*Glug*

The healing potion slid down his throat painfully, his throat still constricted from the effects of inhaling so much bear spray. A cool soothing sensation began to spread throughout his body as the healing potion did its work, gradually restoring his health.

Unlike in games where potions immediately healed their full effect upon consumption, the effect was a bit more organic and gradual here.

Zack’s hands were shaking badly as he set down his finished healing potion, the glass potion clinking against the stone wall that he leaned on for support. He just killed another person with his own hands, not by accident. He crushed the retail salesman’s face until it was bloodied beyond recognition.

And yet for some reason, he felt strangely calm about it. As if it was a familiar sensation. Despite having no recallable memories of his past lives, it felt like his body remembered what it was like to kill a man.

But that wasn’t all it remembered.

When the face tattooed thug swung at him from behind, he felt a surge of awareness that he’d never felt before in his entire life.

As if he remembered his own death.

Just thinking about it made him feel nauseous again. Zack stumbled forward while leaning onto the wall to his right like a drunk man feeling his way back home after work, his head spinning and his sense of balance off.

He looked down and realized that he was still bleeding. Collapsing to his knees, he opened his inventory and took out the bandages he’d prepared the day before, carefully lifting up his gray sweater so that he could wrap the bandaging around his midsection.

The blood flow just would not stop. He wrapped the bandaging six times around his rib cage and tightened it as much as he could, stemming the bleeding finally.

This was what it meant to be a baseline human, which was the description of his race on the status screen. Yes, he had fancy regenerative powers now, but he could still bleed to death, and his internal organs could still be pierced.

He had to find his way back to Claire Fleurette. Right now his senses were dulled and he needed someone to help him look out for enemies, especially now that stronger monsters were going to appear.

His body shivered feverishly.

For the first time in a long time, he felt alone, and he felt afraid.

—

Izaac Putzai lifted the pregnant woman by the neck, licking his lips.

“Sing for me,” he whispered in a heavy accent, producing a wavy edged dagger in his left hand.

“N-no, please!” the blonde woman whimpered as she was barely able to breathe.

The dagger cut across her neck as she gargled with blood. The muscular man with distinctive eastern european features chuckled softly as he dropped the pregnant blonde like a discarded doll, her body crumbling to the floor in a pool of red against the tiled stone floor of the dungeon.

He felt the power coursing through his veins from his god.

A deep, authoritative voice spoke directly into his mind. Izaac remembered the first time he heard the Lion’s voice–it sent shivers down his spine. He did not remember the last time that someone like himself felt intimidated. Normally, others were scared of him.

Very good. You are strong now, and you will grow stronger yet as you consume those weaker than you. This is the law of the beastial realm.

Izaac Putzai smiled with content. “You and I will kill many together, Lion.”

That is correct, my dear apostle. Let the hunt begin. Soon, you will join me in the great halls of the realms.

–––

Zack emptied another health potion down his throat, wiping the cold sweat from his forehead. The health potions were no longer doing much at this point, and he needed to rely on his regeneration and old fashion first aid to slowly heal the near-fatal wound he received.

All of his vital energy was being concentrated onto his ribcage, causing him to feel weak and feverish elsewhere. It felt as if his life energy had been drawn from his entire body to heal the wound.

Not to mention that unbearable nausea and weakness he felt from remembering his own death.

That moment was harrowing and unnatural in a way that affected his very soul. Experiencing a flashback to his own dying moment was something that could break a weak-minded person’s will and cause them to go insane enough to be hospitalized. Such a phenomenon went against the natural order of the universe, and his body violently rejected it.

He bit the inside of his lower lip in concentration, making sure to not lose his mind. Slowly but surely, he retraced his steps back to where he left Claire.

Stolen story; please report.

He avoided confrontation with anything, taking detours when necessary to circumvent both monsters and other humans. It took a while, but he finally got to his destination.

“Zack?” Claire’s voice called out when she saw him emerge from one of the entrances to the large square area where they had first separated. It appeared that she had anxiously been waiting in the same spot as before.

She rushed towards him, placing her thin hand onto his forehead. “Oh my god, you’re burning up. What happened?” she asked in a worried tone.

‘A lot of things happened’, he wanted to say, but the words didn’t make it out of his mouth. He sank to the ground, breathing heavily.

“Drink some water,” she said, taking out a canteen from her inventory. She fed the water to Zack, who drank it thankfully.

It was not the water that made him feel more calm, but rather the fact that he was no longer alone, and someone was showing him care. A weight felt like it was slowly being lifted from his body.

He was beginning to realize that what he felt was a trauma that transcended lifetimes. He felt abandoned, uncared for, alone, scared… discarded.

“You have a fever,” the design student said, her hands gliding down to the bloodstain on the left of his sweater. “What did this to you?”

He mustered up the strength to utter a single word, indicating down with his head. “People.”

Claire’s expression fell. “We’re stuck in this horrible place with monsters, and we decide to hurt each other?”

Zack nodded, closing his eyes. He could finally rest for a moment. If he had gone any further he would have collapsed.

Claire understood wordlessly. “We’ll stay here for a moment. I’ll keep watch and let you know when we have to move.”

He couldn’t stay awake a minute longer. Debilitating fatigue washed over Zack, his mind quickly slipping into feverish dreams. Visions of monsters and labyrinths occupied his fevered dream, as well as the sight of a mysterious stone door, decorated with various carvings of the land and sea filled with mythical creatures.

He tried to walk closer to the door, but every time he stepped forward, it pulled back from him. But he knew there was something in it, something important that he was never able to lay a hand on in the past, something he desperately needed–

“Zack, wake up!” Claire whispered urgently, lightly patting both of his cheeks.

His eyes slowly opened, and he realized that some time had passed. The sky was a bit darker now.

After his short feverish nap, he felt a lot more energized. It seemed like his wound had been sealed up reasonably well as it was no longer dripping like a leaky faucet, and his vital energies had returned to the rest of his body, giving him back control of his facilities.

His throat and eyes still stung a bit though. Zack coughed quietly, clearing his throat.

Claire immediately placed a hand over his mouth to muffle the cough, indicating with her other finger to be quiet. Her eyes glanced to the left.

*Clank.*

*Clank.*

Zack’s eyes opened in alert, the hairs on his arms raising as his heartbeat quickened.

‘What was that?’ He mouthed at Claire.

She mouthed back. ‘Monster.’

They slowly backed away from the sound, peeking around the corner. A hoofed foot appeared, followed by a massive, muscular body covered in blueish, matted fur. The creature was at least seven feet tall, with broad shoulders and long, pointed horns that curved menacingly upwards.

[Servant of the Cho’Zorak – Level 7]

A heavy chain with links as large as the minotaur’s biceps was the cause of the loud metallic clanking sound, the long chain bound around the minotaur’s arms. As the brutish monster advanced, dragging the heavy chains behind it, its payload was revealed.

Zack and Claire watched silently as the minotaur dragged a massive hunk of meat on top of a bamboo holder across the grassy expanse of the labyrinth. The chain attached to the bamboo platform creaked and groaned under the weight of the meat, which was so large and heavy it touched the grass beneath it. The flesh was a deep, dark red, with veins of fat and muscle running throughout.

Judging by the size of the thing, whatever creature the meat came from must have been the size of a house.

The master demands to be fed. The servant answers his call.

A chilling orange notification appeared before them. Up until now, all of the alerts had been blue including the plot advancement notifications.

As the minotaur passed, another spider-like creature emerged. It looked around curiously, shooting a glance at Zack and Claire’s hiding spot, but they had scooted around the corner. The two of them had their backs pressed against the wall, trying to conceal the sound of their breath.

The distant sounds of screams could be heard from somewhere in the labyrinth. Zack and Claire stayed as quiet as the scurrying noise continued onward.

For now, they were safe.

Claire checked around the corner to make sure, then whispered carefully to Zack.

“I think we have to go now. When you were sleeping, we were told by one of those floating box thingies that some areas are closing. It told us to check our dungeon maps.”

Zack nodded, checking the notification before flipping open his dungeon map to see. Throughout all the parts of the labyrinth where he’d traversed through already, the fog of war was lifted with some pathways showing some kind of red mist. It was not spreading in a predictable fashion, like he’d expect in some kind of battle royale situation, but rather it was snaking haphazardly through the labyrinth as if it were a boa constrictor, tightening its coiling grip around their throats, cutting off certain pathways.

The red mist was approaching them from the south east. He looked to the right just in time to see a red cloud of buzzing flies like a horde spreading towards them, carrying some kind of thick oozing cloud with it.

Just a cursory glance told both of them that it was most definitely poisonous.

“You’re right Claire. Let’s go.”

–––

A man in square sunglasses and a tacky patterned suit smiled with his arms spread in an explanatory gesture.

“If you want to go through, you have to pay the toll,” he said cheerfully.

A large group of flustered looking human initiates stood before a stone archway that led towards the next area of the labyrinth, a wooden drawbridge over a running stream.

“We’ll die if you don’t let us through!” an elderly man complained, elbowing his way through the crowd before bursting out.

He tried to make a dash for it, but he was promptly grabbed by a massive man standing by the suited man’s side.

“What did I say?” the suited man continued. “If you want to go through, you’ll have to pay the toll. Ten iron coins.”