Kazuki chuckled. “Oh relax, princess. It’s not like we’re climbing a tower of cheese wheels. This place is even flatter than the Steppes, we’ll be in and out in no time.”

He even mimed offering to catch him, despite one arm preoccupied with said blinking egg.

And then the ground began to shake.

“Ah, fu—” Sensing karma coming straight for him, Kazuki made to leap off the platform at the bottom of the incline, only to brace as his feet slip across the rushing sands, his free hand grabbing hold of a brick. The dunes fell away to reveal what from the distance appeared to be a sunken apartment building.

It rose off the sand pit, bricks shifting, clicking, screeching. Kazuki’s body slammed against the wall, the man dangling off the edge. A brick near his chest—at the front of the monstrosity's facade—sunk inward to reveal a single, violently glowing red eye.

Verai clashed with the monster, the jab of his blade failing to stop its tracks, but succeeding in agitating it further. The sensation of Kitten scampering up its side pushed its bricks about, as if the creature was trying to keep her as far away as possible.

Kazuki’s hand ached where it dug into the edge of the tower, the egg still braced against his chest as he looked down to the whistling height below. They were crossing an area heavily littered with debris. “Shit.” He tried pulling himself up, but the creature’s constant movement made it impossible. Looking down again, he finally noted the red eye, and promptly shoved the egg in its corneas.

The resulting cry was ear-piercing.

It was moving even faster now, heading for one of the crumbling apartment complexes.

“Ver, get up top!” Kazuki yelled. “It’s gonna ram into a wall!”

“Shit, thanks,” Kazuki grunted as Verai yanked him from his precarious position, relieved to land his ass on solid ground, even if that ground was currently stampeding across the dunes to collide with a wall. He lay the egg in his lap, eyes moving between Verai and the view around.

“I don’t know what it is, but—”

With a sharp burst of energy, Verai sank his sword into the gaps between the bricks—only for the bricks to clamp together, pinning the sword.

“—It’s pretty damn tough.”

His HP had already fallen to less than half. A wild encounter hasn’t hit this hard since the Dura-days.

“We’re going to get our asses handed.” He sounded giddy, twisting to look at the oncoming complex. “Let’s see how much we can fuck it up until then.”

He sank his hands into the bricks forming the creature’s turret, combining both the FIGHTER class’ innate strength and a SEISMIC TOSS to yank it like the horns of a rampaging bull.

Even from a far distance, it was easy to retrace his steps and find the walking edifice. The destruction it left in its wake had already flattened a sizeable chunk of the ruin.

The creature smashed another apartment building into rubble, still seized by the insufferable sensation of something atop itself, a pest scurrying on its scalp, a weight pressing its feet onto its segmented carapace. It steadied itself, preparing to charge forwards once more.

Only to find its legs stuck together.

Grinding metal wrapped around the massive building, tying its limbs together. Steelix hissed, barely long enough to span its circumference, and with the building being more than double his weight, it felt like trying to stop a car with rubber bands.

Kazuki was crouched on top of Steelix’s crown, eyeing the building frantically until his gaze caught Verai clinging to a corner with Kitten and the egg tucked under his arms. Favorite of the fucking year. “Ver! Holy shit, no omelets!” Cackling, he tried to stand, only to nearly topple off with his platform currently engaging in a tug-of-war with the enemy.

The creature was breaking itself down—changing. Steelix roared as he tightened his grip, but to no avail, new legs broke free of the stranglehold and it was only a matter of time before the retaliation.

Kazuki barely had time to begin his ascent when the rumbling started up again. He looked up and saw sailing in the air were his egg and Kitten going ‘WEEEAAAAA’ on top of it, cursing loudly as he narrowly toppled off several feet to the ground below to catch both.

“Fuck! Ver?!” But the man was gone, lost in a sea of churning stone.

Kazuki bared his teeth, moving to place Kitten and the egg under one arm. “Kitten, don't you dare move. If you fall off, Ver and Waffle are going to have my ass.”

He stuck his fingers in his mouth and whistled. Steelix unwound slightly, and Kazuki reeled his arm back, lobbing a blast of fire at the offered gap.