"Mia, what about you?" Ethan asked, turning to her.

Mia looked a little awkward. "When I hit Stage C, my new skill was Soul Spike. It attacks the target’s soul. I... honestly don’t know how strong it is yet. I’ve never run into a skill like this before."

"Soul attack?" Everyone’s eyes went wide.

To be fair, none of them had seen anything like that.

Skinny Pete’s Enthrallment was sort of adjacent, but that was more about forcing obedience—and it wasn’t that impressive in a straight fight.

Mia’s Soul Spike, though... that was direct soul damage.

How were you even supposed to defend against that?

Just thinking about it made people’s scalps prickle.

"A soul attack, huh..." Chris rubbed his hands together, grinning. "Kinda wanna see what it does. Big Mike, wanna volunteer?"

Big Mike jumped like someone had yelled "fire." "Hell no! Don’t mess with that! If something goes wrong and I end up brain-dead, even Henry won’t be able to fix me!"

Chris cracked up. "Relax, I’m kidding. Look at your face."

Ethan nodded, still intrigued. "I’m curious too. Later, we’ll test it on a mutant beast."

Mia let out a small breath. "...Okay."

Ethan gestured. "And your Innate Ability?"

"After it evolved, I got Frost Armor," Mia said. "It can tank hits. It boosts my survivability a lot."

"Nice," Ethan said. "One offensive skill, one defensive skill, plus your control abilities—you’re getting really well-rounded."

Mia nodded quickly. "Mm."

Ethan shifted his gaze. "Emily?"

Emily hesitated, then spoke up. "My Stage C ability is a Nature-type skill—Vampiric Vines. I can make a bunch of vines grow in an area, and once they trap someone... they start draining blood like crazy."

She looked embarrassed the second the words were out.

Chris stared at her. "Damn. Didn’t expect the quiet girl to be into bloodsucking."

"I—I’m not!" Emily’s face turned redder. "I just... picked one at random."

Ethan laughed softly, then kept it practical. "It’s a good skill. Area control, multi-target lockdown, plus it wears people down."

"Alright—what about your original ability? How did it evolve?"

Emily’s embarrassment eased a little. "I got Energy Link. I can link to one person and continuously restore their stamina and mental energy."

Ethan’s expression sharpened with interest. "Oh. That’s good. What’s the range?"

"Uh... a little over three hundred feet, I think," Emily said, not totally confident.

"That’s enough." Ethan nodded. "That’s extremely useful. Especially when we run into someone hard to deal with—I’ll need that."

Emily’s eyes brightened. "Mm. As long as I can help."

Truthfully, she’d always been the weakest in the team. She worried about dragging everyone down... worried that one day Ethan would decide she wasn’t worth keeping around.

If she could prove her value, she could breathe easier.

Ethan looked around the room. "Alright. Now we’ve got everyone’s skills mapped out."

"Honestly? This Void Realm run was an insane power spike for the whole squad."

He paused, the mood turning a shade more serious.

"With what we’ve got now, the zombies and mutant beasts on Earth can barely threaten us anymore."

"But lately I’ve had this constant sense of danger. Like something big is coming."

"And even after this upgrade... that feeling hasn’t gone away."

He let that sit for a second. "So don’t get complacent. Keep pushing. Get as strong as you can."

Big Mike frowned. "Captain, don’t scare me like that. You’re Tier 16 now. Who the hell can even threaten you?"

"Earth’s native stuff can’t," Ethan said. "But what if the things inside the Void Realms start coming out?"

"...What?" A chill went through the room. Eyes widened across the board. "Don’t tell me Void Realm monsters are already coming out?"

"The white-furred apes got out," Ethan pointed out. "Why wouldn’t other things be able to?"

"And we can find Void Realm entrances. That means other people can find exits too."

"That..." The excitement from their breakthrough drained away, replaced by a heavy, sinking tension.

They had no idea how strong the creatures inside a Void Realm could be. It depended on the Realm itself.

But they did know one thing: they were still just getting started. Compared to a Void Realm that had existed and evolved for who-knew-how-many years, they were nothing.

On Earth, they might look invincible.

In the wrong Void Realm... they could get swatted flat in seconds.

Ethan lifted a hand. "Hey. Don’t look like that. It’s still just my guess. We’ve got time to grow."

"And Clearford City’s Void Realm showed something important," he added. "Earth’s mysterious energy is actually pretty dense. In a lot of Void Realms, the mysterious energy can’t compare."

"If that’s true, our growth rate will be faster than theirs."

"Yeah..." Everyone nodded, but the worry on their faces didn’t fade much.

Even if Ethan wasn’t wrong—Earth’s mysterious energy really was pretty rich right now—Earth’s "revival" had been going on for less than a year.

Some Void Realms had existed for thousands, even tens of thousands of years. In terms of sheer accumulation, there was no comparing them.

Just then, there was a knock at the door.

"Ethan! Grace asked me to come get you guys for dinner!"

"Got it. We’ll be there in a minute!"

Ethan stood up and glanced around at everyone. "Come on. Eat first. Tomorrow we get ready to head back to Fallen Star City."

"Yeah."

They headed to the dining hall. Dinner was already laid out.

At lunch they’d been so wiped they’d only shoved down a few bites before passing out, but this dinner was clearly something Grace had planned on purpose—there was a ton of food, and it looked damn good.

Everyone took seats around a long farmhouse table, eating and chatting at the same time.

"Ethan," Grace said after a moment, "I already talked to the others. Everyone agreed—our whole compound wants to join yours. When do you think we should move?"

She’d originally thought convincing everyone to relocate to Fallen Star City would take a lot of work.

Instead, it had gone shockingly smoothly. One meeting—unanimous approval.

Later, when she looked into it, she found out why.

Ethan and his people had executed Jared and those men right at the compound entrance, in front of everyone.

It had scared the hell out of them.

And only then did Grace really understand: in the apocalypse, running a compound meant being willing to be hard.

If people feared you, they listened.

A gentle management style might’ve worked before the world ended, but after? It didn’t fit anymore.

You could treat people well and they still wouldn’t be grateful. Some would just decide you were easy to bully—like Jared had.

Once Grace truly accepted that, it only made her more determined to merge into Fallen Star City’s compound. If the Fallen Star Squad were the ones keeping order, she wouldn’t have to carry that pressure every day.

"You guys start packing over the next few days," Ethan said. "I need to get back and talk to Miles first. We’ll see how he wants to arrange the move."

Grace blinked. "Huh? Ethan, aren’t you the Commander of Fallen Star City?"

"I’m a Commander on paper," Ethan said with a grin. "I don’t handle day-to-day operations."

"No wonder you’re so chill and always running around," Vivian said, sounding honestly envious. "You’re a total hands-off boss."

As a compound leader, there were endless things to deal with. Every day was packed, exhausting—you worked yourself like a dog.

Right now, she genuinely admired Ethan’s foresight.

"Ethan, but if you’re never around, aren’t you worried about letting other people manage it?" Grace asked, still confused.

"Worried about what?" Ethan said lightly. "If I don’t trust someone, I don’t use them. If I use them, I trust them."

"And as long as my strength stays ahead of the pack," he added, voice calm but edged with certainty, "nobody underneath me will dare to mess around."

That was something Ethan had decided from day one, back when he first built the compound.

And reality had proved him right. He hadn’t let management slow down his Tier growth—and at the same time, he’d built up a ridiculously powerful force.

Vivian nodded. "Then I’ll head back to the Deepwater City compound tomorrow to get ready. When the time comes, my people will move over too."

"Sounds good," Ethan said.