The Lord of Carrion died screaming. Its throat tore open as I drove my blade upward, and the sound it made was nothing like a beast's roar. It was closer to a thousand flies buzzing in unison, a swarm's death rattle trying to mimic a man's cry. When its body fell, the whole chamber shuddered, and for a heartbeat I thought the ceiling might come down and bury me with it.
I stood there shaking, sword in hand, watching the carcass twitch. The stench was unbearable, rancid meat that had baked too long under a merciless sun. I wanted to gag, but my stomach had nothing left to give.
Then the reward came. It always does.
It started with heat, a slow drip of fire that bled into my veins. I ground my teeth and waited for it to end. The dungeon does not give without taking first, and it always takes in pain. When it was done, I felt something coil inside me, foreign and wrong, but powerful all the same. My grip tightened on the sword hilt. I hated it, but I could not deny it made me stronger.
That was when I heard it again.
"One kill, one gift. One call."
The voice had no body, no breath, no sound of lips shaping words. It was the dungeon speaking, or maybe something deeper than that. I have stopped trying to guess.
I lowered myself against the cold stone, my breath rasping in the stale air. The truth was I wanted to sleep, but the dungeon never allows rest. The walls themselves breathe. The silence is never true silence. Even now I could hear the drip of something I could not name, and the crawl of things too small for the eye.
But worse than all that was the choice waiting for me.
The call.
One chance, one line out into the world above. I do not know if it truly reaches anyone, or if the dungeon only toys with me. Still, I know I must take it. If I don't, then I have wasted blood and breath for nothing.
It is strange, though. The fighting is the easy part. I have been killing since I was sixteen. Steel in hand, orders in ear, coin in pocket. I was a mercenary, nothing more, nothing less. Some called me renowned, though the word always tasted bitter. Renown never bought bread. Renown never stopped a blade. But it followed me all the same.
What I was not prepared for was this. Not the monsters, not the pain. The silence. The choices.
The dungeon dragged me down here on the promise of coin and glory. A noble's bargain, they said. Bring back proof of the dungeon's heart and name your price. I took the contract. Fool that I was. And I did not walk alone. I marched in with thirty others. Men with families. Women with eyes still bright enough to believe they could make it out richer. Every one of them is gone now.
I still see their faces when I close my eyes.
I cannot tell if I survived because I was stronger, or because the dungeon decided to keep me. Sometimes I think it feeds on me, like I am its plaything, its chosen rat in the maze. Each boss I kill, it whispers that same rule. One kill, one gift, one call.
I stare now at the shimmer in the air, that faint glow that means my chance is waiting. I lift a hand toward it, fingers trembling though I try to will them steady. I could call anyone. If the call is real, I could speak to a king or a beggar. I could warn them that this place is alive, that it hungers. Or I could reach for a voice I have not heard in years, just to remind myself I am not already dead.
My throat is dry, but I whisper anyway.
"First call," I say. The words scrape out of me like rust peeling from iron. "Let's see if anyone answers."