The air in the portaling room was filled with ozone and iron. Each breath tasted of lightning and blood. The deafening hum of the unstable portal vibrated in their teeth, a deep, wrong sound that spoke of ripped seams in the world.
Adam's eyes swept the cavernous space. It was a charnel house in the making. The floor was a testament to mindless panic. Beasts lay dead not from claws or abilities, but from the sheer, crushing pressure of the herd. A large, thick-skinned boar had been shoved headfirst into a stone support column, its tusks snapped, its bulk blocking part of an aisle. Smaller, rodent-like things were little more than wet, furry stains underfoot, trampled by larger feet in the frantic rush for the exit.
At the center of it all, the portal itself was sick. It was supposed to be a stable, shimmering window. Now it was a weeping sore in reality, a swirling mass of bruised purple and inky black energy. It convulsed irregularly, and with each painful-looking contraction, it expelled another creature. A wolf missing patches of fur tumbled out, rolling to its feet with a confused snarl. A moment later, a flightless bird with a razor-sharp beak materialized, squawking in alarm. The output was slower now, but it was a constant, dreadful drip-feed into an already overflowing room.
The source of the oppressive hum lined the walls. The mana accumulators, great locker-sized monoliths of crystal and etched metal, were in crisis. Designed to siphon ambient energy calmly, they were now gasping, drawing in power in ragged, gulping pulses. Their surfaces, usually a soft blue, flashed a frantic, eye-watering red. The crystal of the nearest one had a spiderweb of cracks, and a thin, acrid smoke leaked from its base. The warning was clear. The system was far past its limits.
Then came the feeling of being watched.
From the deep shadows behind a toppled control console, two amber eyes glowed. From a recess where piping had burst, three more pairs, these a cold, hungry green, reflected the strobing red light. They emerged from behind the shuddering accumulator towers, from the cover of fallen debris. Dozens of eyes, all slit-pupiled and unblinking, locked onto the new arrivals. These were not the disoriented fresh spawns. These were the ones who had survived the initial chaos, who had shaken off the confusion. Their initial panic to escape had cooled, replaced by a more primal instinct. They were trapped, and the students were the only fresh prey in the stone cage.
Wren straightened up slowly, his back leaving the wall. The color had drained from his face, but his hands were steady as he drew his daggers. The sound of the blades clearing leather was small but final in the roaring space.
"We need to leave," he said, his voice flat, cutting through the din. "Now. I am not sticking around to see what crawls out of that tear next. If it's another big one, we're not walking out."
No one spoke an agreement. They didn't need to. Adam felt the weight of his Terra-Flame sword as he pulled it free. The amber veins within the dark metal seemed to pulse in time with the flashing red alarms, a slow heartbeat against the room's fever. Lira rotated her shoulders, the heavy plates of her gauntlets shifting with a solid, reassuring grind of fitted steel. She cracked her knuckles inside them, the sound a deliberate promise of violence. Raven simply shifted his stance, his grip on his spear tightening until the wood creaked faintly. His expression was not one of fear, but of cold, calculating focus. He gave a single, sharp nod.
The decision was taken from them.
A guttural roar erupted from a hulking, bear-like creature near the portal. It was a signal. The gathered beasts did not coordinate. They did not strategize. A single, unified impulse to destroy the intruders surged through them, and they charged. It was a mindless, frenzied avalanche of fur, scale, and gnashing teeth. Boar-tusked beasts plowed forward, trampling their own wounded in their haste. Wolfish creatures scrambled over debris, saliva flying from their jaws. The spidery thing dropped from the wall in a tangle of limbs, skittering forward with alarming speed.
"Shield form! To the door!" Raven yelled, his voice a blade slicing through the bedlam.
They scrambled into a tight semi-circle, backs toward the distant rectangle of daylight. Adam and Lira anchored the front, their weapons raised. Caspian heaved his greatsword up beside them, a mountain of muscle. Raven and Cain covered the flanks, while Wren and Chris were pushed to the protected center.
The first impact was a physical shock. Adam met a charging boar, his boots skidding on the slick stone as he braced. He didn't have time for a clean strike. He angled his blade and let the beast's own momentum carry it onto the point. The Terra-Flame edge punched through thick hide, and the sickening smell of seared flesh filled the air as the beast's internal heat spiked. It collapsed, almost wrenching the sword from his grip.
[EXP: 68]
To his left, Lira caught a leaping wolf by the throat with her gauntleted hand. She slammed it down onto the ground, the stone cracking under the impact, and stamped down with her boot.
Caspian's greatsword moved in a wide, brutal arc, not finessed but devastatingly effective. It cleaved through two smaller beasts at once, sending a spray of ichor across the floor.
"It's not holding! They're pushing through!" Cain shouted, his chakram whirring as he sent it flying. It sliced across the face of a creature trying to flank them, but three more took its place.
Raven's spear was a constant, darting threat, jabbing at eyes and legs, creating pockets of space. But for every beast they felled, two more seemed to press in, driven by a blind, frantic bloodlust.
Wren, pale and sweating in the middle, raised a hand. A faint, silvery aura flickered around him, struggling to form. "I'm trying... it's hard to focus!"
"Then empower your self" Chris yelled, forming a shimmering shield of solid white mana just in time to deflect a lunging creature. The shield shattered under the impact, and Chris cried out, clutching his head from the feedback.
The circle was buckling. A hyena-like beast darted past Caspian's guard, its jaws snapping at Wren's leg. Raven spun, his spear finding way to the beast. It yelped, stumbling. Raven finished it with a quick thrust, but the effort cost him. He swayed, the dodging as a beast lepth on him.
Adam parried a claw swipe, his arms aching. The heat from his sword was the only thing keeping the press of bodies at bay. He saw the flashing red light of the nearest, cracked accumulator. He saw the mindless beasts surging around it, oblivious to the danger.
A desperate, terrible idea clicked into place.
"Raven! The accumulator! The cracked one!"
Raven followed his gaze, understanding instantly. His eyes widened, but he gave a sharp, grim nod. It was a suicidal gamble. It might bring the whole ceiling down on them. But the mindless tide would surely drown them in the next minute.
"Clear him a path!" Raven commanded, his voice raw.
"How?" Lira grunted, shoving a beast back.
"Like this!" Caspian bellowed. He stopped swinging defensively. He planted his feet, took his huge sword in both hands, and with a roar that cut through the chaos, he spun. It was a pure, overwhelming display of brute strength. The massive blade became a deadly, horizontal whirlwind, clearing a temporary, gory lane through the press of bodies.
"Go, Adam! Now!" Raven shouted.
Adam ran. He sprinted down the bloody corridor Caspian had carved, leaping over twitching forms. A beast lunged at him from the side. He couldn't slow down. He turned his shoulder and took the impact, feeling claws rake across his armor. He kept moving, his eyes locked on the smoking, flashing red monolith.
He could feel the wild mana radiating from it, a prickling, painful static that made the hair on his arms stand up. The warning whine was a physical pressure in his ears.
He skidded to a halt before it. The beast that had clawed him was coming again, leaping through the air. He had one shot.
He reversed his grip on the Terra-Flame sword. Instead of striking with the edge, he raised it high, both hands on the hilt, and with every ounce of strength and fear and rage he possessed, he drove the heavy pommel down like a hammer onto the center of the largest crack in the accumulator's crystal face.
The world exploded into light and fury.