I bit my lips and covered my mouth to stifle a scream as pieces of the building fell around me. I scrambled up and darted farther into the hall.

Please, don't let the whole building collapse, I begged over and over in my heart. Please, just let it be the outer wall and stairwell.

Metal ripped away from metal and squealed as it bent. Concrete crumbled and banged in more concrete. Rotten wood splintered and crumbled. All of it turned into an avalanche that came rushing down. Desks, chairs, and lab equipment were caught in the mess and crushed, bits and pieces of them flinging around because of the force. The dust cloud was so thick I could barely see the uneven ground in front of me. The sounds were deafening, overpowering the muffled ringing still plaguing my ears. Movements darted in the corner of my eyes, revealing nymphs that were fleeing just as passionately as I was. Huge support steel beams, parts of the walls, and science equipment rained from above, smashing the monsters. The floor slanted and shook with every large piece that landed on it.

Panting, I dodged around the falling debris, barely able to skirt around the most dangerous pieces. Unfortunately, I was left at the mercy of the smaller shrapnel as a compromise. Bruises and cuts littered my body, but I kept running. I twisted, dodging around a pipe sliding down the angle of the hall, but my heel caught on a telescope that fell from above at some point. With a horrified gasp, I landed heavily on my back.

I could only stare, wide eyed, at a pile of ceiling tiles falling at me. I curled up in a ball and took out a random object from my Items Bag – a laptop – to cover my head. The tiles landed on me, smothering me with dust and bruising my whole body. Even though it was a desperate, brainless move, the laptop protected my head by deflecting the pointed corners of the tiles away. It still hurt, but it wasn't debilitating. I groaned, unable to resist the sound, and kept my eyes tightly shut.

As fast as it started, the rumbling stopped. I laid there, barely breathing and listening. Was it done? The rest of the building wasn't going to go too? Where was the dragon?

As if to answer my question, the ground rumbled with a boom!

My breathing stopped. Was the building going to start collapsing again? It groaned and shuddered around me, but the sickening sound of metal and brick tearing apart didn't repeat.

Boom! Boom! Boom! The dragon was moving away. Slowly, step by heavy step, it moved on to terrorize other parts of the city.

It took me a couple minutes to collect myself and calm my breathing. It was hard to do, with all the dust in the air. Gingerly, I pushed against the laptop over my head, forcing the pile of junk off me. Coughing lightly, I sat up and looked around.

It was a mess, that was for sure. The whole side of the building had collapsed, cutting off the light except for a tiny gap, which gave me just enough light to see. Everything else was piles upon piles of debris, completely unrecognizable. And so was I. I was so caked in particles and grime that I probably looked like a ghost. Thank god I wasn’t actually one, though. I really thought I was going to die then.

Then again, this whole trip was a suicide mission. At first, I thought it would be fun to have companions, until that hope was rudely shattered. Then I thought if I worked hard enough and got enough sympathy votes, I could actually return home safely. Now, I realize that I was never getting back on the roc. If a monster didn't kill me, Star or her team would. All for a bit of leather.

My lips pulled into a bitter smile as I gripped my battered arm bracer. "Fine," I whispered. "So it's like that." I didn't know I was a vindictive person, but at that moment, I hoped that Star and the others were buried somewhere in the rubble and killed by a monster, just like what she tried to do with me.

My whole body ached, but I forced myself to stand. There was a little over an hour till the roc came back. Whether or not it would land with the dragon in the city was to be seen, but there was one thing for sure. If I wasn't by the beacon, it didn't matter if the bird landed or not, I wouldn't go home, regardless.

There were two miles between me and the beacon. And that was after climbing out of this building. I could rest after I reached the beacon. As long as the dragon didn’t eat me first. I could still hear it romping around the city, somewhere to the west.

I tossed the destroyed laptop aside – I really needed to invest in a shield. That was actually the plan after getting paid for this trip. Now the plan is simply surviving. Heh.

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Still struggling with that bitter pill, I staggered towards the foyer. I wasn't worried about monsters now. Most of them had fled and all the rest were probably buried, which meant that going down the foyer wasn't as dangerous as before. The only hang up was it didn't still didn’t have stairs.

The foyer was in shambles. Half of the roof had collapsed when the dragon tried to barge in, adding to the mess. A large chunk of the second floor balcony gave way at some point too.

I frowned, looking at the mess. It wasn't ... completely hopeless.

A huge beam, probably from the broken ceiling, laid at an angle like a slide between the first and second floor. If I could get down from the third floor, I could use that to reach the ground. You know, given that my weight on the beam didn't make the whole thing collapse. Again.

With a plan in mind, I looked around and spotted a large hole in the wall across from where the stairs were supposed to be, big enough to reveal the metal infrastructure. It was one of the few walls that wasn't completely at an angle – it just kinda was. The metal post seemed solid enough when I tried to wiggle it.

Confident enough to risk it, I took the rope out of my Items Bag and tied one end around the post then walked to the edge, overlooking the foyer. My twenty foot long rope, because of tying it to a beam across the walkway, was barely long enough to reach the second level. It wasn't a straight drop either. The ceiling beam had broken away a part of the walkway directly below me, so I was going to have to swing or jump a meter to touch down. Then I'd have to pray that the second floor walkway didn't collapse while I walked to the beam.

"Ah, hell," I muttered to myself. The tinnitus was starting to fade, but my voice still echoed oddly in my head. "Let's just add this to my growing list of stupid ideas. God, I can't wait till I'm strong enough to just jump down without dying." That will happen someday. Given that I didn't die right now. If I fell off the rope or missed my jump, even if the fall didn't break me, I'd be too injured to make it to the beacon. And there wasn’t enough time for Regen to fix a broken leg – or back – by the scheduled return time.

I took a second to calm my nerves, gripped the rope, and turned around. I'd practiced something like this once in Hunter prep, but that was almost a year ago. And at the time, I wasn't on an extra high third level, it was just a ten foot tall platform with a stunt cushion at the bottom. With another deep breath, I stepped back and lowered myself.

My tired hands shook but I forced them to stay firm as I carefully shimmied down the rope. The stress of the movements made every bruise and cut on my body scream, but it also helped to distract me from the fact that I was dangling in the air, one slip away from dying. My heart pounded in my ears as I focused on my goal – the second landing. It was getting closer and closer.

Suddenly, a low metal-on-metal groan happened above me and the rope jerked. My fingers slipped on the rope and I slid uncontrollably down the rope. Desperate, I gripped the rope until my fingers felt like they were going to fall off, stopping my fall with only a couple feet left before my freefall. Breathing hard, I looked up at where the rope bent over the edge. Was the metal frame giving way? I had to get off this now. But would it hold up long enough for me to swing over?

Terrified anew, I slowly kicked my legs, trying to build up a gentle movement. Nothing too hard to stress the frame. But with every kick, I felt my lifeline shaking more and more. With a burst of energy, I launched myself off the rope towards the platform – just as the frame gave way and the rope went slack.

My jump wasn't good enough. My torso landed painfully on the edge of the landing with my legs dangling in the air. Gasping in terror, I clawed at the floor. Try as I might, the weight of my own legs were pulling me down. There was a squeal and groan from above, a scraping sound, then the rope dropped to the ground behind me, dragging a piece of metal down with it. The metal barely missed skinning my back. The sound of it hitting the ceiling beam then clattering to the ground was like a cold splash of water, an enactment of what would happen to me if I fell.

A burst of adrenaline pumped through my veins. I scrambled with everything that I had and managed to pull myself up. Gasping, I slumped on the walkway. It didn't matter that it was dirty and covered in junk, I was just thankful that it was flat. Slowly, over the sound of my own heart beating, I heard a faint popping noise. I frowned, and a second later, I realized it was coming from the floor pressed under me.

The walkway was about to collapse. Oh, my god. I wasn't done yet.

I rolled to my feet and came up running, just trying to get to the ceiling beam as fast as possible. With every step, I could feel the concrete slab under me warping and shifting. Cracks spread across the floor. All my attention was focused on the beam.

As soon as I was close enough, I didn't pause – I just jumped. The bottom of my boots slipped on the dirty metal, but I used the momentum already propelling me forward to keep hopping down the beam, wobbling my arms to keep balanced. Every step I took sent another grinding tremor to the second floor – it couldn't support my weight on the beam. I was four feet from the bottom when the walkway gave out entirely.

I gasped as the huge beam under me started to freefall and roll. My eyes narrowed. I was not going to let this huge hunk of metal roll on me. I launched myself off the tail end of the beam just before it crashed to the ground with a deafening bang. It bounced back into the air, vibrating from the impact, and rolled, flattening everything within five feet of it.

I landed heavily on the ground ten feet from it and rolled to dissipate the inertia. A part of me just wanted to lie on the ground and celebrate finally getting down. A bigger part just wanted to get the hell out of this damn building. I jumped to my feet and jogged on unsteady feet to the exit.

It was time to get out here before anything else, be it a building or moral credibility, decided to fall apart on me.

*****