The heat in the lower levels of the factory was no longer just uncomfortable; it was suffocating. I leaned against a vibrating bulkhead, my breath rattling in my chest like a box of broken glass. My left shoulder was a mess of shredded fabric and congealed blood, the puncture wounds from the Iron-Hide Hound throbbing in time with my heart.
[Swarm Count: 29/48]
Twenty-nine heartbeats. Twenty-nine small lives standing between me and the end of the world. I could feel them huddled in the lining of my hoodie, their tiny bodies trembling against my skin. They knew. They could feel the weight of the air, the way the dark red light of the Gate seemed to be drinking the light from the room.
"I'm sorry," I whispered, my voice barely audible over the grinding of the gears above. "I'm so sorry."
I pushed off the wall, stumbling into a massive assembly hall. The floor was a sea of rusted metal shavings that crunched like bone under my boots. At the far end of the hall, two silhouettes detached themselves from the darkness.
They were Engine-Ghouls. They were taller than the Husks, their bodies elongated and fused with rusted pistons and hissing steam valves. One of them held a massive iron wrench that looked like it had been pulled from a ship's engine; the other had a circular saw blade embedded in its right forearm, spinning with a low, predatory hum.
They didn't wait. They moved with a synchronized, mechanical fury.
"Rat Blade!" I barked.
Ten rats formed the edge, but I was slow. The Ghoul with the wrench swung, a horizontal arc that would have leveled a brick wall. I used Rat Jump to clear it, but the second Ghoul was already there, the saw blade screaming as it sought my midsection.
I twisted mid-air, a desperate, frantic movement. The saw grazed my ribs, sparking against the air and tearing a line of fire across my side. I hit the floor and rolled, gasping.
"Again!" I screamed, not at the monsters, but at myself. "EMBODY IT!"
The Ghouls closed in. I was being cornered. I used Rat Jump to bounce off a cooling tower, coming down behind the first Ghoul. I drove the Rat Blade into the gap between its steam-valves, twisting the blade to shred the necrotic flesh inside.
[Mastery: 49.8% -> 51.1%]
But the second Ghoul didn't care about its partner. It swung the saw in a vertical cleave. I tried to pull my rats back into a Rat Wall, but I was too late. The saw hit the center of the formation.
I felt the connection snap. One. Three. Eight. Eight heartbeats vanished in a spray of grey fur and sparks.
[Swarm Count: 21/48]
I was thrown backward, my vision flickering. The Ghouls were still coming. My arm was shaking so hard I couldn't hold the blade shape anymore. My mind was screaming, the "holes" in my consciousness from the dead rats making me dizzy.
I'm going to die. I'm going to die here and no one will even find the body.
The Ghoul with the saw raised its arm. I looked at the remaining twenty-one rats. I felt something click—a memory of the old man's voice. Don't just use it. Be the King.
"If I'm a King," I hissed, blood leaking from the corner of my mouth, "then I need a throne of fire."
I didn't form a blade. I didn't form a wall. I felt the rats realize my intent. They scrambled to my right arm, but instead of forming a line, they formed a cylinder. Twenty rats interlocked their bodies in a dense, multi-layered tube, their fur hardening into a texture like cold basalt. The remaining one crawled into the "chamber" at my palm.
[New Ability Unlocked: Rat Cannon]
The pressure in my arm was immense. I pointed my palm at the Ghoul's chest. I didn't think about "using" the skill. I thought about the launch.
FIRE.
The rat in the chamber didn't just jump. It was propelled by the collective muscular contraction of the twenty-rat barrel, launched at a speed that broke the sound barrier in the cramped hall. There was a dull thump, followed by a wet explosion.
The single rat hit the Ghoul like a high-velocity slug. It died instantly, its body turning into a projectile of living stone that punched a clean hole through the monster's chest and the iron wall behind it.
The Ghoul dropped, its saw blade sparking one last time before going silent.
[Mastery: 51.1% -> 52.5%]
I couldn't even breathe. The "barrel" rats disassembled, scurrying back to me, exhausted. The cost was one more life.
[Swarm Count: 20/48]
"Four more," I wheezed, looking at the second Ghoul. "I just need to hit it four more times."
I didn't give it a chance to move. I raised my arm again. Thump. Thump. Thump. Thump.
Four rats. Four sacrifices. I watched them go, watching the tiny projectiles of my own power tear the second Ghoul into scrap metal. Holes opened in its head, its shoulders, its knees. It collapsed into a heap of rusted parts.
[Mastery: 52.5% -> 54.0%] [Swarm Count: 16/48]
I stood in the center of the hall, the silence returning. I was winning. I was actually doing it. I was at 54%. Just a little more. Just one more fight and I'd be at the Boss.
Then, the floor shook.
From the shadows at the end of the hall, something much larger emerged. It wasn't a Ghoul. It was a Centurion-Construct. It stood ten feet tall, encased in thick, blackened steel plates. It didn't have eyes—just a glowing furnace in its chest. It carried a massive iron pillar as a club.
I raised my arm, the sixteen remaining rats already moving to form the Rat Cannon. I just needed one good shot at the furnace.
"Now!" I screamed.
But my body finally gave out. The snap of my rib, the blood loss from my shoulder—my arm wavered for a split second.
The Centurion was faster than its size suggested. It didn't swing the pillar; it thrust it forward like a battering ram. The iron post slammed into my outstretched arm just as the rats were interlocking.
It didn't just hit me. It crushed the formation.
I heard the sound of a dozen tiny lives being extinguished at once. The rats in the "barrel" weren't hardened yet; they were caught in the middle of the transition. The pillar flattened them against my own forearm, the force snapping my radius and ulna like dry twigs.
"AAAAAAAGH!"
I was thrown thirty feet, sliding across the metal shavings. I tried to move my arm, but it was a mangled mess of blood and fur.
[Swarm Count: 2/48]
Two.
I looked down. Two terrified, blood-soaked rats crawled out of my sleeve, huddling against my neck. That was all I had left. The "throne" was gone. The swarm was dead.
The Centurion-Construct stomped toward me, each step ringing through the hall like a funeral bell. It raised the iron pillar, the furnace in its chest glowing a violent, mocking orange. I lay on my back, staring up at the dark red ceiling of the Gate.
So this is it, I thought. The King of nothing.
The pillar began to descend, a shadow eclipsing my vision. I closed my eyes, waiting for the crunch.
CLANG.
The sound was so loud it made my ears bleed. I didn't feel the weight. I opened my eyes.
The pillar hadn't hit me. It had been deflected. Standing between me and the Centurion was a man in a sleek, dark combat suit. He didn't look like a hero. He looked bored. He held a long, black katana that hummed with a low, dangerous frequency.
With a movement so fast I couldn't even see the blade move, the man stepped forward.
Slash.
A single line of silver light divided the Centurion-Construct. The massive steel monster froze. Then, the top half slid slowly off the bottom, the furnace heart sputtering out into cold ash.
The man didn't look at the monster. He didn't even look at the loot. He just flicked the blood off his blade and started walking deeper into the factory, toward the Boss room.
"Wait..." I croaked, reaching out with my one good hand. "Who..."
The man stopped for a second, glancing back over his shoulder. His eyes were cold, indifferent. He looked at me—bleeding, broken, surrounded by the corpses of my rats—the same way someone looks at a crushed bug on the sidewalk.
"You're in the way, kid," he said.
He didn't offer a hand. He didn't ask if I was okay. He just kept walking, leaving me alone in the dark.
My vision began to tunnel. The red light of the factory faded into a deep, heavy black. The two remaining rats snuggled into my collar, their tiny heartbeats the only things keeping me from slipping away entirely.
"I... I have to..."
But I couldn't finish the thought. The world went dark.