The East Highway Interchange looked like the world had tried to vomit itself inside-out.
The darkening sky just highlighted the point.
Four, six, maybe eight lanes wide in places. Ramps looping over and under each other. Trucks jack-knifed at ugly angles. Cars crushed against the median. Smoke smeared the air in greasy streaks. Spot fires flickered between the lanes.
And beasts.
They poured down every lane in a constant tide — shoulder to shoulder at the front, more boiling up behind.
Talia pulled the bike up on a fractured overpass and stared for a heartbeat.
"This is a bit much," she muttered.
She kicked down the stand and got off.
The defenders were clumped near the bottom of the main ramp — twenty, maybe thirty people at most. A few SES vests, a couple of cops, locals in work shirts and office clothes with bats, axes, metal poles. They'd blocked part of the interchange with overturned utes and a bus, but gaps were still visible between the vehicles.
Beasts had already reached the barricade. Humans held them by desperation and adrenaline.
A police officer swung his baton in a wild arc, clipping a dog. A man's makeshift spear snapped as it hit a goat. Someone screamed and a woman in a stained business shirt dragged a bloody teenager back by his collar.
It was going to break.
Talia ran. Her injured thigh burned with every stride. She vaulted onto the bonnet of a car, then a ute, then the flat back of a truck, movements tighter and more economical than usual, favouring her good leg on the landings. Her body protested every impact. She ignored it.
The first beast leapt at her as she landed on the barricade — a fox, jaws snapping. She met it mid-air, spear point through its skull.
Ash scattered.
"Shift left!" she shouted, voice cutting through the panic. "Hold your line! Stop swinging wide—shorter arcs, take one at a time!"
Some actually listened.
She stepped up onto a higher bonnet and saw the wave properly. The press. The thickening points. Where the next surge would hit.
"Brace centre!" she barked. "You two—" she pointed with her spear, "—up on the truck. Higher angle, watch the flanks. You—shield front, no lunges. Let them come to you."
The nearest SES worker blinked, then obeyed.
The next few seconds blurred.
A dog jumped. She skewered it. A roo bounded over the cars; she twisted and drove the point up into its chest. It toppled backward, crushing two smaller beasts behind it.
Her kill count flickered.
[Kill Count: 112]
She stepped onto a median barrier for better height. Beasts at the front snapped and clawed at the cars, bodies pressed forward by the mass behind.
Perfect.
Talia began to cut.
From the barrier she drove the spear down into skulls, eyes, throats, always weak points. Quick and efficient. When one lunged too high, she simply ducked and let it carry itself onto her spear.
Her shoulder burned. Her thigh roared under the bandage, a constant, hot ache. Sweat slid down her spine. But she ignored it; she had to fight to survive. Her body could be healed only if she was alive.
Something in her smoothed. Dodges stopped being panicked jerks. They became small sidesteps, weight shifts, half-turns. Her spear traced clean arcs, each strike flowing into the next. The pain flared, but repetition was slowly turning it into a rhythm she could work around.
Her battlefield sense picked up where foresight left off. Pack tightening left. Boar pushing centre. Gap on the right after two beasts dropped together. She moved to plug the worst holes without needing to look.
The system chimed.
[Kill Count: 120]
No time to open rewards she left them in the backlog.
A goat lunged at her exposed flank. Talia snapped the spear around, skewered it through the mouth, and jerked free.
"Keep your stances narrow!" she shouted. "You—green shirt—lift your point, you're exposing your chest! You with the bat—knees and jaws, not ribs!"
Another wave hit. She stepped higher, onto a crumpled guardrail. From there she started using the terrain properly.
She hopped between hoods and trunks, always seeking the best angle. Height let her stab down, staying out of reach. The broken concrete of the median gave her a solid base; she planted her boots and turned that line into a killing edge.
Her kill count rose like a ticking metronome.
[Kill Count: 130]
[Kill Count: 140]
Her arms felt hollowed out, every thrust stripping more strength — but from above, she held the advantage. The beasts had to look up, had to jump, had to expose throats and bellies.
She took every opening.
When her shoulders began to shake, she dropped back behind the cars, letting the front line take the hits. She leaned against a smashed door, chest heaving, counted five breaths—
Then stepped forward again.
Fight.
Retreat.
Breathe.
Re-enter.
Each cycle her body adjusted — the first re-entry felt like knives, the third like hot wire, the fifth like a heavy, familiar weight shoved into the back of her mind.
Slowly, the others adjusted. Less flailing. More bracing. Shorter, tighter swings. Better blocks.
The line stabilised just as the sun set.
Night crept over the interchange like a slow eclipse. The beasts reacted instantly — movements jerking sharper, snarls edged with something feral.
Floodlights sputtered to life as survivors threw every switch they could find, harsh beams cutting into the dark.
The sudden glare only enraged the horde.
Talia met the surge with a tightening grip and a deadlier rhythm.
[Kill Count: 150]
A muted gold light flickered — a new territory milestone.
She filed it away with the Lord Ticket and the unopened Territory Gift Pack from #100.
Future problems. Right now, the only structure that mattered was the barricade in front of her.
Another family vision rose. Talia shifted a step back between cars, where others covered the gap, and let it wash in — keeping a thread of awareness on her body.
Cael ducked behind a flipped police car as a boar slammed into it. He popped up, fired once, dropped the beast, while Mirana and her parents grabbed supplies from nearby shops. Three more beasts rushed; he lobbed a homemade explosive into a crack between vehicles and turned away as the blast showered him in ash.
Grandpa stood in the Rowe courtyard, axe rising and falling. Twenty-something, he counted vaguely. His back hurt. His arms ached. His grandchildren were behind him. That was enough.
Mum and Brielle cornered a dog in the pharmacy's narrow aisle. The beast lunged; Mum's nail gun punched a staggered line of nails into its face. Brielle's axe finished it. Cold air rolled over them from the broken glass. Brielle laughed wildly, Mum told her not to scare the children.
Dav hauled a limping woman through broken metro station doors. Two lion-dogs hit him at once. Both swords were buried elsewhere. He dropped his shoulder, let one slam against his chest armour, borrowed the woman's axe, finished them, and gave it back with a grunt.
Talia didn't see every detail — just flashes. Enough to know they were still alive. Still fighting.
The waves battering the East Interchange began to thin.
Not stop. Never stop. But the density changed. Where beasts had slammed in a solid wall, now gaps opened between them, just enough for her spear to pass through without always hitting flesh.
The defenders noticed.
"We're— we're holding!" someone shouted, voice cracking.
"Don't jinx it," Talia muttered, stabbing a fox out of the air.
[Kill Count: 180]
She was exhausted. Bone-deep tired. Her thigh burned constantly. Her shoulder throbbed in a steady, overused ache. Her palms were one continuous scrape. But the world had narrowed to a loop: see, move, strike. Breathe. Repeat.
She stepped onto a half-collapsed concrete slab for a better vantage. From there she saw the outer highway feed — still packed, but not endless. Patches of asphalt showed through.
"What's her count?" someone murmured behind her. The voice had a soldier's rasp.
"Too many," another replied. "And not enough."
She almost smiled.
Notifications slid into her vision.
[Kill Count: 220]
[Reward #90 Pending → D-Rank Iron-Rimmed Shield Acquired]
[Reward #95 Pending → D-Rank Expedition Toolkit Acquired]
[Reward #100 Pending → E-Rank Territory Gift Pack]
[Reward #150 Pending → +1 Building Slot]
[Reward #200 Pending → D-Rank Territory Gift Pack]
She accepted the shield and toolkit into her space without even looking. Packs ignored. Her world right now was measured in metres of asphalt and piles of ash.
The massacre continued.
She lured clusters of beasts toward wrecked sedans, then jumped onto roofs and stabbed down. When they scrambled up after her, they exposed their bellies to the defenders.
On a narrow ramp edge she met charges halfway, spear sweeping in low arcs that tumbled bodies back down into the pack. Further along, she smashed a shopfront window and kited foxes and roos along the barrier; they leapt at her, overcommitted, crashed through the glass, and vanished into the interior where others finished them at safer angles, creating a quick kill-zone.
Defenders learnt from her and began creating their own small killzones sending out 'bait' to lure their prey.
Round after round. Fight. Retreat. Breathe. Re-enter.
[Kill Count: 280]
Her vision fuzzed at the edges. Beast sounds grew sharp; human voices blurred. The pain in her leg and shoulder had become part of her body, no longer separate. If she stopped, it would all crash back in. So she didn't.
Not until the noise shifted.
Less screaming. More panting. Fewer impacts. She killed the last dog at the foot of the ramp and stepped back, spear tip lowering.
A rough silence settled over the line.
Defenders sagged against cars, chests heaving, clothes blood-streaked and grimy. Someone laughed once, then turned it into a sob. Another slid down the side of a bus and stared at their shaking hands.
Talia checked her interface.
[Kill Count: 300]
A new glow pulsed.
[Reward #300 Pending → C-Rank Territory Gift Pack]
She let out a long breath.
The East Highway wasn't clear, but it was stable. Any new beasts would trickle instead of flood. That was enough.
She thought if it was now she could leave and get home but then her rational mind took over. She wasn't suicidal, there was an ocean of beasts out there waiting for her. Turning back to the barricade, she rolled her shoulders, feeling every ache — and the quiet reassurance of armor that had kept her alive.
Then she looked south.
Petrol station strip. Multiple servos. Open lots, wide drives. No cover if it went bad. The widest and most dangerous entry point.
"Alright," she said quietly, more to herself than anyone else. "East is solid for now. Next."
She walked back to her bike, climbed on, and winced as her thigh pulled but the motion was smoother than when she'd left the forest. Her body was learning which angles hurt least.The pain killers were wearing off. She'd need more soon.
She glanced once more at the defenders. The firefighter had slumped but was still conscious. The woman with the bent metal pole now held it with real grip. The teen with the bat gave her a shaky grin.
"You going?" he asked.
"Yeah."
"Will you… come back?"
"I'll be back," she said. "I'm going to the other checkpoints, then I'll loop."
She swept her gaze over them all. "Try to take down as many as you can. Around fifty kills, you'll get a message. It matters."
Some of them straightened at that.
Talia switched on the solar torch; the enhanced night vision cut cleanly through the dark.
She started the engine.
Then she rode off, heading for the next monster gate.