The darkness hit like a physical weight the moment they stepped through the gate, and Floor 3 lived up to its name. Underground caverns stretched in every direction, the ceiling lost somewhere high above, with only scattered patches of bioluminescent fungi providing any light at all.
[Floor 3: Blood in the Dark]
[Objective: Reach the exit gate]
[Time limit: None]
[Warning: Limited visibility]
[Warning: Hostile environment]
"I can't see anything," someone whimpered from the group while clutching at the person next to them. Adrian's survivors huddled together in the dim glow of the entry point, their eyes wide and their hands gripping weapons like talismans.
"Stay together." Adrian's voice cut through the panic while he raised a torch that barely pushed back the darkness. "Nobody wanders off. We move as a unit, we watch each other's backs, we survive."
Good advice. The same advice his first party leader gave, right before the shadows started taking people.
'Don't think about that, just focus on now.'
But the memories came anyway, dragged up by the familiar darkness and the familiar fear in unfamiliar faces.
---
*Floor 3. Year One.*
*He huddled behind a stalagmite while something that wasn't quite wolf and wasn't quite shadow tore through his party like paper. Six people entered this floor confident and ready. Three were already dead and the other two were screaming somewhere in the dark.*
*He should help them. Should do something. Should be brave enough to step out of hiding and face the monster that was killing everyone he knew.*
*He didn't move.*
*The screaming stopped. The wet sounds that followed were worse. He stayed hidden, frozen by fear, until the sun rose on a floor that never saw sunlight and revealed what was left of the people who trusted him to fight beside them.*
*'I'm a coward and I'm alive because I'm a coward.'*
*He swore then, over the blood and the bones and the silence, that he would never hide again. Never freeze. Never let fear make his choices for him.*
*It took years to keep that promise. But he kept it.*
---
"Dante?"
Ravenna's voice pulled him back to the present. She was watching him with concern in her mismatched eyes, close enough that he could see the faint glow of the fungi reflected in her pupils.
"I'm fine." He shook his head slightly while forcing his shoulders to relax.
"You went somewhere." It wasn't a question while she stepped closer. "Just now. You went somewhere bad."
'I went back to the worst day of my life, the day I learned what kind of person I really was.'
"Old memories," he said instead while keeping his eyes on the darkness ahead. "This floor brings them up."
She didn't push, just moved a little closer with her shoulder brushing against his in silent support, and he let her stay there because pushing her away would take more energy than he had.
The group moved out, Adrian leading from the front with a torch that barely pushed back the darkness. He and Ravenna stayed at the back, watching for threats, listening for the sounds that meant death was approaching, and those sounds came sooner than expected.
---
The shadow creatures attacked without warning, emerging from the darkness like nightmares given form. They had too many limbs and no faces and they moved in silence, which was the worst part because you couldn't hear them coming until they were already on top of you.
Someone screamed while someone else went down in a spray of blood that looked black in the dim light. Adrian shouted orders and the group tried to form up, but the shadows were everywhere and nowhere and the darkness made everything worse.
Ravenna froze beside him, and he saw the moment fear locked her muscles and stole her voice. He was moving before his mind caught up with his body because a shadow creature was lunging for her exposed back and his knife took it through what might have been a head, dissolving it into wisps of dark mist.
Three more came for them. He killed the first with a slash across its center mass, caught the second by its extended limb and used its momentum to slam it into the third, then finished both with precise strikes that severed whatever passed for their vital organs.
[Enemy slain: Shadow Stalker x3]
[System points: +60]
"Move!" He grabbed Ravenna's arm and pulled her behind him while positioning himself between her and the darkness. "Stay close, don't stop, don't think, just move!"
She snapped out of her freeze and obeyed, following in his footsteps as he cut a path through the chaos. More shadows came and more shadows died, his blade moving in patterns that his body remembered even when his mind was focused on protecting the person behind him.
Adrian's group was falling apart with two more down, maybe three, the survivors scattering in panic as the attack overwhelmed their defenses. Adrian himself was holding his ground with his sword carving through shadows with skill that confirmed everything he suspected about the man's hidden capabilities.
'Let him handle his own, just focus on Ravenna.'
They broke free of the main fight and he kept moving, half-carrying Ravenna through tunnels he remembered from a lifetime ago. Left at the fork, right at the cluster of glowing mushrooms, straight through the narrow passage that the shadows couldn't fit through.
They emerged into a larger cavern lit by massive deposits of bioluminescent crystal, and he let out a breath he didn't know he was holding because they were safe, at least for now.
Ravenna collapsed against a rock, her breathing ragged, her whole body shaking. He stood guard at the entrance with his knife still in hand, waiting for threats that didn't materialize.
"You're not what you pretend to be." Her voice was quiet, hoarse, but steady.
He turned to look at her while keeping half his attention on the tunnel behind them. "What?"
"Back there." She met his eyes without flinching while pushing herself up slightly. "You moved like nothing I've ever seen. You knew exactly where to cut, exactly how to move. You weren't scared at all."
'I was terrified, I just learned a long time ago not to let it stop me.'
"I've been climbing for a while," he said carefully while cleaning his blade on his sleeve. "Picked up some tricks."
"That wasn't tricks." She pushed herself to her feet with her hand braced against the rock. "You fight like you've done this a thousand times, like you've killed those things before, specifically those things, in specifically this place."
She was too smart, too observant, and the darkness stripped away the layers of pretense he usually kept between them.
"I've seen things," he admitted while sliding his knife back into its sheath. "I know more than I should. That's all I can tell you."
"Why?" She wrapped her arms around herself.
"Because the truth would make you think I'm crazy, or worse."
She studied his face for a long moment, searching for something he didn't know if she would find. Then she nodded slowly while some of the tension drained from her shoulders.
"I don't care what you are," she said quietly while meeting his eyes. "You saved me again, you keep saving me even though you don't have to. Whatever you're hiding, it doesn't change that."
'It should, because if you knew what I've done and what I'm planning to do, you'd run.'
But she didn't know, and he wasn't going to tell her.
"Get some rest," he said instead while moving to take position near the entrance. "We'll move again when you're ready."
She curled up against the rocks with her tail wrapped around herself for comfort, and was asleep within minutes. He stood watch over her while listening to the distant sounds of combat echoing through the caverns, wondering how much longer he could keep his secrets before they broke through the walls he built around them.