The apocalyptic wail of the city warning sirens shattered the tense silence of the hallway.
The sound vibrated through the cracked concrete walls of the apartment building with enough force to rattle the cheap light fixtures overhead. A sickening wave of sulfur and stagnant heat washed over them, completely overriding the localized winter Vespera had just created.
Liam recognized the taste of the air instantly. It was the distinct, metallic flavor of a spatial tear.
"Category Five," Vespera stated, her voice slicing through the blaring sirens. She stepped away from Liam and turned her attention down the long corridor toward the stairwell. The ambient temperature around her began to plummet once more. "A spatial fissure just tore open inside the structure of this building. That should be mathematically impossible for this sector."
Liam knew exactly why it had happened.
The Goddess had warned him he had a month until the Cataclysm Gate appeared, but Liora’s explosive awakening had changed the timeline. Her mutated S-Rank core had acted like a blinding flare in the dark ocean of the magical ecosystem.
The sheer density of her starlight had pulled a smaller, highly unstable Category Five fissure right to their doorstep.
Before Liam could explain what he could of this, the concrete wall at the far end of the hallway simply ceased to exist.
It dissolved into a swirling vortex of deep purple energy. A chorus of guttural, clicking screeches echoed from the void, sounding like a thousand massive insects grinding their mandibles together.
Three Ash-Stalkers pulled themselves out of the portal.
These were Category Five horrors standing eight feet tall, their bodies covered in thick, obsidian-like carapace that radiated intense heat. They possessed no eyes, relying on thermal tracking and vibration, and their forelimbs ended in massive, jagged scythes designed to cleave fully armored Hunters in half.
For an ordinary E-Rank Awakened, looking at just one of these creatures was enough to induce a heart attack.
"Stay inside the apartment," Liam ordered Liora, his voice completely devoid of panic as he pushed her gently backward and prepared to shut the heavy steel door.
Vespera let out a sound that was half scoff and half cold amusement.
She unbuttoned the collar of her pristine white trench coat, drawing the elegant, silver-hilted rapier from her waist. "Do not flatter yourself, shadow boy. You are useless here. Keep the rookie safe and try not to get in my way."
The young heir of the Hunter Association did not wait for the monsters to charge.
She took a single, graceful step forward, and the hallway completely transformed.
A localized blizzard erupted from her boots.
Jagged spikes of absolute zero ice shot out from the concrete floor, tearing through the confined space with terrifying velocity. The leading Ash-Stalker shrieked and lunged at her, swinging its massive scythe blade in an arc meant to decapitate her.
Vespera seemed irritated by the attempt. She parried the massive strike with a simple flick of her rapier, channeling a concentrated burst of frost magic up the length of the monster’s arm.
The superheated carapace of the beast met the absolute zero magic, causing a violent thermal shock.
The Ash-Stalker’s arm shattered like fragile glass. Before the creature could register the loss of its limb, Vespera spun elegantly and drove her rapier directly through the thick armor plating of its chest, freezing its internal organs solid in less than a second.
Liam watched the display of raw, refined power with the critical eye of a veteran.
Liora possessed the raw mana capacity of an S-Rank, but she had no idea how to use it.
Vespera was the complete package. She had the overwhelming magical reserves of an S-Rank combined with years of brutal, perfectly drilled combat experience. She dispatched the Category Five monsters with the casual ease of a gardener pruning weeds.
However, Liam’s hyper-focused senses picked up a faint scraping noise coming from directly above him.
The Ash-Stalkers were pack hunters.
While Vespera systematically butchered the three beasts in the hallway, a fourth monster had burrowed through the ventilation shaft above Liam’s apartment. The ceiling plaster directly over Liora’s head suddenly bulged downward, spider-webbing with deep cracks as the creature prepared to drop directly onto the vulnerable S-Rank girl.
Liam moved without thinking. He grabbed Liora by the waist and threw her bodily out of the doorway and into the hallway just as the ceiling caved in.
A massive shower of dust, plaster, and rusted metal rained down as the fourth Ash-Stalker crashed onto the apartment floor.
The beast immediately tracked the intense thermal signature of Liora’s recovering core and let out a deafening screech, turning its eyeless head toward the open doorway.
Liam stepped directly into its path, drawing the tiny reserve of shadow mana he possessed into his right hand.
He was currently an E-Rank. His muscles were slightly enhanced from his recent System rewards, but a direct hit from the monster’s scythe would easily bisect him.
He could not rely on brute strength. He had to rely on a decade of slaughter.
The beast lunged, thrusting its bladed limb forward in a devastating piercing strike. Liam did not try to block it. He dropped into a violent crouch, letting the jagged blade sail mere inches over his head, slicing a few loose strands of his dark hair.
Using the momentum of his drop, he drove his shadow-coated fist directly into the exposed joint of the creature’s knee.
His shadow magic hissed violently against the intense heat of the monster’s flesh, completely failing to penetrate the thick inner cartilage. Liam grimaced as the sheer kinetic recoil rattled the bones in his forearm. His E-Rank attack power was simply too weak to cause lethal damage to a Category Five hide.
The Ash-Stalker stumbled but recovered instantly, raising its second scythe to bring it crashing down on Liam’s exposed back.
A golden window abruptly overlaid his vision, accompanied by an obnoxiously cheerful chime.
[Critical Combat Notice!]
[Your current mana density is insufficient to penetrate a Category Five carapace.]
[Solution: You require an immediate influx of Yin energy to supercharge your shadow blade. The Consort Liora Selene is currently leaking excess starlight mana behind you.]
[Task: Establish direct skin contact with the Consort’s lower mana pathways to siphon power. The System recommends a firm grasp on her bare thigh for optimal energy transfer.]
[Time remaining before you are cleaved in half: 1.2 seconds.]
Liam cursed the sadistic Goddess of Fate under his breath.
He desperately rolled backward, narrowly avoiding the downward strike that cleaved straight through the concrete floor where he had just been crouching. He came up right next to where Liora was sitting on the hallway floor, her eyes wide with terror as she watched the monstrous beast prepare for a third strike.
Liam did not have time to explain the nuances of magical theory. He reached out blindly with his left hand, shoving aside the hem of Liora’s oversized borrowed jacket, and clamped his palm firmly onto the smooth, bare skin of her upper thigh.
Liora let out a sharp, startled gasp, her entire body jolting at the sudden, intensely intimate contact.
"Do not move," Liam commanded through gritted teeth, his eyes never leaving the charging monster.
The moment his skin touched hers, the System ripped a surge of potent starlight mana out of her body and injected it directly into Liam’s shadow core. The conflicting energies collided in his right hand, twisting together to form a jagged, highly unstable blade of freezing black light.
As the Ash-Stalker closed the distance to deliver the killing blow, Liam stepped directly inside its guard.
He ignored the scorching heat radiating from its body and drove the supercharged shadow blade upward, perfectly sliding the weapon beneath the thick plating of its lower jaw and sinking it deep into the creature’s brain cavity.
The monster went rigid. The freezing dark energy detonated inside its skull, instantly extinguishing its life force. The massive beast collapsed backward onto the floor of the ruined apartment, landing with a heavy thud that shook the entire hallway.
Liam stood over the corpse, breathing heavily, his left hand still gripping Liora’s thigh with bruising intensity as the last remnants of the required mana finished transferring into his system.