The old Toll Gate Plaza on the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway was a monument to bureaucracy. Twelve lanes of concrete, abandoned toll booths, and enough potholes to swallow a truck.
"We have three minutes before the Physics Professor arrives," Bhy Khay said, sliding under a rusted, red Nissan Micra taxi.
"A Micra?" Elara looked at the tiny, dented car with skepticism. "Bhy Khay, that thing barely survived the pre-apocalypse pothole era. You want to use it against a Gravity Lord?"
"Micras are the cockroaches of the automotive world," Bhy Khay slid out, wiping grease on his face. "They don't have HP bars. They run on spite and bad vibrations."
He slapped the hood.
"Tomiwa, draw the thrusters."
Tomiwa, who was sketching frantically on the trunk, paused. "Do you want 'NASA Realism' or 'Looney Tunes'?"
"Give me 'Wile E. Coyote'," Bhy Khay said. "We need burst speed, not safety standards."
Tomiwa grinned. She drew two massive, cartoonish rockets on the rear bumper.
[LIVING INK: ACME BOOSTERS (x2)]
[EFFECT: +500% ACCELERATION]
[DURATION: 10 SECONDS]
[RISK: HIGH EXPLOSION PROBABILITY]
"Zayn," Bhy Khay pointed to the passenger seat. "You're on turret duty. I removed the windshield so you can shoot."
"I have a PhD in Ballistics," Zayn muttered, climbing into the cramped car. "And I'm sitting in a clown car about to be launched at a Warlord. My mother would be so proud."
"Elara," Bhy Khay pointed to the road ahead. "When I say 'Hit It', I need a runway. [Permafrost] on the asphalt. Reduce friction to zero."
"Frictionless surface," Elara nodded, gripping her staff. "Newton's First Law. An object in motion stays in motion."
"Unless acted upon by an external arrogance," Bhy Khay checked the rearview mirror.
In the distance, dust was rising. The Godfather's Convoy was coming. The black SUVs and the spiked Danfo were tearing down the highway, crushing wrecked cars like soda cans.
[ENEMY APPROACHING: THE GODFATHER (Lvl 18)]
[DISTANCE: 500 METERS]
"He's fast," Zayn noted, peering through his scope. "And he looks pissed. You really hurt his ego back there."
"Good," Bhy Khay turned the key. The Micra's engine coughed, sputtered, and then roared to life—sounding more like a lawnmower than a car. "Ego is heavy. It makes him slow."
The Godfather stood through the sunroof of his lead SUV. His white suit was pristine, his gold cane pulsing with purple light.
"There!" He pointed his cane at the tiny red taxi sitting in the middle of the road. "They stopped. They accepted their fate."
"Run them over," The Godfather ordered his driver. "Flatten them into a pancake."
The SUV accelerated. 100 km/h... 120 km/h...
Bhy Khay watched them come. He didn't move. He sat in the driver's seat, hand on the gear stick.
"Closer..." Bhy Khay whispered.
"Bhy Khay, they are 200 meters away!" Elara shouted from the roadside.
"Closer..."
"100 meters!" Zayn yelled, nocking an arrow.
"NOW!" Bhy Khay slammed the car into gear. "ELARA! ICE!"
Elara slammed her staff down.
[PATH OF FROST]
A sheet of jagged, blue ice erupted on the road, stretching from the Micra's tires straight toward the incoming SUV.
"TOMIWA! IGNITION!"
Tomiwa snapped her fingers.
BOOM.
The ink rockets on the back of the Micra exploded.
The car didn't just drive; it launched.
0 to 200 km/h in 1.2 seconds.
The G-force pinned Bhy Khay to the seat. "Zayn! Shoot the SUV's tire!"
"I can't aim! We're vibrating at the resonant frequency of a washing machine!" Zayn screamed.
"DO THE MATH!"
Zayn gritted his teeth. He calculated the vibration, the velocity, and the target vector.
TWANG.
The arrow flew. It hit the front left tire of the Godfather's SUV just as it hit the ice patch.
[TIRE BLOWN.]
[FRICTION LOSS: 100%.]
The massive SUV lost control instantly. It spun wildly on the ice, careening sideways.
But the Micra was speeding straight at it.
"He's going to ram us!" The Godfather shouted, raising his cane. "[GRAVITY WALL]!"
A purple barrier of pure gravitational force appeared in front of the SUV. Anything that hit it would be crushed into a cube.
"Brake!" Zayn screamed.
"Brakes are for people who fear death!" Bhy Khay yelled over the engine roar. "And I'm the Admin!"
He didn't brake. He hit a bump in the road—a convenient pothole Tomiwa had drawn earlier.
The Micra hit the bump at 220 km/h.
It didn't hit the wall. It flew over it.
[AERIAL STUNT: +50 XP]
As the car sailed over the Godfather's head, Bhy Khay leaned out of the window.
"Hey, Godfather!" Bhy Khay shouted. "Sir Isaac Newton sends his regards!"
He tossed a small object out of the window. It fell straight into the open sunroof of the SUV, right next to the Godfather.
It was a [Mana Potion].
But Bhy Khay had used his [Admin Edit] on it.
[ITEM: VOLATILE MANA POTION]
[MODIFICATION: OVERCHARGED (Unstable)]
[TRIGGER: IMPACT]
The Godfather looked at the glowing blue bottle on his leather seat.
"Oh sh—"
BOOM.
The potion exploded—not with fire, but with pure, raw magical energy.
The blast blew the doors off the SUV. The gravity wall flickered and died. The SUV flipped over, rolling three times before crashing into a ditch.
The Micra landed on the other side of the toll gate. It bounced hard, the suspension shattering.
CRUNCH.
The wheels fell off. The engine died. Smoke poured from the hood.
"We're alive," Zayn checked his limbs. "I think my spine is now an S-shape, but I'm alive."
Bhy Khay kicked the door open and rolled out.
"Check the kill feed," Bhy Khay said, dusting himself off.
[ENEMY DEFEATED: SYNDICATE DRIVER (Lvl 5)]
[THE GODFATHER: CRITICAL DAMAGE]
From the wreckage of the SUV, a hand emerged. The Godfather crawled out. His white suit was shredded. His sunglasses were gone, revealing eyes glowing with furious purple light.
He stood up, shaking. He wasn't dead. But he was bleeding.
"You..." The Godfather pointed his cane at Bhy Khay. The cane was cracked. "You threw a car at me. Who does that?"
"It's called kinetic bombardment," Bhy Khay called out from the safety of the Toll Gate booth. "Look it up. It's very effective against dinosaurs."
The Godfather looked at his ruined convoy. His men were groaning in the wreckage. His "Gravity Wall" was on cooldown.
He looked at Bhy Khay, then at the City of Ibadan behind him.
"This isn't over," The Godfather spat blood. "You won the sprint. But the marathon is coming. I'll be back with the Union."
He limped toward the surviving Danfo bus.
"Next time," The Godfather growled as he climbed in, "I'm bringing a Black Hole."
The Danfo U-turned and sped back toward Lagos.
[QUEST COMPLETE: DEFEND THE BORDER.]
[REWARD: 2000 COINS + 1 BROKEN NISSAN MICRA.]
Elara and Tomiwa ran up to them.
"You guys look terrible," Tomiwa noted, sketching a band-aid on the smoking car.
"We look victorious," Bhy Khay corrected. "But he's right. He'll come back."
He looked at the road leading to Lagos.
"And when he does, he won't come alone. The Lagos Server is awake."
Bhy Khay turned to his team.
"We need to fortify the Toll Gate. We need walls. We need turrets."
"And," Zayn added, rubbing his back, "we need better suspension on the next car."
"Agreed," Bhy Khay nodded. "Let's go home. I need to tax some people to pay for this Micra."