[Chapter 124. Walking over Corpses]
Searanox crouched before the two archers, his silhouette a sharp, jagged outline against the flickering orange of the dying bonfires below. Their backs were pressed hard against the crumbling plaster of the ruined wall, their breath coming in short, ragged hitches that rattled in the silence of the room. At his side, a cargo drone hovered with a low, predatory hum before zipping away with chanical efficiency to attend to the slaughter in the clearing below.
"What... what are you?" one of the archers shrieked. His eyes were wide, the pupils blown with a terror that bordered on madness as the firelight caught the subtle, inhuman points of Searanox's ears and the unnatural paleness of his skin.
Searanox didn't answer with words. Instead, he reached out and drove his gauntleted fingers directly into the raw, cauterized stump of the man's leg. He ground the scorched flesh and shattered bone together with a slow, deliberate pressure. The archer's scream was high and piercing, a raw sound of agony that cut through the night and echoed off the skeletal remains of the surrounding buildings.
"Did I give you permission to make noise?" Searanox's voice dropped an octave, becoming a sound colder than the stone beneath them.
Both n shook their heads frantically, their cries dissolving into pathetic, choked whimpers. They were broken, their bravado from the rooftops evaporated into the stench of burnt hair and blood.
"I have questions," Searanox said, his fingers finally uncurling from the ruined flesh. The archer let out a long, shuddering sob as the agonizing pressure suddenly vanished. "And you will answer them with absolute clarity."
Searanox's gaze shifted between the two n, his expression an unreadable mask of clinical detachnt. "The two dungeons in this city—how often does your 'Boss' clear them?"
A sound erupted from the n—a bitter, broken rasp that might have been laughter in another life. One of them spat a glob of dark blood onto the floor between them, his chest heaving. "Dungeons? You think he clears them both? As if anyone could survive that level fifteen hellhole."
"That answers more than one question," Searanox said, a thin, predatory smile stretching his lips, though it never reached his eyes. "So, there is a level fifteen instance nearby. Good to know. Let ask about the one below us. How often is it cleared?"
The n exchanged a terrified look, their breathing ragged. The second man coughed, the sound wet and heavy with internal damage. "Once a day. Usually at dusk. The Boss takes his elites in, harvests the easy pickings, and leaves."
"I see." Searanox's attention shifted briefly to the courtyard below. Through the missing wall, he watched as his cargo drone thodically stacked the four corpses of the gate guards beside the bonfire. Its movents were precise, devoid of ceremony or emotion. "That would be the mont when you tell exactly what lies inside those tunnels."
"A nightmare. It’s straight out of so horror story from before the System," the archer wheezed, blood flecking his lips. "Skeletons that won’t stay down. Zombies, too. A whole damn army of them, packed into the dark." His breath hitched, his eyes darting toward the blue portal. "Then there’s the big one. The Boss and his elites barely crawled out with their skins intact the first ti they pushed deep. They lost half their squad."
The other guard nodded frantically, his eyes fixed on Searanox's glowing gauntlets as if they were the sun itself. "They throw people who rebel onto the front line now. They use them as bait to distract the swarms. That’s the only way they make it through without losing the 'important' people."
Searanox rose slowly, his long shadow falling across the n like a burial shroud. "That answers even more questions than you realize." He looked down at them, his pale skin appearing almost luminous in the dim, cyan-tinted light reflecting from the portal. "How many people live in this city? Give a number."
They shared another glance. The second man shrugged, then winced as the movent pulled at his injuries. "A lot. Thousands? Maybe a ten-thousand scattered in the ruins? We don't count the 'fodder' in the lower sectors."
"That was not very helpful," Searanox said, his voice now entirely devoid of emotion. "But I believe I have extracted all the utility I need from you."
In a blur of motion, his Magitech Rifle MKII materialized in his hand, the sleek tal humming with stored energy. The first shot was a muffled thump that exploded the nearer archer's head against the plaster wall. The man didn't even have ti to blink before he was silenced permanently.
The remaining guard let out a raw, desperate scream, scrambling backward until he hit the edge of the floor. "You're killing us! Why?! We told you everything! We gave you the Boss's secrets!"
"I never said I wouldn't," Searanox replied, his tone as flat as a machine's. He fired again. A flash of violet light illuminated the room for a brief, brilliant mont, and the screaming stopped.
As the rifle dissolved back into his storage ring, Searanox stepped to the very edge of the second story. Below, his cargo drone hovered patiently, waiting for its next task. Its yellow lenses regarded the scene with chanical indifference as it zipped upward to collect the two fresh corpses.
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Searanox stepped onto the drone’s flat, reinforced upper surface and allowed himself to descend. The drone cushioned the drop, lowering him gently into the clearing.
When his boots finally touched the scorched earth, he stepped off imdiately, his gaze turning toward the swirling blue vortex of the dungeon.
[Dungeon]
─ Na: Corpse Lantern Cave
─ Level: 5
─ Status: Active
`Corpse Lantern Cave. Appropriate.` He thought, his lip curling in a slight sneer. He reached down and grabbed the first corpse—the halberd-wielder—by his blood-slicked collar. With a casual, powerful heave, he tossed the body directly into the swirling blue portal.
One after another, the remaining guards followed. Their limp, broken forms disappeared into the magical vortex, consud by the blue light.
As the last body vanished into the portal, another scream ripped through the darkness from several blocks away—this one feminine, higher-pitched, and filled with a desperation that suggested she was being hunted.
Searanox paused for a mont, tilting his head to note the exact direction and distance of the sound. He didn't move to help. Instead, he turned back to the portal and stepped through.
He erged in a natural stone tunnel, the transition seamless. The air here was noticeably colder, damp, and heavy with the cloying, cloying sweetness of rot. Hooded lanterns lined both walls at regular intervals, but they were unlike any he had seen before. Their cyan light cast long, eerie shadows that seed to dance and twitch along the uneven stone.
The air carried the scent of wet earth and ancient decay. Searanox reached toward the nearest lantern, his fingers brushing the tal. It was freezing, even through his gloves. A thought sent it to his storage ring, where it vanished in a flash of blue.
[Item]
─ NA: Corpse Lantern
─ TYPE: Utility
─ RARITY: Common
─ LEVEL: 5
─ Crafted by the dungeon's necrotic energy, these lanterns are more than re light sources. They are a fundantal part of the Corpse Lantern Cave's ecosystem, created from the bodies of those who perish within. The wick is not consud by the fla but instead serves as a focus, constantly replenishing the necrotic light.
Searanox's gauntleted fingers closed around a second lantern. Through the thick glass pane, he saw the'wick'—a small, desiccated human finger, suspended in a clear, viscous fluid that looked like old grease. A steady cyan fla flickered at its tip, casting an unwavering, cold light that pushed back the darkness. He sent it to join its twin in his storage ring.
His gaze fell upon the six bodies he had tossed inside. They were sprawled in the eerie glow, their limbs twisted at unnatural angles on the cold floor. Already, the shadows in the room seed to be reaching for them, the necrotic energy of the dungeon beginning the slow process of integration.
"Let's see what this dungeon offers that required such a high price in human lives," he muttered.
He moved down the corridor, the rhythmic, steady drip-drip of water from the ceiling punctuating the oppressive silence. Two Interdiate Assault Drones materialized at his sides, their hum barely audible as they deployed their weapon pods. He kept them in a tight formation; this ti, he wanted to observe the dungeon's threats personally rather than letting his tech do all the heavy lifting.
The first group of skeletons rounded a corner ahead, their yellowed, brittle bones reflecting the ghostly cyan light. They were dressed in the tattered remains of clothing—robes and tunics that had rotted away to rags.
Searanox raised his rifle, the weapon materializing in his grip with practiced ease. Three shots rang out in rapid succession. Each violet beam vaporized a skull before his drones could even lock on. Bone fragnts scattered across the stone floor like hail.
[System Notification]
─ NA: Skeleton
─ TYPE: Undead Construct
─ VARIANT: Lesser
─ LEVEL: 4
Searanox stepped over the bone fragnts, the sharp crunch of splintered remains beneath his armored boots echoing down the narrow tunnel. Ahead, the passage opened into a vast, vaulted chamber that reminded him of the bone pit from the Howling Caverns, but the scale here was grander, more deliberate. The entire floor was a chaotic tapestry of skeletal remains and half-decayed flesh, a literal sea of the dead.
From the writhing mass below, skeletal hands began to claw upward, grasping at the air. More skeletons erged, their empty eye sockets glowing with the sa eerie cyan light as the lanterns. They never reached him. Their movents were stiff, jerky, and entirely predictable as they rose from the endless pile.
"You stay here and clean up everything that moves," Searanox commanded, his voice flat.
One assault drone detached from his side and remained at the chamber’s entrance, its crimson beams vaporizing skulls as fast as they appeared. The second drone shadowed him closely as he ventured deeper into the sea of bones.
He proceeded through the dungeon thodically, his progress unimpeded. When he encountered his first zombie, he felt a brief flicker of disappointnt.
They were exactly as expected—shambling piles of flesh animated by a simple necrotic impulse. Their dull eyes fixed on him with a mindless, primal hunger. It was no different from the skeletons in its single-minded purpose, and because of its slow movent speed, it never ca close enough to even threaten his barrier.
Two Interdiate Reconnaissance Drones materialized at his command, zipping ahead into the dark to map the remainder of the dungeon.
"This dungeon is underwhelming," he noted to himself. "If the 'Boss' struggled here, he is even more incompetent than I imagined."
The tunnels began to narrow significantly, the damp stone walls pressing closer together. Eventually, the lanterns vanished entirely, plunging the passage into an unnatural, thick darkness. At first, Searanox dismissed it as a simple absence of light sources, assuming his Dhampir vision would compensate as it always did.
Then, the realization struck.
For the first ti since becoming a Progenitor, he was experiencing true, absolute darkness. His enhanced vision, which usually saw through the night as if it were day, hit a solid wall of black. It wasn't just a lack of light; it was a magical suppression of sight.
He glanced around the cramped passage. The darkness was absolute—so thick it seed to physically swallow the light from his drones. Now that he stood still, he noticed a new sound: distorted, wet whispers echoing faintly from the stone walls themselves. Even his assault drone, usually a beacon of light, had beco obscured beside him, its usual glow consud by the oppressive, magical gloom.
"Freaky," he whispered, his hand tightening on the grip of his rifle.
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