The chat screamed on relentlessly, messages piling over one another in a chaotic flood.
[IT'S STILL ALIVE]
[DON'T LEAVE HIM ALONE]
[MOONPETAL: Daryl, get out now!]
[SPAMMER: KILL IT]
Daryl pressed his palm against the rebar and felt the heat still trapped in the metal, along with the small tremors that ran through it as the beast released its last bursts of fury, and he forced himself to move slowly while working bolts loose, tying ropes tight, and anchoring metal where it would hold.
He set a final wedge and jammed a rotten steel beam into the creature's shoulder blade like a brace, and when the animal thrashed the beam settled deeper into bone with a wet, horrible sound, a terrible, human noise like someone suffocating.
And then, for the first time since the fight had begun, the ape stopped.
It was not asleep and not quiet, but stilled, every muscle still fighting as the earth and concrete held it in place while it strained until its breath became a thin, keening sound, and the building around it creaked like a living thing finally settling back down.
Daryl slid to his knees at the edge of the rubble, covered in dust and blood, his left arm cut and bleeding and his ribs aching with every breath as his vision tunneled for a moment and he realized how close he was to collapse.
But he was alive.
He pressed a hand to his chest and felt the system's warm, steady pulse of status.
[SYSTEM]
Mission Achieved: Immobilization of Target - Partial
EXP +1,000 | Points +4,000
Numbers flooded his vision as his HUD brightened.
[Total EXP: 2,650 | Points: 6,900]
He had bought himself a margin.
Daryl coughed and tasted grit and blood as he looked back at the pinned nightmare, watching the ape's chest rise and fall slowly, its breathing heavy now, more like a dying engine than the earlier unholy rumble.
He wanted to watch it, to gloat, to collapse where he knelt, but a hunter's instincts kept him moving as he shuffled through the rubble toward the pile of salvage, knowing he still needed rope, wedges, and certainty.
He pressed his ear near the creature's side for a brief moment and heard a distant, thin squeal from within the beast, and he straightened immediately because he would not be fooled again.
He had seen its recovery before.
It healed faster than it should, ghost energy patching wounds while the domain fed it, and there was no certainty it would not pull itself free, and if it did the building would have nothing left to give him.
---
He spent the next minutes like a man possessed, jamming heavy steel girders into forming gaps, levering collapsed columns so their weight bore down on the creature's shoulders, wrapping more ropes and tying them to reinforced stage rigs while hammering rebar into place, prying and shoving as each motion sent white-hot pain through his body.
Dizziness came and went in short waves, but he worked through it as his hands bled until he barely noticed, only realizing when his fingers began to go numb.
Outside, in the chat, people argued, cried, and begged, while MoonPetal typed messages that were small and desperate.
[MoonPetal ⭐]: Please, if you can, get medical help. Don't wait.
Daryl shook his head slowly because he didn't know if he could leave, knowing that if he left and the creature lived someone else would die, and if he stayed he might die anyway.
It wasn't heroic.
It was simple arithmetic.
He salvaged what he could of the arena and attached a final chain across the creature's shoulders, a heavy metal band looped through concrete and around the beast's rump, then locked it in place and threw his weight onto it.
The beast strained and grunted before finally falling still.
Not dead.
Immobile.
Daryl did not celebrate.
He knelt and vomited a little, tasting iron and salt as he coughed.
---
The system notification came again.
[SYSTEM]
Mission Complete: Hostile Neutralized - Immobilized State
EXP +2,000 | Points +8,000
The numbers screamed across his vision.
[Total EXP: 4,650 | Points: 14,900]
He slumped down onto a broken seat as relief washed through him like cold water, and he laughed quietly, the sound small, cracked, and strangled.
He had done it.
He had taken the monster's power and turned the building itself into a trap, using the tools he had, his head, and the ghosts he had caught, coming terrifyingly close to dying again and still succeeding.
---
As the adrenaline ebbed, the pain caught up with him and his body protested violently, every breath becoming a riot as he felt more broken than before.
But the beast lay immobilized.
It could not move, not right now, and maybe never.
He had left the monster to die in the ruins, a monstrous choice that was necessary and practical, even if he didn't like it, even if he knew someone watching would judge him.
The chat was divided, with some cheering, some crying, and some accusing, but Daryl didn't have the energy to answer any of them.
He only had the energy to stand.
He dragged himself upright and limped toward the exit, pausing at the edge of the atrium to look down at the pinned horror, its eyes still open and alive with slow intelligence, like embers waiting to become flame.
He didn't look away immediately because he wanted to be sure, to be present for the end, but the building was tired and had given everything it had.
Cracks spidered across the floor, steel groaned, and dust hung thick in the air.
So he made a decision.
He left.
He did not stay to watch the final breaths.
He walked to the stairwell and began to climb, each step feeling like moving through a storm as his legs trembled and the metal railing bit into his palms.
He looked back once.
The beast lay trapped beneath the concrete, moonlight falling across its face in a single pale slab.
Then he walked out.
---
Outside, the night air was clean and cold, and the world smelled like rain mixed with something metallic as a car alarm wailed down the street and someone shouted in the distance.
Daryl stood beneath the neon lights and let himself be hollow for a second before the stream overlay popped up one last time.
MoonPetal.
[MoonPetal ⭐]: You insane idiot. Go home as rest. Please.
He smiled a tiny, cracked smile.
[Daryl]: I'll be okay. Resting. I need help tho.
The keyboard tapped.
[MoonPetal ⭐]: I have the Metropolitan ToGo App on my phone. If you don't mind I'll send a cab your way, Hold on.
He set his phone down carefully and leaned back against the cold wall of a convenience store, looking at his hands as he flexed them slowly, pain flaring as he saw the cuts, the grime, and the blood beneath his nails.
But the system pulsed warm and steady in his vision.
[STATUS]
Level: 2
EXP: 4,650
Points: 14,900
New lines slid into view as new menu options unlocked.
Weapons Level 2 unlocked (some entries).
Passive slot unlocked.
Domain Report: Target immobilized.
He closed the menu and exhaled deeply, exhaustion settling over him as everything inside him begged for sleep, for a morning with nothing but rent, pizza, and mundane problems.
But the theater would not be quiet forever.
The pinned nightmare still breathed slowly, and he knew it wasn't over, that the domain still had rules to obey.
But for tonight, he had bought himself time.
He had turned the impossible into a margin.
He had won.
And he had lost parts of himself.
He would live.
He would heal.
He would plan.
And when the domain woke again, when the monster repaired itself or the domain manufactured a new trial, he would be there, stronger than before.
He would not die on that floor again.