The stairwell was a throat. Alex climbed down it.
Floor 20. Floor 18. The diamond-hard frost on the railing turned to grey slush.
Floor 16.
The air stopped biting. It grew heavy. Thick. It tasted of ammonia and wet rot.
Biological heat. The fermentation of thousands of bodies packed into a concrete box.
Alex stopped at the fire door. Yellow condensation slicked the metal. He wiped it. His glove came away greasy.
He checked the [Inferno Gauntlet]. The fuel canister indicator glowed dull red. Charge: 40%.
He kicked the latch.
BANG.
The door swung open.
Scritch-scritch-scritch.
No silence. Just the sound of a million needles scratching concrete.
Alex raised his flashlight. The beam cut the gloom. The hallway wasn't empty. The floor moved. The walls rippled.
[System Warning]
[Enemy: Iron-Shell Roach (Lvl 3)]
[Traits: High Defense, Flight, Swarm]
Footballs. Armored, oily footballs with legs. Their backs shone with metallic sheen. These weren't bugs. They were tanks bred by the apocalypse.
HISS.
Wings buzzed. The sound vibrated in Alex's teeth.
The carpet of black shells surged. A tide of legs and antennae rushed him. The ones in the back took flight. They dove like jagged stones.
Alex didn't draw his gun. 9mm rounds would spark off those shells. Ricochets in a narrow hall meant suicide.
He raised his right fist. Mana flooded the copper circuits.
"Burn."
[Skill: Incineration Stream]
WHOOSH.
A cone of orange fury vomited from his wrist.
The hallway turned into a blast furnace. The fire didn't just touch them; it engulfed the corridor. It rolled over the swarm in a liquid wave.
POP. POP. POP.
The sound was sickening. Glorious.
Internal fluids flash-boiled. The roaches couldn't vent the pressure. Their iron shells cracked. Boiling yellow slime sprayed the walls, sizzling instantly into black crust.
High-pitched screeches cut the air. The flyers dropped mid-air. Wings disintegrated. Bodies turned into flaming charcoal briquettes before they hit the floor.
Alex walked forward. The flames parted around the gauntlet's heat shield. He stepped on a twitching carcass.
CRUNCH.
[Kill Confirmed: Iron-Shell Roach x 12]
[EXP: +240]
[Loot Drop: Intact Iron Carapace x 4]
The smell of ozone and cooked insect meat filled the air. Sweet. Nauseating.
Alex reached down. Smoke curled from a blackened heap. He pried a section of shell loose from a dead roach. It was hot. Curved. Incredibly light.
"Raw material," Alex said.
He shoved the plates into his inventory.
He cleared the hall. Short bursts of fire. More popping. More scrolling text.
The swarm retreated. Even mindless hunger feared the fire.
Alex reached the end of the corridor. The heat peaked here. He stood before the stairwell door leading down to Floor 15—the heart of the nest.
This door was different.
The roaches hadn't touched it. No scratches. No slime. No burn marks.
A wooden sign hung from the doorknob. Hand-painted. The letters were jagged, dark, and flaking. Not paint. Dried blood.
PRIVATE GARDEN.
DO NOT ENTER.
Alex traced the letters with his flashlight beam. The blood wasn't fresh. Dark. Crusted. Applied with a finger.
He scanned the door frame. No scratch marks. No chew marks.
The roaches—a swarm that ate rebar and concrete—stopped exactly at this threshold. They didn't ignore this room. They feared it.
Heat radiated from the wood. Feverish. A low thrum vibrated against his palm. Thump. Thump. Like the heartbeat of a sleeping titan.
"Luna," Alex said. "Status."
Hiss.
Static screamed in his ear.
Right. The broodmother chewed the drone. He was offline. No backup. No eyes in the sky.
Alex looked at the sign again. PRIVATE GARDEN.
In the old world, a sign like that meant a lawsuit. In the apocalypse, it meant a hoard. Someone—or something—carved out a sanctuary in the middle of a monster nest. They terrified the bugs into submission.
"Private," Alex murmured. The word tasted like ash.
He checked the fuel gauge. 35%. The nozzle glowed with residual heat, distorting the air.
He didn't knock.
In this building, property rights were dead. There was only his territory and the resources waiting to be claimed.
He gripped the brass handle. It felt slick. Greasy.
"Eviction time."
He twisted.