I looked around at the group. There were thirteen of us left. Juna was still sitting beside me healing, but the pain was fading—a sign that she was nearly done.

  The glow faded from her hands, and I looked at my arm. Rough skin covered the edges of the stump, but while there was no bleeding, the rest of it was a mess of torn flesh that was just on the starting point of healing. I went to thank Juna, but she simply collapsed on me.

  “I’m sorry Sean. That’s the best I can do. I’m tapped out.”

  I wrapped my good arm around her to hold her up. “Thanks anyway. It’s better than bleeding out.”

  The rest of the group stood or lay within the faintly glowing circle, in shock. I moved to settle beside Parker, bringing Juna with me.

  “What are those things? This is a D-Rank dungeon, right?”

  Parker looked at me with a sigh. “I don’t know. I may only be C-Rank, but I’ve been at this for fifteen years and never heard of anything like this. Those monsters? They one-shotted both Johnson and Reeves. You’d have to get into an A-Rank dungeon to fight something that could do that to a C-Rank. And you wouldn’t find a C-Rank in that level of dungeon to test out that theory.”

  I fidgeted, and Juna leaned into me. It seemed like she wanted reassurance as much as she was reassuring me.

  “So what do we do now, Parker? We’re safe in this circle, but the door is closed, and as soon as we cross the circle, the Knights will attack again. We can’t escape the room, and we can’t stay here forever.”

  Parker looked at me. “Hah. You’re right. And you were right about this safe zone. Maybe you should be leading this raid.”

  I felt uncomfortable about that. All I’d done was point out the facts and what I observed. Before I could object, Parker continued.

  “You’re observant. Look around and tell me what you see. Maybe we can figure something out. No dungeon I’ve heard of is unconquerable by design.”

  I looked around.

  Our group of Hunters huddled, defeated and afraid.

  The circle of brass surrounded us, glowing a faint blue.

  At the center of the circle was another smaller circle, also glowing a faint blue.

  The Knights stood sentry under each blue-flamed torch again, motionless and resting their hands on their weapons. The color of the torches matched the glowing brass.

  Then there was the immense statue that hadn’t played a part in anything yet. Holding scales and sword. And some time during the chaos, its eyes had become wreathed in the same blue flame. It was as stone faced as a statue should be, but I somehow got the impression that behind the impassive mask it gloated at our predicament.

  I described my thoughts to Parker.

  “We’re clearly in a safe zone, laid out by the brass circle. Anyone outside the circle will die for certain. But it’s only safe when it’s active —the blue glow. Which matches the torches, the Knights, and the statue. Something is going to deactivate the safe zone, and I don’t know what.”

  I pointed at the statue. “That thing is linked to the safe zone —same color flame. I’m guessing it stands in judgment over us—the scales.”

  I pointed to the centre of the circle, “And then there’s that. A smaller circle about the size to fit one person. Obviously a trigger of some kind, but for what? A trap? Dropping the safe zone? I don’t know.”

  A nearby hunter stood. “Well, let’s find out then.” He walked towards the smaller circle.

  “Trey, wait!” Parker called after him. “We don’t know what it will do!”

  Trey called back over his shoulder, “And we never will just sitting here. And we can’t stay sitting here forever.”

  He took up position, standing directly in the circle and facing the statue. As with the larger circle, as soon as he crossed the brass line, it flared into life with a blue flame and then died back to a subdued glow. I held my breath.

  With a groaning of moving stone, the statue shifted. It leaned forward and looked directly at Trey, and now I could definitely see an expression on its face. A malevolent, gloating grin now occupied its face, below the flickering ice blue flames of its eyes.

  Seconds passed by before another scraping of stone behind us drew my attention. I turned in time to see the doors to the amphitheater swing open with a boom that wasn’t dampened by the strange effect. I didn’t catch who spoke first.

  “The doors are open!”

  Trey turned around and his face lit up. “That’s all it took? Let’s go then!”

  As soon as he stepped out of the small circle that triggered the doors, the statue moved. Faster than anything that size should move, its stone sword flashed out across the arena, large enough that its length crossed all the way to the center of the circle.

  It obliterated Trey as much as bisected him. Blood and viscera exploded from him in all directions. Not one of us was unscathed but the Hunter directly opposite the statue bore the brunt of it.

  The doors slammed shut. One of the torches winked out and I could no longer see the Knight that stood under it.

  “What the fuck?!” screamed another Hunter.

  Parker looked to me again. “What do you think Sean?”

  I wasn’t sure why he was asking me. I’d just noticed things anyone could. But since he was asking me…

  “Clearly someone needs to stand in the circle to open the doors. Equally clearly they aren’t allowed to leave until the statue has finished whatever it’s doing.”

  Parker nodded. “Yes, that’s my thoughts too. But what happens after the statue finishes? Is it going to kill them anyways?”

  “I don’t think so.” I looked around. “Dungeons always have a set of rules. They always follow those rules. The rule here is ‘don’t step out of the circle’.”

  “I agree.” Parker nodded again. “We just need someone to stand there until something else happens. Whatever it is.”

  “I’m not fucking standing in that circle,” the hunter who screamed earlier interjected.

  “Well someone has to,” snapped another, “or we’ll be stuck here!”

  A third hunter spoke up with a raised hand. “I’ll do it.” She was an attractive woman in form fitting robes that brushed her ankles. Like my father had been, she was Korean. A large number of Hunters working in America were foreigners drawn by the larger salaries paid by the corporate guilds. I recalled her name now - Seoyun.

  She stepped into the circle, ignoring the remains of the previous Hunter. She stood proudly, staring up at the statue. As before, the circle flared and settled, the door ground open, and the statue leaned forward again.

  This time, she stood there long enough that I noticed the Knights were moving again. They moved forward at a slow pace, converging towards the circle with us inside it.

  The circle still glowed blue. Would it still protect us, I wondered.

  Another Hunter wasn’t waiting to find out. “Let’s try this,” she muttered, and took off running. She wasn’t assisted by an ability like the last to try this on but her lithe and long legs carried her forward rapidly.

  “Katie, wait!” Parker called out after her, but she kept moving, angling between the two Knights as she got closer. I held my breath as she crossed between them.

  They ignored her and continued their path towards us. She quickly vanished through the door.

  Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

  “It’s safe! Let’s go!” called one man.

  Parker held up a hand to forestall the rest of us, but two more left the circle at a run.

  Seoyun stood still and continued to stare at the statue, meeting its gaze without fear. As the seconds passed, blue flares in its eyes grew in intensity. None of us moved. I could feel Juna shivering against me.

  Suddenly, the statue changed expression. Its eyes flared then dimmed, and it took on a look of disgust as it straightened. A metallic shunk sounded and Seoyun stiffened, her mouth open in shock. Blood poured from it and she slumped, but didn’t move otherwise.

  It was only then that I noticed the brass spike that had emerged from the top of her head, coated in blood and flecks of grey. Beneath her skirts, where we couldn’t see, she’d been impaled on a thick brass spike from the floor, through her entire body.

  The brass spike disappeared with another shunk, and she collapsed onto the ground, blood drooling from her mouth and dripping from the hole in her head.

  “Holy fuck!” another Hunter cried as he shied away from her body. “No fucking way am I stepping in that circle for you fuckers. I’ll take my chances with the Knights before I step in that circle.”

  At that moment, a metallic screech sounded behind us. Looking back, one of the runners had been run through, impaled on the longsword of a Knight, who unceremoniously kicked him off to clear the blade.

  The other runner had made it past the Knights by this time, and was halfway to the door.

  Which was now grinding shut again.

  But now the Knights were moving at their original speed, and one turned to pursue that last runner. Its longer legs and faster pace quickly closed the distance to her.

  She screamed as she pelted towards the closing doors, but slammed into them. The last gap had closed. She kept screaming as she hammered on the door, until she was silenced by the Knight’s descending blade.

  A stunned silence fell over the group.

  Parker sat dejectedly. “We can’t leave the large circle. We can’t open the doors without sacrificing someone. What exactly are we supposed to do here?”

  One of the hunters looked up, desperately hopeful. “Maybe the backup team will rescue us?”

  “No,” said Parker, “we’re only a day from the Veil Breach. This dungeon was low priority because of its low rank, so they roped us in at the last minute. It was supposed to be an easy job.”

  Parker was right. I was most often going into Veil Dungeons that only had a short timer on them, because those were the ones that The Hunters Association assigned Hunters to. Anything more dangerous was also more valuable, and the Guilds took over. They got cleared quickly and mined out. Dungeons like the one we were in rarely had the rights to them purchased, but they needed to be cleared regardless, else the monsters inside would breach the Veil that separated the dungeons from our world.

  Which brought us back to here. A group of strangers and barely acquaintances, sent into an E-Rank dungeon for a quick last-minute clear…only now we were facing something far more deadly.

  I looked at the door, and the Knights guarding the approach to it. I looked up at the once more impassive statue, convinced that there was a way to solve this puzzle. What was the statue looking for? It had obviously examined Seoyun and found her wanting.

  She’d stared directly at it with confidence. Was that it? Everything in this room overmatched us. None of us could look at any of these monsters with any expectations of defeating them. We were forced to follow their rules as much as they were governed by them. Seoyun had acted as if she belonged there, as if she’d earned her place in the center. She’d grinned back at the statue like a challenge.

  I could never do that. I was certain of my place in this world: at the bottom. And everything I’d seen in this amphitheater seemed designed to impress that same feeling on the other Hunters. They just weren’t listening.

  “I will do it.”

  Parker looked up at me in shock.

  Juna actually gasped and clutched me tighter. “Sean, no! You can’t.”

  Parker relaxed—or rather, let the tension drop. “You’ve figured something else out, haven’t you Sean?” .

  I nodded. “I…think so. I think I know what that thing wants.”

  Parker looked tired now. “You’ve been right so far. I think I can trust your instincts.” He gestured to a nearby Hunter. “Jake, help me move Seoyun.”

  The two men lifted and dragged her dead weight aside as gently as they could. Parker placed her hands across her chest and murmured something as he closed her eyes.

  It was clear now that there was a small brass disk in the center of the circle, obviously hiding what had killed Seoyun.

  I looked at the circle I was about to step into, now flecked with Seoyun’s blood as well as the hunter who was killed before her. Was I really going to do this? Risk my life on a hunch?

  I looked around me. Bodies scattered between us and the door, cut down by the Knights before they could reach safety. Two dead bodies inside the circle. The Hunters still alive were not unscathed—I was not the only one wounded.

  I couldn’t in good conscience do nothing. The raid party had essentially carried me here. As much as it pained me to risk my sister’s future, at least all these people could leave here alive.

  Steeling myself, I stepped into the circle. Once again, the circles flared. The doors opened. The statue leaned towards me. And the Knights started moving.

  I looked at Juna. She looked back at me with tears in her eyes. There was really only one thing I had to say.

  “Go.”

  Parker clapped me on the shoulder. “You’re a good man Sean. You won’t be forgotten. The Association will hold a memorial, and I’ll carve your name in The Wall myself if I have to. And don’t worry—I’ll tell your sister you’re a hero, make sure she gets the help she needs.”

  Emotions pricked at the corners of my eyes, and I struggled to swallow before responding, “Get going Parker. Who knows what the Knights will do when they get closer.”

  He turned to the remaining Hunters and his tone shifted into command. “No time to waste. Let’s get out of here before anything changes. Help those who need it. Defensive formation, just in case. Let’s go, people!”

  He clapped his hands and everyone started moving. Except for Juna. She moved directly in front of me, and looked me in the eyes for a moment. “It shouldn’t be you,” was all she said before wrapping me in a quick hug.

  When she pulled back, determination showed in her eyes.

  “I love you, Sean. I wish I’d been brave enough to say so before now.”

  And then, to my surprise, she kissed me, soft lips pressing hard into mine.

  My brain locked up, and I failed to muster a response before she was gone, helped along by Parker.

  Glancing back up at the statue, it hadn’t budged, but I swore that the gloating grin on its face had widened.

  Turning my gaze back to the group, I could see them moving slowly due to the amount of injured and exhausted among them, plus being extra cautious as they threaded past the approaching Knights. I sighed with relief when they passed without notice.

  The group moved a little faster now, but still hampered by the wounded. The Knights continued to close in on me, and the group of Hunters only reached the edge of the arena itself by the time the Knights were at the edge of the larger brass circle. I was relieved to see that it was still glowing blue.

  And then it wasn’t.

  The Knights marched over it without breaking stride. They were going to reach me in a few moments, and several raised their blades in preparation.

  But I knew that if I moved, the doors would close. We would all die.

  I held my ground. Stood firm. I didn’t feel brazen or confident—I felt sick, bracing for the pain I knew was coming. But I knew that they would live, and I was content with that. A small but sorrowful smile tilted my lips.

  This was okay.

  Juna chose that moment to turn and look back. She screamed, “Sean!” her voice raw with terror. Parker held on to her and kept her moving, but she held one arm stretched towards me.

  Regret washed over me. If I’d known she was interested, we could have been something. Or if I’d been brave enough, I could have taken the risk and asked her out. Now, all those opportunities were gone.

  I didn’t see the first strike as it plunged into my back. I fell to my knees, but stayed within the circle. I was determined that no part of me would cross that line until my friends were past those doors. They were close now.

  My thoughts turned to my sister. Without my income she would no doubt struggle. The standard Hunters Insurance would only cover the basics for a little while. But she was a smart girl, and she worked hard. This was not ideal, but she would be okay.

  Another blade thrust into me, but I grabbed the blade to hold me up. The edges sliced to the bone, and my hand slipped along it, but that was the lesser pain than the two swords running through my lungs and stomach. But nothing was going to stop me from making sure I saw Juna leave safely.

  Somehow, I kept watching until they reached the doors and disappeared into the darkness of the corridor. Once they were only a couple of points of mage lights, I let myself go.

  Lying on my back, bleeding out, coughing up blood onto my face, missing an arm and with a severed spine —none of that was on my to-do list for today.

  As my vision dimmed and a Knight loomed over me with sword raised, tip pointing downwards, a sense of rage at the injustice filled me.

  They came to my world. They took my father. They gave me nothing. And now they expect me to just lie there and die?

  Fuck. That. Shit.

  As the Knights sword descended, I slapped at the blade. I couldn’t stop it from impaling me, but I turned it away from a killing blow. It was going to have to work harder than that.

  Rolling over towards the Knight tore the blade from me, another pain added to the list. My legs flopped uselessly—that first thrust into my back had clearly severed my spine. How I’d managed to remain upright enough to watch Juna get to safety I didn’t know.

  That left me with one arm. The best I could manage was to wrap that around the legs of the Knight standing over me and try futilely to leverage my shoulder into them.

  That got me nowhere.

  I’d hoped for something more eloquent in my last moments, but the best I could manage through the pain was, “FUCK YOU!”

  A hand yanked on my hair and I felt a short blade across my neck. As everything finally went black, my last thoughts were of my sister Lucy, Juna, and lost opportunities.