Nero woke before dawn.
After a quick meal, he headed straight for the hospital. Like every morning, he made sure his mother's room was clean and orderly, adjusted the sheets, replaced the flowers by her bed, and read to her for a few quiet minutes. Her expression remained peaceful, untouched by pain or worry, as if she were merely sleeping.
"I will see you tomorrow," he murmured softly as he closed the book.
With no classes scheduled, Nero left the hospital and made his way toward work. A faint smile touched his lips as he approached the Underworld Cleaning trucks. Today was different.
As he reached the parking lot, the smile faded into awe.
This time, there weren't just a few trucks waiting—there was an entire convoy. Heavy-duty transports lined up in precise formation, their reinforced hulls marked with warning sigils and hazard seals.
They weren't going to clean a small battlefield or a ruin.
This was something far larger.
Nero climbed into one of the trucks and immediately spotted Old Smiley among the crew. He greeted the old man with a nod and a smile, which was returned with a toothy grin. Still, unease settled in Nero's chest.
Old Smiley was… old. Jobs like this were brutal even for someone in peak condition. Nero's muscles were still sore from the day before; he could only imagine how the strain weighed on the older man.
But Nero said nothing.
Everyone here had their own reasons. If Old Smiley didn't want to share his, Nero wouldn't pry.
The convoy moved at incredible speed—far faster than any pre–Doomsday sports car—, yet it still took nearly three and a half hours to reach their destination.
When the trucks finally stopped, a heavy silence filled the cabin.
Without a word, Nero and the others donned their hazmat suits and disembarked.
What lay before them was a destroyed city.
Buildings were shattered, their steel skeletons twisted and collapsed. Streets had caved in under unimaginable force. Necros corpses littered the ruins—thousands upon thousands of them, piled so thickly that the ground beneath was barely visible.
But even that devastation paled in comparison to what stood at the city's core.
A colossal tower rose from the wreckage.
It dwarfed every skyscraper Nero had ever seen, its dark surface pulsing faintly as if alive. The structure resembled a massive spear thrust upward toward the sky, its presence warping the air around it.
"A Dungeon…" Nero whispered.
A mixture of awe and dread crept into his voice.
Necros could exist in the physical world without human vessels, but in that state, they couldn't channel Underworld energy. Their power slowly eroded—a weakness humanity had exploited during the early wars.
But Necros were nothing if not adaptable.
If enough of them gathered—and enough sacrifices were offered—they could summon a Dungeon. A fragment of the Underworld anchored directly into physical space.
Within a Dungeon, Necros could draw endless energy. It was their fortress, their sanctuary… and once, their greatest weapon.
Yet humanity had turned even that against them.
Through ingenuity and ruthless experimentation, Dungeons became gateways—tools that allowed humanity to expand beyond Earth. It was through a Dungeon that humans had reached Mars and colonized it in less than a decade.
How exactly that transformation had been achieved was classified information.
"Let's get to work," the foreman barked. "Crew One, northwest outer ring. Crew Two—"
Nero snapped to attention as instructions were handed out.
Working near a Dungeon was dangerous beyond measure, but the pay reflected the risk. One day here earned more than a month of ordinary cleanup work. For Nero, that meant momentum—a massive step toward his goal.
He positioned himself beside Old Smiley, silently taking on the heaviest tasks to ease the burden on the older man.
Step by step, the crews advanced into the ruined city.
They dismantled corpses, cleared streets, neutralized biohazards, and collected every trace of Necros residue left behind by the battle. The sheer number of cleaners allowed them to move quickly despite the scale of destruction.
By noon, the outer circle had been fully cleared.
After a brief meal, they pushed inward.
The closer Nero drew to the Dungeon, the more overwhelming its presence became. Its scale defied reason, its surface rippling faintly like a living thing. Each step forward made his heart pound harder.
Then—something changed.
At roughly five hundred meters from the tower, a strange sensation washed over him. It was subtle, yet unmistakable.
Familiar.
Nero frowned inside his helmet. He couldn't explain it. It wasn't fear or excitement—it felt like recognition.
Before he could dwell on it, the ground trembled violently.
The Dungeon shook.
A deep, thunderous rumble echoed through the ruins, sending shockwaves across the city. Cracks spiderwebbed through already-broken buildings, and several collapsed outright, filling the air with dust and debris.
Chaos erupted among the crews.
Then the base of the Dungeon began to glow.
A sickly, pulsing light spread outward—and before anyone could react, the first Necros emerged.
Then another.
And another.
A tide of them poured forth.
"RUN! BACK TO THE TRUCKS!" Nero shouted at the top of his lungs.
Reapers were already engaging the horde. Explosions rang out as abilities tore through the advancing mass, but the numbers were overwhelming. Even Reapers would struggle against such a flood.
All the cleaners reached the same conclusion at once.
They ran.
Boots pounded against broken pavement as everyone sprinted toward the trucks. Drivers shouted through open doors, engines already roaring as they urged people to move faster. Panic spread like wildfire, thick and suffocating, as the thunderous sound of footsteps echoed through the ruined city—heavy, numerous, and closing in fast.
Nero ran harder than he ever had before.
Adrenaline burned through his veins like acid, forcing his body beyond its limits. His lungs screamed, his muscles protested, but he didn't slow down. The trucks were just ahead—salvation within reach—
Then he heard a scream behind him.
Nero froze.
He spun around just in time to see a nearby building collapse inward. Concrete and steel came crashing down, and when the dust settled, Old Smiley lay trapped beneath the rubble, one leg crushed under a massive slab.
Necros were already flooding through the streets.
They moved with terrifying speed, closing in from every direction. Nero's heart hammered violently as his gaze flicked between the old man and the trucks. The drivers were ready to go—terrified, desperate, and clearly unwilling to wait any longer.
Run… or help.
"Nero, run!" Old Smiley shouted, his face pale with pain.
For a split second, Nero hesitated.
Then rage surged through him.
"Dammit!" he yelled.
Instead of turning back to the trucks, Nero sprinted toward the old man.
"I told you to run!" Old Smiley shouted again.
Nero did not bother with those words and grabbed a metal bar from the debris, wedging it beneath the concrete slab. Gritting his teeth, he put all his strength into it. Muscles screamed as he heaved upward, the slab shifting just enough.
"Move!" Nero shouted.
Old Smiley clenched his jaw and pulled his leg free, barely keeping his balance. Nero wrapped an arm around him, supporting his weight, and together they staggered toward the trucks as fast as they could.
Sadly, they didn't make it.
The drivers reached their breaking point.
Engines revved, tires screeched, and one by one the trucks accelerated away from the city—leaving them behind.
"Wait!"
"Don't leave us!"
"Come back!"
The shouts and pleas from cleaners echoed through the ruins, unanswered. The trucks vanished into the distance, carrying survival with them.
Nero dragged Old Smiley behind the fence surrounding a half-collapsed house. Their breathing was ragged, hearts pounding as distant screams rang out across the city.
They searched desperately for anything—anything—that could be used as a weapon.
There was nothing.
Then the fence exploded.
Two creatures burst through the wreckage.
Necros in the form of massive, putrefying hyena-like beasts appeared, their flesh rotting and split open, jagged fangs dripping with black ichor. Their eyes locked onto Nero and Old Smiley, and something like amusement twisted across their distorted faces.
One lunged.
Its jaws opened unnaturally wide, more than capable of ripping a human apart in a single bite.
Death felt inevitable for Nero and the old man.
But then a blur slammed into the creature at terrifying speed.
The Necros was crushed into the ground, pinned beneath a figure that moved faster than Nero could track. A small sword flashed, plunging straight through the creature's skull. The Necros convulsed once—then went still.
Dead.
The newcomer rose smoothly.
She was a woman with short, spiky orange hair and sharp, light-golden eyes that burned with alert intensity. She wore a black combat suit traced with red accents, her posture calm and confident despite the carnage around her.
Blood splattered her armor.
Her gaze shifted to the second Necros.
She took a slow breath.
A dark blue aura ignited around her twin short swords, crackling softly with power. For a heartbeat, the ruined street fell silent.
Then both moved.
The Necros lunged with claws and fangs, but the woman was faster. She stepped in, blades flashing in a deadly arc. In less than a second, the creature was carved apart—split cleanly into four pieces that collapsed lifelessly to the ground.
Silence returned.
Nero stared at her, blood soaking her silhouette, sword aura fading into the air. His mind struggled to process what he had just witnessed.
It was like watching a Valkyrie.
A goddess of death descended straight from legend.