Solian jumped down from the pipe and landed with a heavy splash, his boots sinking deep into the mud.
He stood still for a moment, taking in his surroundings.
Ruined houses stretched out on both sides of the road, their windows shattered and doors hanging crooked. Cracked walls leaned inward, and roofs sagged under the weight of age and neglect. Across the muddy street, people lay scattered, wrapped in torn blankets and scraps of cloth, their bodies pressed together for warmth.
'Overpopulation?'
He turned his head slowly, studying the endless sprawl before him.
No streetlights illuminated the path ahead.
Only small, scattered fires flickered along the road, their light trembling in the cold air like dying stars.
He chose a direction and started walking.
After a short while, he found an empty alley between two ruined buildings and stepped inside.
'Seems like I'm uninvited here too.'
He gave a quiet snicker.
Just like in the pipes, every pair of eyes that met his carried the same look. Unease, fear, or hostility.
Then, as if answering his thoughts, a voice came from the shadows beside him.
"Give me your clothes, or I'll kill you."
Solian turned his head, surprised to see a girl no older than fourteen. Her clothes were nothing more than torn rags, and in her shaking hand, she held a rusted knife.
He glanced around calmly.
"Do you think I'm joking?" the girl screamed.
"Perfect," Solian murmured under his breath.
She gritted her teeth and lunged.
Solian moved just enough to meet her motion, his hand closing around the knife mid-swing.
The girl's eyes went wide. She tried to pull the weapon free, but it wouldn't budge, as if caught in something invisible.
Before she could react, Solian's other hand shot forward and wrapped around her throat. The grip was firm, stopping just short of crushing it.
"I need information," he said, his tone calm, almost patient.
A choked gurgle escaped her lips as tears began to stream down her face. Her body trembled violently in his grasp.
Solian studied her for a moment before exhaling and releasing his hold.
She dropped to the ground, coughing and gasping for air.
"Breathe for a moment," he said, crouching beside her. "Then I'll ask questions."
The girl pressed her palms into the mud, shuddering as she drew each breath.
Solian was about to speak when the girl lunged, thrusting the knife toward his throat.
He snapped his head to the side, causing the blade to miss by the barest fraction. His arm shot up, catching her wrist mid-swing, and without pause he clenched his hand. A series of sharp cracks followed as the bones in her wrist gave way under the pressure.
The knife slipped from her grip and hit the ground with a dull clatter. A scream tore from her throat, echoing against the alley walls. She swung her free arm wildly, striking at him in blind panic, but Solian didn't move.
His jaw tightened as he shifted his grip, closing his hand around her throat. He lifted her from the ground with a single motion and slammed her into the mud. The impact knocked the air from her chest, and her body twisted beneath his knee as he drove it down, pinning her in place.
He grabbed her face, fingers digging into her jaw, forcing her to meet his gaze.
"Tell me everything you know about this place, and I might let you live."
Her face was pale beneath the dirt, her eyes wide and watery. For a moment she only stared, trembling, as her breath came in ragged gasps. When Solian's grip shifted back to her other wrist and pressure built against the bone, she broke, choking on her own sobs as words began to spill from her mouth in a desperate rush.
After half an hour of merciless pressure, Solian released his grip and stood. He glanced once at the girl before turning away.
'Education must be a luxury here,' he thought.
Even after forcing the answers from her, he left with more questions than he had before. Her knowledge was thin and jagged. She knew where they were and little else. She had no sense of politics, no sense of the city's structure. That made the information he had gained shallow at best.
An hour passed and the crowded streets emptied around him. Rows of ruined buildings rose on either side, a mix of collapsed apartment blocks and single, sagging houses. Solian looked up at one of the taller structures and froze for a moment. He had not noticed what hung above. The sky was not a sky here. Overhead, a tangle of pipes and ruined infrastructure stitched the air together. Occasional flickers of light winked across a rooftop far above him.
"This must be what they call the sky," he murmured.
The girl had told him one useful thing. He was in the lowest part of the capital. That was all she could offer. He guessed the city was built in layers, one level stacked upon the next. The "sky" above the buildings was probably the floor of the layer above.
He pushed that thought aside and stepped into an abandoned house that looked marginally less ruined than the rest. The walls were battered, but the structure still held. It offered privacy. He shut the door and moved inside.
Most windows were boarded or broken, but a few panes remained, letting in the dim, filtered light from the layer above. The place had a handful of rooms. A kitchen stood with rotting furniture, and a common room held a stone bench. "This will do for now," he said.
He was not especially worried about someone finding him. The streets were empty for good reasons. He was in the depths, the lowest quarter of the capital. From what he had seen in a few hours, it was where the city's unwanted and poorest lived. Law meant little here, and crime meant everything. People survived by claws and barter. That explained why he had come. He preferred facing beasts out in the wild to bargaining with desperate humans.
At the far edges of the depths lay the outskirts, a place even fewer dared to live. Beyond them the land returned to ruin and the monsters roamed freely. Solian settled on the bench and listened to the muffled thud of the city above, thinking through the next move.
'Even though the capital doesn't pay attention to this place, I doubt they'd let anything too powerful roam around here.'
That thought was what Solian had bet everything on when he ventured toward the outskirts. With the Crown of the Goblin King's passive constantly active, none of the lesser beasts should attack him, and if his assumptions were right, nothing greater than that would appear in these streets.
He lay down on the stone bench and exhaled deeply. Exhaustion weighed over him like lead. His body was covered in bruises, his muscles ached, and even though the worst of his wounds had closed, the fatigue behind his eyes was harder to ignore.
Out of idle thought, he raised his right hand toward the ceiling. Faint scars ran across his knuckles like branching veins beneath the skin.
'My wounds heal incredibly fast,' he thought, flexing his hand slowly. 'Even the bones mended perfectly.'
The longer he considered it, the more he came to appreciate Hunter's Physique. It had already proven its worth more times than he could count. If he ever had to choose between his relics, he knew the answer without hesitation. He would give up everything else before he gave up this.
The world around him began to blur, the edges of sound and light melting into one another. His thoughts slowed, drifting between exhaustion and half-formed dreams.
Within moments, even the ache in his body dulled to nothing. The last thing he felt was the cold stone beneath him and the slow, steady rhythm of his own breath before everything faded into silence.
He wasn't sure what woke him, the cold, the silence, or the faint echo of footsteps outside. His eyes opened slowly, adjusting to the gray light creeping through the boards.
He sat up, rubbing the stiffness from his neck before stepping outside.
"I need a watch."
The words came out flat, more thought than sound.
He started walking, weaving between the countless ruined buildings. For now, he had only one goal, to familiarize himself with the area.
Just like the girl had said, there was almost no sign of human life. Rats darted between piles of rubble, squeaking as they moved. Occasionally, a scream echoed somewhere in the distance, but it faded just as quickly as it came.
Aside from that, the streets were silent, save for the low mechanical rumble from above, the ceaseless groan of engines and pistons reverberating through the false sky.
He was halfway through vaulting a collapsed wall when his body suddenly betrayed him.
The strength in his arms vanished mid-motion, and he crashed to the floor, his breath scattering dust into the air.
A sharp pain tore through his chest, as if a hand had reached inside and squeezed his heart until it could no longer beat freely.
"What's happening?"
His voice cracked. Cold sweat pooled along his temples, dripping down his face.
He pressed a hand against his chest, fingers trembling, digging into the fabric as if he could force whatever was inside to stop.
The pain didn't fade, it spread. It crawled up his throat and down his left arm, burning and heavy at the same time.
Every heartbeat felt uneven, unstable, like his chest was stuttering.
A slow panic began to take hold. His thoughts splintered, breaking into fragments of disbelief and confusion.
Each breath came shorter, sharper, until it felt like his lungs had forgotten how to work.
He gasped, clawing at his coat, trying to make room for air that refused to come.
"Am I… having a heart attack?"
The words barely left his lips. His pulse thundered in his ears, and the world began to close in, sound shrinking, vision narrowing, until all that existed was the crushing pressure inside his chest and the echo of his own heartbeat fighting to keep going.
Then, a familiar feeling as information flooded his mind.
NEW CURSE DISCOVERED:
Hunter's Thirst
When Heaven forged the first hunter, it did not grant him peace, only purpose. The Hunt was not a choice but a law, movement without mercy, existence without rest. To stop was to defy creation itself, for stillness breeds decay. Their hearts were bound to pursuit, their souls to the act of killing, and through that endless melody, they endured.
Passive: The bearer is bound to the act of the Hunt. If no creature is slain within Heaven's measure, the heart will falter, and the flesh will begin to rot.
Solian crawled into the building, his eyes darting through the shadows for any sign of movement. Sweat dripped from his chin, pattering against the floor.
He coughed, blood spilling from his lips, and dragged himself through the broken doorway onto the street.
'Where are they.'
His vision swayed, the world blurring at the edges. He forced his trembling hand toward his head and tore the Goblin King's crown free, throwing it into the mud.
"Please…"
He could barely move. Each breath sent knives through his chest, each heartbeat stretched into eternity. The pain clawed through his ribs, and he could feel his pulse weakening, slipping further with every second.
Then, movement.
A dark, crooked shape peeked around the corner.
The creature was no taller than a child, its skin the color of old earth, stretched and uneven. It moved on two legs, but its back was hunched. Long arms brushed the ground as it stepped forward, feeling its way across the mud.
It had no eyes, only smooth, scarred flesh where they should have been, relying on touch and smell to sense the world around it.
Solian's gaze steadied. For a moment, pain was replaced by instinct.
He stopped breathing as the creature crept closer.
When it came within an arm's reach, Solian's body snapped into motion.
His arm shot forward like lightning, his hand clamping around its head.
The thing shrieked and flailed wildly, claws scraping against his coat.
Solian gritted his teeth, the tendons in his arm standing out like cords.
He began to squeeze.
The creature's flesh gave way beneath his fingers. The skin split, slick and warm, until he felt the rough curve of bone.
"Please…"
His voice trembled, more prayer than command.
"Please… give in."
He pressed harder.
A faint crack echoed through the alley, followed by another.
then one of his fingers broke through the skull with a brittle pop.
The bone folded inward, collapsing around his hand like shattered pottery.
He didn't stop.
Each pulse of strength drove his fingers deeper, grinding through the fragments, tearing brain and bone alike until the head finally burst under the pressure.
Hot blood sprayed across his chest and cheek. The creature's body twitched once, then went limp, its head a ruined mass of flesh and bone.
Solian's arm dropped, his hand trembling, the creature sliding from his grip to the mud with a splatter.
And in that same moment, the pain in his chest was gone.
Solian fell onto his back and stared up at the sky above.
Pipes and faint lights filled his vision, stretching endlessly across the dark ceiling.
For a while, he didn't think about anything. The world was quiet.
Even the stench in the air seemed distant, almost bearable.
He was just grateful to be breathing again.