Chapter 50: Mana Drain

The remaining three Skitterers let out high-pitched, buzzing screeches. Two of them instantly flared their back plates, launching another salvo of white quills toward Rain’s cover.

The bone barbs slammed uselessly into the thick face of the iron beam, bouncing off the metal and clattering across the concrete floor.

’They have to reload or reset after a volley,’ Rain realized, his mind piecing the mechanic together as the buzzing sound on their backs faded slightly. ’Their shells don’t sprout new quills instantly.’

The moment the volley ended, Rain drove himself upward out of his crouch, holding the iron beam vertically in front of his torso like a heavy shield.

He covered the ten feet between himself and the second Skitterer before the creature could turn its body. Rain dropped the iron beam directly onto the monster’s back, driving the sharp, jagged rusted end down with the full weight of his upper body.

The jagged metal punched straight through the charcoal shell, pinning the creature to the concrete floorboards. White, viscous fluid erupted from the wound as the legs twitched twice and went stiff.

[Target Eliminated: Quillback Skitterer (F-Rank)]

[Experience Gained: +12]

[Experience: 182 / 900]

The third Skitterer, perched six feet high on a collapsed metal shelf, lunged down toward Rain’s exposed neck, its mandibles clicking wide.

Rain didn’t try to dodge. He raised his right hand, caught the creature by its soft underside right beneath its head plate, and slammed it face-first into the concrete wall with enough force to leave a red and white smear on the stone.

[Target Eliminated: Quillback Skitterer (F-Rank)]

[Experience Gained: +12]

[Experience: 194 / 900]

The fourth and final Skitterer turned its flat body around and scrambled frantically back toward the dark passage it had come from, its thin legs moving in a desperate blur.

Rain picked up a half-broken brick from the floor, lined up the trajectory in less than half a second, and threw it with a sharp, whip-like snap of his wrist.

The brick caught the fleeing creature squarely on its rear shell plate, crushing the hind legs and pinning it against the floor. Rain walked over, stepped his heavy boot down onto its head, and crushed the remaining shell with a dull, wet snap.

[Target Eliminated: Quillback Skitterer (F-Rank)]

[Experience Gained: +12]

[Experience: 206 / 900]

Rain stood in the center of the debris-strewn storage bay, breathing heavily through his nose, his right shoulder aching with a steady throb. He looked down at his left arm, where three small holes were still dripping thin lines of red down to his wrist.

He walked over to a fallen wooden crate, cleared a spot free of quills, and sat down.

’The monsters are changing,’ Rain thought, staring at his bloodied knuckles in the dim light. ’First plain scavengers. Then an environmental poison trap. Then a heavy armored brawler that almost broke my shoulder. Now ranged harassment packs that punish you for rushing in blind.’

He leaned his elbows on his knees, his eyes staring into the dark corner of the room.

’I’ve been down here for what, two hours? Three? How big is this lower level?’

He rubbed his chin with his uninjured right hand, feeling the rough grit of dirt and dried leech blood on his jawline.

’The mission says clear every hostile lifeform in the rift. But what does that actually mean? Does it mean I have to hunt down every single Skitterer hiding in every drain pipe across however many acres of this foundation? That sounds impossible. One person couldn’t map this whole sector in a week.’

He shifted his position, his leg aching where the leech had gotten him earlier.

’Or does clearing the rift mean something else? A rift isn’t just a random pile of monsters, is it? There’s supposed to be something anchoring it. If that anchor dies, does everything sustaining the smaller spawn just fall apart with it?’

He frowned, turning the thought over in his mind.

’If that’s true, then clearing the rift means finding whatever’s actually running this place. The boss.’

He looked back toward the high ceiling where the main drainage lines ran.

’Is Holt’s team fighting it right now? If they reach it before I do and kill it, does that even count for me? Does the mission fail because I wasn’t there? Do I get partial credit? Nothing at all?’

He closed his eyes for a second, letting his head rest against the cool wood of the crate.

’I don’t know,’ Rain admitted quietly to himself in the empty room. ’I genuinely don’t know how any of this actually works. The only way to find out is to reach whatever’s down there before they do. Or find out I’m already too late.’

He pushed himself up off the crate, using his right hand to brace against the wood until his legs stabilized. He took a long, slow breath, rolled his left shoulder to work out the stiffness, and stepped into the next corridor.

The air changed twenty yards past the storage bay.

The constant, ambient dripping of water from the high pipes, a sound that had filled the background of every room Rain had walked through tonight, suddenly stopped. The small rustles of cave insects and the distant, metallic creaking of the building’s foundation died away into a dense, unnatural silence that felt heavy enough to press against his ears.

Rain froze.

He didn’t step forward into the passage ahead. He dropped into a lower stance, his right hand hovering near his hip, his eyes tracking the shadows along the narrow concrete hallway.

The silence wasn’t empty. It felt thick, deliberate, as if the air itself were holding its breath.

Fifteen yards ahead, standing in the middle of a wider, vaulted junction room where four major drainage conduits met, was a shadow.

It was tall, at least six and a half feet, with a gaunt, impossibly narrow frame that looked as though it had been constructed from long, bleached animal bones bound together with thick, blackened root fibers. It didn’t twitch. It didn’t skitter. It stood completely motionless in the center of the room, its long, skeletal arms hanging down past its knees, its broad, flat hands ending in four jointed, needle-like fingers of polished horn.

Its head was an elongated, smooth dome of grey bone, completely featureless, no eyes, no nose, no ears. Just a smooth, seamless plate of polished white calcium.

As Rain watched, the creature didn’t turn its head toward him. It simply stepped forward.

It didn’t charge like the Rustjaw. It didn’t dart erratically like the crawlers. It moved with a slow, unnervingly deliberate gait, its long, jointed legs clicking against the stone with the steady, rhythmic precision of a pendulum.

A deep red status window exploded into Rain’s vision, flashing with an urgency he hadn’t seen all night.

[Target Identified: Gravewright]

[Rank: D-Rank (High)]

[Type: Beast / Drain Predator]

[Attributes: Mana Drain on Contact, Reinforced Frame]

[Threat Level: Severe]

Rain’s stomach dropped.

’Severe,’ Rain thought, his eyes locked on the broad, featureless white face of the thing. ’Not moderate. Not high. Severe. And it’s D-Rank High.’

He looked down at his own hands, then back up at the gaunt, towering shape advancing down the junction room.

’My HP is at forty-six,’ Rain calculated rapidly, his pulse hammering against his ribs like a trapped bird. ’I have eleven mana left. No weapon. No armor. And that thing’s frame is built out of fused bone and root fiber.’

The Gravewright took three more slow steps forward, closing the distance to ten yards.

Suddenly, the vertical center of its smooth, featureless face plate split open. A narrow, dark seam ran from the top of its skull down to its chin, revealing a deep, hollow cavity lined with rows of fine, needle-like black cartilage that vibrated with a faint, high-frequency hum.

Rain didn’t wait for it to take another step.

’I can’t out-range it,’ Rain thought, his mind racing through every option. ’It has long limbs. If I stay at medium distance, those needle fingers will reach me before I can pivot. I have to get inside its reach, break its balance, and drive it down to the stone like I did with the crawler.’

He surged forward, driving off his right heel with everything he had.

He covered the ten yards in three seconds, staying low, his eyes fixed on the creature’s thin, jointed midsection. As he reached the Gravewright, Rain threw his weight forward, extending both arms to wrap around the creature’s gaunt waist in a full body grapple.

His hands slammed into the sides of the Gravewright’s frame.

It felt like hitting a solid iron gate wrapped in dry wooden vines. The creature didn’t bend. It didn’t step back. It absorbed the entire momentum of Rain’s charge without moving its feet an inch.

Before Rain could pull back or adjust his grip, the Gravewright’s long, skeletal left hand dropped downward, its four horn fingers pressing flat against Rain’s exposed right shoulder.

A sudden, terrifying sensation shot through Rain’s body.

It wasn’t physical pain. It was a cold, sickening vacuum, a sudden, violent suction that felt as if someone had driven a hollow tube straight into his chest and started pumping his very life force out of his lungs.

[Warning! Mana Drain Active!]