Chapter 66: Death Womb
The Matriarch's birthing canal convulsed, skin splitting as she spewed a tide of slick kits in a wash of blood and discharge. The stench was choking, the squirming pile screaming before they even hit the stone.
Seo-jin laughed through the spray.
"Perfect."
Three skills on colldown. Not for long. He dove into the swarm, cleavers biting, meat and fur scattering in bursts.
Lynn's arm shook as she steadied her pistol, the weight of the fight pulling her eyes again and again toward him...her Boss, her monster. Her savior.
'He doesn't remember…'
But she did.
The fire gnawing her chest was corruption, though she couldn't know it. Even if she had, she would've welcomed it. It came from him. That was enough.
"Watch out!"
Her shot cracked across the cavern, round smashing into the Matriarch's eye. The boss's swing veered wide, missing Pain by inches. The broodling never glanced back, only roared, claws tearing another burning line across the swollen gut.
The Matriarch reeled, leapt backward, one hand clamped over her stomach.
The ground shook as she landed. Lynn felt her skin prickle, hate locked onto her. The charge came, a wall of flesh and fangs, and she froze until an enormous cleaver slashed across the Matriarch's face.
Seo-jin had already closed the gap, his weapons blurring in a storm of bloodlight, hacking at the giant's defenses. Slash after slash ripped the aggro from her and back to him.
[Rend // Deactivated]
[Cooldown // 5min]
Broodlink burned alive between them. No need for verbal commands.
He feinted back, cutting toward the kits, and Pain crashed in without hesitation, flames tearing from his body as he rammed the boss's hip. Panic clung to its head like a parasite, dagger flashing as he hacked at the base of an ear.
Snare kept to the corpses, his feeding constant, blood spraying as his mind never left the fight. His eyes tracked every twitch of the Matriarch's body.
'Why only him…?'
Pain's strikes carved at her stomach, while Panic stabbed higher, yet she focused only on Pain. Not flinching, not diverting, her rage locked on his fire and brute force.
A possibility came sharp in Snare's mind.
"Pain! Legs!"
No response. His brother kept hammering gut.
"Pain!"
The order cracked like a whip—Seo-jin's voice through the link. Pain shifted instantly, claws gouging deep into a thigh.
The reaction he'd hoped for happened, Snare almost laughed as he screamed, fangs bared in triumph.
"The gut! Rip the gut—that's the weakness!"
When Pain had switched and began hammering low, claws raking through its leg, the Matriarch's focus didn't stay on him. Her head snapped, rage locked onto Panic. Snare reasoned, it wasn't the damage that drove her, it was the gut she guarded.
Following his brother's advice, Panic saw his chance. Hanging by one ragged ear, he swung down, dagger flashing. One plunge—three wet pops. The Matriarch shrieked, bile and blood spraying from her stomach as she reeled.
The scream summoned every kit in reach. They hurled themselves at Panic, a tide of claws and teeth.
[-12SM]
[Black Pit // Activated]
[-30% Speed / Radius 4m / Duration 30sec]
Before they landed, the ground turned black. Shadows thickened like tar, dragging limbs, choking movement. At the same time, system light burned across claw and fang.
[-2SM]
[Hive Pulse // Activated]
[All Broodlings // +15% Attack Speed]
The swarm faltered. The brood quickened.
[Minor Soul Stone Consumed]
[+25SM]
Seo-jin's bloodlight flared, his body a furnace of red as he dove in.
[-2SM]
[Rend // Activated]
[+15% Slicing Damage]
Cleavers grew, edges screaming through meat. He carved in fast, strikes ripping fresh wounds into the Matriarch's gut.
[+165 Damage]
[!! Critical !!]
[+176 Damage]
[+162 Damage]
The boss bled heavy now—her resistances weak against slicing, flesh peeling under his blows. Health dropped steady.
[Boss HP // 9452/12800]
"Snare! Watch for shifts!"
Snare caught fragments of Seo-jin's memory through the Broodlink, tactics seared into him mid-fight. He scanned, eyes narrowing.
And saw it.
"Retreat!"
Pain and Seo-jin broke back instantly. Panic didn't.
"Huh?"
The Matriarch's foot slammed down.
The ground split like torn hide. Stone caved inward, tunnels collapsing as a shockwave ripped the chamber apart. Panic didn't brace in time, his waist crushed flat, legs turning to pulp as his torso was launched like a rocket, intestines ripping in thick ropes across the stone until he slammed into a wall.
Seo-jin raised Butcher's Wrath, digging trenches with his heels as the quake slammed through him. The weapon held, absorbing the brunt, but his body screamed. Pain staggered, bleeding from the impact, tossed aside like he'd been hit by a hammer.
Snare and Lynn were far enough back to survive the quake, but their eyes locked on Panic's ruined body.
"Ignore it!"
The order cut through their shock. They snapped back to the Matriarch.
Bloodshot yellow eyes burned, veins glowing as her bulk coiled low. Every muscle clenched, the sound of sinew grinding louder than the quake.
She vanished—
The spot Panic hit exploded. His scream strangled out as the broodling's arm shredded to ribbons, his torso slamming sideways, bones cracking wet. He hit the ground and skidded, already half a corpse.
The Matriarch's legs bunched again, claws tearing grooves in the wall as she hung suspended.
She vanished—
Seo-jin's vision stuttered. He couldn't track her. Just flashes of impact, stone shattering, rock spraying, elderwarren corpses torn into red fog.
This time Pain caught her charge. His body twisted, bones snapping like brittle sticks, blood fountaining across the chamber as he spun through the air. He struck stone with a crunch, limp, sliding down in a heap.
System panels screamed, broodlings critical. He ignored them, bracing for his turn.
[-1SM]
[Fiendskin // Activated]
[+5% Physical Defense]
Skin hardened. His feet began to split, claws ripping through human skin as they hooked into the ground.
[-12SM]
[Black Pit // Activated]
[-30% Speed / Radius 4m / Duration 30sec]
Nineteen Soulmass left. Not enough, and it didn't matter. Their damage wasn't enough, Desecrate wouldn't tip the scale. The truth hit hard. He wasn't strong enough to take this boss, not alone, not even with the Brood. He should've found some humans and dragged them in, broken them if he had to, forced them to bleed for him.
Too late. Regret was useless now. He let the thought rot, let instinct take the reins. Bloodlight boiled off his flesh, bloodlust thick as smoke. Every nerve locked down, every breath timed.
He needed the perfect moment. All that was left was do or die.
[4th Weapon Effect // Activated]
[Slicing Damage Converted → Bludgeoning / Piercing]
Responding to his killing intent, Butcher's Wrath warped faster than usual, cleavers bulking into hammers of meat and metal. Hellfire still burning, Soulmass bleeding away—
"Motherfuckers!"
The roar rattled stone. Lynn's gunfire cracked from the backlines, wild and useless. She was trying to save Panic from the surviving kits. Pointless.
The Matriarch didn't slow. She ricocheted from wall to wall, every bound detonating stone, claws carving trenches in the cavern. Sparks burst, rubble rained, each impact louder than the last.
She couldn't keep it up forever. Her body strained, lungs howling, but for a heartbeat she faltered. The intruder standing his ground, the one who had slain her children, radiated something colder than fire. The bloodlight pressed into her bones. For the first time since reaching her status, she felt small. She felt like prey.
The doubt didn't last. The stink of her slaughtered young flooded her skull, rage flooding out fear. Her eyes blazed—
'Now!'
The boss launched.
Seo-jin swung.
Their collision detonated.
Rock and dust erupted.
Lynn hit the floor hard, ears ringing. Her vision spun, but instinct dragged her hand toward Panic's ruined frame. His body was pulp, intestines wet across her legs. She dragged him into a heap of bone and shit, hand glowing weakly as she tried to hold him together.
Pain clawed his way upright, blood steaming from his ribs. Snare crouched low, eyes narrow, a kit writhing in his mouth. Both stared into the settling cloud.
A groan leaked through the dust...wet, broken. First to be seen, the Matriarch sprawled sideways, claws digging as she tried to push upright, blood pouring from half a face.
Lynn's lips parted, hope breaking through. The cheer rose in her throat...then froze. She screamed instead.
The dust thinned.
Not Seo-jin. Azakh-Tur. Demon.
The human shell was peeling back. Flesh warped, organs spilling from a torn gut, but no longer human, black entrails writhed, steaming, thick with veins that pulsed even outside the body. His lungs fizzled, pink flesh rotting to black, folded wrong, one split open and dripping. Broken ribs jutted through his skin like jagged stakes.
Embedded in the stone, he looked less like a demon and more like a ruined corpse nailed up for display. And yet, even ruined, even gutted, his body bled bloodlight. A mutilated carcass that still burned with hate.
Pain and Snare roared, tearing toward their father. Lynn only screamed louder, clutching Panic's corpse, her mind breaking. The Matriarch was already rising again, eyes locked on the broodlings. They were running straight into death.
And Seo-jin...her savior, her everything—hung broken in the wall.
Tears stung. Hatred surged. Madness swallowed the rest.
Her hand clawed backward. Fingers found something. Ripping it forward, her jaw snapped it in half. Teeth gritted. She swallowed it whole.
A Deathcap.