**CHAPTER 23: **
The subway entrance exhaled a corpse-breath stench of rust and rotting meat. Blackened streaks of ichor painted the collapsed concrete like claw marks from something massive trying to dig its way out. Elena Vasquez tossed him a rebreather without looking, her plasma whip already sparking in anticipation.
"Seal it tight. Dredger pheromones melt brains."
Seun caught the mask one-handed, his eyes never leaving the tunnel's yawning mouth. The System's analysis scrawled crimson warnings across his vision:
**[NIGHTMARE DREDGER (DEMI-KING RANK)]**
**[THREAT PROFILE: PSYCHOTROPIC HAZARD/PHASE-SHIFT CAPABILITY]**
**[WARNING: SHADOW HARVEST STRONGLY DISCOURAGED (COGNITION HAZARD)]**
Elena checked her wrist display. "Trial rules—"
"Don't care." Seun adjusted his grip on Nightfang, the voidsteel blade drinking in the dim light. "Either lead or get out of my way."
Her jaw tightened but she stepped aside. The tunnel swallowed them whole.
---
### **THE KILLING DARK**
The first hundred meters passed in silence, their boots crunching over bone fragments and shattered riot gear. Then the air changed—thickening with a wet, organic pressure that made the rebreather's filters hiss in protest.
Seun saw it first.
A flicker of movement where the shadows shouldn't have moved.
His blade was already sweeping up when the Dredger *phased* through solid concrete, its six barbed legs splaying open like a grotesque flower. The creature stood three meters tall at the shoulder, its chitinous hide rippling with bioluminescent veins that pulsed in time with Seun's suddenly racing heartbeat.
Elena's whip cracked forward—
—and passed harmlessly through the beast's suddenly incorporeal abdomen.
**"Ģ̴͝ǎ̸͜ẗ̶̤́h̷̺͂e̵̗͝r̶̫͌i̵̻̒n̷̛̗g̵͝ͅ ̷̘̈́ḑ̶̋a̵̮̕ţ̵̈́ä̴̖́"** the Dredger intoned, its voice vibrating directly in their skulls. **"S̶͓͝p̶̧̓a̸̳̎w̴̦̅n̷̳͝ ̸̥̽o̵̖̿f̴̬̾ ̵̳̔ť̸̰ḫ̸͝e̷̳̓ ̴̺̌F̴̺͝i̴͎̒r̵̻͠ṡ̷̹t̶̲̋ ̴̖̋M̷̼̌ö̷̘́ņ̵̎a̴̝͝r̶̙͝c̶̙̑h̴̺̽ ̵̫̈́ď̸̝ě̷̬ẗ̸̼́ě̸̩c̷̱̿t̸̳͝e̸̥͛d̷̠͌"**
Elena screamed as the creature's foreleg speared through her thigh, lifting her off the ground like a butterfly pinned to corkboard. Blood rained onto the tracks as she fired her sidearm point-blank into the Dredger's face—to no effect.
Seun didn't move to help.
He *observed*.
The way its legs blurred between corporeal and intangible. The rhythmic pulse of its bioluminescence. The half-second delay when reforming after an attack.
Weaknesses.
---
### **SHATTERING ILLUSIONS**
The Dredger whipped Elena's body against the tunnel wall hard enough to crack concrete. She slid down in a broken heap, her whip skittering across the tracks toward Seun.
**"Y̵̳̕o̵̳̕ǘ̴̩ ̶̘̈́ŗ̴̅ǎ̴̠n̸̘̅g̷̗̓ ̸̗̒f̴̦̈́r̸̹̈́o̵̳͠m̵̺̎ ̴̼̅t̷̳̽h̸̹̓ë̷̪́ ̴̳̆T̸̟͋o̴̼̊w̵̤̌e̸̘̅r̵̩̈́"** it hissed, phase-shifting toward Seun. **"Ļ̴̎a̶̦̅s̴̱̎ț̶̾ ̵̖̾o̸̳͂f̷̤͝ ̴̟̈́t̵̤̕h̷̫͌ě̷̗ ̶̤̈́S̶̫̊ḧ̴͖́a̷̳͝ď̷̙o̵̦͌ẅ̸̰́-̷̤̅b̵̝̆ơ̸̫ř̸̖n̷̗͝ë̸̪́"**
Seun exhaled through his nose.
Then he *moved*.
Nightfang carved upward as the Dredger struck, the blade passing harmlessly through its phased body—
—until Seun twisted mid-swing and *slammed* the flat of the blade against the tunnel's steel support beam.
The resulting shockwave of metallic vibration made the Dredger's form *stutter*.
**[SONIC DISRUPTION DETECTED]**
**[PHASE-SHIFT INTERRUPTED]**
For exactly 1.4 seconds, the creature became fully corporeal.
Seun was already pivoting, his boot crushing Elena's fallen whip into activation as he kicked it upward—
—straight into the Dredger's pulsating underbelly.
The overloaded plasma coil detonated with the sound of a small sun being born.
---
### **AFTERMATH**
Smoke coiled from the Dredger's twitching carcass when Elena finally crawled upright, her nanites stitching muscle back together with visible discomfort. She stared at the smoldering ruin of what should have killed them both.
"You... knew its weakness."
Seun wiped black ichor from Nightfang's blade. "Observation. Basic tactics."
She limped closer, blood still dripping from her ruined leg. "Bullshit. That thing was quoting Lazarus Project intel. It *recognized* you."
The System pinged urgently:
**[PSYCHIC RESIDUE DETECTED IN SHADOW VEINS]**
**[COGNITIVE HAZARD: MEMORY FRAGMENTS DETECTED]**
Seun turned toward the exit without answering.
"Wait!" Elena grabbed his arm. "You owe me an expl—"
Cold steel pressed against her throat before she finished speaking. Seun's eyes held less warmth than the dead creature behind them.
"Owe you?" His voice could have frozen nitrogen. "You'd be carrion if I hadn't intervened."
The plasma whip's melted handle crumbled to dust between them.
"Remember that before making demands."
---