Vincent

The moment the vines had tightened around his body Tommy was set into a panic. Despite the pep talk he had just given himself, he still was unable to function properly in a situation like this.

The vines were drawing blood from his body at a very slow pace, just barely breaking the skin. The moment his skin broke the pressure subsided substantially. The vines were lessening their grip, holding him firmly in place but no longer causing any pain apart from the cuts already caused.

The panic had started to subside in Tommy now that the pressure had lessened. That was until he felt the tendrils burrowing into his skin. The vines felt as if they were rooting into his body through any cut made in the skin, avoiding any of his natural orifices. He could feel immense pain as the roots ravaged under his skin, spreading throughout his body. He could feel every single movement from each individual tendril as it separated his skin from his muscle.

The feeling was indescribable as he felt himself being torn apart from the inside. Tommy had no clue how long it had been, but to him it felt like days or even weeks. Feeling every single millimeter moved by the tendrils through his body for what felt like this long he had grown accustomed to it after what was in reality just a few minutes.

By the time Tommy was able to ignore the sickeningly large amount of pain, the roots had taken hold in every major part of his body making it impossible to move without skinning himself. The tendrils had finally reached their destination, the base of Tommy's brain.

**********

Outside the Office Graveyard, Solus was talking with the guard, Vincent.

"I really believe him when he says he's from a different world." Solus was telling his childhood friend about everything that had happened that day.

"Well he certainly looks strange enough. To be honest he looks like he just became a man. No hair on his face, that pale skin, and by god is he small. What makes you believe him though?" Vincent was humoring his friend by asking. He was convinced, from the story, that it was just a wanderer from one of the ice tribes. It would be the only thing to explain that ghastly skin tone. As far as his size goes, in rare occurrences certain mutations would affect the bodies physical properties as well causing ones body to drastically change, but this only happened when someone attempted to absorb a mutation far too potent for their body.

The most common example was the Rage Wolf. The mutation was really quite special as it granted several abilities instead of just one. Most gave 3 abilities but there have been legends stating that there have been some with up to 6. The most common abilities granted were a base strength increase, it directly increased the base strength of a person. Which meant that it altered their original strength instead of adding to it, making any strength multiplying abilities now multiply this base instead of their previous strength. Secondly would be a speed increase, typically making someone as fast as a modern day sports car. And lastly a shape shifting ability turning them into a wolf, which made pursuing them almost impossible in the right terrain. The major problem with this gene was the fact that it is at least Apocolyptic in strength, but the fact that it had at least three abilities attached to it made a lot of people attempt to mutate with it before they were ready.

"Well for one, he didn't even know what a nephilim was. He asked if I was a freaking angel. Do you see any wings or a golden piece of metal floating above my head?" Solus responded pretty sarcastically. "Plus you didn't see the way he looked at everything around. The sheer shock on his face is something you couldn't fake. The thing that really got me though was that he said he killed a Demonic Barbarian with nothing but a steak knife."

"..." Vincent couldn't even respond to this last bit of information. The Demonic Barbarian was one of the strongest Titan creatures known to man. The gene mutation of strength multiplication was by far the strongest of strength enhancers out there. Typical strength multiplying was actually fairly low following a rule of 10.

Acolytes- 1-10

Mages- 11-20

Giants- 21-30

Titans-31-40

Apocolyptic- 41-50

Any mutations higher than that are just myth and legends as no one has ever had a mutation higher than Apocolyptic. At least not to their knowledge.

"How....How could someone do that? How strong is he?" Vincent blurted out without fully realizing it. It was more a thought to himself that to Solus yet he couldn't seem to keep it in his head. Vincent has been using a Demonic Barbarian gene for almost 5 years. It was the only thing giving him hope to challenge Nathan for the title of Solus, Head of Solar Security and Master of the Flame.

Vincent and Nathan grew up together first as neighbors, then as training mates, and finally as best friends. Since they grew up training together, they had also hunted together and actually shared most of their lives together in their pursuit of power. They used each other as constant competition to always challenge the other. This kept them always improving, never plateauing like everyone else has done. That was until Nathan got lucky coming back from a scouting mission, he came across a legendary Apocolyptic creature known as the Thunder Cat.

The Thunder Cat was a fairly small creature that was overtly powerful. It was around the size of a medium sized dog, black in color with yellow and blue rings going down its body in a pattern. The fur was a matte black causing no light to shine on it looking like a dark shadow while standing in the sunlight, yet the yellow and blue rings seemed like they glowed in the dark but being daytime couldn't be sure.

He killed the cat and obtained the mutant gene pushing him to an Apocolyptic Nephilim. The youngest in history at the age of 20. After gaining the mutation he was able to push his own magic level to Apocolyptic in only 2 months, thanks to all of the training with Vincent all he lacked was the physical strength that the mutant gene gave him.

The part that frustrated Vincent more than anything was the sonic power that came from the Thunder Cat perfectly integrated into their fire abilities, creating explosions at will. Vincent had been left behind ever since causing both of their growth to come to a halt. Vincent was no longer a challenge for Nathan and Vincent couldn't breakthrough without an Apocolyptic gene mutation.

Nathan had offered on multiple occasions to help Vincent to get one, but Vincent wanted to prove that he was strong enough to do it himself. He didn't just want to do it himself but he wanted something that would increase his power to be on par or even surpass Nathan. Being a world based on pure strength and power, they would typically throw everything they had into every single attack. This made for explosive, intense, fast paced battles that would typically be over very quickly in just a few attacks from each side. This fact is what had driven Vincent to the Demonic Barbarian. Now all he lacked was the proper Apocolyptic gene mutation.

"I fought him and from what I saw he was a simple Titan in strength. The crazy thing though is that he drew blood, he made me bleed. I mean it wasn't anything crazy, a few scrapes and a bruise or two, but the way he fought. It wasn't anything I had ever seen before." Solus had a glaze over his eyes remembering their quick scuffle. The pure astonishment on his face immediately had Vincent's attention, he hadn't seen that look on his face since the first time he successfully combined the sonic ability with his fire.

"What do you mean?" Vincent was as hurt as he was curious about those words. He had been Nathan's sparring partner for as long as he could remember. Even after there was no way for Vincent to improve. He could have started training with Andreas, the only other person in the city who had an Apocolyptic gene mutation.

"He attacked me, it had to be at least 40 strikes at least, with no slight breaks in between. Every time he hit me it would move my line of vision just enough to not see the next hit in time to avoid it. There wasn't a single hint of magic in any of his hits. And the craziest thing about it all. After my guys pulled him off of me he still had the strength to try and fight back. Whole thing actually lasted a few minutes and this guy still had strength. It's unheard of. Hell, I still can't figure out how he got me off my feet." Solus was practically bragging about Tommy's fighting skills.

This down right pissed Vincent off.

'We'll see how strong you are when you get a totem.' Vincent thought smugly.