Twenty minutes deeper into the tunnel system, Alex was starting to understand why the DMB had flagged this place for unusual activity.
The phosphorescent water was getting brighter. Not in a good way – more like the sickly glow of something radioactive. The fungal growths on the walls were pulsing faster now, their rhythm almost matching his heartbeat. And the smell coming through his rebreather had shifted from "industrial waste" to something organic and wrong.
"Environmental readings are spiking," Lisa reported, checking her tablet. "Toxicity levels are still manageable, but whatever's causing the phosphorescence is getting stronger."
"How much stronger?" Marcus asked, pausing to let Tom's enhanced senses sweep the tunnel ahead.
"Think 'swimming pool full of glow sticks' instead of 'mood lighting,'" Lisa replied grimly.
Alex adjusted his camera settings to compensate for the increasing light levels, stepping carefully around a particularly bright pool of the glowing water. The auto-exposure was struggling with the contrast between the bright liquid and the dark tunnel walls, creating a strobing effect that would make viewers nauseous.
That's when he slipped.
His boot caught on a piece of broken concrete, sending him stumbling sideways into the tunnel wall. His hand shot out instinctively to catch himself, plunging wrist-deep into a pool of the phosphorescent water.
"Shit!" Alex yanked his hand back, but the damage was done. The water clung to his skin like liquid light, seeping through a small cut on his palm that he'd gotten from handling equipment earlier.
"Alex, you okay?" Sarah called.
"Yeah, just—" Alex started to say he was fine, but the words died in his throat.
The water wasn't just glowing. It was warm. Really warm. And that warmth was spreading up his arm like fire in his veins, racing toward his heart with purpose that felt almost... intelligent.
"Something's wrong," he gasped, staring at his hand. The phosphorescence was fading from his skin, but he could feel it inside him now, merging with his bloodstream and spreading to every corner of his body.
That's when his AR display started acting up.
At first, it was just minor glitches. Text overlays flickering. Targeting reticles jumping between positions. The kind of thing that happened when you brought civilian electronics into high-energy environments.
But then the words appeared.
Foreign Energy Detected... Analyzing... Compatible
Alex blinked, thinking it was just a hallucination from whatever he'd absorbed. But the text was still there, floating in his peripheral vision like a message from another dimension.
"Uh, guys?" he said, his voice sounding strange in his own ears. "Anyone else seeing weird readouts?"
"Define weird," Sarah said, ice crystals forming and dissolving around her hands as she tested her abilities against the dungeon's interference.
"Like... text that shouldn't be there. And I think that water did something to me."
Tom's head snapped toward him, enhanced senses focusing intently. "Your biometrics just spiked. Heart rate, neural activity, cellular metabolism – everything's accelerating."
Energy Integration: 47%... 68%... 89%...
Combat Data Archive - Initialization Sequence Active
Alex's heart was racing now, but not from fear. From something else. Something that felt like potential energy building toward a critical mass.
"That's not normal," Marcus said, moving back to check Alex's condition. "The phosphorescent water isn't supposed to be absorbed through skin contact. You should probably—"
"Contact!" Tom's shout cut through the conversation like a whip crack. "Big one. Really big."
Initialization Complete - Welcome to Combat Data Archive
The tunnel ahead of them exploded into motion, but Alex barely noticed. He was too busy staring at the new interface that had just overlaid his entire field of vision, displaying information that should have been impossible for F-rank equipment to process.
Whatever that water had been, it had changed him.
And something told him he was about to find out exactly what that meant.
The tunnel ahead of them exploded into motion.
What emerged from the phosphorescent water wasn't another pack of tunnel rats. It was something that belonged in a much higher-star dungeon, something that made Alex's emergency shield generator feel about as protective as a paper umbrella.
The Tunnel Worm was thirty feet of segmented nightmare, its body as thick as a subway car and covered in chitinous plates that gleamed like black mirrors. Each segment sported clusters of sensory organs that tracked the team's movements with predatory intelligence. But it was the mouth that made Alex's blood freeze – a circular maw lined with three rotating rows of teeth, each one the size of a butcher knife.
"That's not supposed to be here," Sarah breathed, ice barriers already sprouting from the tunnel floor.
"D-rank minimum," Marcus said, his sword coming up in a defensive stance. "Maybe D-plus. This thing could punch through to the surface if it wanted to."
The Tunnel Worm regarded them for a moment, its sensory clusters focusing on each team member in turn. When its attention settled on Alex, he felt like a mouse being evaluated by a very hungry snake.
Then it attacked.
The worm moved like liquid death, its massive body undulating through the water with impossible grace. Sarah's ice barriers might as well have been paper – the creature smashed through them without slowing down, sending razor-sharp crystal fragments spinning through the air.
"Scatter!" Marcus shouted, diving to one side as the worm's mouth gaped wide enough to swallow a small car.
Alex's combat training – what little he had – kicked in. Move. Don't think, just move. He threw himself against the tunnel wall, his camera gear clattering against the concrete as the worm's body swept through the space where he'd been standing.
Combat Analysis - Pattern Recognition Active
The text appeared in his AR display again, but Alex was too busy trying not to die to pay attention. Tom was calling out positions and movement vectors. Sarah was throwing ice spears that bounced off the worm's armored hide like toothpicks. Lisa was chanting healing buffs and praying they'd live long enough to matter.
And Marcus... Marcus was dancing with death.
Alex had seen B-rank Awakened fight before. He'd filmed dozens of them, analyzed their techniques, studied their combat efficiency. But watching Marcus face down a creature that outclassed him by an entire threat category was like watching someone try to stop a freight train with determination and a really sharp stick.
Except Marcus was winning.
His sword work was flawless – not just good, not just B-rank proficient, but perfect. Every cut found the gaps between chitinous plates. Every dodge timed to the microsecond. Every movement flowing into the next like he was following a choreographed routine.
Lightning Slash came again, faster this time, the blade moving in that same impossible arc Alex had noticed earlier. But now he could see it clearly, frame by frame through his camera's high-speed recording.
The technique wasn't just fast. It was mechanically perfect. The angle of attack, the timing, the way Marcus's entire body moved to channel maximum force through the blade – it was like watching a master craftsman at work.
Data Archived - Lightning Slash (Swordsmanship) - Proficiency: 73%
Alex's breath caught. The AR display was analyzing Marcus's technique in real-time, breaking it down into component movements and efficiency ratings. But that was impossible. His camera equipment didn't have that kind of processing power.
The Tunnel Worm's screech filled the tunnel as Marcus's latest attack found something vital. Black ichor sprayed from between its armor plates, and the creature's movements became more frantic, more desperate.
But also more dangerous.
The worm's tail whipped around in a wide arc, too fast for Marcus to dodge completely. The impact sent him flying into the tunnel wall with a wet crunch that made Alex's stomach drop.
"Marcus!" Sarah screamed, abandoning her ice spears to throw a protective barrier between their leader and the advancing worm.
But Alex could see the calculation in the creature's movements. Sarah's ice wouldn't hold. Tom was too far away to help. Lisa's healing buffs couldn't fix being eaten alive.
The Tunnel Worm's mouth gaped wide, and Alex realized with crystal clarity that he was about to watch his friend die.
Emergency Protocol Active - Combat Data Playback Available
The words flashed across his AR display, but this time they came with something else. A feeling. Like a door opening in his mind, revealing a room he'd never known existed.
And in that room, playing over and over again in perfect detail, was Marcus's Lightning Slash technique.
To be continued...