Werewolves attacking on our first night shouldn’t have surprised any of us. I’d faced the deadly monsters and knew better than anyone how difficult they were to put down. I doubted whoever was on watch was truly prepared to handle a pack of werewolves. They needed help, and they needed it now.

  “We have to get out there,” Ruby cried, leaping to her feet beside me. Her beautiful face was slightly flushed from drinking so much of Sam’s weak ale, but her natural regeneration would cancel any slight inebriation quickly.

  The hall to the main door was clogged with partygoers, so I instead rushed to one of the big, shuttered windows in the outer wall.

  “Shostakovich, It’ll take too long,” Ruby said, then blinked in surprise and glanced at me. “What did you just hear?”

  “It sounded like Shostakovich.”

  “Cyrus changed my swear again, but that’s not a Jumanji reference.”

  “I’m so glad you noticed,” Cyrus chimed in cheerily. “Do you like it?”

  “Wait, that’s a Russian composer. Hey, are you copying Santa from Rise of the Guardians?”

  Cyrus chuckled. “Quick on the artwork, as always, Lucas.”

  “It’s quick on the draw.”

  “Why limit yourself to one form of art?”

  “That’s not . . . Never mind. Why change our swears again?”

  “Two reasons. First, I regret not including a Rise of the Guardians team. That one’s a classic. Second, you were all whining so much about the Jumanji swears, I’ve decided to switch them up! Every tier will unlock a new range of unique swears. I even changed it so all of your close friends will share the same pool of swears.”

  Tomas and Jane were looking around uneasily. They weren’t as used to chatting with Cyrus. Apparently no one was, and folks would soon notice and make stupid assumptions.

  Thankfully, the people around us were too busy pushing for the exit to realize it was Cyrus speaking. I didn’t need someone spreading even more rumors that I was colluding with the AI right when the town was attacked.

  “Great,” I said sarcastically.

  “I’m so glad you approve,” Cyrus said.

  “This is Bach,” Jane grumbled, then rolled her eyes.

  We were wasting time. “Jeeves, I need to get outside now.”

  I could have accessed the castle menu myself, but that would take too long. I’d seen something in them during my initial quick review about window defensive turrets. I’d love to check those out, but not now.

  The butler apparition appeared next to me, unflappable expression unchanged. “Very good, sir.”

  The shutter disappeared, along with the window behind it. I planned to simply jump through, but the wall melted, stone flowing down into a set of stairs to the ground.

  “Perfect. Thanks.”

  “Good hunting, sir. May I suggest shoes?”

  “I’ll get to it,” I promised as I raced out with the others hot on my heels.

  Flashes of magical light pierced the darkness on the northern edge of town, punctuated by shouts, screams, and several wolf howls. Scores of people were running in that direction and I sprinted after. Seven people streamed after, including Tomas, Jane, Ruby, and Steve, plus Lana the Latina crossbow illusionist and Andy the dual-sword warrior from Tomas’s team, and Scott the ocular blaster from Jane’s X-men team.

  I forgot I was faster. I still wasn’t sure which physical stats affected running speed. Probably a combination of Strength, Agility, and Endurance. They’d all jumped by so much that even with the Efficiency being only 40%, my effective stats now pretty much equaled what my pure stats had been before that last title.

  Honestly, it was kind of mind-blowing. Now my effective tier-0 Agility was a whopping 556, and my Endurance 428. Those were pushing well into superhero ranges. What would I be able to do now? Fighting some werewolves provided the perfect opportunity to find out.

  I eased my pace. During my insane sprint up the mountains to face Bristleback the boar-tar sacred boss, I’d topped out at over 200 miles per hour. Now I could probably go even faster, so as I slowed, I felt like I was barely jogging while everyone else sprinted pretty much flat out.

  Our Base Camps were already on the western side of town, and more Base Camps stretched all the way to the western edge of the clearing, ending about 100 feet from the trees. The larger street just north of us was flanked by wooden shops of crafters.

  All the streets in that section of town ran east to west, bisecting the town from the forest on either side. We joined throngs of other people running toward the disturbance, withe more paralleling our path on nearby streets.

  When we neared the fight, my Wolf Sight night vision ability made it easy to see through the deep shadows and pick out what was going on. I had heard that the first group who arrived in the area and established the town, led by Tony and Burns, had received some pretty impressive upgrades.

  One of those was a set of perimeter wooden ward stakes they set up around the entire town. When activated, they formed a pretty good magical defensive barrier, strong enough to block most creatures.

  That barrier shimmered into view every time something struck it. At the moment, it was flashing like a strobe light. Outside the perimeter, a dozen werewolves were prowling and lashing at the barrier.

  Four more werewolves had gotten inside somehow. Two of them were standing over the bloody, mangled forms of half a dozen humans. Four men and two women looked dead, or close to it. Blood and guts and body parts were strewn everywhere.

  The other 2 werewolves were closer. It looked like they’d chased a bunch of other people away and were fighting a knot of men and women. Half a dozen people were attacking each wolf with weapons and spells, but their regeneration made them terrifying to put down.

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  The werewolves plowed into the ranks of fighters, biting and slashing with claws, ripping flesh and sending people flying. Then one of the wolves staggered back from a middle-aged, big-framed guy with balding hair I didn’t know. The wolf had been about to eat his face, but he’d thrown up a hand and cast something.

  The werewolf shook its head violently, its jaw distended from something inside shoving it farther and farther open. I zoomed my vision on the mass of brown objects flying from the werewolf’s mouth and chuckled.

  Potatoes. The werewolf’s mouth was full to bursting with huge potatoes. It looked like the monster was choking on them. That guy must be the potato wizard who’d made all the delicious fries. Lucky move.

  I charged forward and shouted above the din of snarling wolves and screaming people. “Melee fighters to the front. Ranged fighters behing. Work together to take them out!”

  I mentally touched my inventory, planning to drop Soulrend and Fang into my hands to dive into the fight. Except my blades had both been lost in the final crazy fight to escape stage 1. Again I hesitated for a second as I mentally shifted gears.

  My team didn’t. Jane pointed at the nearest wolf just as it lunged toward a stumbling sword-wielding warrior. The werewolf stopped mid-lunge and floated into the air, limbs scrabbling uselessly against nothing.

  Steve fired an ice-imbued arrow while Lana shot it with her crossbow at the same time. Her exploding bolt blew off one of the monster’s rear legs. Steve’s arrow punched deep into its side and ice started creeping across its torso.

  That wouldn’t slow it for long, but for a second it was no longer a threat. The other werewolf spat out a stream of potatoes, then froze, crimson eyes locking on me. It raised its muzzle and howled. The sound reverberated through the night and the other wolves took up the cry.

  I might no longer be a werewolf, but my upgraded Linguasight utility spell did translate most languages. The werewolves were sentient creatures, so it worked on them too. The pack were calling for the Alpha.

  “Oh, Schumann.”

  The other werewolf started to charge straight at me, but Tomas suddenly appeared right next to it, sword already swinging. The wolf ignored him, despite Tomas cutting deep along its flank. The wound healed almost instantly.

  A red beam that looked like a laser shot past my shoulder as Scott Terrell from Jane’s X-men team unleashed his ocular beam. It caught the charging werewolf in the chest and blasted it right over backward with a smoking hole in its torso. It rolled back to its feet, the nasty hole visibly closing.

  I’d fought werewolves. Hell, I’d been a werewolf, but again seeing their insane regeneration speeds was awe-inspiring. My team had given me the second I needed to adjust my mental battle plan.

  My blades were gone, but I had a new class. Time to test out the shiny new class spells I received with Backdoor Synergy Wizard.

  Although, now that I thought about it, I didn’t have many offensive spells left to synergize. I’d burned through just about everything I had trying to escape the first stage, just like I had with my weapons and gear.

  Okay. Plan C, then.

  I leaped into a sprint, closing on the werewolf in a blink as I accelerated like a race car. The werewolf opened its jaws to snap at me, but it clearly hadn’t expected me to move so fast. Behind me, Ruby shouted a warning, but my entire focus was on the wolf.

  My 500 pound giant ogre club appeared in my hands and I threw all my strength and momentum into a baseball style swing that would have made Babe Ruth proud. The werewolf’s eyes widened in surprise just before the club splattered it to paste and sent its bloody, mangled remains flying all the way back through the defensive energy wall.

  “Recover from that, pal,” I grinned as I tossed my huge club back into my inventory. My Strength had grown to the point I could wield the giant club like a fighting stick if I had to, but it was so big, it wasn’t practical.

  The pile of werewolf goo did start re-forming, but it would take a while, and it was now stuck outside the town’s barrier. My team had concentrated all their attention on the wolf that Jane still held in the air with her telekinesis. Her control and power had at least doubled since I’d seen her use that spell last.

  The werewolf’s regeneration was visibly slowing as Steve and Lana peppered it with explosive bolts and ice arrows, while Tomas and Andy dashed in between volleys to carve it with blades.

  Another howl turned me back to the other 2 werewolves that had been standing over the fallen humans. Now I realized why they’d been waiting. They weren’t finishing off the people. They were waiting for them to transform.

  Six sleek new werewolves were rising from the bloody ground to join the 2 who had mostly killed them. Lycanthropic Transformation had worked instantly on me. It looked like it took a few extra seconds when you didn’t Harvest the spell and consciously trigger it.

  “Get back!” I shouted to everyone as all 6 werewolves charged us.

  More fighters were arriving every second, so as we stepped back, we formed a rough line facing the werewolves. Spells and arrows filled the air as everyone unleashed a mighty volley against the monsters.

  Fire balls, ice bolts, and lances of lightning tore through monster flesh. I also glimpsed less common spells unleashed. One werewolf dove into a shimmering bubble that grew in front of it. The bubble looked like a giant version of the soap bubbles we used to blow as kids.

  The werewolf clearly expected to burst through, but the bubble held and the wolf’s forward momentum turned into spinning. It tumbled over and over as the bubble slowly drifted higher and started filling with liquid. It didn’t look like water, either, but was a sinister orange color, like really fizzy orange soda.

  The werewolf’s thrashing slowly stilled as it drowned in the bubble. The orange liquid solidified around it like foam. I shuddered. That was a nasty way to go.

  Other unusual spells included one that summoned an old-fashioned cast-iron stove above a charging werewolf. The heavy stove crushed it into the ground, then belched a stream of purple fire that consumed the wolf and filled the air with the scent of charred hair and overcooked meat.

  The person with the building block power must have showed up because they scattered small blocks right in front of a running werewolf. When it stepped on them, it howled in pain and crashed to the ground.

  Back on Earth, stepping on Legos was a great way to wreck your feet, but werewolf paws should have been too tough. Somehow the blocks still stabbed into the wolf’s feet, and when it fell, walls of blocks quickly stacked themselves all around it, forming a cage. As soon as the wolf lunged and smashed the cage apart, every single block detonated like frag grenades, ripping the wolf into a shredded mess.

  Wow. Cyrus had said just about any spell could be used as the foundation for an eventual build, and I’d thought I had been creative. I wished I had time to ask those people how on Earth they’d developed those powers.

  The werewolf charge slowed, but the two original werewolves plowed through the rain of arrows and spells, dodging many with impressive agility. They closed on me, their red eyes locked on with killing intent.

  My team were right behind me, but they were still focused on finishing off the first wolf Jane had caught. The howls and shouts and sizzling spells triggered a remembered bloodlust from the one night I’d spent as a werewolf and I bared my fangs. I would not wait for my prey to come to me.

  I triggered Energy Ward along with my new Elemental Harmony class spell.

  “Elemental Harmony. Combine the effects of up to 3 elemental-based potions with any spell you cast to add a melded elemental effect to the spell. Effects vary depending on potions applied and base spell used.”

  I added a potion of lightning resistance and a potion of fire resistance to Energy Ward. My defensive aura thrummed and became visible as a glowing sphere of yellow and red bands swirling around me. It passed harmlessly through my team.

  Then I selected tether points and triggered Tether Slide. This time when the golden chain shot from me to the first tether point, the front of it looked like an ethereal grapple claw. It caught the second werewolf in the face before a second line shot out to my final tether point.

  So cool. Too bad the tether claw didn’t deal any physical damage. As my spell yanked me off the ground, a rush of exhilaration and battle lust swept through me and I snarled, baring my teeth again like wolf fangs. I shot forward like I’d been fired from a ballista, straight at the nearest wolves.

  They leaped at me without hesitation. Steve managed to hit one with an ice arrow just before I reached it, but the werewolf never flinched, its crimson gaze locked on me.

  Blasting through the two wolves was a moment of pure thrill. Energy Ward deflected the snapping jaws and raking claws just wide of my body while delivering a triple return hit. The werewolves bounced back under the power of double the deflected physical damage while their muscles convulsed under intense lightning shocks and their muzzles and paws caught fire.

  “That’s what I’m talking about!” I laughed. Combining these two spells was already a favorite new tactic.

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