After about thirty minutes, Luke and Selene were crouched on the rooftop of a crumbling, three-story ruin. The cracked concrete roof was littered with broken glass, old nails, and stubborn patches of moss that clung to life despite years of neglect.
As for the kissing incident… there was no need to dwell on it. They weren't teenagers fumbling through first crushes, blushing at every little touch. Luke had kissed her, Selene had accepted it without a word, and that was that. They both knew there was at least some measure of affection there, even if neither was in any rush to make a speech about it.
From up here, they had a clear view of another building across the narrow street. It leaned slightly to one side, as though it had grown tired of standing upright. Half of the windows were shattered, the walls stained with decades of grime and soot.
This was the slum district, and even in the Underworld, it wasn't a pleasant sight.
"Lycans are really poor," Luke remarked, his tone dry but honest. "I mean, vampires have those fancy gothic mansions, chandeliers, silk curtains—the whole luxury package. Meanwhile, Lycans live in slums, ruined buildings, and sewers. They're basically poor bastards."
Selene didn't answer, her eyes fixed on the target building like she hadn't even heard him.
Luke wasn't expecting sympathy from her, and he wasn't offering any himself. Being poor didn't earn the Lycans a free pass—not after everything. They'd chosen war with vampires, and that choice had consequences.
Not after the car accident. Not after the chaos they'd caused. He didn't need a guilty conscience to wipe them out. In fact, the thought of cutting them down for experience felt… satisfying.
If they were going to fall, better that their end at least help push him toward his next level.
"So… are we going to barge in?" Selene asked at last. Her tone was more rhetorical than curious, the kind of question where the answer was already obvious. Storming a building that probably held fifty—maybe a hundred—Lycans was madness. Even for her, it would be suicide.
"No," Luke said flatly, shaking his head. "I don't have a death wish, and I'm not dumb enough to just walk into that mess." His tone was calm, but his eyes stayed fixed on the crumbling structure across the street.
The thought of all those potential experience points was tempting, sure—but not tempting enough to make him march into a meat grinder. Not yet.
He knew those Lycans weren't just stronger than him—they were many times stronger. Physically, they could tear him in half . Add guns into the mix, and it would be like a pig walking happily into a slaughterhouse.
Selene's lips curved in the faintest hint of approval. "Good. Even that stupid Kraven and his men are probably in there. If we barged in, we'd be dealing with Lycans and vampires. I'd rather not make it a party."
Luke's grin returned, lazy but edged with mischief. "Yeah, that would be bad. But… Selene, what do you think about earthquakes?" he asked casually, as if suggesting a change in the dinner menu instead of large-scale destruction.
Her eyes flicked toward him, narrow and suspicious. "Earthquakes?"
Luke's smile widened a fraction. "Because I've been thinking—who says we need to fight them directly?"
He let the idea hang in the air, his gaze drifting back to the decaying building across the street. In his mind, plans were already taking shape—plans with no front-door heroics, no charging into a hail of bullets and claws. Just the raw, crushing force of the earth itself doing the work for him.
Earth magic didn't have the flare of fire or the speed of lightning when it came to close combat. It wasn't the kind of thing that made crowds gasp in awe. But Luke knew its quiet strength—its ability to smother, to crush, to end fights without a single blade swing. Used right, it could be just as terrifying as any flashy element.
And tonight, that was exactly what he had in mind.
If he could combine two earth-element skills—skills meant for shaping terrain and breaking structures—he could bring the entire building down on top of the Lycans before they even knew what hit them. It was a demolition job, not a duel.
He dropped to one knee and pressed his palm firmly against the cracked rooftop beneath him. His eyes slid shut as he focused, pushing aside the city noise and zeroing in on the ground beneath the Lycans' lair across the street.
Up until now, he'd always cast one skill at a time. Not because he wanted to—but because his brain would give out if he didn't. Running multiple spells in parallel wasn't just hard, it was dangerous; mages called it "splitting the mind," and for good reason. Overdo it, and you didn't just fail—you could knock yourself out cold.
But tonight? He'd deal with the migraine later.
A pounding headache was already waiting for him on the other side of this, and he could feel it coming. That was why mages stacked Intelligence and Wisdom so much—they needed the mental stamina to handle casting speed and multitasking. Luke didn't exactly have that luxury yet… but he was going to try anyway.
He took a slow breath, visualizing the ground beneath the enemy base—its pillars, its foundation, the layers of concrete and stone holding it upright.
'Stone Spike.'
In an instant, dozens of jagged spikes erupted inside the structural pillars of the building, piercing upward like hidden fangs. The spell itself was small-scale, but the location was precise—dead center in the support columns.
The next step was the dangerous part.
'Quake.'
The ground shuddered violently, but not in a wide area—Luke forced the quake to focus only around those spike-impaled pillars. The combination was brutal: the quake shattered the already weakened supports, while the stone spikes tore them apart from within.
One by one, the building's legs gave out.
The Lycans didn't even have time to understand what was happening before the entire structure groaned, tilted, and began to collapse in on itself. Dust exploded into the air, drowning the street in a choking cloud. The sound of tons of rubble crashing down swallowed up the city noise, leaving nothing but a low, rumbling echo.
Under that crushing weight, no Lycan could escape.
Luke's forehead was slick with sweat now, his breath coming in sharp, uneven bursts. His head pounded like someone was hammering nails into his skull, but a grim smile spread across his face.
"Level-up bait, delivered," he muttered.
Luke staggered as he got to his feet, swaying slightly like someone who'd just stood up too fast. His vision pulsed at the edges, and for a moment he thought the rooftop might tilt under him. Using that many spells at once wasn't just exhausting—it was like shoving his brain through a meat grinder on high speed.
Selene, standing a step behind him, kept her usual calm, unreadable expression. she didn't expect this guy to really cause a minor earthquake.
She looked past him at the collapsed wreck that used to be the Lycans' hideout. A plume of dust still hung in the air like a ghost, drifting slowly toward the empty street. The sound of settling debris echoed faintly, but there was no movement beneath it.
Even Lycans couldn't survive that kind of burial. Concrete slabs, twisted iron rods, and several tons of rubble had swallowed them whole. And since they hadn't been in their beast form, their bodies would have been crushed instantly. It was swift, brutal, and in its own way, efficient.