The Shadow Sovereign: Level Up from the Dirt

If the sand lizard bit my arm off, Kemi would die before sunset.

That thought kept my feet moving through the hot mud of the Gully Rift. The air inside this magical tear tasted like old copper. My boots sank deep into the wet dirt with every single step. I did not stop. I could not afford to stop. The three blue pills in my pocket were melting from my own sweat. They were the only things keeping my fourteen-year-old sister alive. By tomorrow morning, her medicine would be completely gone, and the sickness would finally take her.

"Zane, behind you," Kemi said through the cracked plastic earpiece in my left ear.

She was sitting three miles away in our leaking shack in the Mainland slums. She was watching my location through a tracking map she built herself from broken scrap metal. Even with the mana-rot sickness destroying her lungs, her mind was always sharp. She was a genius, and she hated feeling useless while I risked my life.

I threw my body to the left.

A heavy, gray lizard crashed into the mud exactly where I just stood. It was almost six feet long. Its scales looked like thick rocks, and its mouth was full of long, yellow teeth. It hissed loudly, spitting thick green slime at the ground.

"It is an F-rank beast," Kemi said. Her voice was steady, but I could hear her breathing hard. "Its weak spot is the skin right under its chin. Do not fight it head-on, brother. You do not have the armor for that. Just wait for an opening."

"I know," I said. My chest burned. I was eighteen, but my arms were thin because I gave most of my food to her. My cheap iron knife felt very heavy in my hand.

The lizard lunged forward. Its heavy tail hit my leg, knocking me completely off balance. I fell hard into the mud, and my knife slipped from my fingers. Before I could sit up, the beast climbed directly on top of me. Its sharp claws pinned my shoulders to the ground. Its foul breath hit my face.

"Zane. Your map signal just went flat," Kemi said. She sounded genuinely scared now. "Talk to me. What is happening?"

I could not answer. The lizard’s jaws were just inches from my neck. I looked up at the glowing blue mana crystal attached to its forehead. That crystal was worth fifty Nexus Credits on the black market. Fifty credits meant a whole month of medicine for Kemi. It meant real food for both of us.

If I died here, the Vanguard Guild would sweep the rift and take the crystal. They would leave my sister to rot in the slums. To the billionaires on the Island, poor people like us were nothing but dirt.

I stopped pulling my arms. Instead, I lifted my right leg, jammed my knee hard into the lizard's soft stomach, and pushed with all my strength. The beast grunted in surprise. Its grip loosened for a split second. I reached out, grabbed a sharp, broken stone from the mud, and drove it straight up into the soft skin beneath its chin.

The lizard stiffened, fell sideways, and stopped moving entirely.

I forced myself to sit up. My muscles ached terribly. I picked up my iron knife and carefully cut the blue mana crystal out of the beast's head.

"I am fine," I said, finally catching my breath. "I got the crystal, Kemi. We have enough for the medicine now."

Kemi was silent for a few seconds. "Forget the black market medicine, Zane. We are leaving the Mainland."

I froze. "What are you talking about?"

"Ifunanya just called me," Kemi said.

My heart skipped a beat. Ifunanya Okoye was my girlfriend. She lived on the wealthy Island, behind the massive concrete walls that kept poor people out. We had been dating in secret for six months. Everyone told me a rich girl would never care about a boy from the slums.

"What did she say?" I asked, wiping wet mud off my face.

"She talked to her father," Kemi explained. "She found a premium doctor at the Vanguard Hospital on the Island. They have a new treatment that can cure my sickness permanently. She got me a free bed. A guild car is coming to the border wall to pick us up in exactly one hour."

Relief washed over me. I wanted to laugh out loud. Ifunanya actually did it. She saved us.

"Are you sure, Kemi?" I asked. "The Island elites do not give away free hospital beds to people like us."

"Ifunanya promised it is real," Kemi said. Her voice went entirely cold. "And you know me. I already hacked the hospital's digital records to check. The doctor is real. The appointment is officially in our names. Go get your clothes. We are going to the Island."

I ran out of the rift and hurried back to our sector. An hour later, Kemi and I stood at the massive concrete border wall. Kemi looked so small in her wheelchair, her skin very pale from the sickness, but her eyes were alert and calculating.

A sleek black hover-car with the golden Vanguard Guild logo drove through the heavy steel gates. The back door opened. Ifunanya looked out at us. Her clothes were perfectly clean.

"Zane, hurry," she called out. "The doctor is waiting."

I helped Kemi inside, then sat next to Ifunanya. I tried to hold her hand, but she pulled away and looked out the window. I thought she was just nervous about the armed guild guards sitting in the front seats.

The car flew across the bridge, entering the Island. Giant glass skyscrapers pierced the sky. The people outside wore expensive clothes and shiny, clean armor. It looked like a completely different world.

The car stopped at the Vanguard Premier Hospital. Two large guards in heavy armor immediately took Kemi’s wheelchair. They pushed her through the tall glass doors. Ifunanya and I followed them closely.

They did not take us to a regular patient room. Instead, they pushed Kemi into a large, freezing laboratory. It was filled with glowing wires, heavy steel claws, and a massive glass tube in the center of the room.

A large man wearing gold-plated armor sat in a leather chair at the back of the lab. It was Chairman Femi Adenuga, the billionaire leader of the Vanguard Guild.

My stomach dropped. "Ifunanya, why are we in a lab? Where is the doctor?"

Ifunanya did not answer. She walked past me and stood directly behind Chairman Femi's chair.

The two guards grabbed my arms. They slammed me hard against the cold floor. A heavy boot stepped heavily on my back, pinning me down.

"Zane," Kemi said sharply, her small hands gripping the arms of her wheelchair.

Chairman Femi smiled. He looked down at me like I was a small, worthless insect. "Thank you for bringing her to me, Ifunanya. You did a perfect job."

I looked up from the floor, staring at the girl I loved. "Ifunanya, what is this? Why are you doing this?"

She looked down at me. Her face showed absolutely no emotion at all.

"Did you really think I cared about you, Zane?" she asked. Her voice was flat and calm. "A dirty trash hunter from the slums? I only stayed with you to monitor your sister's blood data. Her body contains something very valuable to us."

Chairman Femi raised his hand. The heavy steel claws began to descend rapidly toward Kemi’s chest.

"Do not touch her," I ordered, struggling wildly against the guards.

A heavy fist crashed directly into my jaw.

"Let the extraction begin," Femi said.