They cut through the next few chambers with brutal efficiency.

  Kobolds rushed them in twos and threes, half-prepared, poorly positioned. Spears broke against Josh’s shield. Arrows dropped bodies before they could close. Fire and steel ended fights before they properly began. After the puzzle room and the unique, it felt… easy. Almost disappointing.

  That worried Josh more than any ambush.

  The tunnel ahead narrowed into a jagged throat of stone, its walls pressing closer with every step. Their formation tightened without a word, shoulders nearly brushing rock as the ceiling dipped low enough that even Bhel had to hunch. Sound carried too well here. Every scrape of boot or breath felt amplified, fed forward into the dark.

  Then the stone fell away.

  The tunnel spat them into a cavern so vast that Brett’s light died long before reaching the far wall. Shadows swallowed the edges of the chamber whole, leaving only a dim island of visibility around them. The air inside was hot and dry, carrying a sharp, metallic tang that clung to Josh’s tongue and the back of his throat, like old blood baked into stone. With each breath, it felt as though the cavern breathed back.

  Perberos raised a fist and dropped into a crouch, bow half drawn.

  The others followed instantly, easing forward to the threshold, every muscle tight, every sense stretched thin.

  In the centre of the cavern, arranged with deliberate care around a raised stone dais, crouched a small force of kobolds.

  Not the skittering scavengers from the tunnels. Not the panicked defenders they’d cut through earlier. These were broader through the shoulders, scales clean and well kept, armour reinforced with layered plates and bone. Spears were held at the same angle. Shields overlapped. Eyes tracked the darkness with disciplined patience.

  A pack. A formation. A guard.

  They weren’t attacking. They were waiting.

  Josh’s gaze slid past them, and his stomach tightened.

  Behind the formation loomed a massive door set into the far wall, dwarfing everything around it. Bronze plates formed its surface, darkened with age and scored by old impacts. Carved into it was a scene of violent grandeur: a towering dragon locked in combat with a lone humanoid warrior, blades and claws frozen in eternal clash. Beneath that, a second relief sprawled across the lower panels, kobolds and humans locked in a brutal battle, ranks colliding, bodies falling, the ground beneath them carved with blood and fire.

  Josh swallowed, tightening his grip on his sword as the weight of the chamber pressed down on them. They crouched at the threshold, half-hidden by jagged stone. Ahead, the chamber guards were no longer pretending to be unaware.

  Kobolds clustered around the raised dais in disciplined knots. Shields overlapped. Spears angled outward in layered ranks. Their scales were clean, armour fitted, weapons well-maintained. This was not a mob. It was a garrison.

  Behind the guard, the bronze door dominated the far wall.

  It was enormous, its bronze surface worked with reliefs worn soft by centuries of use and neglect. The dragon dominated the centre, reared high with wings flared wide, jaws frozen mid-roar as if the metal itself remembered the sound. Opposite it stood a lone humanoid warrior, shield locked forward, sword braced against the torrent of flame.

  Josh swallowed. For a heartbeat, he could see himself there instead. Small. Steady. Standing his ground against something vast and inevitable.

  A sudden warmth spread through his chest. He stiffened, glancing down in reflex before exhaling in relief. No fire. No divine omen. Just adrenaline… Hopefully.

  Perberos shifted beside him, already counting. Lanes. Distances. Elevation. His fingers brushed arrow fletching with practiced calm, though his jaw was tight.

  “Six in front,” he murmured. “More behind the dais. Two slingers up high. Maybe three.”

  Carcan leaned closer, eyes glowing faintly as he traced the flow of mana. “There’s structure to this place. They’re drawing strength from the chamber. Anchors, maybe. If we don’t break their formation fast, they’ll grind us down.”

  Bhel rolled his shoulders, axes resting against his thighs. “Then we hit fast.”

  Josh nodded once. “Shield first. I hold. You break.”

  Brett closed his eyes, wincing as a familiar pressure bloomed behind them. Symbols flickered at the edge of his vision, untranslated noise scraping against his thoughts. He breathed through it, grounding himself.

  “Once we’re committed,” he said quietly, “there’s no pulling back. This place won’t let us disengage cleanly.”

  Carcan looked at each of them in turn. No speeches. No bravado. Just a shared understanding that this would hurt.

  Josh lifted his shield and stepped into the light.

  The kobolds shrieked as one.

  Spears slammed against shields in a thunderous, coordinated response as the front rank surged forward.

  Josh charged to meet them. He hit the line like a battering ram. His shield smashed into the nearest kobold with bone-jarring force, lifting the smaller creature clean off its feet and hurling it backward into its own ranks. The impact sent bodies stumbling, spearpoints skittering wide as formation discipline fractured under the sudden violence.

  Josh pressed the advantage, blade flashing in tight, brutal arcs. He hacked low, drove forward, then slammed his shield again, each step forcing ground from the kobolds as they scrambled to recover. A spear glanced off his rim, another scraped across his pauldron, sparks snapping in the dim light.

  They shrieked, regrouping, snarling orders in their guttural tongue.

  Josh felt the weight of them turning, the pull of hostile intent tightening like a hook in his chest. This was the moment. He planted his feet and raised his shield high, letting our a roar that shook the chamber, activating Guardian’s Call.

  The skill surged outward, a tangible pressure that dragged their focus to him. Heads snapped his way. Spearpoints realigned. Every hostile eye locked onto the lone shield in their path. Josh held firm, knowing he only had to keep them looking at him.

  Bhel would do the rest.

  Spears hammered against Josh’s shield in a vicious storm, scraping and clattering as the kobolds tried to overwhelm him by sheer weight of numbers. One spear thrust too high. Josh chopped it aside and surged forward, shoulder-first, smashing a kobold backward into its fellows. His blade followed in short, brutal cuts aimed for joints and throats. Blood splashed hot across the rim of his shield.

  The kobolds began to bend around him, snarling, trying to slip past his guard.

  That was when Bhel moved.

  The dwarf roared and crashed into the exposed flank like a collapsing wall of iron and muscle. His axes rose and fell in brutal rhythm. One bit deep into scaled flesh. The other ripped free, tearing hide and bone as momentum carried him straight through a staggered pair of kobolds. They went down screaming, bodies folding beneath the force of the blow.

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  Bhel laughed once, sharp and savage, the sound torn from his chest. Then a spear punched into his shoulder.

  The impact jerked him sideways. Pain flared, hot and blinding, but it only twisted his grin into something feral. He snapped the shaft with a wrenching pull and surged forward again, axes already rising, blood slicking his beard as he drove deeper into the breaking line.

  “Bhel!” Carcan shouted from behind the line. “Hold still, you stubborn bastard! You’re going to tear something if you leave that in there!”

  Green-gold light flared from her hands as she thrust them forward, mana snapping into shape. The spell struck Bhel’s shoulder like a hammer of warmth. The broken length of spear lodged in his muscle lurched free with a wet, sucking pop, spinning away to clatter across the stone, as green mana filled the wound it left behind.

  Bhel grunted, more surprised than pained. “Hah—”

  “Don’t you dare move,” Carcan snapped, already layering the spell.

  The dwarf, thoroughly chastised, held off moving further into the kobold ranks. The torn flesh knit together in rapid, unsettling pulses. Muscle drew closed. Blood flow slowed, then stopped entirely, leaving behind angry pink scars that faded even as she watched. Bhel rolled his shoulder once, teeth bared in a grin. The pain was gone. The strength was back.

  “Good as new,” he growled, axes already rising again, before diving forward.

  Carcan didn’t answer. She was already scanning the field.

  Her eyes flicked from Josh anchoring the centre, shield battered but unbroken, to Bhel tearing through the kobolds’ flank. Mana counts ticked through her thoughts, not numbers but sensations. How much she had left. How much she could afford to spend.

  Then she saw movement beyond them.

  Brett had stepped fully into the fray, staff raised as sigils flared around his hands. A lance of compressed fire mana tore through a knot of kobolds trying to reform, blasting one off its feet and scattering the others in a spray of broken bodies.

  To the far side, Perberos had vanished into motion. Arrows whispered out of the shadows, precise and merciless. A kobold barked an order and dropped mid-word as a shaft punched through its throat. Another spun, clutching its knee, hamstrung before it could reach the line.

  Carcan exhaled slowly. They were all committed now. She raised her hands again, already shaping the next spell, eyes never leaving the battlefield.

  “Left ledge. Slinger,” Perberos called calmly.

  The bowstring thrummed. His arrow punched clean through the kobold’s throat, the creature toppling from its rocky perch to burst against the floor below. Perberos was already moving, boots sliding over stone as pebbles and sling-shots rattled past where he’d been standing a heartbeat earlier.

  “Pin the right!” Brett shouted.

  Perberos didn’t ask why. He sighted, loosed. The arrow took the spear wielder in the ankle, nailing its foot to the stone. The kobold shrieked, dropping its weapon as its formation buckled around it.

  “Good,” Brett muttered, raising his hand.

  Mana dragged itself into shape around his fingers, thick and uncooperative. The chamber fought him, ambient energy churning like a storm he had to wrestle into submission. Sweat beaded along his brow as he forced the spell to cohere.

  “Front rank, now!” he warned as he released. The concussive wave slammed outward, rippling through the kobold line, and a chain of fire danced across the Kobold ranks. Bodies crashed together, shields tangled, spears knocked wide. Screams echoed as the tight formation collapsed into chaos, kobolds stumbling into one another instead of surging past Josh and Bhel.

  “Gap opened,” Perberos said, already shifting his aim. “They can’t flank through there.”

  “Then keep it that way,” Brett replied through clenched teeth.

  Another arrow flew. Another spell began to form.

  Between them, the battlefield narrowed. Every pinned limb, every staggered body, every forced choke point fed the melee where Josh and Bhel waited, turning the kobolds’ numbers into a liability instead of an advantage.

  Josh surged forward. Shield high. Sword tucked tight to his side. A spear lunged for his throat. He knocked it aside and drove the rim of his shield edge-first into a kobold’s snout. Cartilage collapsed with a wet crunch. Before it could even scream, Josh stepped in and rammed his blade under its ribs, twisting as he tore free. Hot blood splashed across his forearm.

  The Kobolds behind poured over the bodies of their fallen comrades, boots slipping in gore, spears stabbing low and high in a relentless rhythm. The press forced Josh back a half-step at a time. His shield arm screamed. His lungs burned, breath rasping through clenched teeth.

  Steel scraped. A blade slipped past his guard and bit into his thigh. Pain flared white and sharp.

  Josh snarled, planted his foot, and drove forward anyway. He smashed his shield into the kobold’s chest with brutal force, sending it skidding across the stone. Before it could scramble up, Bhel’s axe came down in a savage chop, splitting skull and stone in the same stroke.

  Josh didn’t look back. There were still too many in front of him.

  “Left!” Perberos shouted from behind.

  Josh turned just in time. A heavier kobold, its armour reinforced with bronze plates, crashed into him. The impact drove Josh back a step, then another. The creature snarled, teeth bared, strength surprising.

  Josh braced, planting his feet. Shield met shield, the impact jarring through his arms. Every muscle burned as he held the line, forcing the kobold backward inch by inch. When it wobbled, overextended, he didn’t hesitate.

  His sword arced in a sharp, clean strike, cutting through throat and bone. The creature collapsed against his shield, sliding down with a wet, final thud, and did not rise.

  Behind him, Brett cried out as a sling stone clipped his shoulder. His spell faltered, fizzled. He staggered, vision blurring, then forced himself upright.

  “No,” he hissed. “Not now.”

  He drew deep, deeper than was safe. His mana surged.

  A lance of compressed fire ripped across the chamber, tearing through shields and bodies alike. Kobolds were flung aside like broken dolls. Brett dropped to one knee, gasping, blood trickling from his nose.

  Carcan caught him before he fell fully. “That was reckless.”

  “Effective though,” Brett managed to gasp out, spitting out a goblet of blood.

  The Kobold’s resolve faltered. Josh felt it. He roared and pushed.

  The party moved as a single, lethal organism. Axes rose and fell with bone-crushing force, arrows whistled through the air, and magic crackled and snapped in brilliant arcs. Dust and blood swirled around them, masking the floor beneath the constant trampling of boots and claws. The disciplined formation of the kobolds began to splinter under the relentless pressure, but the last guards fought with the ferocity of animals trapped in a corner.

  An arrow pierced Perberos’ side, biting deep. He snarled through the pain, snapped the shaft with a sharp twist, and drove another arrow straight into its wielder’s eye. Bhel took a vicious strike across his shoulder, blood matting his beard, yet he pressed on, axes swinging in a storm of brutal efficiency.

  At the centre, Josh stood immovable. His shield bore the marks of countless impacts, his arm throbbed and felt numb, his vision narrowed to the chaos at his feet. Sparks of pain lanced through him with every strike that slipped past his guard, but still he did not retreat. He held the line, a living bulwark against the frenzy around him.

  The last kobold crouched before them, smaller than its brethren but no less vicious. Its scales were mottled grey and black, streaked with jagged lines of crimson like old scars. Yellow eyes glinted with feral intelligence, and its jagged teeth caught the torchlight as it hissed. Clutched in its hands were twin daggers, curved and wicked, each etched with crude runes that faintly shimmered with mana.

  It lunged first, blurring across the floor with shocking speed. Josh met it head-on, shield raised, absorbing the initial strike as metal clanged against metal. The kobold twisted, ducked, and slashed low at his legs. Pain flared along his calf, but he pivoted, driving his shield into its midsection and sending it skidding back across the stone floor.

  Bhel followed instantly, axes swinging in wide, merciless arcs. One cleaved the kobold’s shoulder, sending a spray of dark blood across the chamber. The creature snarled, spinning in a violent whirl, attempting to dodge the second strike but Josh’s sword was already there, stabbing for ribs, twisting and forcing it to stagger.

  Carcan’s voice rang out behind him, sharp and commanding. She sent a surge of healing energy into Josh and Bhel, knitting torn flesh and pushing the lingering pain into numbness. Simultaneously, a faint barrier shimmered around them, deflecting a desperate magical pulse the kobold had hurled from its rune-carved daggers.

  The creature tried to flee, vaulting toward the far corner of the chamber, but Perberos’ arrows cut across its path, one piercing a thigh and pinning it in place. Brett’s mana coiled around his staff before shooting forward and scorching along the back of the monster, flame dancing across its skin.

  Josh braced, planting his feet, and with a grunt of pure effort, swung his shield like a battering ram. The kobold was knocked sideways, staggering. Bhel stepped in immediately, axes raised, and Josh’s sword followed, piercing through the creature’s chest. Its scream was a shriek of defiance and pain, echoing off the stone walls.

  Then it went still.

  The chamber settled into an uneasy silence. Breathing ragged, armour dented, weapons slick with blood, the party looked around at the aftermath. Josh’s shield hung at his side, sword lowered but ready. Bhel’s axes dripped crimson onto the stone floor. Carcan’s light faded, leaving only the faint hum of mana lingering in the air. Perberos checked his quiver, muttering under his breath, and Brett exhaled slowly, fingers trembling.

  The final guard was down. The path ahead was theirs.