I caught it before it hit my chest.
Argh!!
The impact vibrated through my arm, rattling my teeth. My body had moved before my mind could process. The thing in my hand was still humming with the force of its throw, warm and wet and wrong.
"Captain!"
"Boss!"
"Nams!"
"Captain!"
"Are you okay?" They asked in unison. Their voices overlapped. Their faces were tight with fear.
I tightened my grip. The object pulsed against my palm like it had a heartbeat.
"Yes. I'm fine."
I wasn't fine. None of us were fine. But saying it out loud made it feel almost true.
I looked down at what I'd caught.
Not a spear.
A horn. A Duman's horn, torn from someone's head—or shed, or broken, or ripped—and thrown with enough force to pierce through Niclomantius armor.
It was longer than my forearm, jagged at the base where it had been separated from its owner, and still warm. Still alive, in some way I didn't want to think about.
And from the darkness beyond the treeline—
I saw eyes.
Dozens of them. No—more. They filled the spaces between branches like embers scattered across black water. Glowing. Watching.
Something moved behind them. Something bigger.
The lesser Dumans parted without sound, without command, clearing a path the way prey clears a path for a predator. And from the space they made, it emerged.
Crack!
Crack!
Dry leaves snapped under something heavy. The sound was deliberate. Not the careless tread of a mindless beast. Something was savoring this.
Thud! Thud! Thud!
My brain didn't want to accept any sound besides my heartbeat and the cracking of leaves and the voice in my head screaming run, run, run.
Nams. Stop panting.
I gritted my teeth. Forced my breathing to slow. Forced my hands to steady.
"It's here."
"Boss?" Marcus's voice was uncertain. For the first time since I'd known him, uncertain.
It stepped out from behind the tree.
This was no ordinary Duman.
I'd seen Star class. I'd seen Demon class—once, from a distance, when I was young enough to think distance meant safety. I'd seen things that moved faster than eyes could follow and killed faster than thought could form. But this—
It stood upright. Deliberate. Its movements were slow and precise, the way a surgeon moves before making the first cut. It held itself with a dreadful, alien awareness.
The intelligence in its eyes was not the cunning of a predator—it was the calculation of something that understood strategy.
What type of Duman is this? It clearly has a brain. It can think like a person.
"Gha-Ruk... skra... Oroz... Zekk."
A voice. Grinding stones and tearing meat. Sounds that scraped through the air like broken glass dragged across bone. The words—if they were words—settled into my ears and stayed there, echoing.
Eh?
My mind went blank. Overloaded. The team froze beside me, their weapons raised, their bodies locked in that terrible space between fight and flight.
"Boss? What's going on?"
It can talk.
What's going on? I haven't seen any Duman who can do this. I haven't heard of any.
The voice was too much. Too wrong. I wanted to cover my ears. I wanted to run.
I did neither.
I looked at its horns.
They weren't just on its head. They spiraled down its arms—ridged, twisted spirals of dark bone that caught the faint light and threw it back in fragments.
Each horn was a different length, a different shape, like they'd grown at different times, for different reasons.
"Captain!" Ethan's voice was a strangled whisper from behind his scanner. His hands were shaking.
"Three hundred and forty-seven horn signatures... I'm reading three hundred and forty-seven!"
He sounded terrified.
He should be terrified.
We all should be.
I had never even heard of a Duman with over a hundred horns. Demon class started at what—fifteen? Twenty? The classifications broke down after a certain point because no one survived long enough to study anything higher. Three hundred and forty-seven was not a classification. It was a death sentence.
My blades were in my hands before I decided to draw them. Muscle memory. The familiar weight of Theridiam settled into my palms, and for a moment—just a moment—the world felt solid again.
"Boss! I'm kinda running out of bullets." Marcus's voice was light, almost casual, but I could hear the strain underneath.
"Marcus, handle the others. I'm taking this one on my own." My eyes stayed locked on the Duman. It hadn't moved. It was watching me the way I was watching it.
"Captain! I'm coming with you." Ethan stepped forward.
"Nams! You don't think I'm letting you go alone, right?" Sophie's voice was steady but her eyes were not.
Obviously not. Every time we're together on a mission, she stays with me. She did the same thing with my mother, years ago, before everything fell apart.
"Boss! I can still fight alongside you." Clara smiled. Weakly. The Garimin was working, but I could see the edges of pain creeping back in.
"I'm coming too." Veyna's hands had stopped shaking. His eyes were pure, cold hate.
What are we doing? The enemy is right in front of us. Why are we talking? Why isn't it attacking?
Marcus looked at us. His grin spread wide. Mocking.
"Huh? Huhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh... Are you guys telling me to die alone, or wha—"
The Duman moved.
It wasn't even a blur or a teleportation. Those words were too slow. One moment it was a hundred feet away, standing in the clearing like a monument. The next—
Behind Marcus.
A spiked arm already in a vicious arc toward his skull.
"Ma—"
Too late.
Marcus reacted. Faster than I'd ever witnessed him move, faster than should have been possible, he twisted. His blade came up. He barely—barely—stopped the strike from connecting with his head.
The impact sent shockwaves through the air. The sound was metal against something harder than metal.
"Arghhh!"
We sprinted toward him.
What's with this Duman? I'm the captain. I'm the first person it could have attacked. The logical target. But it chose the last person—the one farthest away, the one who was talking instead of fighting, the one who seemed least dangerous.
Marcus flew backward and hit a tree. The trunk cracked. He didn't get up immediately.
"Sophie, check Marcus!"
"Yes, Captain." She was already sprinting toward him. Good. Sophie was reliable.
"And you all—keep them safe until I come back."
The Duman was already moving again. Not toward us—away. Deeper into the jungle. Toward its base.
It ran. Again. Like before.
"And don't you dare follow me."
I sprinted after it.
"You're not running this time!"
But does it want to run? Or is it just playing with us? The question circled in my mind, unanswered.
I don't care now.
"CIMY, lock my blades."
The mechanisms clicked. My swords fused tight against my back. I needed my hands free to run. I needed speed more than weapons.
Faster. Faster. Faster.
My legs pumped. Muscles burning. The jungle blurred around me—trees becoming walls, shadows becoming threats, the distant glow of Duman eyes flickering past like ghost lights. I pushed harder. My lungs screamed. My heart hammered.
It's not enough.
I need to move faster.
Faster!
Is it running or playing? What does it want? Why does it keep stopping just long enough for me to almost catch up, then pulling ahead again? Why does it want me to follow?
It moved way faster than before. Impossible speed. The distance between us stretched and compressed and stretched again.
We are close.
WE are.
WE were close—
It vanished.
One moment solid. The next—nothing. No sound of leaves rustling. No displacement of air. Just... gone. Like it had never been there.
I stopped. My boots skidded on dead leaves.
Haa... Haa...
My sweat fell from my forehead, dripping onto the forest floor. I wasn't thinking carefully. Now I needed air—too much air. The jungle pressed in around me, silent and watching.
Haa... haa...
Where did it go? Where did it—
°°°
Marcus was leaning against the tree. One arm hung limp at his side. Blood dripped from his forehead into his eyes, painting half his face crimson. Clara crouched beside him, her medical kit open, hands working fast despite the pain she was trying to hide.
"Fuck. It was strong." Marcus tried to force a smile. It came out as a grimace.
"Marcus! Just stay still." Sophie's voice was sharp with worry.
"Dumbass." Veyna muttered it, but his eyes weren't on Marcus. They were scanning the darkness, sword ready, body tense. He knew. They all knew.
Ethan's scanner was beeping erratically. The rhythm was wrong—too fast, too chaotic, patterns that didn't match any Duman signature he'd ever seen.
"It's close. It's—"
The air behind them split open.
The darkness moved, thickened, and suddenly the Demon Class was there. Standing twenty feet from the group.
Its head tilted in that awful, calculating way. The way a child might examine an insect before deciding what to do with it.
They didn't even have time to scream.
It moved. No—it vanished.
Veyna was first. He swung his blade in a perfect arc, faster than most RAW soldiers could track. The strike should have connected. Should have done something.
The Duman simply wasn't there anymore.
Then it was inside his guard. Its clawed hand closed around Veyna's throat and lifted him off the ground like he weighed nothing. Veyna's feet kicked at empty air. His sword fell from his grasp.
"Veyna!" Sophie lunged, both blades flashing.
The Duman used Veyna's body as a shield. Sophie pulled her strike at the last possible second, twisting mid-air, throwing herself sideways to avoid hitting him. She crashed into the dirt. Rolled. Came up bloody.
Ethan fired his last bullets—three shots, center mass, perfect grouping. The rounds hit the Duman's hide and flattened. Like raindrops on stone.
It dropped Veyna. He hit the ground gasping, clawing at his throat. The Duman turned to Ethan with that terrible, deliberate slowness.
"It's toying with us." Ethan's voice was horrified.
His scanner fell from his shaking hands. "Captain... Captain, where is h—"
The Duman's arm shot out. The movement was casual. Almost lazy. Ethan flew backward, ribs cracking audibly—a wet, splintering sound that echoed through the clearing. He landed in a heap beside the tree where Marcus was slumped.
He didn't move after that. His chest rose and fell in shallow, irregular breaths. His eyes stayed closed.
"Ethan!" Clara screamed.
The Duman turned toward her voice. Slow. Deliberate. Like it had all the time in the world.
Because it did.
Clara stood between it and the others. Her blade was drawn—shaking, but drawn.
Her eyes darted from the Duman to Ethan, to Marcus, to Veyna gasping on the ground. Calculating. Even with her bones shattered, even with the Garimin barely holding the pain at bay, she was trying to find an angle.
There was no angle.
"Clara..." Marcus's voice was weak, slurred. Blood still dripped from his forehead. His left arm hung wrong—dislocated, maybe broken. But he was pushing himself up against the tree, forcing his body to move when it should have stayed down.
"Clara, run."
She didn't look at him.
"Shut up, Marcus."
The Duman took a step toward her.
She didn't retreat.
Another step.
Everything was so loud and so silent at the same time. The space between heartbeats stretched into eternity.
She shifted her stance—feet wider, blade angled low. A defensive posture. Waiting for it to come to her. Like a smart person doing the dumbest possible thing.
It came.
It walked toward her like a person walking down a street. Unhurried. Unconcerned.
Each footfall crunched dead leaves. Each step ate the distance between them.
Clara held her ground.
Ten feet.
Five.
Three.
She moved. Her blade flashed upward—a diagonal slash aimed at its throat. Perfect form. Perfect timing.
Against any normal Duman, it would have connected.
This one caught her wrist.
Just... caught it. Mid-swing. Like it had known exactly where her strike would land before she even thought of throwing it.
Clara's eyes went wide.
It squeezed.
Crunch.
"AHHHHHHH!"
Her scream tore through the jungle, sharp and raw and awful. The blade fell from fingers that no longer worked. Her wrist bent at an angle wrists shouldn't bend—bones grinding, tendons tearing, the delicate machinery of the human hand reduced to wreckage.
It didn't let go. It pulled her closer. Brought its face—that nightmare of twisted features and void-dark eyes—within inches of hers. Its breath smelled of rot and old blood. Its grip was absolute.
"Clara... skra... weak..."
It threw her.
She hit the ground ten meters away. Rolled twice. Didn't get up.
Silence.
The concept of everything vanished for a moment. Sound. Time. Hope.
The Duman stood there, surrounded by bodies.
Veyna gasping. One hand pressed to his throat. The other reaching for a sword he couldn't quite grasp.
Ethan unconscious. His chest barely moving. His scanner dark beside him.
Clara broken. Her wrist bent wrong. Her eyes open but unseeing.
Sophie bleeding. Pushing herself up from the dirt. One hand pressed to her side where dark blood seeped through her fingers.
And Marcus.
Marcus pushed off the tree.
His legs shook. His arm hung useless. Blood painted half his face like a mask. But he stood. He stood when every logical part of his body should have kept him down.
"Hey, ugly." His voice cracked but carried.
"Yeah, you. The one who looks like someone tried to draw an octopus from memory and fucked it up."
The Duman turned toward him.
Marcus smiled. That same stupid, infuriating smile he always wore. The one that made you want to punch him and hug him at the same time. The smile that meant he was about to do something incredibly brave or incredibly stupid. Usually both.
"Clara was my friend, you know. Before all this—" He stopped for a moment. Swallowed blood. "Before Dumans and missions and watching people die."
He took a shaky step forward. His legs barely held.
"She used to bring me lunch when I forgot mine. She... she used to cover for me when I showed up late to briefings. Used to call me an idiot to my face." His smile widened. "Which I respected."
Another step.
"And Sophie? That girl's got more courage than anyone I know. She smiles at things that should make her run. She smiles, you monster."
Another step. His voice was getting stronger now. The words were pulling him forward.
"Ethan barely talks, but when he does, it's always the right thing. Always. Like he's been saving up words just for the moment they matter most."
Another step. Closer now. Close enough to die.
"Veyna lost his sister to your kind. Did you know that? He fights every day with a hole in his chest where his heart used to be. And he still gets up. Still swings his sword. Still tries."
The Duman watched him approach. It stood still. Curious, maybe.
Marcus stopped five feet away. His good hand reached down and picked up Clara's fallen blade. The weight was wrong—he was left-handed, and his left arm was useless—but he held it anyway. His grip was unsteady but absolute.
"So here's the thing," Marcus said. His voice dropped low. The joking was gone.
"You hurt my family."
"You broke them."
"And I'm probably going to die in the next thirty seconds."
He raised the blade. The steel caught the faint light and held it.
"But I'm gonna make sure you remember the idiot who made you work for it."
He charged.
He wasn't fast—not anymore. Not with his injuries. But he was creative. He used the trees, the terrain, the shadows. He swung wild from angles that made no sense, angles that shouldn't have worked but somehow did.
He kept himself alive a second longer.
Then another second.
Then another.
The Duman swiped at him. Marcus ducked—not gracefully, but desperately, throwing himself sideways and rolling back to his feet.
It lunged. He sidestepped, stumbled, and slashed at its passing arm.
The blade bit shallowly—barely a scratch against its hide—but it bit. Azinthenium against ancient flesh.
For the first time, the Duman made a sound that wasn't speech. A grunt. Surprise? Pain? Annoyance?
Marcus laughed. Blood bubbling at his lips, and kept moving.
"See, asshole? Not so tough when someone fights back, huh?"
It spun. Faster now. Less playful. Its arm caught him across the chest and sent him flying into a tree trunk.
Crrack.
Marcus slid down. A dark mark—his blood—streaked the bark behind him. Clara's blade fell from his hand and clattered onto the roots.
He didn't get up.
The Duman walked toward him. Slow again. The amusement was back in its posture. It wanted to savor this one. The one who'd dared to scratch it. The one who'd made it feel something.
Marcus looked up through broken ribs and blurred vision. His breath came in wet, ragged gasps. Blood bubbled at his lips when he spoke.
"Clara... Soph... Ethan... Vey..." He coughed. Blood sprayed. "Boss... I tried... I really..."
The Duman raised its arm for the final strike. The claws caught the moonlight—long and curved and patient.
Marcus looked at it. His eyes were fading but his smirk was not.
"Boss is still alive, right? He will beat the shit out of you, Dumbass."
The arm came down.
And separated from its body.
---