Chương 15: Chapter 14: Dark Roads and Thorny Walls

I pushed open the side yard gate just as Frank fired up the Ford van's engine. Behind me, I could hear Chad unlocking the heavy manual motor chain on the garage door, pulling the rollers upward with a loud, rhythmic rattle. The moment Frank backed the van smoothly out into the street, I swung the wooden gate shut, latched it tight, and climbed into the cab of Chad's old square-body truck. Putting the transmission into reverse, I rolled backward out into the cool night air.

Through the glass of the front living room window, I could see Denise standing in the dim light, watching me leave. I brought the truck to a brief halt in the center of the asphalt, blowing her a quick kiss and giving her a reassuring wave. She blew a kiss right back, mirroring our usual leaving routine, but even in the shadows, my enhanced vision caught the deep, heavy sadness lingering in her eyes.

I pointed a finger firmly to my own chest, pointed back at the house, and then held up a single pinky finger toward the windshield—an unspoken "pinky promise" that I was going to be completely fine, and that I would absolutely return to her. Through the window, Denise gave a soft, grim nod, a tiny smile cracking through her worry as she held up her own hand to return the promise.

With that anchor locked in, I threw the truck into drive, cut the headlights completely, and turned left at the intersection, navigating our way north out of town. The first few minutes on the road went smoothly, but our convoy strategy didn't stay a theoretical exercise for long. We had just cleared the final neighborhood grid and turned east onto the long, unlit country blacktop when Frank's voice suddenly crackled sharply through my earpiece.

"Derrick, we've got a problem up ahead," Frank murmured, his tone dead serious.

"Looks like a crude roadblock. A couple of old couches and some junk piled across both lanes. I'm slowing down."

"Copy that," I whispered into the mic, instantly easing off the accelerator.

"Do not stop completely if you can avoid it. Keep your rolling momentum. I'm hitting the shoulder right now." Thanks to my Dark Vision, the moonlit landscape was cast in clear, sharp grayscale. I gently guided the square-body onto the soft, grassy shoulder about three hundred yards behind Frank's taillights, cutting the engine into a dead silent glide.

"I see movement in the tree line on your left, Frank," I whispered, unlatching the door and slipping out into the tall weeds. I reached into the bench seat, grabbing my handmade snake bow and slipping the quiver over my shoulder. Each arrow was tipped with a vicious, tri-bladed broadhead, packed with an extra ten points of piercing damage.

"Two targets stepping out from the brush. One's carrying a long gun. Keeping their eyes on your headlights." Dog silently vaulted over the side of the truck bed, landing in the grass without making a sound, his ears pinned forward. I gave him a silent hand signal to stay low at my hip. Through the grayscale dark, I watched two desperate-looking scavengers step into the road, waving a rusted pipe and an old hunting shotgun toward Frank's idling van.

They thought they had an easy mark—a lone driver trapped by a junk pile. They had absolutely no idea a Level 5 Ranger was tracking them from the pitch-black void behind them. I slid an arrow onto the dacron string, drawing the heavy sixty-pound limbs back to my cheek. With my Strength sitting at eighteen, the massive tension felt as smooth as silk. I locked my eyes on the scavenger holding the shotgun, aiming just above his center mass. Thwack. The heavy wood limbs snapped forward.

The broadhead tore through the night air, striking the gunman squarely in the shoulder. A bright red damage indicator flashed across my vision: -38 HP. The impact was so punishing it literally knocked the man off his feet, sending his shotgun clattering uselessly against the asphalt as he let out an agonizing yell. The second scavenger froze in absolute horror, violently spinning around to scan the empty, blacked-out road behind him.

Before he could even process where the shot had come from, I already had a second arrow notched and drawn.

"Drop the pipe!" I roared from the darkness, the booming echo of my voice shattering the quiet of the country fields. The man took one look at his bleeding partner, looked back into the terrifying, invisible void of the road, and instantly hurled the rusted pipe into the ditch, throwing his hands straight into the air.

"Frank, secure the weapons and clear that junk out of the lane," I ordered calmly over the radio net, stepping out of the grass with my bow still half-drawn.

"We don't have time to linger." Frank didn't waste a second. He marched out of the van with his heavy sledgehammer resting over his shoulder, kicked the fallen shotgun into the tall weeds, and used his boosted Warrior strength to effortlessly heave the heavy junk couches clear off the asphalt, tossing them into the ditch like they were made of cardboard. The uninjured scavenger didn't even move, staring in wide-eyed terror at the sheer physical power of the man clearing the road.

"Let's move," Frank grunted, tossing a quick nod back toward my position in the dark. I slipped the arrow back into my quiver, hopped back into the driver's seat of the square-body, and fired up the carbureted engine. Within ninety seconds, our two-vehicle convoy was rolling down the blacktop again, leaving the two shell-shocked highwaymen eating our dust in the dark. As the adrenaline faded, the rest of the drive smoothed out.

I maintained my half-mile trailing distance, navigating around a few dead, EMP-fried cars scattered along the blacktop. Glancing into my side mirror a few times, I couldn't help but chuckle. Dog had his head leaning straight out over the truck bed, his face catching the wind with his tongue hanging out in a completely derpy, happy-go-lucky fashion. It was hilarious to look at.

I couldn't quite wrap my head around what had changed him so drastically—going from a terrifying, feral alpha dingo trying to rip my throat out over a goose, to this goofy house pet riding shotgun. Was it just the naturally less aggressive temperament of the American Dingo breed, or was it the pure magic of the System's taming spell? Maybe a perfect mix of both. Either way, I was incredibly glad it worked out the way it did. This book was originally published on Royal Road.

Check it out there for the real experience. As the trucks finally approached the perimeter of my mom's country property, my eyes widened in absolute shock. Spanning the entire front of the yard, stretching cleanly from the western fence line all the way to the eastern boundary, was a massive, eight-foot-tall wall of dense, intertwined vines. The vines were so tightly tangled and knotted together that it looked like it would take a whole construction crew with chainsaws and machetes just to clear a path through it.

To make matters worse, the exterior wood was completely covered in wicked, jagged thorns that looked capable of shredding a man's flesh to ribbons if he tried to climb over. Frank pulled the van up along the shoulder, and I parked the truck right behind him, cutting the ignitions. Stepping out onto the gravel, I climbed up onto the rear tire and stood on the side of the truck bed to get a look over the top of the foliage.

The exact second my head cleared the eight-foot mark, another head popped up on the opposite side of the barrier at the exact same height. It was my son, Alex. He was standing there with a massive, triumphant grin plastered across his face. He held a 12-gauge shotgun casually in his left hand, the barrel pointed safely at the sky and the stock resting against his hip. Putting on a hilariously terrible, exaggerated British accent, Alex looked right at me and said, "'Ello, fatha. Did ya bring the milk?"

I instantly busted out laughing, the sheer absurdity of the moment washing over me. The scene was completely surreal. Here I was, losing my mind for forty-eight hours, terrified that my mother and son were sitting out in the country completely defenseless against God knows what—and instead, my kid is just chilling behind a giant wall of magical death-thorns with a shotgun like it's a casual Tuesday afternoon. Well, "sitting there" wasn't entirely accurate.

He was clearly standing on something that had elevated him to greet me. Once my laughing fit finally died down, I wiped a tear from my eye.

"What in the world is going on here? What are you standing on? What is all of this?" Alex smirked, adjusting his grip on the shotgun.

"Do you want me to answer all of those at once, or should I just pick one at a time?"

"Alright, smartass," I chuckled, leaning against the truck cab.

"What is this crazy wall thing?"

"It's my Bramble Wall," he said proudly.

"Your Bramble Wall?" I repeated, narrowing my eyes as I focused my mind to activate my Inspect ability: [Name: Alex. Race: Human. Level: 5. Class: Druid.]"A Level 5 Druid?!" I exclaimed, staring at the floating text.

"Okay, you are definitely going to have to fill us in on the details in a minute. But first things first—are you and your grandmother completely safe?"

"We're doing great," Alex stated, his chest puffing out a bit.

"And second," I gestured to the wall, "how on earth do we actually get onto the property?"

"Oh, that part's easy," Alex replied. Without a single word of warning, the massive wall of thick brambles completely vanished into thin air. Alex dropped straight down to the grass, his knees bending slightly to absorb the impact as he landed flat on his feet.

"Were you literally standing on a section of the wall itself?" I asked, stepping down from the truck bed.

"Yeah, I sure was," Alex said, walking over to meet us.

"It's one of the spells I unlocked right after the System went live and the power grid fried. I got two main spells to start with: Bramble Wall and Vine Whip."

"Wow. Well, you can tell me all about the magic in a second. Right now, I'm just incredibly happy to see your face," I said, stepping forward and wrapping him in a fierce, heavy hug. I let him go and gestured toward the road.

"We need to get these vehicles tucked into the driveway so you can put that defensive wall back up." Frank stepped up next, giving Alex a quick, hearty hug of his own, and we quickly climbed back into our cabins to guide the Ford van and the square-body truck down the long gravel driveway. The moment I stepped back out of the truck, I looked down the road and watched Alex raise his hands into the air, his face tightening with deep concentration as he tapped into his mana pool.

Right before my eyes, the thorny bramble wall began to rapidly sprout from the dirt, weaving itself from one side of the property line to the other. Within a single minute, the eight-foot barrier was fully reformed, completely cutting our position off from the open roadway. Glancing past the driveway toward my mom's garden, I noticed her old hobby greenhouse was absolutely overflowing with incredibly lush, vibrant green plants.

Even from a distance, I could see massive, oversized vegetables hanging heavily from the vines. The System's Fuckery was clearly working overtime out here in the soil. A sudden, sharp commotion broke out behind me, and I turned around just in time to see Pepper, Frank's dog, come bursting out of the farmhouse door at a full sprint. I instantly grabbed Dog by the back of his thick neck, sending a wave of calming intention down our mental bond as I gave a firm, quiet command: "Stay."

Dog obeyed instantly, dropping his hips to the gravel, but I could feel the intense, vibrating eagerness pulsing through his muscles as he locked his eyes on the newcomer. Pepper had clearly been heavily affected by the System's evolutionary growth stage, too. She stood every bit as tall and heavily muscled as Dog, completely defying her original size. She was a gorgeous, dark brindle German and Australian Shepherd mix.

The second she reached Frank, she vaulted upward, planting her massive front paws squarely onto his shoulders and aggressively licking his face, nearly toppling him over onto the gravel. If Frank hadn't dumped his recent attribute points into his Strength stat, the sheer impact of the overgrown shepherd probably would have flattened him into the dirt.

"I take it she missed you," Mom said, a warm, familiar smile on her face as she stepped out onto the porch behind the dog. Frank smiled brightly, gently pushing Pepper's heavy paws off his chest so he could wrap his wife in a deep, emotional embrace.

"Sorry I'm a little bit late getting home from work, honey." Mom laughed softly against his shoulder.

"It's alright. I figured you guys just ran into some car trouble or something."

"Yeah... something like that," Frank chuckled. Mom pulled away from Frank and walked straight over to me, wrapping her arms around my tactical vest in a tight hug.

"I missed you, kiddo."

"What? Don't tell me you weren't worried about us out there," I teased sarcastically, hugging her back.

"Nah," she smirked, stepping away.

"I knew you'd show up sooner or later. Who's that giant guy you're holding onto back there?"

"Dog," I answered simply. Mom stared at me for a second, then let out a soft sigh.

"Yep. That's exactly what I figured. I don't even need to ask. John Wayne, right?"

"Got it in one," I giggled. A low, soft whimpering sound reminded me that I was still holding Dog back by his collar. Looking down at him, I could tell his body language wasn't aggressive at all; his thick tail was wagging like crazy, and I could sense nothing but pure curiosity vibrating through his bond. Over by the porch, Pepper was being held back by Frank's hand, whining and wagging her tail in the exact same manner.

"Alright," I called out to Frank.

"Let them go. They're going to have to figure each other out sooner or later." We released our grips at the exact same time. Dog cleared the side of the truck bed in a single, smooth leap, trotting over to meet Pepper in the center of the yard. The two massive animals immediately entered into the classic, high-stakes canine ritual—circling each other in tight loops, ears perked, doing the whole'Hi, nice to meet you, let me thoroughly inspect your rear end' routine.

"Well, they aren't tearing each other's throats out," I noted, watching them relax.

"Let's just leave them to settle the pack hierarchy while we head inside." Before crossing the threshold into the house, I reached down to my vest and keyed up the push-to-talk button on my radio, checking our comms link with Chad's house.

"Base, this is Red Rover. How do you copy? Over." A second later, Chad's raspy voice crackled clearly through the speaker.

"Loud and clear, Red Rover."

"Copy that. We are officially on location," I reported, keeping my voice low.

"Everything here is code four, family is secure. I'll be back en route to your position shortly. Over."

"Copy that, son. See you soon. Keep your eyes open and stay safe. Over."

"Will do. Red Rover out." With our security check complete, I reached into the truck cab and gathered up my broadsword, my recurve bow, and my heavy rucksack. Leaving the two giant dogs to finish their business in the yard, we turned and walked into the warmth of the farmhouse.