CHAPTER 2: THE MEAT SHIELD'S FINAL LAUGH
"Fuck… Fuck...that damn… son of a bitch!"
The words came out as a wet, gargling wheeze. Yo-han leaned against a jagged obsidian wall, his lungs burning with every breath. He reached up to wipe his mouth, but his hand came away coated in thick, crimson blood. His vision was beginning to swim, the edges of the dark cavern blurring into a hazy mess of gray and red.
Yes, Yo-han was dying. He was fucking dying.
He wasn't dying a hero's death. He wasn't falling in a blaze of glory while defending the innocent. He was dying in the dark, deep within a mid-tier Gate, because he had been stupid enough to believe in the word "promise." He had trusted the very people who viewed him as nothing more than a piece of equipment and a disposable one at that.
For two months two whole months at that, Yo-han had served as the group's porter. He had carried their heavy crates of supplies whenever they want, sharpened their spare blades when they go and come back from the tower dungeons, and hauled their bulging bags of mana stones until his shoulders were raw and bleeding. He had done it all because Naim had promised him a fair share of the trades.
"Don't worry, kid," Naim had said, clapping a heavy hand on Yo-han's shoulder weeks ago. "Work hard, keep your head down, and I'll make sure you get enough to live like a king."
Naim, the leader of the party, was a man who possessed a Unique-Grade Artifact. He was one of the elites of elite if you look at it like that, a man known by the title < Conqueror >. In the world of Raiders, a title wasn't just a nickname; it was a mark of absolute power. Naim was the kind of person who didn't need to care about weaklings like Yo-han.
Yet, for some reason, Conqueror Naim had approached him. He had offered Yo-han a job when no one else would. He had promised that his artifact a shimmering, gold-inlaid shield would protect Yo-han from any danger.
Yo-han had fallen for it. He had done everything literally everything to prove his worth. He had been the first to wake and the last to sleep. He had endured the mocking gazes of other Raiders who called him a "trashy slave bastard" and a "leeching cockroach." He had ignored the whispers that Naim was only keeping him around for a darker purpose.
He hadn't been blind. He had suspected foul play. But when you are starving, and the only hand reaching out is holding a poisoned crust of bread, you eat it anyway. Conqueror Naim was the only one who let an F-Rank without skills join a high-level party. Yo-han had clung to that "generosity" like a lifeline.
But today, the lifeline had turned into a noose.
The raid had gone totally wrong. An Elite Monster a shadow-marrowed beast with eyes like burning coals had ambushed them in the tower dungeons and the second floor in that matter. In the chaos, Naim hadn't raised his legendary shield to protect his porters.
Instead, he had used them.
"Buy us some time!" Naim had roared, his face twisted into a mask of cold indifference.
With a brutal shove, Naim had sent Yo-han and the other three porters stumbling into the path of the beast. It wasn't a mistake. It was a tactical sacrifice. Naim and his "true" teammates had used the few seconds of the monsters' feeding frenzy to turn and run toward the exit escaping for their dear lives.
Whatever happens in the dungeon stays in the dungeon. No witnesses. No survivors. No guilt.
"Ah… Naim… you motherfucking bastard!" Yo-han screamed, but it was barely a whisper.
He looked over to his left. The other porters young men just like him, desperate for a better life had already been silenced. Their bodies were being torn apart, their screams cut short by the sound of snapping bone. They had become nothing more than monster feed to ensure a "Conqueror" could live to see another day.
A hysterical, jagged laugh bubbled up in Yo-han's throat. He laughed until he coughed up more blood, the irony of it all hitting him like a physical blow. He had worked himself to the bone for two months just to become a snack for an Elite Shadow Beast.
"If I had known… if I had only known…"
He wouldn't have come. He would have stayed in the rain, delivering pizzas. He would have lived as a ghost. But the offer had been too good. The lie had been too beautiful.
The beast finished its meal. Its glowing eyes turned toward the last remaining morsel: Yo-han.
"You damn bastards," Yo-han hissed, his fingers clawing at the dirt. "See if I ever trust another soul again! See if I ever bow my head to another 'Hero'!"
The grudge he felt was a physical weight, heavier than any bag he had ever carried. It was a cold, black fire that burned hotter than the monster's breath.
"I'm going to become an evil spirit," he snarled, his eyes wide and bloodshot, staring at the beast as it lunged. "I'll haunt you, Naim! I'll tear your throat out in your sleep! I'll haunt every single one of you for the rest of your pathetic lives!"
Just as the beast's claws reached for his chest, the ground beneath Yo-han gave way.
The vibrations from the battle, or perhaps the sheer weight of the monster's leap, had triggered a structural collapse. The obsidian floor shattered like glass, and Yo-han found himself falling.
He didn't scream. He just watched the light of the upper floor disappear as he plummeted into a pitch-black abyss, falling toward a floor that shouldn't have existed.
As the wind whipped past his ears and the darkness swallowed him whole, a strange blue light flickered at the corner of his vision a notification that was different from anything he had ever seen before.