Edrin learned quickly that the dungeon did not reward rest.
The corridor he had chosen—chosen being a generous word—didn't grow quieter with time. The stone around him shifted in ways too subtle to track directly. Not movement exactly. More like tension redistributing, the way a structure settled after taking weight it hadn't expected.
He moved before his legs stiffened.
"Just walking," he told himself. "That's all. No heroics. No—whatever that was earlier."
The wound on his calf had stopped bleeding, though it still burned. That bothered him. It should have hurt more by now. Pain was supposed to escalate, not flatten out.
The dungeon opened into a wider chamber ahead.
The ceiling arched high, broken by rib-like stone formations that curved downward as if trying to close the space again. Patches of the floor were uneven, cracked open by jagged growths of dark mineral threaded with dull orange veins. Heat bled from those fractures in slow pulses.
Edrin slowed, eyes scanning.
"Okay. Big room means something lives here," he muttered. "Or something used to."
=== === ===
It wasn't a single creature.
Three shapes detached themselves from the shadows near the far wall.
They were vaguely humanoid, but stretched wrong—too tall, too thin, their limbs elongated like they'd been pulled instead of grown. What skin remained was dark and dry, split in places to reveal fibrous material underneath. Their heads were smooth, featureless slopes, except for shallow depressions where eyes should have been.
Remains-bound entities.
Former humans. Or close enough that the difference no longer mattered.
They moved in broken coordination, each step delayed, as if following instructions that arrived too late.
Edrin swallowed. "Three," he whispered. "That's… great. That's just great."
They didn't rush him.
That was worse.
He backed toward a cluster of stone ribs, narrowing the angles. The knife felt steadier in his hand now, as if his grip settled faster than his thoughts.
The first entity lunged—slow, predictable. Edrin stepped in and drove the blade into its side.
The feedback was wrong.
There was resistance, but not where bone should have been. The thing barely reacted, turning its torso stiffly as the second entity closed in.
"Okay, okay—bad idea," Edrin muttered, yanking the blade free and retreating two steps too late.
Something struck his shoulder. Hard. Not sharp, just heavy.
He rolled, came up on one knee, breath sharp in his throat.
This wasn't a fight to win. It was a problem to reduce.
Edrin stopped trying to finish them.
Instead, he cut joints. Knees. Ankles. Movements that disrupted motion rather than ended it.
The third entity fell awkwardly, its legs folding wrong beneath it. The first slowed. The second followed.
It took time. Too much time.
By the end, Edrin's arms trembled and his breathing lagged behind his heartbeat, but all three shapes lay still—broken, not cleanly killed.
He leaned against the stone ribs, sliding down until he sat.
"That was… awful," he said quietly. "I did everything wrong."
Residual Adaptation Reinforced.
Edrin laughed once, short and humorless. "Yeah. I noticed."
=== === ===
He didn't stay long.
Staying felt like an invitation.
As he moved deeper, the dungeon grew warmer. The walls narrowed again, forcing him into shorter strides. His shoulders brushed stone more often than before.
He became aware of patterns—not conscious ones, but rhythms. Where movement attracted attention. Where silence did the opposite. How long he could stay in one place before the pressure returned.
"Don't think about it," he muttered. "Just… react."
The words felt increasingly hollow.
He caught his reflection in a patch of dark mineral polished smooth by heat. His face looked sharper. Thinner. His eyes—still brown—seemed darker somehow, absorbing light instead of reflecting it.
"Temporary," he told the reflection. "This is still temporary."
The dungeon did not respond.
Psychological Drift Trending.
Edrin exhaled slowly, then tightened his grip on the blade and kept moving.
=== === ===
The smell came first.
Metallic. Old. Wrong.
Edrin slowed, every step careful now. The corridor opened into a low chamber, its ceiling sagging under uneven stone growth. The floor was littered with debris—broken equipment, fragments of armor, splintered tools half-fused into the ground.
Bodies lay where the fight had ended.
Some were intact enough to recognize. Others were not.
He stood there longer than he meant to.
"That's… that's our formation," he said quietly, eyes tracing the positions. "We didn't scatter."
A helm lay cracked near the wall, the insignia of his school split cleanly down the center. He recognized the markings immediately. He'd helped polish them before the mission.
Edrin crouched beside one of the bodies.
The face was slack, expression frozen somewhere between surprise and effort. No defensive wounds. No sign of retreat.
"Fast," he murmured. "It was fast."
His throat tightened. He swallowed hard and reached for a familiar satchel, fingers pausing just before contact.
"Sorry," he said under his breath, unsure who he was apologizing to. "I—I don't think I can carry you."
He searched quickly, efficiently. Communicators shattered. Supplies depleted or useless. Nothing that explained how they'd all gone down at once.
He stood again, chest heavy.
"I was right here," he whispered. "I was right here."
No answer came. Not from the dungeon. Not from the dead.
Edrin turned away, jaw set, blade tight in his hand.
"I'll remember," he said, more firmly now. "I don't know how yet. But I will."
He stepped past the bodies and moved deeper into the dungeon, carrying their absence with him.