The moment I stepped through the gate, the world as I knew it vanished.

  For one thin, fragile second, it felt as if the air had been ripped out of existence. My lungs expanded out of instinct, desperate for oxygen, yet nothing filled them. It was not suffocation; it was absence. A hollow, weightless void pressing against my skin. My body forgot gravity. My boots lifted an inch from the invisible ground, my stomach lurched upward, and my balance slipped through my fingers like sand.

  Even though this had to be my five hundredth time entering a gate, the sensation never dulled. It never softened. It remained sharp and invasive, like plunging into ice water without warning. Familiar, yes. Predictable, maybe. But normal? Never.

  Unique. That was the word.

  The swirling distortion in front of me pulsed brighter, a violent bloom of white light folding into itself. It rushed forward as if it had intention, as if it was hunting me rather than transporting me. The glow thickened, swallowing the edges of my vision. Instinctively, I tightened my grip on the branch in my hand. The bark bit into my palm, grounding me, reminding me that I was still solid. Still real. Wherever I was about to land, it was not going to be friendly. It never was.

  Then the light struck.

  The brilliance consumed everything without burning or exploding.

  In the next heartbeat, I was falling.

  I slammed onto something hard and uneven. The impact knocked the breath from my chest in a violent gasp as my back collided with the wet, jagged jungle floor. Mud splashed against my clothes. Sharp stones dug into my shoulder blades. Damp leaves stuck to my neck. The air here was thick, heavy with the smell of rot and rain and something metallic underneath it all.

  “Ouch!”

  The word tore out of me before I could stop it. I lay there for a second, staring up at a canopy so dense it strangled the sky. No open blue. Just tangled branches and drooping vines woven together like a ceiling of claws.

  Pain prickled across my skin. I shifted slightly, hissing as small scratches protested. Nothing major. No broken bones. No deep gashes. Just surface wounds, thin red lines forming along my arms and collarbone. They stung like hell though, sharp and insistent, a reminder that this place did not welcome visitors.

  A translucent panel flickered into existence in front of my face, glowing faintly against the oppressive green darkness.

  [You have entered a Rank B dungeon! Be careful…]

  For a moment, everything inside me went still.

  Oh, shit.

  I pushed myself up onto my elbows, mud squelching beneath me, heart beginning to pound harder now that the message had sunk in.

  I didn’t expect this to be a Rank B.

  Rank B meant stronger monsters, smarter ones, and faster ones. It meant fewer mistakes allowed. It meant that one wrong step could turn this entire jungle into my grave.

  The air felt heavier after that. The silence sharper. Even the distant rustling of leaves sounded like something stalking me.

  I tightened my grip on the branch again, knuckles whitening.

  “Alright,” I muttered under my breath, scanning the shadows between the trees.

  If this was Rank B, then I needed to move carefully. Very carefully.

  Before I could even draw in a proper breath, something dropped from the canopy above. There was a sharp rustle of leaves. A sudden displacement of air. A flicker of movement so fast it almost blurred into nothing.

  Then I saw it.

  A snake, long and thick, its scales slick with a sickly sheen that shimmered between murky green and bruised purple. Its eyes glowed with a venomous luster, narrow and intelligent, like it knew exactly where to sink its fangs. Its mouth was already open midair, curved fangs dripping with translucent poison that caught what little light filtered through the jungle canopy.

  Instead of slithering, it lunged.

  Instinct moved me before fear could. My arm snapped upward, branch cutting through the damp air with a desperate, reckless swing. The wood met flesh with a wet, splitting sound. There was resistance for a fraction of a second, then it gave way.

  The snake separated cleanly in midair.

  Both halves hit the ground with a grotesque thud, writhing violently in opposite directions. Dark blood seeped into the mud, thick and almost black, steaming faintly as if even the earth rejected it.

  Obviously, everyone knew snakes could survive being severed in half for a few minutes. The nerves kept firing; the muscles kept twitching. The head could still bite and the body could still coil. But at least it bought me time.

  I staggered back a step, heart hammering against my ribs so hard it almost hurt.

  “Reanimate, my soldiers!!”

  The shout tore out of me on pure adrenaline, louder than intended, raw and jagged. It echoed through the suffocating jungle like a gunshot.

  Shit. That was too loud.

  The sound hung in the air, unnatural and intrusive. Even the severed snake reacted. Its upper half actually recoiled, as if startled, its body jerking backward from the force of my voice.

  From the shadows behind me, two figures materialized. Out came the elite and the soldier.

  The elf brute surged forward first. His massive frame moved with terrifying momentum, though for a split second it looked almost slow, like time itself hesitated in fear of what he was about to do. Muscles bulged beneath ashen skin. His feet crushed foliage with each heavy step. The elite followed close behind, leaner but sharper, blade already angled to claim the kill.

  The brute did not give him the chance. With a guttural roar, he brought his weapon down. Instead of splitting, the snake simply exploded.

  Flesh, bone, and venom burst outward in a grotesque smear across the jungle floor. The writhing stopped instantly. What remained was nothing more than a crushed pulp soaking into the mud.

  The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

  Disgusting.

  I wiped a speck of blood from my cheek with the back of my hand, trying not to think about how close those fangs had been to my throat.

  At first, I genuinely believed that every creature possessed a soul I could consume. Humans, animals, monsters. I assumed it was universal. Life was life, right? Apparently not.

  After hunting down at least a dozen more creatures, testing, experimenting, and reaching out with that invisible hunger inside me, I got nothing. No pull. No absorption. No satisfying surge of power flooding through my veins. Some souls simply refused me.

  So it’s selective…

  That realization irritated me more than I expected. Still, despite the inconvenience, I was clearing the dungeon at an impressive pace. Corpses littered the jungle behind me. The air grew heavier with the scent of blood. The silence between encounters grew shorter.

  Then I saw it. A blockade.

  Ahead of me, the path narrowed and was completely obstructed by a massive cluster of boulders. These weren't merely pebbles or rocks; they were true boulders. Each one was absurd in size, their surfaces jagged and layered with moss. If I compared a single boulder to the elf brute, the stone would dwarf him easily—perhaps three times his size. They were stacked unnaturally, almost deliberately, forming a crude wall that cut off any forward progress.

  That’s not natural.

  Before I could analyze further, a voice broke through my thoughts. High pitched. Crude. Laughing.

  I turned slowly. Behind me stood a gang of goblins.

  At least a dozen of them. Maybe more emerging from between the trees. Their skin was a mottled green, their ears long and twitching. Their eyes gleamed with malicious intelligence. They held crude weapons made of bone and rusted metal, and their grins were wide, full of crooked, needle like teeth.

  They had formed a semicircle. The boulders in front. Goblins behind.

  Shit. No way these goblins tried trapping me.

  I had always considered goblins to be reckless and opportunistic. Annoying pests. But this? This was strategy. They had blocked the path and waited for me to step into the kill zone. I never knew they were this smart.

  Still, smart did not mean strong.

  I exhaled slowly, then raised my hand.

  “Brute. Greed. Hunt them down.”

  The command was calm, almost bored. The reaction was immediate.

  The brute stepped forward and bent down, fingers digging beneath one of the smaller boulders. Smaller was relative; it was still massive, but manageable for him. Muscles strained, veins bulging across his arms as he lifted it overhead.

  The goblins’ grins faltered.

  With a roar, he hurled it. The boulder tore through the air like a meteor and crashed into the center of their formation. The impact was catastrophic. Bones shattered with sickening cracks. At least four goblins were crushed instantly, their bodies reduced to mangled heaps beneath the stone.

  The survivors shrieked and scattered, scrambling over each other in panic. A few attempted to counterattack, charging forward with jagged blades raised high.

  They never reached me.

  Greed moved like a shadow given form. He slipped between them, blade flashing in precise arcs. One throat opened. Then another. Then a third. The cuts were clean and deliberate. Blood erupted outward in violent sprays, painting the leaves and tree trunks in dark red streaks.

  It was almost beautiful in a horrific way.

  Blood sprayed everywhere, splattering against the jungle floor like fountains under pressure. Goblins clutched at their necks, choking on their own lifeblood, eyes wide with disbelief as they collapsed.

  Within seconds, the ambush had become a massacre. Silence returned, broken only by the wet gurgling of the dying and the slow drip of blood from Greed’s blade.

  I stood there, branch still in hand, staring at the carnage.

  So much for trapping me.

  [You’ve killed a Rank D Goblin!]

  [You’ve killed a Rank D Goblin!]

  [You’ve killed a Rank D Goblin!]

  [You’ve killed a Rank D Goblin!]

  [You’ve killed a Rank D Goblin!]

  [You’ve killed a Rank D Goblin!]

  [You’ve killed a Rank D Goblin!]

  [You’ve killed a Rank D Goblin!]

  The notifications stacked over one another, translucent blue panels flashing repeatedly in front of my vision like a broken slot machine that had finally decided to pay out. Each message shimmered faintly against the blood soaked jungle backdrop, the polite, emotionless font completely detached from the carnage sprawled around me.

  Bodies lay twisted at unnatural angles. Limbs bent the wrong way. Eyes still open. The smell of iron hung thick in the humid air, blending with crushed leaves and damp earth until it became something suffocating.

  Then another panel appeared.

  [You’ve leveled up to Level 7! Stats will be increased automatically, accordingly.]

  A faint warmth pulsed through my veins. The sensation was neither explosive nor dramatic; instead, it felt like a quiet reinforcement, as if invisible hands were tightening bolts inside my body.

  Another screen unfolded in front of me.

  [Here is your status! Corvian Vale Level: 7 Rank: C Stats: Health: 3 Power: 6 Intelligence: 8 Skills: Reanimate]

  I stared at it for a long moment, mud drying against my boots, blood still dripping from Greed’s blade nearby.

  “Well damn, first off, that took a long, long time to level up from level six to seven but…”

  My voice trailed off as my eyes scanned the information again. Something’s off.

  The system clearly said this was a Rank B dungeon. And that made sense. Rarely would a low-ranked dungeon manifest as a sprawling, suffocating jungle thick enough to swallow light whole. Rank B environments were dangerous, unpredictable, and layered with threats.

  And yet… these goblins were only Rank D.

  Why the hell are Rank D mobs guarding a Rank B environment?

  That was not normal. Rank gaps like that usually meant one thing: Fodder. Disposable scouts. Or worse. Bait.

  Before I could dig deeper into that thought, a sound split through the jungle. A horn. Low. Deep. Resonant. It echoed from somewhere far ahead, beyond the boulder blockade, vibrating through the air like a warning carved into sound itself. Rather than the crude noise of goblins celebrating, the sound was structured and intentional. A call.

  The jungle seemed to hold its breath after it faded. My skin prickled.

  “Follow behind me,” I ordered, keeping my voice steady despite the tightness coiling in my chest.

  The brute responded instantly, stepping closer. Greed wiped his blade clean against a fallen goblin’s ragged clothing before falling into position. I turned toward the boulder blockade.

  Up close, the stones were even more massive than they had appeared from a distance. Their surfaces were rough and uneven, with patches of slick moss clinging to crevices. They were stacked deliberately, not naturally scattered. Someone had placed them here.

  Definitely a trap.

  I grabbed onto a jagged edge and began to climb. The stone scraped against my palms. Dirt crumbled beneath my boots. It was not an easy ascent; each movement required balance and caution. One slip would send me tumbling backward into the mess of corpses below.

  Halfway up, the horn sounded again. Closer this time. Louder. It rolled across the canopy like distant thunder, and I felt it in my ribs.

  I climbed faster.

  Just as my fingers curled over the top edge of the highest boulder, something warm touched my skin. A drop. Thick. Slow. It landed on my knuckles.

  I froze.

  Another drop followed, then another. I lifted my hand slightly. Dark red liquid coated my fingers. The smell hit me a second later: metallic, heavy, and fresh. Blood.

  It dripped steadily from above, sliding down between the cracks in the boulders and trailing along my wrist. It crept beneath my sleeve, slick and warm, before rolling over my shoulder in a slow, deliberate path.

  My throat tightened. That’s… a lot of blood. This isn't just splatter or remnants; it's a pool.

  I hauled myself up the rest of the way, slowly and cautiously, my heart beginning to pound harder with every inch I gained.

  The moment my eyes cleared the top of the boulder, the world beyond revealed itself in fragments. A clearing. Torn earth. Shadows moving. And at the center of it all, a massive pool of dark, metallic-smelling blood spread across the ground like a crimson lake.

  It was still flowing. Still fresh.

  My grip tightened against the stone. I’m definitely not prepared for whatever the fuck is waiting on the other side.