Alya P.O.V.

  The cavern shook with chaos the moment we charged in, and I had no time to marvel at the horror show of the place before steel and screams filled my world.

  These gorg were different.

  Bigger.

  Faster.

  Meaner.

  The last groups we fought felt like training dummies compared to this lot.

  Still, we hit them hard. Two mages went down early; Marcus speared one straight through the head, and Quinn slit the other open before it could blink. The third raised a shimmering barrier, and Jack didn’t make it in time. A blast of force hammered him across the cavern and smashed him into a pile of bones.

  I swore under my breath and pivoted, but Elias turned towards us—only for me to shout across the chaos:

  “Leave this to us!”

  He actually listened. Good. Because the boss was the real nightmare in this room.

  My own opponent slammed a bone club the size of a tree trunk at my head. I rolled under it, felt the air ripple over my scalp, and countered with a slash across its stomach. The blade bit deep, but not deep enough. My sword wasn’t sharp enough, and these monsters were as thick as boulders.

  It roared and charged again.

  Around me, the battlefield twisted in fast snapshots. Quinn darted like a phantom behind two brutes, cutting them apart with frightening speed. Marcus hurled his thin spears one after another, each throw puncturing hide and bone with impressive accuracy. Jack, God bless the man, was already back up, front-lining the surviving mage with sheer stubbornness.

  Quinn, after leaving the two brutes on the ground to bleed out, started dancing around the mage, waiting for the kill like a wolf circling a dying elk.

  The kid was terrifying.

  But the most frightening thing in the cavern wasn’t any gorg.

  It was Elias.

  I caught glimpses of him between swings. He walked straight towards the leader with the casual confidence of someone strolling through a garden. No fear. No hesitation. Just purpose.

  Then he started… doing something.

  Gesturing.

  Swiping the air.

  Flicking something at the boss.

  The massive gorg jerked like a puppet glitching through two different rhythms. Its ears twitched violently. It clawed at its own head. It staggered, eyes darting around as if the air itself were attacking it.

  Then Elias began downing more vials.

  And another.

  And another.

  The boss looked like it was losing its mind.

  I didn’t have time to unravel his madness, because my brute lunged again. I sidestepped, invoked Rend, and my blade carved a deep, ragged wound across its ribs. Blood sprayed. The gorg howled and swung wildly, but it was weakening—slowly, painfully.

  If this damn sword were sharper, I could’ve ended it already.

  Then a shrill, unnatural scream tore across the cavern.

  Both I and the brute I was fighting froze for a heartbeat, looking towards Elias.

  The sight almost knocked the breath out of me.

  The giant leader…

  It was missing its dick.

  Blood fountained from the mangled stump, painting the stone floor in thick splatters. The monster’s scream cracked so high it almost sounded human for a moment. It collapsed to its knees, clutching the ruin between its legs.

  Elias, calm as ever, fired another projectile into the top of its skull.

  I blinked.

  Then refocused and tore my own brute apart. Rend opened it again and again, the wounds deep, wet, and fatal. The monster toppled face-first, twitching weakly, and I felt the familiar ding of a kill notification. Then another. A level up. Not surprising; these things were far above our usual foe.

  I spun back towards the others.

  The boss lay on the ground, unable to respond, convulsing under the barrage Elias kept pumping into its skull. How many had he fired? Dozens? More? Each projectile tore more flesh away until bone shone through and brain matter pulsed beneath the cracks.

  He turned briefly and shot at the last mage. It absorbed the hit with a barrier, but that was all Quinn needed. The kid darted in and began carving the bastard like a butcher cutting fillets.

  They had it handled. It was better not to interfere.

  Instead, I focused on Elias.

  He was walking towards the boss, unhurried, unsettlingly sure.

  The damn thing was still alive despite its ruined head and having lost enough blood that should have dropped a mammoth.

  My stomach tightened.

  A single swing from that monster, even dying, would turn anyone into paste.

  But Elias reached it.

  Placed a hand gently, almost tenderly, on the exposed brain.

  Blue light pooled under his palm.

  Then—

  BOOM.

  A chunk of the boss’s skull detonated sideways. Bone fragments and brain sprayed across the cavern wall like thrown paint. The monster collapsed instantly.

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  I let out a long breath of relief.

  It was over.

  Or so I thought. After less than ten seconds Elias staggered, then dropped to one knee.

  Then fully collapsed.

  “Elias!” I shouted, sprinting towards him, but halted mid-step three or so yards away, as something icy crawled up my spine.

  My body refused to go any closer.

  Goosebumps broke out across my skin, and a deep, instinctive revulsion clenched around my ribs. It wasn’t fear.

  It was something primal.

  Wrong.

  “Elias, answer me!” I shouted.

  He didn’t even look in my direction.

  Mary rushed in and gasped, her whole body jerking back like she’d touched a live wire.

  “I-I can’t get near him!” she said, terrified. “Something’s... wrong!”

  Dread curled low in my stomach.

  Then behind Elias… I noticed movement.

  “No,” I breathed. “No, no, no…”

  The boss twitched.

  It should have been dead.

  It was missing half its head.

  Yet it was getting up.

  “Impossible…” I whispered.

  But it wasn’t bleeding.

  Its flesh was grey.

  Dead grey.

  And its eyes glowed a sick, murky green, not just the irises, but the entire eyeballs.

  Recognition struck like lightning.

  Just like the man in the safe zone.

  Dead, but held upright by something foul and unnatural.

  “Fuck,” I hissed. “Elias must have killed it while it was cursed in some way!”

  Think! Think! What can I do? I can’t get close, I can’t move him, and I can maybe get the boss’s attention by giving him time, but how can I make him get up?

  The level-ups – he must have gotten a bunch – and the achievement too.

  I screamed at him again.

  “Elias! You need to trigger your status! Open your status!”

  For a heartbeat, clarity flickered in his face; he heard me.

  But before he could react, the undead boss surged forward. Its leg swung out.

  And kicked Elias.

  My breath froze as I watched him fly.

  He soared over our heads, hit the ground hard, bounced, and rolled like a rag doll.

  He didn’t get up.

  The corpse-thing turned towards us.

  It reached down.

  Dragged its massive stone club across the floor, sparks scraping off the surface.

  Then faced us.

  We were totally, royally fucked.

  ────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────

  Elias's P.O.V.

  The boss’s kick tore into my ribs, and the world blurred again.

  Stone. Impact. Pain.

  And even while flying, even while every bone in my body screamed, I hit the ground. Rolled. Gasped in pain.

  The darkness wasn’t more gentle after seeing my pain.

  It clung to me like a greedy animal, digging claws into my mind, pulling me downward. The curses were everywhere, threading through my bones, dragging my thoughts into pits I’d already crawled out of too many times. My limbs twitched uselessly. My vision pulsed in and out, devouring colour, swallowing edges.

  I wasn’t just hurt.

  I was unravelling.

  Everything inside me sagged under that weight. My will, once sharp enough to cut through any fear, felt crushed flat, soaked and heavy as rotten cloth. The world around me blurred into a smear of blood, stone, and muted screams.

  And I wanted to stay down.

  That was the worst part.

  The curses whispered the same poison they always did, but this time it sank deeper.

  Why fight?

  Why stand?

  Why cling to a life always teetering on the edge of someone else’s disaster?

  The boss was dead.

  I’d done what I had to.

  I could rest now. Finally…

  Something in me kicked, a primal jolt that tore through the curse-induced lethargy like lightning chewing through a dead tree. A voice… I had to do something…

  Status.

  Notifications.

  Rewards.

  Evolution.

  The words slithered back into meaning. And the curses, startled by the sudden shift, faltered just enough for breath to reach my lungs again.

  I pushed my hand against the floor. It shook violently, fingers spasming as the curses tried to yank me back into the dark. My nerves burned. My stomach knotted. My ribs howled.

  But that jolt Alya gave me – it was like someone striking a bell inside my skull.

  It gave me clarity.

  A thin crack. Just enough to wedge myself back into consciousness.

  I couldn’t keep the thought clear enough, so I tried to speak it out loud, forced air into my throat, tried to speak, failed, and tried again.

  “S… status…”

  My voice was shredded, but the command left my mouth.

  And the moment it did, the moment the system recognised my intent...

  Everything shifted.

  Light flared in front of me, faint but real. A flicker of blue pierced the suffocating fog. I felt something snap open inside my mind, like a lock giving way.

  Notifications surged up from the depths, one after another, trying to flood me with information faster than my battered consciousness could process.

  The curses recoiled, shrinking back like startled insects as the surge of system feedback burned through the worst of their influence. I could feel clarity fighting its way up my spine.

  I looked at the cascade of notifications waiting to be read.

  With a wheeze I put an arm under myself, then a leg. I could think again. I watched the undead boss going for my companions. My curse, the original one, wasn’t weakening like the others; it was pushing harder, forcing me to go and save them or suffer the consequences. With a grunt of pain, I got to a knee.

  No rest for the wicked, huh? No matter, time for round two.

  20 chapters ahead!