Chapter 70: Out of Control

Chapter 70: Chapter 70: Out of Control

The tunnels that had been silent a few minutes earlier were silent no longer.

Monsters poured out of side passages as the group retreated, forcing them into a running fight through corridors far too narrow for anyone to properly spread out.

"Stay together!" Reeve shouted, cutting down something low and fast that lunged from the dark, his experience showing in every economical movement as he kept the group’s momentum pointed in a single direction.

Jason and Skyler held the rear, trading glances as they fell into an unspoken rhythm, Jason’s spear meeting anything that got too close while Skyler’s arrows thinned out whatever tried to flank wide.

The confined space made his usual technique feel clumsy and unrefined.

’No room for the wide arcs. No room for proper footwork either.’

He shortened every strike, abandoned half the forms Darius had drilled into him, working instead in tight, economical jabs that fit the cramped tunnel without sacrificing the follow-through entirely.

---

A shape broke past Reeve’s guard, fast and low, aimed squarely at Wen who moved at the center of the pack.

Jason moved on instinct, driving his spear through the creature’s shoulder before it could close the distance, the point punching clean through muscle and bone alike.

That didn’t even didn’t slow the crazed creature down.

The thing twisted mid-impale, jaws snapping for his forearm, and Jason wrenched back just far enough to avoid losing the limb, the motion costing him his footing for half a breath.

He recovered fast, driving a second strike into the exposed line of its neck, and this time it finally dropped, twitching once before going still.

"Thanks," Wen managed, breathless.

"It’s nothing. Keep moving."

The passage widened a short while later, and the difference in his own fighting showed immediately, full reach returning, proper footwork settling back under him, the spear suddenly feeling like an extension of his arm again instead of a clumsy, shortened thing.

He held two monsters at range with pure reach alone, driving one back with a feint before finishing it clean, buying the group another few seconds of clear retreat.

’Don’t show more than you need to.’

He kept that thought in his mind underneath everything, a steady, deliberate restraint even as the pressure mounted around them.

---

The junction that should have led toward the entrance was blocked entirely, massive slabs of collapsed rock sealing the passage from floor to ceiling.

"We can’t clear this thing in any reasonable time," Skyler said, studying the debris with a frown.

"We need another route." Reeve pulled up his tracking device, tapping through readings that refused to settle into anything coherent.

"The readings on this thing are scattered so I can’t get a clean fix on our position relative to the entrance."

"Of course they are," Wen snapped, sharper than Jason had ever heard her, panic bleeding through the words. "Did you even check the damn thing before we came in here?"

"It was working fine before that chamber activated, you know that." Reeve said, voice tight but controlled.

"This isn’t equipment failure, Wen. Something in this Gate is actively interfering with it."

The tension in the group sat heavy for a moment, nobody quite willing to break the silence that followed.

Jason broke it instead.

"The fluctuations get worse the closer we move toward the chamber," he said.

"Weaker the farther we get from it. If we stick to the outer passages, away from the center, the readings should stabilize if only by a little."

Reeve studied him for a beat, something assessing in his expression again, then nodded.

"It’s worth trying at least."

They moved on, the group’s pace slower now, wearier, every corner met with more caution than the last.

---

The ambush came from above, three creatures dropping from an elevated ledge without warning, claws and weight bearing down on the group before anyone could fully react.

Cassius took the brunt of it, losing his footing on the loose rock and slamming hard into the stone below, a sickening crack audible even over the chaos of the fight.

"Cassius!" Skyler’s arrow found one of the attackers mid-air, dropping it before it could press the advantage.

Jason and Reeve handled the rest between them, the fight brief but brutal, and once the last creature fell, the group finally had a moment to breathe.

Cassius wasn’t standing on his own anymore.

"Shit!" he said through gritted teeth, propped against the wall, face pale. "My leg might actually be broken."

Wen was already at his side, hands glowing, healing essence pouring into the injury with visible effort.

Jason watched closely as she worked, and what he saw concerned him more than the injury itself.

Her essence wasn’t moving the way it should. The current that normally flowed smooth and controlled through her healing now stuttered and caught, circulation visibly struggling to maintain any consistent rhythm, like something inside her had come loose from its proper track.

It was even worse now than at the beginning of the raid because of her panic.

She managed to knit the worst of the break closed, Cassius’s wince easing into something more manageable, though far from fully healed.

"That’s the best I can do right now," she said, breathing hard, sweat beading along her temple despite the cool air of the tunnel.

"Thanks I’ll manage" Cassius said, testing weight on the leg carefully. "I can move. Slowly, but I can move."

---

Nobody said it aloud, but the understanding settled over the group without needing to be spoken.

They couldn’t afford to fight everything they encountered anymore.

Not with Cassius slowed, Wen’s reserves clearly strained past their normal limits, and whatever was happening to this Gate showing no signs of stabilizing.

’We need to survive first. We can figure out the rest once we’re actually out of this damn place.’

They pressed on into a narrow tunnel that seemed to curve away from the central chamber, Reeve leading the pack with renewed caution, Jason falling back to cover Cassius’s slower pace alongside Skyler.

Behind them, the sound of cracking stone grew louder, a deep, grinding rhythm that hadn’t been present when they first entered this section of the Gate.

Jason glanced back once, the tension in his shoulders refusing to ease even as the tunnel swallowed the sound behind them.

’Whatever’s happening back there, it’s not finished yet.’

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Author’s note

This is coming way too late but as promised, this is one of the two gift Chapters.

As penance, the second one is way longer than my usual.