The air had changed.
What once smelled of sweat, dust, and cold concrete now reeked of something far more primal wet iron, scorched fur, and the sour sting of greed turned violent. The chamber walls once solid blue throbbed faintly with red veins of light, like arteries pumping some unseen code. Dust danced in the air, electrified. The static hum beneath our boots felt alive.
Everyone was frozen.
No one dared move.
The remaining Rank C members crouched behind jagged stone, hiding, breath shallow, clutching their now useless knives.
Yggy trembled, his hands dim with fading Aether, his thoughts somewhere with the family he might never see again. crawling, limbs shaking, breath caught between hope and horror.
At the far end of the room, Trixie a few more meters away will make her silhouette in the narrow opening of the exit, one hand still gripping the doorframe, her face pale, torn between running and looking back.
And in the center,
the wolf didn't move.
It didn't need to.
Its fur sizzled with steam.
Its eyes blazed like molten circuitry.
And the scent of blood, oil, fire, and fear was unbearable.
Then came the static pulse.
The panel above flickered violently.
[Greed Awakening System has Activated]
A corrupted, digital laugh echoed from all directions.
"Ah...ha...ha...HA...!"
The environment warped slightly—walls bending as if reality itself flinched.
That's when Garret shouted..
"Vince, do the same!" eyes wild with desperation.
But before Vince could leap toward the frozen C-rank member..
SNAP!
The wolf pounced.
Its fangs clamped down, dragging Vince mid-air like a ragdoll.
A wet crunch echoed as the wolf's claws pierced through Vince's chest. Blood splattered in arcs
The exit hissed, opening just a sliver more just enough for Garret to slip through.
Trixie was seconds behind him.
I crawled after them, dragging myself across stone, blood trail on my torn leg, decapitated left arm and shattered soul.
My notebook bag weighed on my back like guilt.
Just as my fingers reached another inch..
CLINK!
A metal chain lashed from the ground, coiling around my other leg—tight, cold, alive.
Same chain… same fate as the C-rank whose tendon had been severed.
The other C-rank, those who are in hiding, dashed for the exit… screaming.
But the wolf met them halfway.
CRACK!
The beast landed in front of the exit like a demon from hell, claws clenched around Dela Cruz's head as he smashed him on the wall
The wolf turned.
Its eyes inhuman and mechanical glowed with crimson algorithmic spirals.
It gazed at the four of the C rank member desperately escaping together they tried shooting some projectile but no avail
The panel flickered again.
[What is your sacrifice?]
Yggy sobbed.
He clutched the wound on his right arm, eyes already losing hope.
His lips trembled. "M.Mina..Kira… my grandmother… what'll happen to them—"
While the C rank members in front of the wolf broke Screams filled the chamber as they turned on one another.
Steel on flesh.
One stabbed. Another gurgled.
But before any of them could finish—
RRRRRRRIIIIIPPPP!!
The wolf blurred.
One swipe.
Each body split in half, blood sprayed like a curtain pulled open by a butcher.
Then the countdown above the panel finished.
A loud tone rang.
DING.
The panel glowed.
[Greed Awakening System has Activated]
A corrupted laugh echoed from the system—
Digitized, glitched, like static choking on glee.
"AH…HA…HA…HA…"
The chamber trembled.
Pillars of red light beamed from the walls.
The wolf's body cracked and pulsed.
Black steam hissed from its back.
Its muscles bulged, fur matted with gore.
Its eyes—now three instead of two—scanned the room like targeting lasers.
The smell of ozone and blood fused into something unnatural.
It howled.
Not a beast. Not a machine.
Something in between.
The wolf's gaze shifted.
It locked onto the incapacitated Rank C member—the one Trixie had maimed.
He lay there, bleeding, eyes wide with silent tears.
The panel above buzzed. The words glowed blood-red:
[What is your sacrifice?]
The boy sobbed. He didn't answer.
4.
3.
2.
1.
DING.
In a flash of blurred movement, the wolf's claw swiped clean through him.
Split in half.
The scream didn't even finish.
Yggy watched. Frozen.
He stared as the massacre unfolded before him.
The wolf changed with each kill its frame twisting, mutating. Its jaw unhinged wider, too wide. New spines jutted from its back like spears. Its growl is deeper, heavier… hungrier.
It was no longer just a beast.
It was becoming something worse.
Yggy's eyes darted across the room
What was once a chamber full of towering relics, piles of coins, ancient weapons and enchanted gear…
…was now just rubble.
Collapsed columns. Crushed crates. Shattered relics.
Treasure?
No. Empty chamber
The wolf had made it all more to debris in its rampage.
And yet
among the ruin, Yggy spotted something.
As his gaze drifted—
There it was.
The katana. The one last thing to loot before the chaos
No ornate scabbard. No runes. No legend.
Just a simple blade lying in his blood near his severed right arm, like it had been waiting meant to be looted again,He had nearly forgotten it.
Dropped it when Garret mutilated his right arm
But now…
It called to him.
Not with power
…but with purpose. Telekinesis if used would be an insult
His fingers reached, hand trembled and reached out.
The notebook crackled against his thighs.
Grab the katana
Touch. Channel. Transfer.
Aether surged from his fingertips.
The katana flickered in glow, then vanished, sealed within the page.
One last entry. He whispered
Item Acquired – 100% Complete
He smiled.
A small, bitter smile.
The kind only a looter would understand.
But his vision blurred.
Tears welled in his eyes.
In his mind I have taken everything
Then his voice cracked. "Mina… Kira… Grandma…"
"…So this is the end."
Not sorrow for his death.
Sorrow for leaving them with nothing.
No protection. No future. Just the same hunger… the same hardship.
The panel pulsed.
The digital stone wall, cracked and slick with blood spray, began to flicker—veins of red and gold circuit patterns crawling across its surface like roots seeking life.
It shimmered.
Glitched.
Then violently crumbled inward—pixels falling like gravel.
The message returned, but not as before. This time… it boomed.
[GREED AWAKENING SYSTEM HAS ACTIVATED]
But it didn't stop there.
The letters twisted—glitched mid-line, then reformed into something new:
[GREED AWAKENING SYSTEM IS ACTIVATED]
[HIDDEN QUEST CONDITION HAS BEEN MET]
[ALL TREASURE HAS BEEN TAKEN – 100% CLEARED]
[NUMBER OF PERSON TO TAKE THE TREASURE (1/1) – 100% CLEARED]
Yggy stared at it.
Eyes wide.
And then…
He felt it.
That stare.
Like fire on the top of his head.
He turned.
The wolf was glaring at him.
In a flash..
The wolf was right in front of him.
No warning. No blur.
Just appeared.
Its massive snout hovered inches from Yggy's face, breath hot, reeking of blood and ozone.
But this time…
The panel didn't flicker.
No text.
No mechanical voice.
Instead, the wolf spoke.
Its voice was guttural, distorted… almost human.
"What is your sacrifice?"
No screen.
No system.
Just the beast asking, like the system had merged into it.
Then, it began to count.
"Five..."
Yggy's heart raced. His body locked up.
"Four..."
He clenched his fists.
I can't die here.
I need to go back.
I have to return to them.
"Three..."
He pulled the bag near his leg
"Two..."
"All I have is yours," Yggy said, breathing hard.
He grabbed the blade that was given to all of them a while ago at his waist…
And sliced the bag open.
RIP—!
Notebooks spilled across the ground like pages of a broken memory.
The wolf stared at them.
"These were mine," Wolf growled.
Then Yggy muttered "Were!!. I have taken them from you."
Yggy raised his head, defiant.
"The wall said it too. That I took them. That they are now mine."
He stepped back, voice trembling.
"Then I offer them to you now. As my sacrifice."
The wolf stared.
Its eyes pulsed.
Its body loomed larger.
Then it laughed.
Loud. Deep. Shaking the room like a war drum.
"So you're the greedy bastard."
It stepped around the scattered books.
"A whole tower and this Floor worth of treasure—
All stolen by one man."
It snapped its head back and howled with laughter.
Then it paused.
Glared.
"But you don't fool me."
The wolf's voice dropped into a snarl.
The walls shook violently.
Dust rained from above.
The boulders cracked.
The door had already closed.
There was no way out.
Only death is the escape route?