Chapter 19: Bad Signs

Following the distant sounds downward, they reached the stairs to the second floor.

"We're half a day in and already heading down," Jax said as he packed up their camp from the night before. The sleeping bags had somehow ended up pressed tightly together.

"If we keep this pace, we'll clear the next floor in about the same time. That gives us another full day to push deeper. Assuming we can handle it."

"What do you think our limit is?" Mira asked, stuffing the sleeping bags into their supply pack with unnecessary force.

"I think we can manage three days this time. As long as that weird hobgoblin isn't still lurking around. If he is, we can plan for it. See if we're ready for something like a floor seven beast." Jax watched her struggle with the fabric, frustration flickering in her eyes.

The mention of three days made her shove the bags into place and march toward him.

"I almost forgot about that thing. We nearly died," she muttered with a shiver. Then she looked up at him, bright and fearless. "You'll watch my back though, right?" "I feel like if we stop and actually plan, we could take on most of this dungeon. Especially with you beside me."

"You do understand how dungeons work, right?" Jax asked, pulling out his guild book. "This one is twenty floors deep."

"Twenty?" Mira said, nearly shouting out of excitement.

"They're all different. And once we enter, it's just us. We didn't walk into a building. We walked into something alive. No one has ever reached the twentieth floor of this dungeon and returned to Ravelin."

"So if someone comes in alone, they never make it back?" Mira asked, leaning against his shoulder.

"Not quite. This dungeon only accepts teams of two or more. There are solo dungeons, but those are built for elites. Rare monsters. High drop rates." He paused.

"Even so, there have been teams of seven that never returned. Takeo's warning hasn't left my mind. I can't shake the feeling we made the wrong choice."

"No. I trust your instincts more than some old man who's too afraid to step inside himself. All he does is hammer and twist metal."

"He's an elite tier armorsmith and highly respected. You're lucky he can't hear you." Jax smirked. "I'd be more afraid of him jumping out from behind a rock than a monster."

Jax noticed it first. Nothing. No movement. No creatures. Not even the faint scrape of claws. The air hung still, as if it were waiting for something to shatter.

"This place creeps me out," Mira said, scanning the floor. "Where are the monsters? We can't earn anything if nothing shows up."

"Something's wrong. Mira, we should turn back."

"No." She jogged ahead, then turned, walking backward to face him. "I thought you weren't a coward anymore. We haven't even seen a single monster on this floor."

"That's exactly the problem. They should have appeared an hour ago. We're almost at the third floor already." He quickened his pace. "The first time we came down here it was chaos. This feels too easy."

He stayed close to her after that, tension threading through him like wire pulled too tight.

"If it gets any stranger, even a little, we leave. Agreed?" He asked.

"Fine. But only if it gets really bad. We have to test our limits." She mimed stabbing her own heart and laughed.

The gate to the third floor appeared ahead, a circular platform etched into the stone. When activated, it lowered its occupants through space itself. The descent was smooth.

When they arrived, the first thing they noticed was the smell. Rot and death, thicker than before, heavy enough to cling to the back of the throat.

"Mira, we need to go back," Jax said quietly. "This isn't normal. Not even when that hobgoblin attacked us did it feel like this. Those dark clouds earlier weren't there when we entered."

"Stop complaining and keep moving," she snapped. "I need to fight something. Now." Her voice trembled, not with fear, but with hunger. Then she ran.

"Mira!"

She vanished around a stone pillar. By the time he rounded it, she was gone.

Completely. Not hiding. Not laughing. Gone.

Panic flooded him. His pulse spiked. His thoughts fractured.

"Mira!" He checked every corner, every shadow, every crack in the stone.

Nothing.

"Gods damn it." His breath came sharp and uneven. "I hesitate for one second and the dungeon takes her."

The silence pressed in on him, then he saw it. A faint glow tucked behind a pillar that did not match the rest of the floor.

He approached cautiously.

Unmarked. Unlisted. Not recorded in any guild text he had studied. A warp gate. He examined it quickly. No visible traps. No hostile magic signatures.

He stepped away and scanned the entire floor one last time. "If she stepped on this by accident, she isn't on this floor anymore," he muttered. "But where does it go?"

The gate gave no answer.

Unknown gates meant unknown rules. Unknown rules meant death. He clenched his fist until his knuckles whitened, breath held tight in his chest. Mira might already be somewhere he could not reach.

He stepped onto the circle.

For a moment, nothing happened. The stone beneath his boots felt warm. Not hot. Not comforting. Just aware.

The faint glow deepened. It did not brighten so much as pull inward, like something inhaling. His stomach dropped before the world did.

The chamber around him blurred at the edges. Pillars bent slightly, as if seen through warped glass, and the air pressed against his chest hard enough to make breathing feel distant.

He thought of Mira.

Not the look she gave him before she ran. Not the hunger in her voice. He thought of the way she laughed when she forgot to guard it, the way she leaned against him without realizing, the way she said she trusted him.

Then the floor vanished.

Sound disappeared next. There was no falling sensation, no wind, no rush. Only absence. His shield flared instinctively and then failed, the magic slipping through his fingers like it had found nothing solid enough to hold.

For one terrible heartbeat, he felt alone in a way that had nothing to do with darkness.

Then the world snapped back.

Stone slammed into place beneath his boots. Air rushed into his lungs all at once, thick and stale, while the glow behind him flickered once and died.

Silence.

Not empty silence. Listening silence.

“Mira?” His voice came out rough.

The space around him was unfamiliar. The stone was darker, slick beneath his boots. The ceiling hung lower. The air felt colder and heavier, like it had been sealed away for years.

He turned slowly.

His chest tightened.

“Mira.”

The word echoed back thinner than before.