Sector 4. The Dead Zone.
The rain tasted like rusted iron.
It slammed against the corrugated metal walkway, drowning out the sound of my ragged breathing.
My boots were old, the soles worn thin, and they slipped on the wet grate with every step.
I wiped the water from my eyes.
"Kael, wait up," I called out, my voice barely louder than the thunder.
Kael didn't stop. He was ten steps ahead of me, his flashlight beam cutting through the thick, yellow fog. The light danced over piles of scrap metal, broken droid parts, and trash that had been rotting here for decades.
"Hurry up, Ren," he shouted over his shoulder.
"We have ten minutes before the patrol comes by. If the Shark-men catch us here, they'll skin us alive."
I shivered. Not just from the cold rain soaking my thin jacket.
The Shark-men.
They were the enforcers of the Poseidon Clan.
Seven feet tall, covered in blue scales, with muscles hard as steel.
They ruled this sector. To them, humans like us were just bugs.
Annoying, weak, and easy to crush.
"Are you sure about this place?" I asked, catching up to him.
I clutched my empty canvas bag against my chest.
"My sister needs her medicine tonight, Kael.
If I come back with nothing, she won't make it through the night."
Kael stopped abruptly.
We were standing at the edge of a massive hole in the ground.
The Pit.
It was a giant crater in the middle of the sector.
No one knew how deep it was.
It was just a black void that smelled of sulfur and old death.
The locals said the Clans used it as a garbage chute.
"Don't worry, Ren," Kael said softly.
He wasn't looking at me. He was staring down into the darkness.
"You won't be empty-handed."
"What do you mean?"
Kael turned to face me.
For the first time, I saw his face clearly in the dim light.
He looked pale. Sweat was mixing with the rain on his forehead.
His eyes were darting around nervously.
"I'm sorry, Ren. I really am."
"Sorry for wha—"
THUD.
Two massive shadows stepped out from behind a rusted shipping container.
I froze.
Blue scales. Dead yellow eyes. Gills flaring in the humid air.
Two Shark-men.
One of them held a heavy iron club resting on his shoulder like it weighed nothing.
"Is this the bait?" the Shark-man grunted.
His voice was deep and rough, like grinding rocks.
Kael nodded. He took a step back, away from me.
"Yeah. He's healthy. No diseases. The monster should like him."
My blood ran cold.
"Bait?" I stepped back, my heel hitting the edge of the walkway.
"Kael? What are you doing?"
"I owe them, Ren," Kael whispered, his voice trembling.
"Gambling debt. 5,000 credits.
They said if I bring them live bait for the Pit Monster, they'd wipe the slate clean."
"You sold me?" I whispered.
The betrayal hit me harder than a punch to the gut.
We grew up together in the same orphanage.
I shared my bread with him when we were starving. I fought for him when the gangs tried to jump him.
"For 5,000 credits?"
"It was you or my fingers!" Kael screamed, suddenly defensive.
"Don't look at me like that! You would have done the same if you were me!"
"No," I said. My hand drifted to the rusty knife at my belt.
It was a useless piece of metal against Shark-men, but I wouldn't just let them take me.
"I wouldn't."
The Shark-man with the club laughed.
"Brave rat. Stupid, but brave."
He moved.
He was fast. Terrifyingly fast for his size.
One second he was ten feet away. The next, he was right in front of me.
He didn't use the club. He just backhanded me.
CRACK.
My world exploded in white light.
I felt my jaw dislocate.
I flew backward, over the edge of the railing.
The last thing I saw was Kael turning away, unable to watch.
And the Shark-man smiling.
Then, the darkness took me.
Falling felt like an eternity.
The wind roared in my ears. The fog blinded me.
I couldn't scream.
My jaw was hanging loose, pain radiating through my skull.
I'm going to die.
Maya is going to be alone.
She'll wait for me. She'll cough until her lungs give out, wondering where her big brother is.
CRASH.
I hit the bottom.
I didn't hit rock. I hit bones.
Thousands of skeletons cushioned my fall. Human bones.
Animal bones. Things I couldn't recognize.
But the impact was still brutal.
My left leg snapped.
"Gahhh!" I choked on a scream, tasting blood in my mouth.
I rolled down the mountain of bones, coming to a stop in a puddle of black mud.
I lay there, gasping for air.
My leg was on fire. My jaw was broken. My ribs ached.
I was broken.
Scrape... Scrape...
A sound echoed in the silence.
Bone dragging on stone.
I froze. I held my breath.
The Pit wasn't empty.
In the gloom, two red eyes glowed.
It stepped into the faint light filtering from above.
A Corpse Eater.
It looked like a centipede made of nightmares.
Pale, translucent flesh stretched over a jagged exoskeleton.
Dozens of sharp legs clicked on the stone floor.
It had no face. Just a vertical slit of a mouth filled with rows of needle-teeth.
It hissed, tasting the air.
It smelled my fresh blood.
I tried to crawl backward.
My broken leg dragged uselessly in the mud.
"No..." I slurred through my broken jaw.
I grabbed a bone from the pile next to me. A femur.
It snapped in my hand. Brittle. Useless.
Just like me.
The monster lunged.
It moved fast, skittering over the debris.
I closed my eyes, raising my arms to protect my face.
I hate this.
I hate Kael. I hate the Shark-men. I hate being weak.
I want to kill them. I want to kill them all.
My hand brushed against something cold in the mud.
Metal?
My fingers closed around a handle.
It was wrapped in rough leather that hadn't rotted. It felt heavy.
[Do you hate?]
A voice spoke.
It didn't come from my ears. It resonated in my blood.
It felt like ice water injected into my veins.
I opened my eyes.
The monster was mid-air, jaws wide open to bite my head off.
[Do you want to butcher them?]
"Yes," I screamed in my mind.
[Then take me.]
I pulled.
The sword didn't stick in the mud. It flew into my hand as if it wanted to be held.
Black smoke exploded from the ground.
A sword emerged.
It was massive. A Greatsword made of jagged black metal that seemed to absorb the light. A single red line pulsed down the center of the blade like a heartbeat.
It was too heavy. My arm muscles tore under the weight.
But I didn't drop it.
The pain made me focus.
I swung.
Not with skill.
With pure, desperate panic.
SWISH.
I didn't feel an impact.
The black blade cut through the monster's head like it was smoke.
The giant centipede split in half down the middle.
Green blood sprayed everywhere, sizzling as it hit the black blade.
The two halves of the monster crashed into the bone pile behind me.
Twitching once, then still.
Dead.
I fell to my knees.
The sword dropped from my hand, clattering onto the stones. It was too heavy to hold for more than a second.
I panted, staring at the dead monster.
One hit.
I had killed a Predator Class monster with one hit.
I looked at my hand.
The palm was burned red. Blistered from the heat of the hilt.
My arm was trembling uncontrollably.
This weapon... it wasn't normal. It rejected me. It hurt me to use it.
But it killed.
Gods, did it kill.
I looked up at the small circle of gray sky far above.
Faint laughter drifted down.
Kael and the Shark-men were still there. Celebrating.
They thought I was being eaten alive right now.
I grabbed the hilt again.
The pain returned. Burning. Biting into my skin.
"Good," I whispered, spitting blood onto the mud. "Pain means I'm alive."
[My name is Zev,] the voice whispered in my mind. It sounded amused.
[And you are very weak, little meat-sack.]
"Shut up," I muttered.
I used the sword as a crutch to push myself up.
My broken leg screamed. My jaw hung loose.
I looked like a corpse that refused to stay dead.
[But you have hate,] Zev continued. [And hate... is the sharpest whetstone.]
I looked at the cliff wall.
It was wet. Slippery. A thirty-meter climb straight up.
Impossible for a normal human.
Especially one with a broken leg.
But I wasn't normal anymore.
I had a monster's sword in my hand. And a monster's rage in my heart.
"I'm coming for you, Kael," I thought.
And for the first time in my life, I wasn't the prey.
I was the hunter.