"Wait for me!" John said, standing on one leg. Pain clear on his face, but his eyes screaming bloody murder.
"I can't wait for you," Kael replied, continuing forward. "I'm under the curse."
"Right, I'll help you out!" John said, hopping toward him. "Just wait, let me help you out!"
"I'm fine," Kael said, voice hard. "I told you I'm fine."
John kept coming anyway, hopping fast for a man with a busted foot, desperation and calculation mixed in his eyes. The exit door was right there. Kael could practically taste the end of the trial. And John was closing the last bit of distance like a man trying to grab a drowning victim and use him as a raft.
Kael was a few steps from the exit when John's arm landed on his shoulder.
The added weight nearly crushed him. Not because John was heavy, but because Kael was already barely standing under the rune and hammer's burden. John's grip turned the weight into something unbearable.
"I told you I don't need the help," Kael hissed.
"But you do," John said, voice smooth now. "Look, the exit is right there. Give me one of those pieces. Let me hold it for you."
Kael's eyes narrowed. "Quite funny. That's what you said the first time we met."
"You're being rude now, and I'm in pain right now." John replied, as if offended, as if this was a conversation between friends instead of a mugging with a countdown.
"And you're slowing us down," Kael said. His jaw tightened. "The doors are shutting down."
"Just give me one of them."
"If I try to do that, it'll unequip and they'll shatter," Kael said, forcing the logic to stay sharp even under exhaustion. "Not right here next to the exit. So just leave first."
"Nah," John said, tightening his hand on Kael's shoulder. His fingers dug in. "If we leave, you'll regain your ability to move without the weights. You'll just run away. I'd rather we split the reward right here."
Kael's voice dropped into something colder. "I'm not in the mood, man. Fuck off. Or I'll just unequip them right here so you won't get them anyway."
"Better that way than you leave with something and I with nothing."
"Your greed is the reason you're leaving with nothing," Kael snapped. "I warned you it wasn't something you could handle."
John's face twisted.
He flicked something from his side. Not a knife, because that was a luxury here, but a shiv made of a metal shard, rope wrapped around it as a grip. Crude. Ugly. Effective.
He did not hesitate.
The shiv punched into Kael's side.
Air blasted out of Kael's lungs. Pain flared, sharp and bright, and the world narrowed to that one hateful point of impact.
"Should have given me one," John said, voice tight with satisfaction as he tried to twist it. "Now I'll get both and you won't leave."
A notification flashed again.
[Brokk's hammer Destroyed [Primitive Weapon]]
He was surprised because it wan't his, but the fact that the shiv was still partially in his body probably made the hammer believe it was an item. Although painful, at least it made sure he won't get stabbed again….
The shiv turned to dust in John's hand.
Kael did not waste the moment.
He hit the floor and grabbed at the exposed bone in John's shin. John's leg was already compromised. Kael's hand found purchase and yanked down with all the ugly strength he could muster.
The sound of bone ripping from flesh and snapping echoed louder than John's scream.
John's wail came out raw, not even words, just noise. The two of them fell fully to the ground. Kael scrambled backward, bloodied and bleeding, dragging himself toward the door like a wounded animal that refused to die where it lay.
John spasmed, clutching his leg, eyes wide.
"Fucking ungrateful piece of shit," Kael growled, breath ragged, pain pulsing hot at his side as he crawled.
"Son of a bitch!" John screamed. "You broke my leg!"
Kael did not turn. He dragged himself forward. Another ringing boom struck from the hammer, stunning him for a second, his head buzzing, his thoughts blurring, and that pause was enough.
John caught him.
A hand closed around Kael's foot.
"You're going nowhere!" John snarled.
"We'll both die, you fucker!" Kael spat, panic and fury mixing. "The walls are coming down!"
John did not care. Or did not notice. The steel walls behind them were nearly at the exit now, slamming down like executioners, each one closer, each one a heartbeat.
John tried to drag Kael away.
He did not account for the real weight.
It was not that Kael felt heavier.
Kael was heavier.
John could not even make him budge. His grip slipped, his body strained, his one good leg trembling. And without a second to waste, Kael kicked with everything he had.
His boot hit John's face.
It felt like driving a sledgehammer into a skull. John's head snapped back, his body flung away, and he hit the floor hard.
He gasped with a bloodied nose that could not draw in air. "FUCKER!" he tried to holler, but it came out wet and broken.
Before he could stand, the wall came down like a guillotine.
Steel slammed through him.
John's chest split in half.
For a moment the sound disappeared, like the tower itself muted the world to savor it. A soundless gasp left John's lips. His eyes went vacant.
[You have killed a Climber.]
[It was deemed self-defense You won't be marked as a Red Climber.]
And a tumbling Soul Core spun out from his body toward Kael, rolling and glinting against the floor like a final joke.
Kael did not hesitate.
He pocketed it into his inventory and kept moving.
Another wall slammed down.
The timer had a dozen seconds, maybe less. Kael could see the final stretch, but his body felt ruined. His side burned. His head rang. His legs dragged like they belonged to someone else.
Another wall fell, close enough that Kael felt the rush of displaced air against his boots.
Another.
Closer.
Kael clawed at the floor, half crawling, half stumbling, his hands shaking under the weight of the rune and hammer, his vision narrowing on the exit door like it was the only thing in existence.
And just as the final wall was about to fall and slam into Kael's body, he touched the exit door.
The system responded instantly.
The trial ended.