"They?"
Lugh questioned, his voice barely above a whisper.
"The hounds"
Lieutenant Dain replied vaguely, his eyes locked on the darkness ahead.
Then ca the sound—claws scraping against stone. The noise slithered into Lugh's ears, primal and wrong. His felt his skin crawl. A mont later, two massive creatures lunged from the shadows.
They resembled dogs in only the most horrific sense. Patchwork armor—crude plates bolted into flesh and bone—covered parts of their bodies, while their exposed flesh stretched too thin over their ribs.
Their fur, if it could even be called that, clung to them like dried sinew, brittle and rotting. Their eyes, black and depthless, seed to drink in the dim light.
For a split second, Lugh almost believed he was staring at the undead ssengers of the underworld—creatures dragged from a forgotten myth and set upon them.
Dain moved first. A flick of his wrist—a flash of steel.
The enchanted dagger whirled through the air, its edge catching the faint light of their surroundings. It sliced through one of the beasts' front legs in a clean arc. A bloody mix of snapping tendons and broken bones followed as the creature collapsed with a high-pitched whine.
The dagger, now slick with dark blood, curved back through the air and landed effortlessly in Dain's waiting palm.
Lugh held his breath.
"You can do that?"
But he had no ti to process it. The second beast was already upon him.
It's powerful hind legs tensed and it shot forward with terrifying speed, claws skidding against the stone floor, jaws open wide, aiming for his throat.
Lugh had already seen this happen, he didn't think, he moved.
A quick sidestep. A sharp pivot. And then, his unseen blade drove upward.
The strike was surgical and precise. The dagger slipped into the beast's skull like hot knife through butter, parting flesh and bone without any resistance.
There was silence
The monster froze mid air as if it hadn't even realised it was dead yet.Then, like a puppet with its strings cut, it collapsed in a limp heap at Lugh's feet.
By the ti he straightened, Dain had already dispatched the other one, its twitching corpse sprawled beside him.
Lugh exhaled slowly and steadied himself. He hated to admit it, but he preferred things this way. The raw brutality of combat, the singular focus of survival.
A desperate struggle against abominations was infinitely better than slowly losing your mind, piece by piece, in this labyrinth that sought to consu them.
But even as they stood over the dead creatures, the low growls hadn't stopped.
Dain stiffened.
"There's more of them."
The sound swelled, a symphony of snarls and pounding footsteps, rolling toward them like a coming storm.
"We have to leave. Hurry!"
Then the chase began.
A tide of writhing bodies flooded the corridor behind them, clawed feet hamring against the stone, kicking up dust and bone fragnts.
There were dozens of them.
The tunnel twisted and turned, the path ahead barely visible in the dim light. Lugh's feet slapped against stone. He could hear them behind him.
Claws scraping, growls echoing, the air was thick with the scent of blood and dust.
Every corridor was a decision made in an instant, guided by sheer instinct. The maze blurred around them, a disorienting web of towering stone walls.
And yet, even as they ran, sothing felt wrong. The hounds could have caught them by now. They should have.
But they hadn't.
Lugh's gut twisted. They aren't chasing us. They're herding us.
He had no ti to voice his thoughts before his feet skidded against loose gravel and his montum carried him forward.
A dead end.
His stomach dropped.
The monsters were already upon them. There was no escape.
Lugh tightened his grip on his blade, his fingers curling so tightly around the hilt that his knuckles whitened. The only question now was how long they could hold out.
He would carve through as many as he could before he fell.
Beside him, Dain mirrored his stance, his enchanted dagger held at the ready.
"When they pounce, we charge. We charge, no pounce. When they pounce, we—"
Lugh's stomach turned.
Dain's thoughts were unraveling and his speech was slipping.
'Of course, this had to happen now. Perfect. Just perfect.'
He risked a glance. The lieutenant's breathing was uneven. His eyes unfocused. This wasn't just exhaustion. It was sothing deeper. Sothing worse.
Their odds of survival had already been slim. But now?
It was impossible.
Then—
The hounds stopped.
Their growls faltered into whimpers and their massive bodies, once poised to pounce, shrank back as if recoiling from an unseen force.
Lugh blinked.
A girl stood before them.
Not appeared. Not erged. One mont she wasn't there, the next she was.
She stood unnaturally still. Her tattered white gown billowed like mist.
She looked young—seventeen, maybe eighteen—yet her presence felt tiless. Ancient.
Her long black hair was impossibly smooth, the strands shifted like ink dispersing in water. Her pale skin seed almost translucent in the dim light.
But it was her eyes that unsettled him the most. A deep oceanic blue, vast and empty.
She wore an amulet—a simple cord hung loosely around her neck, holding a strange pendant that pulsed with a faint unnatural glow.
Lugh's blood ran cold.
His right eye throbbed.
The girl turned slightly, as if sensing sothing. Her gaze locked onto his.
For a brief mont, sothing flickered in her eyes and Lugh was quick to notice it.
Was it disappointnt? Curiosity? Maybe even amusent.
Whatever it was, it vanished as fast as it had co.
Lugh forced himself to stay composed, but every instinct in his body scread at him.
This wasn't normal. This wasn't natural. He wasn't afraid of people. But this girl? She felt wrong.
'Like everything else in this cursed place!'
The hounds whimpered and backed away. So turned, slinking into the shadows, as if they knew better than to be in her presence.
And then she spoke.
"Follow —"
Her voice was smooth. Too smooth. There was no hesitation or uncertainty.
It was a voice that expected to be obeyed.
"—I'll take you sowhere safe."
Lugh's fingers tightened around his dagger.
"I'm sorry. I can't do that," he said imdiately.
His tone was steady, but his entire body was tense.
His instincts told him she was safe. His mind told him to trust her.
And that was exactly why he wouldn't.
Trust was not sothing he gave freely. Not to strangers. Not to people who appeared from thin air. Not to people who could make monsters flee with just their presence.
And yet, she still felt familiar. Not in mory. But in essence. Like sothing he was supposed to recognize but couldn't grasp.
He expected Dain to share his hesitation.
Instead, the lieutenant stood utterly still, eyes glazed, as if staring at sothing unseen.
Before Lugh could react, the girl smiled. The expression wasn't cruel, nor was it kind. It was sothing else entirely.
"You will regret this."
And then—
She was gone.
Lugh exhaled, only now realizing he had been holding his breath. His right eye throbbed.
Dain blinked, looking around as if waking from a dream.
"Lieutenant?"
Lugh asked cautiously.
The man's voice was slightly uneven.
"Uh—y-yes? Is sothing wrong?"
Lugh had too many questions, but he held them back.
"Let's go."
And so, they walked.
But the deeper they went, the heavier the air beca.
And for the first ti, Lugh wasn't just wary of what lurked in the dark.
He was wary of the man walking beside him.
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