The moment Mary finished casting her stamina spell into the others, a faint glow rippled along their limbs like someone tapping the tension strings of a bow. Everyone inhaled as one. Quinn, who had always been a blur of movement rather than a physical presence, momentarily remained motionless, as if an invisible signal signalling the end of the warm-up phase.

  But the spell wasn’t for me; no, I wanted to avoid any kind of external help in case the solo achievement fails to trigger. I had other preparations to tend to; I was already peeling off my pack, lowering it to the cavern floor with the same ceremony a soldier uses to set down his helmet before a last stand. I clasped the cloak and let it settle across my shoulders; the enchantment hissed against my skin like cold oil. Then the shield. Then the mace. The weight of those curses hit me instantly; my ears rang, I had to strain a bit more to hold the mace, and my focus narrowed into a funnel. The world dimmed and sharpened at the same time, like looking through smoked glass.

  Alya winced. “You good?”

  “Never been better,” I muttered, and then grabbed the row of cursed potions.

  The vials clinked against each other in my hand, little bottled calamities. One by one, I uncorked them with my teeth and slammed them back. Each swallow burned along a different axis in my body; one made my joints feel as if molten iron cooled inside them, another turned my heartbeat into a hammer against my ribs, and another made my vision strobe. By the time the fifth swallow reached my stomach, I experienced a sensation akin to a collapsing star masquerading as a man.

  I exhaled. “Now.”

  No need for theatrics. They bolted.

  Jack sprinted ahead with a roar, Marcus close behind, the spears in his hand fanning like metallic feathers. Quinn blurred besides me, nothing more than an undistinguishable shape slipping through the entrance. Alya darted wide, sword on the shoulder, already posed to strike.

  I walked forward, letting the compounded curses drag across my nerves like hooked wire. My vision tunnelled, sharpened into a painful spearpoint focused on the end of the cavern. My thoughts were muddled, and a cold dread started flaring up in the middle of my chest.

  The leader was still rutting into the massive female blob of a gorg—its obscene rhythm so loud I could feel it echoing in my ribs. He didn’t even look up at the intrusion.

  Fine. Perfect. Let the beast finish its last act of stupidity.

  I began the transfers.

  With a thought, the grimoire’s curse snapped from me and flared into it. Then the mace’s curse. The shield’s curse. The cloak’s curse. Every time, he shuddered harder, grunted louder, slapped at his ears, and started looking around as if a swarm of invisible insects bit into him.

  Then the potions.

  One. Two. Three. Four. Five launched into him like smoke needles. His back arched, his breath hitched, and the grotesque thrusting stopped. He froze mid-motion, then slumped against the female’s gelatinous form. A bellow tore from his throat.

  Good. Very good.

  Behind me, Quinn shouted, voice edged with panic. “They’re over level twenty-five!”

  A thunderous boom rippled through the cavern, shaking grit loose from the ceiling. I spun just long enough to see Alya decapitating one of the gorg, not cleanly; there was a glow on the blade, but the cut wasn’t clean; it looked more like a tear. At the same time a still-alive mage hurled Jack across the chamber like a sack of bricks. Mary shrieked his name. Marcus’s spears cut through the haze in retaliation.

  I raised a hand, pulling mana into the grimoire at my hip. It answered eagerly, like a dog unclamping from a chain. I shaped it into a dense, compact projectile so heavy with mana it strained my focus.

  “Leave the matter to us!” Alya called, voice sharp.

  Fine.

  I turned back. The leader had collapsed onto one knee, frantically scratching at his skull, his gaze flickering in and out of focus as if reality itself were fading away. His discarded club lay to the side, a slab of dark stone thick enough to flatten a car. Under the mace curse, he probably couldn’t lift it anymore.

  Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  I started downing the remaining vials one by one, quickly, and transferring those curses to the boss.

  My mind clicked through the options. The brute was too massive. Too thick, both with muscles and fat. I doubted a normal barrage would punch through its defences in time before someone else got pulped by the other gorg.

  So I aimed for the one weakness universally acknowledged by male anatomy and the universe.

  I invested all my strength into the projectile. More. Then more. Until my knuckles whitened and my temples throbbed.

  And shot him in the groyne.

  The projectile, a compressed shard of pure arcane power, hit dead centre.

  The result was… spectacular, in the most grotesque way.

  Blood gushed down to the floor like a fountain. Something wet and heavy that I refused to look at plopped onto the cavern floor with a noise I will hear in nightmares. Despite the usual gravelly speech of these creatures, the leader’s scream was so sharp it cracked into a squeal. Even the other gorg paused mid-frenzy in confusion.

  I didn’t stop; I continued forward.

  This wasn’t cruelty. It was just strategy; I thought that the easiest way to make something that large die fast was to deprive it of blood.

  At that moment, half of the creature's lifeblood was spilling onto the stones.

  Not only that, the curses swirled around him like a diseased rainbow. His vision obviously fractured, his eyes tried to focus but jittered in opposite directions while he was trying to stem the flow of blood with his hands, futilely. But good for me.

  After a moment it raised its head and tried to advance towards me, so I created a barrier in front of its left foot; it stumbled forward when it tried to take the next step and fell on its hand and knees.

  I shot twice at his skull. Then again. And again. Each impact spat skin and chipped bone into the air. It tried to crawl to me now, but the effect of the curses was intensifying; it kept twitching, flinching, thrashing around and looking at the empty air.

  Behind me the others screamed and fought and bled. Magical detonations boomed. A spear whistled. Someone crashed into a rock. I heard Jack roar with surprising fury.

  I turned around; the situation wasn’t that good, so I interjected.

  The next bullet I shot at the surviving mage, just to interrupt its spell. It hit a barrier and shattered in a spray of sparks, but it made the creature turn, and Quinn was instantly on it, carving it open with a frenzy I didn’t know he possessed.

  I returned to the boss. I was almost out of mana. The curse transfers had drained me more than expected. I needed to end this fast; if the curses came back to me, I was done for.

  The creature convulsed, spasming on the cave floor. The top of its head was a cracked dome. Bone and grey matter glistened in the dim light.

  Enough.

  I let the shield and mace drop with a clang and stepped through the expanding lake of blood. It soaked my boots, warm enough to steam slightly in the cold cavern air. The stench of the creature and the brain leaking through its skull hit me like a wave; the rot of old meat and bile around the room as a background made me nearly vomit.

  I reached out, pressing my palm directly into the exposed brain.

  It was slick, pulpy, and wrong in every possible dimension.

  Focus.

  I pulled every last scrap of mana I had left, funnelled it through the grimoire, and into my hand. Concentrated it. Compressed it. The spell built pressure like a storm behind a sealed door.

  Then I released it.

  A concussive blast erupted from my palm. A shockwave slammed outward. A quarter of the boss’s skull detonated in a wet explosion that painted the cavern wall with gore.

  The sound rang through the cavern, everyone turning to look at me.

  Then the soft chiming of notifications in the back of my mind, one after another, stacking like falling dominoes.

  I exhaled in relief, taking a couple of seconds to look at my work. I did it. It had been quite easy too by abusing the stack of curses I inflicted on myself... I didn't even have time to finish my thoughts before the curses came back into my body all at once, like a tidal wave of misery.

  The impact punched a grunt out of my throat.

  Fuck, this is much worse than last time. Damn grimoire... But I had to bear them; I know I could.

  I felt my body start to disobey me; my muscles were twitching erratically. I fell to one knee, trying to stabilise myself. My thoughts were becoming foggy, and my attention waned to the muted colours of the cave and the beautiful, bright red of the blood all around me.

  Why was I here again?

  A sour wave rose from my stomach, violent enough to override the fog. I vomited, hard, retching until bile burned the back of my throat. The spasm seized my whole torso, dragging me into a coughing fit that scraped my lungs raw.

  Someone shouted my name. I couldn’t tell who. Their voice arrived warped, like it travelled through layers of glass.

  Everything spun. The floor felt oddly comfortable against my cheek, warm from blood seeping across the stone.

  I felt so weak.

  The numbness crept in from the edges of my limbs, cold and creeping like frost climbing a windowpane. It hollowed out my chest. Pulled my attention inward. There was… nothing. No reason to move. No spark to fight it.

  The curse was always going to win eventually, wasn’t it? I’d held it back for years, pushed, clawed, bargained, and fought, but in the end, what chance did I ever have?

  And what was the point?

  I gave. I gave everything. I invested time, strength, and every ounce of my being. And what came back?

  Almost nothing.

  Maybe it really was better to stop.

  To lie here.

  To rest.

  Yes… rest sounded beneficial.

  I’d done my part. I killed the leader. That was enough. More than enough. Let the others finish whatever was left.

  Something huge shifted besides me, making the faint light vanish under its shadow. I didn’t even flinch. Darkness was… nice. Gentle. I wanted to sink into it. Let it fold over me.

  Just let me rest.

  A flicker of movement. A pulse of heat. A tremor of instinct buried deep screamed something, but the fog swallowed it before I could grasp it.

  Someone’s voice tore through the haze—raw, panicked.

  “THE BOSS! THE BOSS IS STILL ALIVE!”

  “ELIAS!!!”

  20 chapters ahead!