Ed and Mordy reached the end of the alleyway.
"It's a dead end." Mordy frowned. "Hey Ed. What are you spacing out for?"
"Huh?" Ed lifted his head. "Sorry. I was just thinking about what that man said. He mentioned the sinless."
"The sinless?"
"Right. Ed nodded. "Before the nightmare attack there was always an old guy at the park preaching about the sinless. They were some kind of anti-esper religious group. I wonder if the faith spread after the attack?
"Hard to say." Mordy shook his head. "It could have just been one crazy dude. It's also possible people from other cities traveled here after the attack."
"That's true…" Ed rubbed his chin. "They could have also come here specifically to spread the religion. It's easier to recruit people during hard times."
"Groar!" A roar sounded. Ed turned and saw a winged black-panther lunging at him. Ed lifted his right arm without thinking. The panther bit onto his arm. A crunching sound rang out as the metal dented.
"Ugh!" Ed took several steps back after the panther let go of his arm. A sizzling sound could be heard. When he looked down at his arm he saw black miasma corroding it slowly. Ed hurriedly used his powers to reform the arm back into proper shape.
"How strong is that mutant?" Mordy yelled. "It deformed your steel arm like it was a soda can!" Mordy shot a large ball of acid towards the panther. The panther took a direct hit, but was completely unaffected! "Looks like my acid doesn't work on it." Mordy frowned. He moved closer to Ed while holding the pipe he found earlier. He held the pipe in a defensive stance.
Ed took aim with his arm. Bang! A bullet slammed into the shoulder of the panther! It tore through skin and opened a small wound. However, it failed to cause any major damage. "Damnit!" Ed gritted his teeth. He controlled his power to melt the ground underneath the panther. The panther easily dodged out of the way.
"Hurry up and trap it!" Mordy screamed. The panther was running towards him!
"I'm trying!" Ed melted the ground in front of Mordy, but the panther easily dodged backwards. Then it unfurled its large wings and flew into the air. It stared at the boys with its sharp gold eyes. The black miasma surrounding it formed into a large black ball that shot at them!
"Shit!" Ed melted the ground and a large wall formed in front of them. The black ball slammed into it and immediately burnt a large hole in it. "Let's go!" Ed screamed as he turned around. He melted the wall of the nearby building and created a hole. Ed and Mordy dived through the hole and the wall closed behind them.
"Holy shit!" Mordy yelled. "That was a mutant with a mana-core! Our luck is really dog-shit!"
"It's too soon to relax. Let's go." Ed hurriedly ran towards the stairs. A loud crashing sound occurred behind them. The panther had easily broken through the wall.
The boys ran up two flights of stairs. "Mordy!" Ed yelled. "Its powers are similar to yours. What's your weakness?"
"My weakness?!" Mordy hesitated. Then his face turned serious. "It's water. My acid becomes useless as it's diluted by water."
"Water? Perfect!" Ed turned around. The panther appeared after a few seconds. Ed ran straight for the panther. It lunged towards him. Ed rolled out of the way and took aim. A large blast of steam fired from his right arm.
"Grahh!" The panther moaned in pain. The steam blasted away the black miasma surrounding its body and left large burns behind.
"Now Mordy!" Ed screamed.
"I'm on it!" Mordy shot dozens of small acid balls towards the panther. Loud sizzling sounds rang out as its flesh slowly melted. It screamed in agonizing pain the whole time. Then it fell to the ground. Mordy began walking towards the corpse.
"Wait!" Ed called. "Let me restrain it just in case." Ed melted the floor and reformed it to bind the panther.
Mordy got close and gave it a couple of good kicks. "Should be dead." Mordy collapsed to the ground. "Huff! Huff!" He breathed heavily. "That was insane. I thought we were going to die."
Ed sat down to recover his breathing as well. Sweat covered his entire body. He could barely move his right arm due to lack of mana. The two rested for nearly an hour before recovering.
Ed got up and melted the panther's head to reveal a mana-core. It shone with 7 colors, but the black color took up most of the core. "How do you want to split it?" Ed questioned.
"You keep it." Mordy shook his head. "You did most of the work this time around. We can split the body."
"Okay." Ed nodded and put the mana-core in his pocket. He then used his mana to divide the dead panther into a pile of bones, meat, and hide. "How are we going to carry all this?" Ed questioned.
Mordy frowned. "I hadn't thought of that before coming… Leave the meat. It's the least valuable. We can use some of it for rations once we cook it. The hide should be the most valuable. Can you make it easier to carry?"
"Sure." Ed nodded. He used his powers and the hide melted. It condensed into two leather backpacks. The condensed material was much stronger than before. "They're heavy but this is the best I can do for now."
"Alright." Mordy smiled. "This is already pretty good. As for the bones, let's just leave them. They're less valuable than the hide and they're too heavy to carry."
"Okay." Ed agreed. "Since we're ditching them then I might as well use them a little." He melted a few of the stronger bones and fused them into his metal arm. "Hopefully that increases the durability a little…"
The two decided to setup camp in the building since it would be night soon. Each of them had brought a backpack with food, water, and some other goods. They abandoned the cheap backpacks for their new panther leather ones. Then they setup a fire and roasted some meat.
"This is pretty good!" Mordy greedily ate the meat. "I can feel my mana increase as I eat it. No wonder espers love hunting mutants."
"Mm." Ed nodded. He licked some grease off his fingers while eating the meat. "I think I'll turn some into beef jerky to bring with us." Ed cooked some meat. Then he used his powers to dry the meat. He couldn't remove the moisture, but he could remove the meat while leaving the moisture behind. He then condensed it into thin strips. He took a bite. "Mm… It tastes weird. Is this not how beef jerky is made? Oh well, at least it's edible."
Mordy tried some as well and made a weird face. "Yeah… you need to work on that…"
"I will." Ed nodded.
The night slowly passed as the boys chatted. When it was time to sleep they took turns keeping watch.
The next day, Ed awoke to the building shaking. "What's going on?!" He yelled. The entire building was moving. They were in an office building. Papers fell everywhere, chairs moved around and ceiling tiles started to fall upon them.
"Let's go!" Mordy yelled. He blasted a hole in the nearby window and jumped out. He shot a large amount of acid below him and it started to melt the ground. He landed within the acid completely unharmed.
Ed followed behind him. He used his metal arm to grip the building as he slid down. A loud thud rang out as he landed on the ground.
The two ran from the building and turned around to see it collapse. It fell straight down on itself. Mordy had a grim face. He spoke, "A few more seconds and we would have died…"
Clap, clap, clap. A teenager nearby clapped his hands. "Very impressive. I thought for sure you two would die from that."
The two turned around and saw a tall teenager. He had long brown hair. He wore ordinary blue jeans and a black leather jacket. He had tan skin and brown eyes.
"Why did you attack us?" Mordy questioned.
"Attack?" The teenager shook his head. "That was just a greeting. If I wanted you dead, then I would have just collapsed the building sooner."
Ed took aim with his arm. "Who are you? why are you here? You have ten seconds to answer before I blow your brains out."
"Relax, relax!" The teenager put his hands up. "My name is Quake. I belong to the Reef Kingdom. I saw two unfamiliar espers and figured I'd see what would happen if I attacked. It's only natural that I probe outside espers."
Ed frowned. "How did you know we were espers? What is the Reef Kingdom?"
"Wow!" Quake exclaimed. "You really must not be from around here. Everyone knows about the Reef Kingdom. As for how I knew you were espers… you're walking around with a metal arm dude. It's pretty damn obvious."
Ed looked at his arm and frowned. 'Will I have to disguise it as a normal arm in the future…?'
"So, what's this Reef Kingdom you're on about?" Mordy questioned.
"We're the local esper group." Quake smiled. "We rule Reef city. Well, most of it anyways. Damn Sinless bastards keep interfering, but we'll wipe them out soon."
"Why name it the Reef Kingdom?" Ed questioned.
"That's obviously because we serve the king!" Quake grinned. "I can introduce you if you want. We could always use new espers."
"What do you think Ed?" Mordy questioned. "Should we meet with their so-called king? Maybe we can form some kind of alliance for Blood-Lust? That would probably earn us some merit we can use to exchange for equipment."
"It's suspicious." Ed frowned. "How can there be an esper powerful enough for all of the Reef espers to serve him willingly? Also, would World Walker not be aware of the situation before sending us here? Things don't add up."
"That's true." Mordy nodded. "World Walker should be picking us up in two days anyways. Let's just wait for him."
"Right." Ed nodded. He looked towards Quake and spoke, "We'll decline your offer. We'll be leaving now. If you attack us again, I'll kill you."
"Haha, sure! No problem!" Quake laughed. "I'll meet you guys here again in three days, okay?"
Ed and Mordy gave Quake a confused look. Then they shook their heads and left. The next two days they kept a low profile while hiding in nearby office buildings. They occasionally found a mutant and hunted it. Unfortunately, they found none with mana-cores. They only gathered some cheap hides, claws, and scales.
"It seems mana-cores really are rare." Mordy sighed. "How many did they give you when we first joined anyways?"
"They gave me seven." Ed answered. "I divided it into 7 elemental powders. I've already used all the fire and water powder. The core we got today barely contains any of the fire or water element. It's not very useful to me…"
"This sucks!" Mordy complained. "I doubt all the materials we gathered are even worth a single mana-core. How am I supposed to afford good equipment?!"
"What kind of equipment do you need anyways?" Ed questioned. "Can't you just shoot acid like you normally do?"
"No way!" Mordy shook his head. "I need to get supporting equipment. All I can do now is shoot balls of acid or spray acid. If I get what I want, then I'll be able to shoot acid faster and more accurately. I also want some acid resistant clothes. Have you even seen my shoes?!"
Ed looked down and saw the soles of Mordy's shoes were completely ruined. Probably from when he had jumped into his own acid from the building. "I can make you some shoes with the panther leather and dark elemental powder if you want. It should be acid resistant. After that I won't have enough of it left to make anything else that can resist your acid."
"That'd be awesome!" Mordy's eyes shone with excitement. "We'll hunt more later, and I'll get you to make me other equipment too!"
"Sure." Ed smiled. "World Walker should be here soon, right?"
"Yup!" Mordy nodded. "He said he would open a portal no matter where we were. I wonder how he does it? He should be here within another hour or so."
The two waited. An hour passed. Another hour passed... Soon the sun went down and night arrived.
"He's not coming." Ed frowned.
"Maybe he just got delayed?" Mordy questioned.
Ed sighed, "Let's do our usual shifts for night watch just in case."
Morning soon arrived. There was still no sign of World Walker. The two boys sat there with grim faces.
"The fucking bastard abandoned us already!?" Mordy yelled. "Why go through so much trouble to recruit us if he's going to leave us here to die!?"
"That shouldn't be it." Ed shook his head. He looked out the office window with a worried face. "Remember what Quake said?"
"To meet him in three days…?" Mordy's eyes widened. "You think the Reef Kingdom is behind this?!"
"I'm not sure…" Ed sighed. "However, everything has been suspicious since we arrived here. Why would World Walker send us here? He specifically said he wanted us to avoid espers for our 1st mission. Yet, here we are in a ruined city filled with them."
"…" Mordy went silent for a moment before speaking. "What should we do?"
"What else?" Ed questioned. "We have to go meet with Quake. We won't survive long-term here without any allies. We probably won't be able to make it to Miami on our own either. The evacuations for Reef city already ended. There shouldn't be any trains heading in or out of the city for a long time."
Mordy nodded. The two boys exited the building and headed to the previous location where they had met Quake…