The roar didn't fade. It rolled through Junk Zone 88 like a train dragging chains behind it, long and metallic and too heavy to belong to anything reasonable. Riko clung to the bent exhaust pipe as the rooftop trembled under him. Dust dripped from the rafters like powdered rain.
Huddled together below, the three smaller monsters glitched violently, their bodies flickering between frames, as if their fear was interfering with their physical shape. They didn't even look at Riko anymore; whatever was waking up behind the scrap mountains terrified them far more than he ever could.
Riko swallowed hard. "Okay… okay, just stay… calm—"
Another roar hammered the air, and the nearest junk pile—one of the tallest mounds in Zone 88—convulsed.
Metal sheets tumbled down its side. Old engines clattered free and bounced across the ground. A rusted satellite dish spun like a coin, ringing as it fell. Then something big shifted underneath the pile. It wasn't crawling out. It was pushing the junk off itself like a blanket.
The whole mountain groaned.
Riko's knees locked. His breath stuck halfway up his throat.
A head - if it could be called a head - rose from beneath the mountain of debris. It was enormous, easily the size of a delivery van. Cracked metal plating wrapped around its face like mismatched armor. Wires dangled from its jaws, sparking occasionally, as if they were nerves torn out mid-bite. A chunk of car bumper hung from one tooth.
The creature lifted higher, dislodging more junk with every movement. Its eyes glowed like boiling data streams, vertical slashes of red-orange code dripping down its face. Each inhale rattled the metal in its throat. Each exhale blew dust out in spirals.
Riko stopped breathing altogether.
He didn't even know if he could move. His muscles were locked so tightly that his bones felt welded in place. Everything inside him screamed to run, jump, scream-something-but his body refused to choose. Fifty levels of raw power, and he still felt like a kid trapped under an avalanche.
The creature opened its maw wider, metal bending around its jaw. Scraps of wire and bolts tumbled from between its teeth. A guttural, grinding rumble crawled up from deep inside its throat.
Riko thought it was preparing to roar again.
But the sound came from his wrist instead.
Warning: BOSS class creature.
The voice of the screen this time wasn't a whisper, a beep, or a chime; it was a full-blown siren: harsh, blaring, urgent enough to make his ears ring. The display flashed with such violence that the air around it flickered with digital noise.
"B-BOSS?!" squeaked Riko. "THAT'S A BOSS?! I'M NOT READY FOR A BOSS! I DON'T EVEN KNOW HOW TO PUNCH CORRECTLY!"
The device pulsed harder than ever before, shaking his entire forearm.
RECOMM
RECOMM
RECOMM
DO. NOT. ENGAGE.
"YES, THANK YOU! GREAT ADVICE!" Riko shouted back at the screen. "BUT I'M ON A ROOF! I CAN'T RUN ANYWHERE!"
The screen continued to blare warnings while the boss monster tore its way out of the junk pile, sending towers of trash crashing down. Each movement shook the earth. Every step cracked open old machinery like eggshells.
It emerged fully-massive shoulders made from twisted shipping crates, spine ridged with pipe segments, tail dragging broken metal fencing behind it like a chain. It stood on four legs, each one wrapped in scrounged armor plates held together by seams of light from digital stitches. The whole creature was like someone had taken a giant animal, smashed it with a computer virus, and let a scrapyard rebuild it wrong.
Riko pressed his back against the exhaust pipe. "This is a nightmare. This is literally a nightmare."
The boss lifted its head to the sky and let loose a roar so huge the rooftop beneath Riko bowed and sagged. The force of the sound blasted grit into his face. He shielded his eyes, coughing.
The three smaller monsters scrambled away, running in chaotic zigzags. The boss didn't even glance at them. Its glowing eyes were scanning -analyzing, searching.
Searching for him.
Riko tried to swallow. It didn't work. His throat had abandoned its job.
The boss's eyes landed right on him.
"Oh no," Riko whispered. "You do NOT see me. I am NOT noteworthy. I am a background object. A scenery prop. Look at the bushes again—they're delicious!"
The creature did not look towards the bushes.
It bent its legs.
Riko's heartbeat stumbled, then sprinted.
"No. No no no no—don't you dare—"
The boss monster charged with a Strong crash. The entire junk pile behind it collapsed in its wake, avalanching downward in a wave of rusted engines, bent rebar, crushed appliances, and torn fencing. Everything poured forward like a metal tsunami, surging directly toward the factory roof where Riko stood. The boss charges, and the whole pile of junk collapses toward Riko.