away if he was anywhere near the blast radius – well, he didn’t want to think about it.

His labored breaths echoed off the narrow walls as time slowly ticked past. Each second he got further away from the danger zone. In the distance, he spotted Tony and Jess slowly walking. “Run,” he shouted.

Tony turned, then slowly began jogging away. Aaron caught up to them in less than a minute. “Why?” Tony asked in between gasps for air, running with an awkward gait – years of lazing around in prison had drained the athleticism out of the man.

“Just run.” They worked their way through the corridor till they reached a storage area. The corridor widened dramatically – to the point where it couldn't really be called a corridor anymore. The main path continued forward, but a large opening was carved into the side of the room, creating a cavern, for lack of a better word. In the cavern, rows of crates were piled till they touched the ceiling. He swerved to the side and hid behind a crate. Jess and Tony followed, close behind him.

“Why are we running; did the big demon guy break down the kitchen door?” Jess asked as she tried to fix her sweat-matted hair.

He panted like a dog on a hot summer day; sitting in a cell without much aerobic exercise really killed his endurance. “No, it didn’t break down the door.” He paused to get his breathing under control. As pathetic as it was, uttering that breath sentence had left him light-headed.

“Then what were you doing back there?” she asked. The ground shook slightly, so faint that if he wasn’t on the lookout for it, he wouldn’t have noticed. Did I do something wrong? A fraction of a second later, a blast wave shot through the corridor, lightly rattling the wooden crate they were hiding behind.

“That.” A massive number of blue screens popped up, blocking his vision.

Level 9 Imp Mage Slain! 225 Exp Gained.

Level 9 Imp Mage Slain! 225 Exp Gained.

Level 9 Imp Mage Slain! 225 Exp Gained.

Level 9 Imp Mage Slain! 225 Exp Gained.

…

Congratulations! Class: [Mage] has reached level 6. +4 Strength, +4 Endurance, +4 Recovery, +4 Defense, +8 Dexterity, +4 Agility, +8 Perception, +12 Mind, +12 Magic, +4 Spirit.