17. Dungeon Crawling (III)

His old tricks wouldn't work anymore. That two lives gambit only worked if he could shove in enough essence at once to push himself over the top. Now he needed a ridiculous amount of essence to move the needle. It was rare he was ever a few Moon Fruit away from a level-up. Only killing a boss would do it, really.

Which meant his margin of error right now was tiny. No do-overs. One fuck up, life over.

Maybe against the Keeper he had a little more leeway. But as he looked up at this monstrous colossus, he got the sense it could trip and fall on him, and that'd be it. That was tons upon tons upon tons of reinforced steel…

And by the looks of it, it knew how to use it.

𝕄𝕖𝕔𝕙𝕒𝕟𝕚𝕔𝕒𝕝 𝕊𝕖𝕟𝕥𝕚𝕟𝕖𝕝

𝔼𝕤𝕤𝕖𝕟𝕔𝕖 𝕃𝕖𝕧𝕖𝕝 𝟜𝟙

ℍ𝕪𝕕𝕣𝕒𝕦𝕝𝕚𝕔 ℙ𝕦𝕟𝕔𝕙 (𝔸𝕔𝕥𝕚𝕧𝕖) [𝕌𝕟𝕔𝕠𝕞𝕞𝕠𝕟]

𝕋𝕙𝕖 𝕊𝕖𝕟𝕥𝕚𝕟𝕖𝕝'𝕤 𝕙𝕒𝕟𝕕𝕤 𝕡𝕚𝕤𝕥𝕠𝕟 𝕠𝕦𝕥 𝕨𝕚𝕥𝕙 𝕥𝕙𝕖 𝕗𝕠𝕣𝕔𝕖 𝕠𝕗 𝕒 𝕙𝕪𝕕𝕣𝕒𝕦𝕝𝕚𝕔 𝕡𝕣𝕖𝕤𝕤. 𝔸 𝕡𝕦𝕟𝕔𝕙 𝕨𝕙𝕚𝕔𝕙 𝕔𝕒𝕟 𝕤𝕙𝕒𝕥𝕥𝕖𝕣 𝕣𝕖𝕚𝕟𝕗𝕠𝕣𝕔𝕖𝕕 𝕤𝕥𝕖𝕖𝕝.

𝕊𝕥𝕖𝕖𝕝 𝕊𝕥𝕠𝕣𝕞 (𝔸𝕔𝕥𝕚𝕧𝕖) [𝕌𝕟𝕔𝕠𝕞𝕞𝕠𝕟]

𝕋𝕙𝕖 𝕊𝕖𝕟𝕥𝕚𝕟𝕖𝕝 𝕦𝕟𝕝𝕖𝕒𝕤𝕙𝕖𝕤 𝕒 𝕨𝕙𝕚𝕣𝕝𝕨𝕚𝕟𝕕 𝕠𝕗 𝕛𝕒𝕘𝕘𝕖𝕕 𝕞𝕖𝕥𝕒𝕝 𝕒𝕥 𝕤𝕦𝕡𝕖𝕣𝕤𝕠𝕟𝕚𝕔 𝕤𝕡𝕖𝕖𝕕𝕤, 𝕕𝕖𝕒𝕝𝕚𝕟𝕘 𝕞𝕒𝕤𝕤𝕚𝕧𝕖 𝕒𝕣𝕖𝕒 𝕠𝕗 𝕖𝕗𝕗𝕖𝕔𝕥 𝕕𝕒𝕞𝕒𝕘𝕖

Its weakness lit up red—its chest. It had a core there, bright yellow, but Zane had a strong suspicion it like with the Behemoth. Another honey trap. That core lay behind walls of steel and thick glass. There was no way he was getting to it. Besides, he had nothing piercing nor concussive to blast it with. His strengths were strangling and burning. Better to play to his strengths than bend over backwards trying to exploit the others' weakness. He'd learned the hard way.

The Sentinel struck first, swallowing half the room in a stride. He leapt up to meet it. His plan was simple—do the same thing he did with those Box Golems. Just bigger.

But the moment he tried looping his Chain around his arm, its bus-sized hand whipped out and snatched it right out of the air. He dangled there, stunned—something that big should not be able to move that fast.

Then it yanked, and he went flying. Shit! There was no time to put his other Chain between them. That fist was closing in fast, raging with essence—a Hydraulic Punch was coming. Oh, this thing is good.

All he could do was throw up his arms and grit his teeth. The fist shot out—

A blue shield flickered in front of his face. It caught the punch—for half a second. Then it shattered into a thousand brilliant shards. But that half-second was enough. He threw up his other Chain, got it between his body and the fist. He blocked it.

It didn't feel like it.

It crushed him into the ground like a boot crushes a gnat. His ears popped, his vision went black.

𝕎𝕒𝕣𝕟𝕚𝕟𝕘: ℍ𝕖𝕒𝕝𝕥𝕙 𝕦𝕟𝕕𝕖𝕣 𝟟𝟝%!

The fist receded and he scrambled out, choking in air. Everything hurt. He felt like all his bones were shattered inside him—how was he still upright? It hit this hard even partly blocked? Shit. He grinned.

He heard a gasp. It was Reina, splayed out against the ground, coughing blood. That blue shield had been hers.

No time to check on her, no time to think on it. The Sentinel was stomping at him again. It swung down a fist like a hammer, and he barely leapt out of the way. It swept it out, knocking over rows of racks, throwing them across the floor. He gritted his teeth. He had to keep running.

Lesson learned! Don't throw naked lunges at its arms. If they tried grappling his head, he imagined a similar thing would happen. Which was a shame, because that had been most of his plan.

Now he had to come up with a new one on the fly as the brute stomped after him, terraforming the ground in real-time. It was getting frighteningly close to him. He could see the craters it left where he'd been just moments before. He reached and he ducked, and his fingers closed just above his head. He felt the air whooshing by.

It was exhilarating.

Can't go for its head, might as well try its legs. It moved less, and it was closer too. But when he tried throwing his Chain around, he barely made a clean loop before one giant hand reached down and plucked it off almost contemptuously. This time, he let go of the Chains before it could drag him; they vanished. He re-summoned them as he ran.

So that didn't work either… one more try, then. This time he started running in loops like one of those cockroaches he'd seen with their heads cut off, going between its legs, around its legs, making it bend over trying to snatch at him, making it stomp at him. He didn't try to bind it. He just let his Chains make natural loops on the ground, like a fox trap.

Meanwhile, he felt a warm pulse touch his back.

𝕐𝕠𝕦 𝕙𝕒𝕧𝕖 𝕓𝕖𝕖𝕟 𝕒𝕗𝕗𝕝𝕚𝕔𝕥𝕖𝕕 𝕓𝕪: ℍ𝕖𝕒𝕝𝕚𝕟𝕘 𝕋𝕠𝕦𝕔𝕙

ℍ𝕖𝕒𝕝𝕥𝕙 𝔼𝕗𝕗𝕖𝕔𝕥: ℍ𝕖𝕒𝕝𝕥𝕙 ℝ𝕖𝕤𝕥𝕠𝕣𝕖𝕕 𝟚𝟘%

Reina nodded at him from a dim corner. He was so busy running, he'd only forgotten she existed for a second—it was lucky she healed him then, because she ended up slotting into the last chunk of his plan. He had it—now he just had to do it. He felt truly unreasonably confident given he'd done precisely zero damage to that thing, and it had nearly ended him with one blow. He just had a good feeling.

Then he heard an ear-piercing sound like steel grinding against steel; he looked up. And nearly got his eye poked out by a nail going supersonic. A jagged steel plate whizzed by, ripped up his arm; another cut a huge gash down his leg. It was spewing Steel Storm at him. Another blue field shimmered into being. This time, it lasted maybe three seconds before collapsing, along with its maker.

Zane felt a little bad asking now, of all times, but—"You said you had a disorientation skill, right?!"

She nodded, in between hacking gobs of blood.

"Can you still throw it?" He had to shout as loud as he could. It was hard making himself heard over that staccato hailstorm, but again she nodded. "On three," he said, pointing at its face.

She screamed something at him—as he ducked between the sentinel's legs, he missed half the words, but it was something like—it won't do anything! And she was right. The Level difference was too big. It'd be like being stung between the eyes at best. Still, he said, "On three!"

To his relief, she trusted him; she nodded. He made one last loop. Two, three—

A dark pulse rippled through the air and clocked the Sentinel right on the side of the head. Good shot. And she was right. It didn't do anything.

Except make it turn to her, and piss it off.

It roared, a sound like thousands of stuck gears grinding. Then it lunged for her. She shrieked.

At the same time, Zane yanked.

And his little tripwire, triply reinforced, shunted into the air. It wound in on itself, binding the Sentinel's legs together. The Monster could only flail, grasping uselessly, as it began to topple the way skyscrapers topple, slowly but ponderously, inevitably.

***

Reina saw it.

As that Monster fell, splaying its hands in a futile try at righting itself, she saw it—what Zane must have seen all along. She gasped—there was a sliver of a chance! He had to go now, seize that split second—

And he did.

She saw him lunge up the back of its legs even as it toppled, leap up its back, climbing higher and higher, racing for the neck. As the monster put out its hands to break its fall—hands that, crucially, lay tens of feet from its neck—he looped one Chain around. Then he turned, throwing around another Chain even as one of its massive hands got free and swatted at him. She saw his face—the sheer glee in it. But he wasn't manic; he wasn't flailing, spasming. He moved like a machine. The hand swept over him, barely missing. But his eyes weren't on the thing about to crush him; it was like he didn't care about that at all. All he cared about was executing. He swerved smoothly around it, all poise.

He'd said this was his plan earlier. To put his Chains around the Sentinel's neck and burn it through, but she couldn't believe she was actually seeing it. It was like something out of an action movie—it didn't make any sense, it was so... clean. Didn't he see the hands coming to crush him?! It was like he didn't believe they could touch him.

The Chains locked tight, flared white. And a hiss poured out.

"Oh my God," she whispered. He was really doing it! He was—

Then the Sentinel's hands reached over, dropping long shadows over Zane's head.

"Run!" she screamed, despairing. It was all she could do. She'd run out of essence. But he couldn't run—he was locked in too tight!

He looked up. And even in the dark, she could see the gleam of his grinning teeth.

She felt faint. She realized then why he was so poised, so cool in the heat of the moment. It wasn't that he thought he was invincible.

He just didn't care.

And he was still smiling when the hands closed over him and squashed him like a fly.

She heard the crunching of bones as the hands closed tight, firming to fists. More crunching, sharper now, louder. He didn't cry out in pain; he didn't even scream; he just took it.

She saw rivers of blood trickling out from the iron fist.

She choked out a sob. There was a long silence.

She noticed something odd about the scene.

The Chains were still burning white.

Then that great steel head sloughed off the boss's shoulders, and cratered into the ground.

She gasped. "What…?"

The hands loosened, fell away, leaving the ruins of a body splayed out atop the steel corpse.

"Oh my God," she said again. His spine—his arms—his neck! It was all— She couldn't bear to look.

Then all that steel dissolved to white.

She saw a rush of it pour into her.

𝕃𝕖𝕧𝕖𝕝 𝕦𝕡!

𝔼𝕤𝕤𝕖𝕟𝕔𝕖 𝕃𝕖𝕧𝕖𝕝 𝟚𝟟 -> 𝟚𝟠

𝕃𝕖𝕧𝕖𝕝 𝕦𝕡!

𝔼𝕤𝕤𝕖𝕟𝕔𝕖 𝕃𝕖𝕧𝕖𝕝 𝟚𝟠 -> 𝟚𝟡

𝕃𝕖𝕧𝕖𝕝 𝕦𝕡!

𝔼𝕤𝕤𝕖𝕟𝕔𝕖 𝕃𝕖𝕧𝕖𝕝 𝟚𝟡 -> 𝟛𝟘

𝕊𝕜𝕚𝕝𝕝 𝕝𝕖𝕒𝕣𝕟𝕖𝕕!

𝔼𝕤𝕤𝕖𝕟𝕔𝕖 ℂ𝕝𝕠𝕒𝕜 𝕀 (𝔸𝕔𝕥𝕚𝕧𝕖) [𝕌𝕟𝕔𝕠𝕞𝕞𝕠𝕟]

𝔸 𝕓𝕦𝕗𝕗 𝕗𝕠𝕣 𝕠𝕟𝕖'𝕤 𝕥𝕖𝕒𝕞𝕞𝕒𝕥𝕖𝕤. 𝔻𝕒𝕞𝕡𝕖𝕟𝕤 𝕥𝕙𝕖 𝕖𝕗𝕗𝕖𝕔𝕥 𝕠𝕗 𝕒𝕝𝕝 𝕖𝕤𝕤𝕖𝕟𝕔𝕖-𝕓𝕒𝕤𝕖𝕕 𝕒𝕥𝕥𝕒𝕔𝕜𝕤 𝕓𝕪 𝟙𝟘% 𝕗𝕠𝕣 𝕒 𝕝𝕚𝕞𝕚𝕥𝕖𝕕 𝕡𝕖𝕣𝕚𝕠𝕕. 𝔼𝕗𝕗𝕖𝕔𝕥 𝕒𝕟𝕕 𝕕𝕦𝕣𝕒𝕥𝕚𝕠𝕟 𝕤𝕔𝕒𝕝𝕖 𝕨𝕚𝕥𝕙 𝕝𝕖𝕧𝕖𝕝.

But the bulk of the essence went to him. She hadn't thought he was still alive. But there was a flash, and a different body lay face down, limp on the ground. A whole body.

Zane picked himself up, brushing the dust off him, and made a face at his shirt. It had been badly torn. Then he shrugged at it, and his eyes met hers.

"Hey," he said, "Good work out there."

She forgot to breathe. "How are you—" she got out. "How are you so calm?"

He shrugged. "Let me know when you're ready."

… Ready?

He nodded to the ceiling. "For the second floor. The other boss, I mean."

She couldn't believe what she was hearing. She wanted to crawl into her cot and sleep for a day straight.

"You good?" he asked, frowning. "You did Level Up, right?"

Numbly, she nodded.

"Great. So you're fully healed."

Was he the crazy one, or was she? "You almost died!"

He cocked a brow. "But I didn't, did I? No harm done."

This man… she felt weak at the knees. God.

***

It seemed Reina needed a little break before they went on. It was a mental thing, she said. He was happy to oblige. That worked out well.

After they cleared the boss, all its Box Golem minions vanished too. Which meant the other warehouse workers were safe—they were free to come in. They were mostly men, mostly young, mostly Level 17, 18, 12. No one of interest. But they seemed intent on hovering around Reina, asking repeatedly if she was alright, even after she said she was, multiple times—like they were lining up to be her protector. Which was funny, given the Level difference.

Zane could tell she'd be fine. He'd barely known her, but he'd fought with her; that was enough. She was shaken, but he could tell she had steel in her. She was rising to her feet even now, shaking out the cobwebs. She was good.

"Hey! You!" said one of the men, a fluffy-haired blond. He looked so young he could've been in college. Zane blinked.

"Yeah, you! I'm talking to you!" said the man. He was red-faced.

𝕋𝕣𝕖𝕟𝕥 𝕄𝕚𝕝𝕝𝕖𝕣 (ℂ𝕣𝕖𝕒𝕥𝕦𝕣𝕖)

𝔼𝕤𝕤𝕖𝕟𝕔𝕖 𝕃𝕖𝕧𝕖𝕝 𝟡

"What were you thinking, running in here like that?! Can you imagine what would've happened if Miss Reina wasn't here to save you? Risking your own life's one thing, but you put the Miss in danger! You—"

"Quiet, Trent," said Reina suddenly. "You don't know what you're talking about."

She stood. "Zane's not from here—he's here to help. Without him, we might never have slain the first Boss. We should be thanking him."

"But—" Trent looked aggrieved, like it was unfair she was telling him off. "He—you—"

Zane saw the exact moment Trent Identified him. His words choked off suddenly; his eyes bulged. At first this kind of thing had annoyed Zane. Now he found it amusing.

The rest of the men—they seemed more like boys by the second to Zane—looked like the last thing they wanted to do was thank him. They seemed scared, wary, and… jealous? But her tone brooked no disagreement. So they did, mumbling.

"Zane," said Reina, crossing her arms. Seemed she'd gotten her wits back. "I just got a new Skill. Give me a few hours to practice, and rest, and eat. Then we can head up. How's that sound?"

He could see why the other workers deferred to her—other than the fact that most of them seemed in love with her. Now that she wasn't as frazzled, she had a natural confidence to the way she spoke.

"Sure," he said. What would he do in the meantime? Were there treasure areas around here—hadn't she said something about… "What's that Cavern of Insight you mentioned?"