The sandstorm howled. Kael tasted grit and coppery dust. Visibility dropped to nothing beyond ten paces. He ducked a wild swing, the scout's blade whistling where his head had been. This was chaos. Good. Chaos was a system, too.
He moved, Sylvara a dark blur at his flank. Her sword, etched with faint, cold light, parried a second scout's attack with brutal efficiency. A wet thud echoed. One down. Kael didn't look. He needed to re-route their aggression.
"North wall," Kael grunted, the words ripped by the wind. "Tripwires. Shallow."
Sylvara didn't question. She melted into the swirling red haze. He trusted her to understand the "system logic." They had worked together since the aftermath of the dream-realm collapse. Mutual survival was the only language that mattered. His arm, claw-grazed after the Bone Reaver fight, throbbed. He felt the subtle creep of the spectral rot under his skin. It looked a little darker today, almost purple against his pale flesh. The Aether Codex remained silent, but he felt its cold gaze. It watched. Always.
Three more scouts emerged from the sand, howling. Dumb. They charged in a line. Predictable. Kael slammed his boot down, burying it quickly in the loose sand. Not a tripwire, but a shift. A subtle, calculated collapse. The lead scout screamed, tumbling forward, face-first into the shifting earth. His comrades tripped over him. A chain reaction. Kael was already moving, his Runeslash flaring, severing the second scout's leg at the knee. The man dropped, gurgling, clutching the spurting stump. Tactile. Visceral. No time for thought.
The last scout, a lean figure with a scar across his eye, pulled back. Smart. He circled, waiting for the sand to settle.
"They're herding us," Sylvara's voice cut through the wind, closer now. "Into the mire."
Kael had seen the edges of the Bloodmire. A pulsating, crimson stain on the horizon, growing. A cursed terrain. Varak's influence. He knew the warlock wanted to funnel them there. Varak wasn't just hunting. He was planning.
"Not today," Kael muttered. He felt the subtle hum of Essence flowing into him from the fallen scouts. It settled, then the prickle. The Curse Gauge, a cold number in his mind, flickered. It nudged higher, a new weight settling in his bones, a slow, insidious burn. His vision sharpened, colors deepening in the swirling sand. The rage simmered, a familiar presence since the Bloodrot started its work.
The lone scout lunged, desperate. Kael dodged, pivoting on his heel. He saw the scout's intent, a flicker of raw fear beneath the aggression. The man wasn't a fanatic. Just a grunt, caught in the system.
Kael's fist, wrapped in hardened bone, connected with the scout's jaw. A sickening crunch. The scout went limp. Kael didn't kill him. Not yet. He hauled the unconscious body over his shoulder, a dead weight. Sylvara gave him a look, a flicker of something unreadable in her frost-like eyes.
"Why?" Her voice was flat.
"Bait," Kael said, the lie tasting like dust. "Or leverage. Never waste a resource."
The air thickened. Not just sand. A new sound. A low, guttural chanting, carried on the wind. Kael felt a tremor in the ground, a deep thrumming. The Aether Codex's presence felt agitated. Anomaly protocol: Defiance detected. The thought was cold, sharp.
Kael needed a new defense. His instinct screamed it. Not just physical shields, but something against the unseen. The Codex had rules. He could bend them. He could break them. His mind raced, pulling at the threads of his reality. He remembered the pain, the flashes of his former body, Marcus Chen, after the physical birth. He remembered the warrior's muscle memory. He felt the curse, the spectral rot visibly spreading, a faint purplish web stretching further up his arm. It tingled, an invasive prickle. The Bloodrot, a gift and a curse. What could it do for him, beyond just decay?
He focused on the feeling, the slow, invasive spread. He tried to direct it, to weave it. A defensive skill. A shield made of... what? The very corruption trying to consume him.
The Aether Codex hissed in his mind. Warning. Unsanctioned mutation detected. Data deviation.
But Kael pushed. He felt a click, like tumblers falling into place. A new ability. Curseweaving. It felt raw, an instinctive pull on the energies around him. A defensive skill. Not an attack, but a twisting of adverse energy.
The sandstorm shifted. The chanting intensified. A new element. Psychic.
Then came the laughter. Menacing. Psychic. Varak. It echoed directly in Kael's skull, cold and clear despite the roaring sand. A personal touch. Varak was here. Or close.
Kael dropped the unconscious scout. The man lay motionless, a pathetic lump in the swirling grit. The sand tore at his exposed skin.
"The Bloodmire," Sylvara said, her voice tight. She pointed.
Through a sudden lull in the storm, Kael saw it. The crimson stain had swallowed the horizon. It pulsed with a sickening, wet glow, actively consuming the ancient battlefield remnants. Skeletal structures, half-buried, dissolved into the viscous red. It wasn't just advancing. It was feeding. And it was moving fast. They were trapped.
The scout on the ground stirred, groaning. His eyes fluttered open, wide with terror. He saw the Bloodmire, the approaching scarlet wave. He saw Kael. He began to plead, hoarse, broken words.
Kael stared down at him. Marcus Chen, the hacker, would have felt a jolt of empathy. A flicker of something. But Kael Vorne, the Breaker, felt mostly the growing rage of the Bloodrot. He felt the urge to eliminate the loose end. He felt the cold calculus of survival.
The Codex remained silent, but Kael felt its expectation, its judgment. Pragmatism.Efficiency.
Kael lifted his foot. He brought it down hard on the scout's neck. A quick snap. A dull thud. No time for lingering guilt. No time for pity. The messy world didn't allow for it. The system demanded efficiency.
He felt the familiar chime in his mind. Not from Essence gain this time. A deeper register. A confirmation. His Curse Gauge hit 20%. A significant step. The Doomfall threshold felt closer now. The spectral rot on his arm pulsed, visible in the dim light, hungry.
Varak's laughter echoed again, closer this time, resonating through Kael's very bones. "The Crimson Dawn calls for its champion, Breaker." The words were twisted, a subtle manipulation. "The true harvest begins now."
The Abyssal Hunt was fully initiated. Coordinated horns blared in the distance, a terrifying symphony against the roar of the storm and the sloshing of the Bloodmire. They were caught. Kael watched the Bloodmire consume the landscape, stretching towards them like a living thing. Its putrid scent filled the air, thick with decay and raw power.
His defiance hardened. He looked at the encroaching, sentient mire, at the sandstorm, at the swirling chaos Varak had orchestrated. He felt the Codex's cold judgment, its watchful, malevolent presence.
"I'll break your damn system," Kael swore aloud, his voice rough, bleeding defiance into the wind.
He turned, facing the growing red tide, the spectral rot a constant burn on his arm. Ragnar, a gruff mercenary, would be needed. Desperately. But for now, it was just him and Sylvara. And the system. Trapped. He could feel the ground vibrating beneath his boots. The Bloodmire was here.