Chapter 59: Inside Out
Azakh-Tur's claws tore gouges into stone as he waited. Maces burned in his grip, bloodlight leaking with every ragged breath. Each step left smears of him behind.
'Hurry...'
He pulled himself up as the mantis stalked closer. Carapace glinted orange and black. Scythes twitched in hunger.
'Any day...'
Above, Pain and Panic hammered at the stalactite, arms jackhammering. Stone cracked, shards rained across his shoulders. Grimm's faint glow pulsed blue, tracing the fracture line. Almost ready...but not fast enough.
The mantis shrieked. The sound shredded his eardrums.
"Drop it now!"
He roared, jaw tight. But he knew. It was too late.
The foreleg blurred. Faster than any strike before. No room to slip clear—
—and his body came apart.
[Rotflow // Activated]
[User HP <10% // Survival Protocol Engaged]
Flesh liquefied. Black sludge ripped from bone. Muscle sloughed into strands. His frame collapsed inward, pouring into cracks, sluicing aside as the scythe ripped the ground open where he'd stood.
The stalactite broke loose.
CRACK!
The ceiling buckled. A mountain of stone tore free and crashed onto the mantis's back. Dust blasted outward. Steel screamed. The chamber thundered like the earth itself was splitting.
The beast screamed, legs thrashing, pinned for a heartbeat. Just a heartbeat. The armor cracked, spiderweb fractures splitting across its shell—but still it rose, dragging the slab until the rock slid free.
'Boss! It didn't work—just cracked it!'
Pain's voice stabbed through his skull as Azakh-Tur reformed, sludge snapping back into sinew and bone. He staggered upright, arm half-dead at his side, health bleeding on his screen.
"You just don't fucking quit, do you?"
The mantis steadied, aura bleeding off its carapace. Azakh-Tur lowered his stance, Butcher's Wrath heavy in his grip, bloodlight boiling, and launched into the air with every ounce of strength left coiling in his arms.
"Break, you piece of shit!"
BOOM!
[118 Damage]
The first mace crashed into the fracture, shards spraying.
BOOM!
[132 Damage // Critical!]
The second blow split it wider—plates cracking open, pale meat exposed.
The mantis buckled, shriek tearing stone. It steadied, mandibles slick, heat pouring from its aura. Azakh-Tur's arms trembled, weapon heavy, but he refused to lower it.
Then the aura detonated. Pressure slammed him like a wall, blasting him off its back. The air turned weightless as he flew, calm for a heartbeat.
'This is it…'
He had nothing left.
[-62HP]
Impact bent him across a railcar, steel caving under the hit. Blood smeared behind him like paint.
[HP // 4/460]
Panels screamed warnings, red text flooding his vision. He ignored all of it. All that mattered was the quake of its steps, the rasp of its breath, the sight of it looming.
The mantis peered down, head tilted, human eyes glowing, mandibles dripping green saliva onto his chest. It knew. It knew he was finished.
"It's too bad…"
He spat blood into its face, grin carved in gore.
"Dying just after being born has got to suck."
The ceiling broke.
Two shadows dropped into the wound he'd made.
The mantis's eyes went wide, human pupils shrinking to pinpricks. For a second it froze, as if refusing to believe what had just pierced its shell.
"Eat it alive."
Then—violence. Body convulsing, legs thrashing, scream splitting the chamber. Saliva turned to blood as Pain and Panic clawed inside, screeching with mad delight. Their teeth tore into raw flesh, no bones to stop them, no muscle thick enough.
Baba-yaga's summons-voice twisted high and wet, a keening of agony, not beast, not human. The broodlings laughed from inside its body.
Azakh-Tur's lips split bloody. Grimm drifted down beside him, hovering over his ruined frame, intestines gently caressing his master's wounds.
"You did good."
His voice was heavy.
"Don't worry about me. I'm already healing."
Demonic Will had deactivated earlier when he used Rotflow, but it didn't matter. His brood feasted, their joy feeding through the link, stitching his body back together piece by piece.
Just enough for him to quickly roll out of the way of a thrashing leg.
The mantis's eyes widened, human irises shrinking as realization hit. For a breath it froze—denial in its stare—then the convulsions began.
Legs hammered stone and steel, railcars split, shrieks shaking the chamber. Blood poured from its mouth in ropes as Pain and Panic clawed deeper into the crack, their screeches bubbling inside its chest.
[HP // 2876/3200]
[-24 Damage]
[-28 Damage]
The link flared. Not hunger this time—rage. Hot, sharp, protective. They weren't just feeding. They were furious that something had dared to break their boss.
Azakh-Tur staggered back, dragging himself across the ground. His chest heaved, one arm useless, Butcher's Wrath scraping beside him.
[Broodlink // Feed Active]
[+9HP]
[HP // 22/460]
[+9HP]
[HP // 31/460]
The mantis reared, mandibles flaring. Panic dug his knife into lung tissue, twisting, laughing between shrieks. Blood sprayed his face as he tore free a chunk of meat with his teeth.
[-26 Damage]
[-29 Damage]
It hacked wetly, green spit turning to red.
Pain wasn't laughing. His claws buried steady, carving slow and cruel. He ripped upward through rib and cartilage, jaw clenched, feeding his hate into every gouge.
[-25 Damage]
[-23 Damage]
Through the link Azakh-Tur felt his fury, sharp and focused, a mirror of his own bloodlust. It almost startled him.
The mantis slammed against the cavern wall, bursting stone, trying to crush them inside. Its shriek rattled the ceiling. Grimm shrieked back, his glow jittering blue, darting between Azakh-Tur and the beast as if torn on where to shield.
[+9HP]
[HP // 49/460]
[+9HP]
[HP // 58/460]
Pain's claws punched through a lung. Panic found the bile sac and bit down, yanking veins loose like strings.
[-24 Damage]
[-28 Damage]
[-30 Damage // Critical!]
[HP // 2249/3200]
The mantis sagged, its forelegs twitching, blood gushing from its mandibles in thick sheets. Its scream broke into a bubbling groan as more flesh spilled from the split in its chest.
[+9HP]
[HP // 67/460]
[+9HP]
[HP // 76/460]
Azakh-Tur rose shakily, wounds knitting with each pulse of Feed. He bared his teeth as he felt it—jealousy burning. His broodlings were inside it, feasting, savoring what should belong to him.
Dropping to all fours, his horns pressed out, his claws split longer, teeth cracking against each other. He sprinted across the gore-slick stone, leapt, and climbed its collapsing body.
"Enough!"
Pain and Panic froze at the command, blood dripping from their jaws.
Azakh-Tur dove into the wound, forcing himself into the broken carapace. His body twisted as he shoved himself in. He dove deeper, ripping through wet muscle. His claws tore, his jaws clamped, blood sluicing over his face.
[-92 Damage]
[-101 Damage]
The mantis shrieked high and raw, eyes bulging wide, thrashing its massive body against the cavern walls. Chunks of stone split and rained. Its forelegs scraped trenches across the floor, desperate to dig him out.
[HP // 1783/3200]
He dug with both hands, pulling loops of intestine free and hurling them aside. Gnawed on slimey tissue, laughing as blood gushed into his throat.
[-94 Damage]
[-98 Damage]
[HP // 1591/3200]
His teeth sank, his throat worked. He swallowed its life.
[-102 Damage // Critical!]
[HP // 1489/3200]
The beast reared up, body convulsing. Legs smashed railcars flat. Its scream warped into a bubbling hiss as blood drowned its lungs.
[+9HP]
[HP // 94/460]
[+9HP]
[HP // 103/460]
He kept feeding, carving. The broodlings fury bled into him. They weren't satisfied with meat—they wanted punishment.
[-91 Damage]
[-95 Damage]
[-100 Damage]
[HP // 1303/3200]
Azakh-Tur dragged himself higher inside the chest cavity, forcing meat apart with raw strength. Insides cracked wider, connective tissue snapping like broken shields. His claws scraped bone as he wedged deeper.
[-93 Damage]
[-98 Damage]
[HP // 1112/3200]
The mantis toppled sideways, slamming into the stone with a quake, its body splitting open under the weight. Blood cascaded out in torrents, drowning the ground beneath. Grimm shrieked nervously, his glow jittering as he orbited the collapse.
Azakh-Tur's grin stretched bloody.
"Move."
He shoved Panic and Pain aside, their eyes wide, bodies covered in filth as he seized the heart with both hands. His claws sank in. He tore it free in a single ripping pull.
[-102 Damage // Fatal]
[HP // 0/3200]
The mantis convulsed once, twice, then went still. Its final scream choked wet in its throat.
Silence held. Only the drip of blood from split carapace, the rattle of death inside the corpse, the faint grind of stone settling overhead. For what seemed like minutes, nothing moved.
Then, the gap in the carapace, filled with blood and ground muck began to stir. A figure dragged itself free of the wound, black with gore, body dripping bloodlight as it crawled out into the open. Pain and Panic followed close after, slick with entrails, their chests heaving steady as Broodlink poured strength back into them. Their eyes glowed, bloodlust burning through the haze.
The boss licked his teeth. Smiled.
"Mine."
[+4000Exp]
Three sources of system light exploded.