The teeth of the Scavenger Chest fell like a guillotine.
Noctis threw himself backward, slamming hard against the chamber floor. The jaws closed where his hand should have been moments before.
He rolled to one side as one of those bone-thin legs stabbed down at him, the sharp tip tearing a crater in the stone.
'Damn it! Why did I have to be right?'
Noctis cursed his bad luck; to think that the chest would be a disgusting Remnant. He mistakenly assumed that, under this pressure, there were only empty spaces... How wrong he was.
The creature that had been a chest staggered forward on its grotesque limbs. It was caught between object and organism, an abomination of both.
The tongue shot out.
Noctis raised his broken sword to block... The tongue coiled around the blade and pulled.
The sword slipped from his hands and clattered across the chamber.
'No, no, no, damn it!'
He stumbled backward as the Scavenger Chest advanced. Its movements were jerky and unnatural.
But it was fast... faster than it had any right to be.
The jaws opened wide (more than would be physically possible) and lunged forward.
Noctis rolled to the left. The Remnant's teeth scraped the stone where he had been standing, sending sparks flying from the ground.
He scrambled to his feet and ran toward his fallen weapon.
The tongue shot out again.
It grabbed his ankle.
Noctis shuddered with disgust at the slimy feeling and fell, his chin hitting the stone. Blood filled his mouth. The world spun.
The tongue began to drag him backward.
Towards those teeth. Towards those jaws that stank of rot and old metal.
Was this how it ended? Discarded by his family... and now devoured like trash?
No.
He wasn't going to disappear so easily.
Noctis writhed, trying to cling to the smooth ground. His fingers found a crack in the stone.
The tongue pulled harder.
His grip was slipping.
Noctis clenched his teeth so hard that his jaw stood out. He didn't know how long he could hold on, clinging with his bruised arm.
'I can't die here.'
In a desperate attempt, he circulated his mana to strengthen his body; he felt himself fill with strength and kicked. He felt his bare foot strike the slimy tongue.
The Scavenger Chest recoiled with a sound like torn fabric. Its grip loosened.
Noctis kicked again, harder, and broke free from the tongue's grip. He jumped to his feet and lunged for his broken sword. His hand closed around the hilt just as the Scavenger Chest's jaws snapped shut again.
He rolled under the bite and shot away.
The broken blade dug into one of those bone legs halfway through the joint—the edge cut through: not flesh or wood, but something in between. The leg cracked like dry wood.
The Scavenger Chest staggered to one side and lost its balance.
'Now.'
Noctis attacked the creature's torso, that hybrid mass of wood and flesh that pulsed like a tumor.
The sword pierced through the outer layers.
It struck something deeper.
The Scavenger Chest convulsed. Its entire body contracted; its legs curled up like those of a crushed spider. Its jaws opened and closed rapidly, its teeth grinding together.
Then it stabilized.
It regained its balance.
And its body began to change again.
The wooden parts softened and turned into flesh. The fleshy parts hardened and formed plates, like bark armor. The wound Noctis had inflicted on him was sealed with new growth.
He was adapting.
Noctis stared at him with an incredulous expression.
"...Really? You've got to be kidding me!"
Of course, just what we needed now, a Remnant that adapts. It seems the Abyss has taken a liking to it.
The jaws of the Scavenger Chest opened, but this time, instead of lunging, something spilled out.
Thick, green, acrid smoke. The chamber filled quickly. Noctis couldn't see more than two meters ahead. His lungs burned with every breath. His vision blurred.
Somewhere in the fog, he heard the Scavenger Chest moving. Those legs are pounding on the stone. That wet breath, coming out of its throat, is impossible.
Movement to his left.
Noctis, holding his breath, lunged to the right.
The jaws snapped shut at empty air.
But the tongue came from a different angle.
He grabbed his arm with the sword, wrapping it around his wrist like a python. Bones creaked. The broken sword fell from his limp fingers.
The tongue lifted him off the ground, leaving him hanging like a puppet.
Noctis spun around, gritting his teeth, enduring the pain, swinging his free arm in a wide arc, and digging his feet into the slimy, disgusting worm.
He dug his nail deep. Blood—if it was blood—spurted out black and viscous.
The Scavenger Chest screamed.
It wasn't the Hollows' chirping. It was a full-blown scream, high-pitched and pitiful.
His tongue spasmed. He let go.
Noctis fell.
Not into the jaws (which had snapped shut in pain), but onto the creature's wooden back.
He didn't think; he attacked again with his bare hands. And again. The wood broke. The flesh tore. Black ichor splattered.
The Scavenger Chest reared up like a wild horse.
Noctis clung on with one hand while the other continued to strike. His broken sword was somewhere in the fog.
All he had was his fist and the desperate strength of someone with nothing to lose.
The Scavenger Chest threw itself against the chamber wall.
The impact nearly broke Noctis's grip. His ribs cracked again. The pain intensified and sharpened.
But he persisted.
He kept hitting.
The creature threw itself against the opposite wall.
This time, Noctis lost control.
He flew through the air, fell to the ground rolling, and got up panting.
The poisonous fog began to dissipate. Now he could see silhouettes. The Scavenger Chest is on one side of the chamber. He, on the other hand.
And between them, shining in the fading smoke, his broken sword.
They both saw it at the same time.
The Scavenger Chest lunged forward.
Noctis ran.
The race lasted two seconds.
Noctis won by half a step.
His hand closed around the hilt just as the jaws came down. He threw himself forward and rolled, the teeth scraping his back so hard they tore the fabric.
He approached the creature from behind.
He saw something he hadn't noticed before.
On the back of the Scavenger Chest, where the wood met the flesh, there was a joint. A line where the transformation was incomplete. Where the two materials fought for dominance.
A weakness.
The Scavenger Chest spun faster than something of that size should be able to move. Its tongue shot out.
Noctis crouched down. He moved closer. Too close for the jaws to reach him.
The Scavenger Chest threw its weight backward, trying to crush him against the ground.
Noctis rolled away, narrowly escaping.
The jaws attacked him from an impossible angle; the creature's body contorted in ways that defied anatomy.
He blocked the blow with his broken blade. The impact nearly shattered his wrist.
The tongue wrapped around his leg again.
Noctis let himself be dragged forward. He let the tongue drag him toward the jaws.
At the last moment, Noctis turned and raised his sword.
Not at the jaws.
Not at the body.
At that seam. That line where wood and flesh met and could not merge.
The blade pierced through the outer layers and attacked; the pale, disgusting flesh stopped the broken sword with all its might.
...But Noctis had a hidden card up his sleeve; without thinking twice, he activated the newly created Skill with his free hand: [Shadow Strike]. He felt his mana drain away and his fist become covered in shadows.
And a mass of shadows shot out at high speed and struck the core of whatever this thing was.
The effect was immediate and catastrophic.
The Scavenger Chest's body convulsed. Its jaws opened, unable to close. Its legs buckled. Its tongue loosened and fell out.
Noctis rolled on the ground, shaken and in pain; he moved as far away from the Scavenger Chest as he could, fearing that it would adapt to the [Shadow Strike] and kill him.
He no longer had the strength for a third round.
Leaning against a wall, he looked at the Remnant, praying that the creature was dead.
Then, the voice of the Abyss echoed, as sweet as a good morning greeting:
[You have killed a Corrupt Aberration, Scavenger Chest.]
[You have reached level 2.]
"A Corrupt Aberration..."
Noctis, with his back against the wall, closed his eyes.
Just for a moment.
To breathe.
The broken sword lay on his lap.
Outside, in the green-lit corridors, the Hollows continued their eternal grinding.
And Noctis, who had been cast aside by his family and left to fend for himself in this nightmare, made a decision.
He would rest.
Then he would move on.
Because no one would come to save him.
So he would have to save himself.