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[Chapter 21] Terrible Name Ideas for a Party: a Comprehensive List

  This forest was drenched in blood.

  Ace ran the back of his hand across his brow to wipe away the sweat. Heat hung between the massive tree trunks like a physical presence, the air so thick that it seemed to coat Ace's lungs with each unnecessary breath. Above the canopy, the sky burned crimson—not the gentle red of Earth's sunsets, but the same dark crimson of freshly spilled blood. It cast everything beneath it in a sickly, slaughterhouse glow that turned shadows purple-black and highlighted every imperfection in the twisted landscape. Rays of bloody light penetrated the gaps between massive leaves, creating spotlights filled with dancing orbs of dust and pollen.

  But the sound, most of all, caught him off guard. There was a steady hum of distant activity—the snap of jaws, the rustle of something massive moving through undergrowth, the occasional distant scream cut suddenly short. The effect created a tapestry that set his every nerve on edge. Nothing in this forest was truly still. Everything watched. Everything hungered.

  Even, perhaps, his teammates.

  They had formed a party—which meant sharing kills, EXP, and whatever else came with the rampant murder required of this bloody landscape the System had created.

  "Is anyone else feeling... weird?" Olivia asked, rubbing her arms as if trying to brush away invisible cobwebs.

  "I can feel all of you," Rachel whispered, her eyes wide with wonder. "Like, actually feel you. Marcus, your shoulder is killing you."

  Marcus rotated his right shoulder with a grimace. "Old weightlifting injury. Didn't realize it was that obvious."

  "It wasn't," Rachel replied. "Until now."

  Ace shuddered, trying to shake off the sensation of suddenly wearing four extra skins. It was like having phantom limbs, except that the extension of himself was other people.

  Nope.

  He wasn’t a fan.

  In Ace's peripheral vision, four faint auras pulsed—color-coded indicators of his companions' statuses. Rachel's glowed a vibrant green, almost crackling with energy and enthusiasm. Tara's shimmered a cool blue, controlled and precise. Olivia's flickered a soft yellow, wavering with uncertainty but surprisingly resilient at its core. Marcus's burned a deep red, solid and unyielding.

  "This is fucking incredible," Rachel said, bouncing on her toes. "I can tell Ace is exhausted but pushing through it anyway. Classic Marine bullshit."

  "And I can tell you haven't slept properly in three days," Ace shot back. “Care to tell us why?”

  Rachel’s lips pursed in annoyance, but she didn’t respond.

  Tara's lips twisted into a rare half-smile.

  As Ace took a step forward, he felt the others shift their weight in subtle response, like magnets adjusting to maintain optimal distance. Their movements weren't forced but instinctively coordinated—five separate bodies beginning to function with the synchronized precision of a single organism.

  "It's stronger when we move together," Olivia observed quietly, her perpetual nervousness momentarily replaced by fascination. "Like we're all strings on the same instrument."

  But there was a vulnerability to it that left Ace uneasy. These people could now sense his weaknesses, his dread—the parts of himself he'd learned to bury deep during his time as a Marine.

  The parts that had no place in survival.

  "Don't worry," the System whispered in his ear. “The connection has limits. Physical status and basic emotional states only. Your thoughts are still your own… for now."

  Ace couldn’t resist the rush of relief that swam through him at the thought, even if he wasn’t entirely sure he trusted anything the floating sadist said.

  As they stood together in their newly forged connection, the air between them seemed to shimmer with invisible current. Five separate beings, now linked by the System's magic. For better or worse, they were no longer just allies of convenience.

  They were a team. A unit.

  And, as always, Ace looked out for his own.

  “Congratulations!” the chipper System said happily as she floated in a circle around the newly formed group. “I think a fine team like this deserves a name, don’t you?”

  “Yeah,” Marcus said with a hint of excitement. “It should be something badass.”

  “Priorities,” Ace said with a shake of his head. “We need to focus on—”

  “C’mon, you boring old thing,” the System said with a pout. “It’s for morale!”

  “It’s for your entertainment,” Ace corrected with a sidelong glare her way.

  She giggled, evidently caught red-handed.

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  “I know!” Marcus interrupted. “The Crimson Dawn.”

  “Or the Blood Debt Collectors,” Tara suggested, though she couldn’t stop the playful grin at the corner of her mouth.

  Ace couldn’t resist a chuckle, but he needed to get the rest of them to regroup. “C’mon, guys. Let’s focus.”

  “The Fang Gang?” Rachel suggested.

  Everyone went silent, each of them staring at Rachel and too stunned to say anything.

  “You cannot be serious,” Ace finally said, breaking the spellbound silence.

  “The Fang Gang it is!” the System said with a happy little chirp.

  “What?!” Marcus interjected. “No, that’s stupid!”

  “It’s terrible,” the System agreed with a cheerful nod. “That’s why you’re stuck with it!”

  From somewhere behind them, Victor laughed.

  A prompt appeared in front of each of them, except for Victor.

  [PARTY FORMED: "THE FANG GANG"]

  “Rachel, I swear to God,” Marcus pinched the bridge of his nose and curled one hand into a fist. “Just… just don’t talk anymore.”

  “Bye!” The System gave them a little wave and, in a rush of sparks and fire, dissolved into the air.

  Ace sighed in frustration.

  Somewhere out there, the System was watching their reactions with that sadistic little smile of hers, pleased with her handiwork.

  "The Fang Gang," Victor repeated, still chuckling. "Oh, that's precious. Still glad you formed your little group, Blackwell?"

  Ace didn’t reply. He wasn’t about to rise to the bait.

  "We're not actually going by that," Tara said, though her tone suggested resignation rather than conviction.

  "It's already locked in," Olivia pointed out, gesturing at the notification still hovering in the air. "System-approved and everything."

  Ace rubbed his temples. "Can we please focus on survival? We need to—"

  He stopped mid-sentence, his nostrils flaring.

  Something wasn't right.

  A faint, copper-tinged scent brushed against his heightened senses—but there was no mistaking what it was.

  Blood.

  It was back, and it was stronger than ever.

  "You guys smell that?" he asked quietly, his posture shifting from annoyed to alert in an instant.

  Marcus frowned, lifting his head and inhaling deeply. "Yeah. Blood, about half a mile out, maybe less."

  Through their newfound connection, Ace felt the others' reactions ripple across his consciousness—Rachel's excitement, Olivia's fear, Tara's cool calculation. The shift in emotional tenor was immediate, like a stage transitioning from comedy to horror with a single lighting change.

  "Might be nothing," Tara said, though she grabbed her bow and stood as she stared off in the direction it was coming from. "Could be a wounded animal."

  "It's getting stronger," Olivia whispered, her yellow aura pulsing with anxiety. "Too strong, too fast."

  She was right. The scent intensified with each passing second, metallic and sharp—like rust-coated pennies dissolving on the tongue. Whatever was bleeding wasn't just nearby; it was charging straight toward them.

  Victor's smile vanished. "We should move. Now."

  "No," Ace countered, dropping into a defensive stance. "With that thing’s speed, we’ll never outrun it. Besides, we don't know what's out there, or how many. Moving blind could take us right into a trap."

  The scent of blood grew heavier, coating the back of his throat. His fangs extended involuntarily, his body responding to the promise of sustenance even as his mind raced with ideas on how to handle the approaching danger.

  Through their connection, he felt the same primal hunger awakening in his companions—their vampire nature responding in unison, like wolves catching the scent of a wounded deer.

  "Form up," he ordered, falling back on Marine training. "Rachel, Olivia—back to back in the center. Marcus, Tara—flanking positions. Victor—"

  But Victor was already moving, scaling the nearest tree with inhuman speed, positioning himself as a lookout.

  Damn it.

  "Movement in the trees," Victor said, his voice tense. "Coming in fast from the east."

  The bloody haze in the air became overwhelming, no longer just a scent but now an assault—rich, warm, and terrifyingly abundant. Too much blood for one creature.

  Hell, too much blood for ten.

  Vibrations rumbled through the ground beneath their feet. The thunder of falling trees and tumbling branches grew closer with each passing second. A distant crash echoed through the forest—the unmistakable sound of something massive tearing through underbrush, snapping trees like they were twigs.

  The crashing grew louder. Closer. Whatever was coming wasn't trying to be stealthy—it was charging straight for them.

  And, given their luck thus far against the creatures in this world, it was probably hungry.

  "Ready your weapons," Ace commanded, his own blade glinting in the dim light.

  "It's—" Victor's warning was cut short as he leapt from his perch, barely avoiding the tree as it exploded into splinters.

  Through the demolished treeline, something massive emerged—a writhing mountain of flesh and fangs, its skin slick with blood that wasn't its own. The creature's multiple eyes locked on them with predatory intelligence, its massive jaws dripping with gore from previous kills.

  The forest before them split open as something erupted from the treeline—not charging through it, but rising from within it. What Ace had mistaken for an ordinary ancient oak was transforming, its bark splitting to reveal a grotesque, humanoid torso. Branches twisted and elongated into razor-sharp limbs that dripped with a viscous mixture of sap and blood. At the center of its trunk-like body, a face emerged—wooden and alien, with glowing blue eyes that fixed on them with predatory intelligence.

  All around it, the carcasses of forest animals hung from its lower branches—deer, wolves, and what looked disturbingly like human remains, their blood draining down its bark in rivulets.

  “What the fuck is that?!” Tara gaped up at it and took a few wary steps backward.

  In answer, a notification flickered to life above the monstrosity.

  ———

  CARNAGE FIEND [LEVEL 12]

  Core Racial Trait: Poisonous branches

  ———

  “Oh, good,” Ace muttered under his breath. “We’re being attacked by a tree.”

  Because why the fuck not.

  The creature's wooden jaw unhinged, expanding to an impossible length as it let out a sound that was half-roar, half-creaking timber—a sound no plant should ever make.

  And then it darted across the mossy forest floor, its clawed branches digging into the dirt for balance and kicking up chunks of soil as it launched forward. It moved far faster than something that big had any right to.

  Too close.

  Too fast.

  And headed right for Ace.

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