[TIME REMAINING: 35 MINUTES]
[PARTICIPANTS REMAINING: 623/1,247]
The participant count kept dropping.
Daniel watched the numbers tick down with each passing minute, his jaw tight. Over six hundred people dead. Half the initial group, gone in less than half an hour.
The smell was what got to him most. Copper and iron—blood, so much blood—mixed with something acrid and chemical from the Scuttlers' ichor. It clung to the back of his throat, making every breath taste like death. Bodies littered the chamber floor, some still, others twitching in their final moments. The black stone was slick with gore, painted in streaks of red and black.
And that Elite Scuttler was a huge part of why.
CRASH!
Another pillar came down as the massive creature bulldozed through a group of survivors who'd been trying to mount a coordinated attack. Their screams cut off abruptly. The Elite shrieked in triumph, its massive form outlined in the blue glow of the chamber's runes, its bladed legs dripping with fresh blood.
[ELITE SCUTTLER - LEVEL 5]
[HP: 2,104/3,000]
It had taken more damage, but not enough. Not nearly enough.
Sarah whimpered behind them, huddled against the back wall of their alcove. She'd been silent since they'd rescued her, just watching with wide, terrified eyes as the carnage continued. Her hands were clasped together so tightly her knuckles were white.
"We can't keep doing this," Dante said suddenly, his voice cutting through the sounds of distant screaming.
Daniel glanced at him. Dante was staring at the Elite, his expression hard and calculating. His injured arm was still wrapped in blood-soaked bandages, but he gripped his baseball bat with white-knuckled determination.
"Can't keep doing what?" Kevin asked nervously, though his voice suggested he already knew and dreaded the answer.
"This." Dante gestured at their alcove, at their defensive position. "Hiding. Waiting. Playing it safe." He turned to face them fully, and Daniel could see something desperate burning in his eyes. "The way this is going? We can't outrun that thing any longer. It's killing all of us. Eventually, it's going to make its way over here, and we'll be trapped."
Daniel's stomach sank because he knew Dante was right. The Elite was systematically clearing the chamber, moving in a rough spiral pattern. Their alcove was maybe ten minutes away from being in its path.
"So what are you saying?" Daniel asked, though he had a feeling he already knew.
Dante met his eyes. "So I'm not saying anything. I'm suggesting..." He took a breath. "We should kill it."
The silence that followed was deafening.
Then Kevin exploded.
"WHAT?!" His voice cracked, going high-pitched. He grabbed Dante by the front of his shirt. "NOOOOO! No, no, absolutely NOT! Are you insane?! Did you hit your head? Did that thing's screech scramble your brain?!"
"Kevin—" Dante started.
"That thing is LEVEL 5!" Kevin shouted, shaking him. "We're Level 3! It's killed like three hundred people already! I watched it tear through a guy in tactical gear like he was made of paper! What part of that sounds survivable?!"
"The part where we don't have a choice!" Dante shouted back, pushing Kevin off him. "You think we can just hide for thirty-five more minutes? You think it won't find us? You think—"
"I think you're going to get us KILLED!" Kevin's voice broke, and Daniel realized with a start that there were tears in his eyes. "I saw them, Dante! Twenty minutes ago! There was a group—eight people, organized, armed with real weapons—they tried to take it down together!" His hands were shaking. "It killed seven of them in under a minute. The eighth guy ran, and it chased him down and crushed him against a wall. I watched it happen!"
The alcove fell silent except for Kevin's ragged breathing.
"I don't want to die," Kevin whispered. "I don't want to die in this place."
Dante's expression softened. "Neither do I, man. Neither do I." He ran a hand through his hair, leaving bloody streaks. "But I'm not going back to that coffee shop. I'm not spending the rest of my life wondering if I could've been something more." His voice cracked. "My parents... they look at me like I'm a disappointment. Like I wasted my potential. And maybe I did. But this?" He gestured at the Tower around them. "This is my shot to be something they can be proud of. To be someone I can be proud of."
"You'd rather die trying than live safe," Daniel said quietly.
"Yeah." Dante's jaw tightened. "Yeah, I would."
Sarah spoke up suddenly, her voice small but steady. "I think... you're both right."
Everyone turned to look at her.
She took a shaky breath, still hugging her knees but meeting their eyes now. "Before you guys saved me, I saw... so many people die. Some were fighting. Some were running. Some were hiding." Her voice trembled. "They all died the same. That thing doesn't care if you're brave or scared. It just kills." She wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. "So if we're going to die anyway... maybe it matters how we die. Maybe it matters that we tried."
Kevin stared at her, then at Dante, then at Daniel. "You're all crazy. You know that, right?"
"Probably," Daniel admitted. His mind was already racing, pulling from every boss fight he'd ever read about. "But crazy might be what it takes to survive this."
Kevin was silent for a long moment. Then he let out a long, defeated sigh. "Okay. FINE. Let's say—hypothetically—I agree with this insane plan because apparently I'm crazy too now." He looked at each of them in turn. "How exactly do we kill it? Because I didn't hear that part of the master strategy."
Dante opened his mouth, then closed it. "...I'm working on that part."
"Oh, perfect!" Kevin threw his hands up. "Fantastic! Airtight plan! We'll just walk up and ask it politely to die!"
"We need to think," Daniel said, his voice cutting through Kevin's panic. He crouched down and started drawing in the dust and ash on the floor with his finger. "Okay. Let's actually plan this. What do we know about the Elite?"
"It's big," Kevin muttered, still clearly unhappy.
"It's fast for its size," Dante added, crouching next to Daniel. "Faster than it should be. And those screeches stun people—I've seen at least a dozen people freeze up and die because of it."
"Its shell is thick," Daniel continued, sketching out a crude outline of the creature. "Regular attacks barely hurt it. But—" he tapped the drawing "—we've seen its HP go down. That group Kevin mentioned, and others. It can be damaged. We just need to hit weak points."
"Like where?" Sarah asked, leaning in to look at the drawing.
Daniel thought back to every Scuttler they'd killed, replaying the fights in his mind. "The joints. Between the chitin plates. That's where I got critical hits on the smaller ones." He pointed at his drawing, marking spots. "Legs, where they connect to the body. The neck area. And—" he tapped the belly of his crude sketch "—the underside. I bet the belly isn't as armored. That's true for most creatures."
"Great," Kevin said flatly. "So we just need to flip over a twelve-foot-tall murder bug and stab its belly. While it's trying to kill us. Simple."
"We also need to avoid its attack patterns," Daniel continued. "It uses its weight to crush—I've seen it drop down on people. Its legs slash in wide arcs. That screech stuns for at least two, maybe three seconds. And it's smart enough to chase down runners." He looked up at them. "We need to exploit a weakness. Create an advantage."
"How?" Dante asked.
Daniel stared at his crude drawing. In every novel, every story, boss fights were won through strategy, not brute force. David beat Goliath. Hunters brought down mammoths with traps. You didn't fight fair—you fought smart.
"We need to immobilize it," Daniel said slowly. "Or at least slow it down. Get it off balance." His eyes widened. "If we can trip it, get it on its back..."
"Then we can hit the weak underbelly," Dante finished, his expression shifting from doubt to dangerous excitement. "And all those joints would be exposed."
"How do we trip something that weighs like two tons?" Sarah asked.
Daniel looked around the chamber, his eyes scanning past bodies and debris, looking for anything useful. Broken pillars. Scattered weapons. Backpacks torn open, supplies spilled across blood-slicked stone.
And then he saw it.
Rope.
A survivor about forty feet away—dead now, killed by a Scuttler—had what looked like climbing gear. A coil of rope was still attached to his belt, along with carabiners and other equipment.
"There," Daniel pointed. "We use rope. String it between pillars or debris, about leg height. Get the Elite to charge, and use its own momentum to trip it."
Kevin followed his gaze. "That rope looks thin. You think it'll hold?"
"Climbing rope is rated for like 2,000 pounds of force," Dante said. "If we tie it right, double it up... yeah, it might work."
"Might," Kevin emphasized.
"Better than nothing," Daniel countered.
"We'd need bait," Dante said, his expression growing serious. "Someone to get its attention. Make it charge the right direction. Lead it into the trap."
The four of them fell silent.
The weight of what that meant settled over them like a physical thing. Someone would have to stand in front of that monster. Get close enough to draw its attention. Make it angry enough to chase. Risk getting caught, crushed, torn apart.
The silence stretched.
"I'll do it," Daniel said.
"No—" Kevin started immediately.
"I'm the fastest," Daniel interrupted, pulling up his stats mentally. [AGI: 11]. "I put all my points into Agility and Vitality. I've got the best chance of dodging." He looked at each of them. "Dante's injured—that arm's going to slow you down. Kevin, you're specced for magic eventually, and we need you alive for when you unlock abilities. Sarah doesn't even have a weapon yet."
"Daniel—" Sarah started.
"I'm not being brave," Daniel cut her off, and he meant it. His heart was already hammering at the thought. "I'm being practical. This gives us the best chance."
Dante studied him for a long moment, then nodded slowly. "Okay. But you run the second that rope goes taut. Don't try to be a hero. You bait, you run, you let us finish it."
"What about after?" Sarah asked quietly, her voice barely audible over the distant screaming and crashes. "After Daniel baits it and it goes down. Who actually fights it?"
"All of us," Dante said firmly, gripping his baseball bat. "We coordinate. The moment it goes down, we rush in together and hit every weak point we can find. Joints, neck, belly—everything." He looked at Kevin. "You still have that tire iron?"
Kevin nodded mutely.
"Aim for joints. Legs especially. Try to disable them so it can't get back up." Dante turned to Sarah. "We need to find you a weapon. Something, anything."
"There's... there's a knife over there," Sarah said, pointing with a shaking hand at a dead man about twenty feet away. A kitchen knife, not unlike Daniel's, was still clutched in the corpse's hand.
"I'll get it," Dante said.
He jogged over, keeping low, and carefully pried the knife from the dead man's grip. When he came back, he handed it to Sarah. "Ever used one of these?"
"I've... I've cooked," she said weakly, taking the knife. "That's different though, isn't it?"
"Aim for soft spots. Stab hard. Don't hesitate." Dante's voice was gentle despite his words. "And stay behind us. You go in last, only when it's safe."
[TIME REMAINING: 32 MINUTES]
[PARTICIPANTS REMAINING: 571/1,247]
"We're losing time," Daniel said, watching the counter tick down. "If we're doing this, we need to move now."
But he couldn't help looking around the chamber one more time. At the bodies. At the survivors still fighting desperately in small groups. At the Elite Scuttler systematically destroying everything in its path.
This is insane. This is actually insane. I'm a warehouse worker with a kitchen knife about to fight a boss monster.
But then he thought about his apartment. His shitty job. The warehouse. The smell of cardboard and dust and wasted time. His mom's worried voice on the phone. His dad's disappointment whenever they talked.
I was dying anyway. Just slower.
"Alright," Daniel said, standing up and gripping his knife. The handle was sticky with dried blood—his or the creatures', he wasn't sure anymore. "Let's kill a boss."
Dante grinned, manic and terrified and determined all at once. "Hell yeah."
Kevin looked like he wanted to throw up. "I hate all of you so much right now."
"You can hate us after we win," Daniel said.
Sarah just nodded, gripping her knife with both hands.
They stepped out of their alcove together.
The chamber was worse up close. The smell intensified—blood and bile and something chemical from the Scuttler ichor. The floor was slippery, painted in red and black. Daniel had to step over bodies, trying not to look at their faces, trying not to think about how they'd had names and families and dreams.
Focus. Get the rope. Set the trap. Survive.
They moved carefully through the carnage, staying low, avoiding the attention of the remaining Scuttlers. Daniel kept his eyes on the dead climber with the rope, forty feet away.
Thirty feet.
Twenty feet.
A Scuttler skittered past them, chasing someone else. They all froze, holding their breath, but it didn't notice them.
Ten feet.
Daniel knelt beside the body—a man, maybe thirty, wearing a hiking backpack and athletic gear. He'd been prepared. It hadn't mattered.
Don't think about it. Just get the rope.
Daniel's hands shook as he unclipped the rope from the man's belt. It was good rope, thick and sturdy, about sixty feet of it. He also grabbed the carabiners—they might be useful.
"Got it," he whispered.
They moved toward a section of the chamber where two intact pillars stood about twenty-five feet apart. Perfect distance—far enough that the Elite wouldn't notice the trap, close enough that the rope would catch its legs.
"Dante, Kevin—tie this off," Daniel said, handing them the rope. "Wrap it around the pillars multiple times. Make it as strong as possible. Two feet off the ground—high enough to catch the legs, low enough it won't see it coming."
They got to work, winding the rope around the first pillar. Dante tied it off with a climbing knot, then pulled it taut across to the second pillar.
"Double it," Daniel said, watching. "Use all the rope. Make it redundant."
Kevin's hands were shaking so badly he kept fumbling the knots, but Dante helped him. They wrapped the rope back and forth, creating multiple strands between the pillars, then secured it with the carabiners for extra strength.
"Test it," Daniel said.
Dante pulled on it hard. The rope held firm, barely giving an inch.
"It'll hold," Dante said. "It has to."
Sarah was keeping watch, her new knife gripped in white-knuckled hands. "That thing's getting closer," she said, her voice tight. "Maybe five minutes away at its current pace."
[TIME REMAINING: 29 MINUTES]
[PARTICIPANTS REMAINING: 512/1,247]
"Okay." Daniel took a deep breath, trying to steady his racing heart. "Okay. Here's the plan. I get its attention, lead it toward the rope. The moment it goes down, you three rush in and hit the weak points. Legs first—disable them so it can't get up. Then the belly."
"What's the signal?" Kevin asked.
"Me screaming and running," Daniel said with a weak attempt at humor.
Nobody laughed.
Dante put a hand on Daniel's shoulder. "Hey. If this goes bad—"
"It won't," Daniel interrupted.
"If it does," Dante insisted, his voice serious, "you run. You get out. Don't die for this."
Daniel met his eyes. "Same to you. All of you." He looked at each of them—Dante, Kevin, Sarah. His party. His team. Maybe, in another life, they could have just been friends playing video games together. "If I go down, you leave me. You survive. That's the priority."
"Screw that," Kevin said, surprising Daniel. His voice was still shaky, but there was steel in it now. "We all survive. Together. That's the actual priority."
Sarah nodded. "He's right. We're a party. That means something."
[PARTY CHAT - DANTE: Whatever happens, it's been an honor climbing with you idiots.]
[PARTY CHAT - KEVIN: Don't say it like that, you're making it sound like a suicide mission.]
[PARTY CHAT - DANIEL: It kind of is. But let's make it a successful one.]
[PARTY CHAT - SARAH: ...Good luck, Daniel.]
Daniel checked his knife one more time. The blade was chipped, the handle sticky, but it had gotten him this far. He looked across the chamber at the Elite Scuttler.
It was currently demolishing what looked like a three-person team, its massive legs moving in a blur. Blood sprayed. Screams cut off.
[ELITE SCUTTLER - LEVEL 5]
[HP: 1,876/3,000]
Alright. This is it.
Daniel's whole body was shaking now. Not from cold, but from pure adrenaline and terror coursing through his veins. His mouth was dry. His palms were sweating. Every instinct screamed at him to run the other direction.
He thought about his warehouse job. The fluorescent lights. The repetitive motions. The slow death of routine.
I'd rather die here than waste away there.
He took one step forward.
Then another.
His legs felt like jelly, but they moved.
In the novels, this is where the protagonist has a cool one-liner. Some badass moment.
Daniel didn't feel badass. He felt terrified.
But he kept walking.
The chamber stretched before him—bodies and blood and chaos. The Elite Scuttler was maybe fifty feet away now, finishing off its latest victims. Daniel could hear the wet sounds of chitin tearing through flesh, could smell the copper-iron stench of fresh blood.
His heart hammered against his ribs so hard it hurt.
Just get its attention. Just make it chase you. You can do this. You've read about this a thousand times.
But those were stories. This is real.
His hands were shaking so badly he almost dropped his knife.
Focus. Breathe. Move.
Daniel spotted a chunk of broken pillar, about the size of a softball. He picked it up, his palm scraping on the rough stone, and weighed it in his hand.
The Elite Scuttler was turning away from the bodies, scanning for its next target.
Now or never.
Daniel threw the rock with everything he had.
It sailed through the air and struck the Elite's carapace with a dull thunk, bouncing off harmlessly.
For a moment, nothing happened.
Then, slowly, that eyeless head swiveled toward him.
The Elite Scuttler turned to face him fully, its massive body shifting with terrifying grace. Black ichor dripped from its maw. Blood—human blood—stained its bladed legs.
[ELITE SCUTTLER - LEVEL 5 HAS DETECTED YOU]
Daniel's breath caught in his throat.
Every muscle in his body locked up with primal terror.
The Elite's maw opened wide, wider, impossibly wide—
And then it screeched.
The sound hit Daniel like a physical force. His vision blurred. His knees buckled. The world tilted sideways and suddenly he couldn't move, couldn't think, couldn't breathe—
[STATUS EFFECT: STUNNED - 3 SECONDS]
Three seconds.
The Elite charged.
And Daniel couldn't move.
He could only watch as two tons of nightmare monster barreled toward him, its legs tearing up the stone floor, its maw opening to reveal those concentric rings of teeth—
Move. MOVE. MOVE!
His body wouldn't listen.
The Elite was twenty feet away.
Fifteen.
Ten.
I'm going to die I'm going to die I'm going to—
[STATUS EFFECT ENDED]
Control flooded back into Daniel's limbs.
He threw himself to the side, tucking into a desperate roll. The Elite's massive leg slammed down where he'd been standing a split-second before, the impact cracking the stone floor.
Daniel scrambled to his feet, his heart exploding in his chest.
RUN!
He ran.
Behind him, the Elite shrieked again and gave chase, its legs thundering against stone like war drums.
Daniel sprinted toward the rope trap, his enhanced AGI the only thing keeping him ahead. He could hear the creature behind him—feel it, the vibrations of each step traveling up through the floor.
Twenty feet to the trap.
Fifteen.
Ten.
Please work please work please work—
The Elite was right behind him. He could hear its breathing, a wet rasping sound that promised death.
Five feet.
Daniel crossed the rope line—
SNAP!
The rope went taut, catching the Elite's front legs mid-stride.
For one frozen moment, the massive creature seemed to hang in the air.
Then momentum and gravity took over.
The Elite Scuttler crashed, its enormous body slamming into the ground with a sound like thunder. Stone cracked. Dust exploded into the air. Its legs flailed, trying to find purchase, but the rope had done its job—it was on its back, its armored belly exposed.
"NOW!" Daniel screamed.
Dante, Kevin, and Sarah burst from cover, weapons raised.
The real fight had begun.