The ridge they climbed up was not a safe place. It was jagged stone cutting up from the jungle like the spine of some buried beast. It wasn’t tall enough to be called a mountain, but it was high enough that the mud couldn’t swallow them instantly. The slope was steep and uneven, filled with sharp edges that tore at skin and fabric. But compared to the soft jungle ground below, it might as well have been a castle.

  The boy’s hands scraped against the rock as he climbed. His ribs screamed at him with every movement. Every breath felt like it was grinding his bones together. He forced himself upward anyway, dragging his body like it was dead weight. His palms slipped in the wet dirt smeared across the stone and he nearly fell, but he caught himself and kept going.

  Above him, Wrighty climbed like a natural. He moved fast, using his staff like it was part of his body. He hooked it into cracks in the rock and used it to pull himself up, vaulting over ledges and hopping from one stable foothold to another. The boy watched him for half a second and felt a flash of annoyance. Wrighty made it look easy.

  “COME ON!” Wrighty yelled down, voice cracking with panic and energy at the same time. “IF YOU DIE I’M GONNA HAVE TO CARRY YOUR CORPSE AND I DON’T WANNA DO THAT!”

  The boy wanted to tell him to shut up. He didn’t have the breath. He climbed higher and finally hauled himself onto the ridge, collapsing onto his knees as his ribs flared with pain so hard he nearly blacked out. He coughed, tasted blood, and pressed his palm into his side as if he could hold his bones together through sheer will.

  The ridge was crowded , but not as crowded as it should have been. That thought hit him like ice. The camp had been huge. Hundreds of people. A constant noise of voices, footsteps, movement. But now the ridge only held a fraction of them. Maybe half. Maybe less. Too many had been swallowed on the run. Too many had fallen behind. Too many had been erased so quickly it felt like they had never existed at all.

  Gravel reached the top shortly after, climbing with pure stubborn force. His hat was gone. His hair was caked with dirt. He didn’t even look around long. He didn’t have time to mourn. He scanned the ridge, counted the survivors, then turned his eyes forward.

  The tremors were still coming. The ground below was shaking constantly now, vibrating so hard the stone beneath their feet rattled. The grinding noise from the jungle was louder than ever, like the earth itself was being dragged across metal. Trees in the distance were bending and snapping. Leaves rained down from the canopy as if the whole forest was trembling in fear.

  Then the grub came into view again. The boy’s throat tightened as he saw the pale segmented body sliding through the jungle like a living landslide. It crushed trees beneath it like they were weeds. Mud bubbled and exploded around its bulk. Its body pulsed in thick rings, moving forward with slow certainty. Slime coated its underside, dripping in thick strands that left wet trails across the ruined earth. It was disgusting. It was so huge that the boy couldn’t even process how something like that could exist and still move. It wasn’t quite the size of The Leviathan but it was on land. Things on land were generally smaller than things in the ocean so the size of this thing was absurdly impressive.

  It was a grub. A damn worm. A creature that should have been small enough to step on. But this thing was an abnormal calamity, one that he knew was impossible in his world. Was things like this normal in this world??

  Snow stood near the edge of the ridge, bow raised, eyes narrowed and shaking hands barely steadying the arrow. She loosed a shot and the arrow disappeared into the green below, vanishing into the grub’s mass like it had been swallowed by fog. Snow’s jaw clenched and she drew another arrow, her face tightening with frustration.

  Sheath stood beside her with his sword drawn, breathing heavy. The boy could see his pride fighting with fear. Sheath looked like he wanted to jump down and carve into it like a hero, like a fool. His knuckles were white around the hilt of his blade.

  Wrighty paced behind them, staff tapping against the rock. He was trying to calm himself through motion. His face was pale, but he still had that stupid energy in his eyes. Like he refused to let the world crush him quietly.

  Five arrived with Shiela. Five carried her all the way there, one arm under her legs, the other gripping her back as he climbed the ridge with controlled effort. He didn’t look like he was struggling, but sweat ran down his face and his breathing was heavier than normal. He set Shiela down carefully on the stone, and Shiela’s hands immediately rose in front of her like she was praying.

  Hexagonal shields flickered around her palms. They formed, cracked, and vanished. Formed again. Weak, unstable, like glass trying to assemble itself in the air.

  “I can’t hold it, but I want to help…” Shiela whispered, voice trembling. “I can’t make it stay…”

  Five stared at her with that same calm expression. His calm didn’t comfort anyone. It was the calm of someone who had already accepted the worst outcome.

  “Don’t waste it,” Five said simply.

  Shiela looked like she wanted to scream at him, but she didn’t. She just swallowed and nodded, forcing herself to breathe.

  The boy’s eyes drifted across the ridge, searching for Eerie. He didn’t see him at first. That made his skin crawl. Eerie always appeared when things went wrong, like he was attracted to disaster. Then the boy spotted him off to the side, half-hidden behind a rock. Eerie leaned casually against the stone, arms crossed, watching the grub like it was an interesting animal. His face was dull. His eyes half-lidded. He didn’t look afraid at all.

  The boy’s stomach turned. Eerie wasn’t normal. He couldn’t be. No one could look at something like that and remain calm. Eerie’s gaze flicked toward the boy for half a second. He gave a faint emotionless smile. Then he looked away again as if the boy didn’t matter.

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  Gravel’s voice cut through the ridge.

  “LISTEN UP!” he roared.

  People flinched. Some stopped crying. Some turned their heads. Gravel stepped forward to the highest point and pointed his arm down toward the slope.

  “THIS RIDGE IS OUR ONLY ADVANTAGE,” Gravel said, voice loud and harsh. “THAT THING’S TOO DAMN BIG TO CLIMB FAST. IT HAS TO SLOW DOWN HERE. IT HAS TO COMPRESS.”

  Sheath scoffed. “So what? We just sit up here and hope it gets bored?”

  Gravel glared at him. “It ain’t gonna get bored.”

  Snow’s voice was tight. “It’s chasing us. That means it wants us.”

  The boy felt his ribs flare again. He gritted his teeth and forced his breathing steady. The weight in his chest pressed harder now, like something inside him was waking up. The closer the grub got, the heavier it became. It wasn’t just pain anymore.

  Wrighty looked at Gravel like he couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “What’s the plan? We poke it with sticks until it leaves?”

  Gravel didn’t smile. “No.”

  Gravel’s eyes swept over the survivors. “We stop running,” he said. “If we keep running, it’ll swallow us one by one. We fight here. We make it choke.”

  Five stepped forward quietly. “If it climbs, it has to open its mouth.”

  Snow narrowed her eyes. “That’s the only part that isn’t armored.”

  Sheath’s face lit with grim satisfaction. “So we hit the mouth.”

  Wrighty’s lips twitched. “Great. We’re gonna punch the calamity in the throat.”

  The boy forced himself to focus on the grub again. Its mouth-ring wasn’t visible yet, but he knew it was there. He had seen it earlier. That pale circle with grinding plates spinning like teeth. And inside it…Bones.

  The boy remembered the brief glimpse he’d gotten while running. He had seen bones pressed against the grub’s inner flesh. Human bones. Dozens. Maybe hundreds. The remains of the first expedition that hadn’t been in the cave. The remains of everyone it had swallowed on the run. Like Knell. The people who had screamed and vanished.

  His chest weight pulsed again. It wasn’t random. It wasn’t just reacting to the grub’s presence. It was reacting to the death inside it. The boy swallowed, eyes narrowing. His breath came out slow and shaky. If his power had anything to do with death… then this grub was practically overflowing with it.

  Gravel’s eyes locked on the boy. “Boy,” he said, voice dropping slightly. “You said you felt something when it got close.”

  The boy nodded once. “I did.”

  Snow glanced at him sharply. Wrighty turned fully now, his face tightening. Even Five’s gaze sharpened.

  “What did you feel?” Gravel demanded.

  The boy hesitated, then pressed his palm against his chest. The weight pressed back like a stone lodged beneath his ribs.

  “I felt death,” the boy said quietly. “I felt bones inside it. Like it was… full of them.”

  Wrighty’s expression twisted. “That’s disgusting.”

  “It’s useful,” Gravel replied instantly.

  Wrighty blinked. “What?”

  Gravel pointed down the ridge. “If your ability reacts to death, then that thing is your target,” Gravel said. “We make it open its mouth, we force it to expose what’s inside, and you use whatever the hell you’ve got.”

  The boy’s stomach dropped. “You want me to fight it.”

  Gravel stared at him. “You want to live, don’t you? It’s the only chance we’ve got. Your power was able to easily best that alpha and I….cant use mine well.”

  The boy’s jaw tightened. The answer was obvious. He wanted to live more than anything. He wanted to live badly enough that it made him angry.

  Snow swallowed. “How do we even make it open?”

  Sheath stepped forward. “We hit it until it does, obviously.”

  Five shook his head. “No,” he said calmly. “We bait it. It’s following movement. It will chase noise, it will chase the herd.”

  The boy remembered his realization while running. That being together had made them a single target. A single feast. He clenched his fists as anger burned through him. If they had spread out earlier, maybe fewer would have died. Maybe Knell would still be alive. Maybe—

  His ribs flared again and he nearly doubled over.

  Wrighty grabbed his shoulder. “Doc, you’re shaking.”

  “I’m fine,” the boy muttered.

  Wrighty snorted. “Stop saying that. You’re literally about to fall apart.”

  The boy didn’t respond. His eyes stayed locked on the grub. It was reaching the base of the ridge now, its body sliding forward with relentless pressure. Mud exploded outward as its bulk pressed into the incline. Trees snapped behind it. The jungle trembled like it was begging the creature to leave.

  Then the grub lifted its head. Slowly. The mouth-ring opened.

  The grinding plates inside rotated faster. The sound rose into a deafening mechanical howl that vibrated through the ridge and into the boy’s bones. The smell hit them immediately. It was terrible and smelled of acid and old meat. Something that made the boy’s stomach twist violently.

  Shiela gagged. Someone screamed. Snow drew her bowstring back. Sheath raised his sword. Wrighty planted his staff.

  Gravel lifted his hand. “WAIT!” he shouted.

  The boy stared into the mouth. The inside was pale and wet. The grinding plates spun like a machine. And deeper inside, behind the flesh… Bones. He could see them now. Packed into the creature like a grave. White fragments pressed against the walls. Some broken. Some intact. Some still wearing scraps of cloth. The boy’s chest weight surged. The pressure inside him cracked open like a coffin lid. The boy gasped, knees nearly buckling as his entire body reacted. His heart hammered. His ribs screamed. His mind blurred for a moment, overwhelmed by the sensation.

  He felt it. Not just the grub. The dead inside it. Fear. Regret. Rage. Pressure lingering like smoke. The boy’s hands trembled. He couldn’t tell if it was his fear or something else. Gravel’s voice cut through everything like a blade.

  “NOW!” Gravel roared.

  Snow released her arrow. Sheath charged forward with a snarl. Wrighty slammed his staff down against the stone and shouted something that sounded like a curse. Shiela’s shields flared bright for the first time, shimmering hexagonal plates forming in a trembling wall. And the grub lunged upward. The ridge shook violently. People screamed as the creature climbed, compressing itself against the stone, mouth opening wider like it was about to swallow the entire ridge whole.

  The boy stared at it, ribs screaming, chest weight roaring inside him like a storm. He didn’t know how to control it. He didn’t know what it was. But he knew something else now, something that settled into his bones with terrifying certainty. This wasn’t a fight they could run from anymore. If he wanted to live… If he wanted answers… If he wanted a name… Then he had to be the one to kill it.

  And as the grub’s mouth opened wide enough to swallow the ridge, the boy made his choice. He would risk everything. Even his life. Because dying without knowing who he was was worse than death itself.