The cavern burned.
Heat pressed down like a weight, thick enough to choke. The air shimmered, rippling over the rocks, carrying the taste of ash and iron into Cass's mouth with every breath. The ceiling dripped with glowing cracks, and the floor trembled under claws heavy enough to break mountains.
Cass braced behind his shield.
The dragon's breath struck.
Flame slammed into the metal like a hammer. The sound was a shriek of tortured steel. Heat clawed through the straps and into his arms until his muscles trembled. Smoke curled upward in gray ribbons.
System:Durability of Shield < 12%
The cold words cut across his vision, then vanished.
He dug his heel deeper into a crack in the stone floor. If he moved, even a step, the dragon would surge forward and the whole cavern would become a tomb.
Behind him should have been the sounds of his guild. Healers chanting. Arrows whistling. Valorin's voice cutting sharp orders with calm authority.
Instead, there was only the sound of boots fading into the tunnel. Retreating.
They had left him.
"Hold him a little longer, Cass."
Valorin's voice echoed in his ears, smooth and steady. A command wrapped in false warmth. Cass had wanted to believe it meant trust. But he knew. Die here, so we don't have to.
The dragon inhaled again. Its chest swelled, ribs glowing like molten bars. Each breath drew in the heat of the cavern, and when it exhaled, the whole world shuddered with fire.
Cass raised his shield higher. A crack ran through the center, splitting wider with every impact. His health bar already bled into yellow.
He thought of the whispers before the raid. Brion muttering, "Better him than me." Not a single voice had argued.
The flames came.
The blast drove him back. Sparks flew where his boots scraped stone. Fire crawled into the cracks of his armor and bit his skin. His shield screamed as it warped further.
System:Durability of Shield < 3%
Behind him, faint laughter carried down the tunnel. His guild. Already safe. Already celebrating.
A sound escaped him—half cough, half bitter laugh.
He should have let go. He should have dropped the shield, thrown aside the sword, and waited for the fire to finish what it started.
But when he closed his eyes, he didn't see the dragon. He saw a hospital bed.
A pale hand wrapped in tubes and wires. Thin fingers curled weakly around his own.
"You'll be alright," she had whispered to him.
Always to him. Never for herself.
Ten million dollars. That was the number. The cost of a treatment that could have given her five more years. Maybe more. He had chased that number with every breath, every job, every raid. He had buried himself in debt for it.
And by the time he had scraped together even a fraction, she was gone.
His chest tightened at the memory. The fire felt colder in comparison.
The dragon's tail swept low. Cass tried to raise the shield, but too late. The blow smashed into his side and hurled him into the wall. His ribs cracked against stone. His vision blurred white, then black, then red.
System:HP < 10%
The shield clattered away, splitting into two bent halves. It didn't look like a shield anymore.
Cass dragged himself up. His knee trembled, barely holding. His chest burned with every breath. He planted the sword into the ground and leaned on it until his legs obeyed.
He looked once more toward the tunnel. Only shadows.
No one was coming back.
He remembered Valorin's hand on his shoulder after their first clear. "You make it easy to win," Valorin had said, voice warm with approval. The others had clapped him on the back, called him a wall.
He had thought it meant something then.
The dragon roared. The cavern shook, dust falling from the ceiling in gray showers.
Cass inhaled slow. In through the nose. Out through the mouth. The way he had done before stepping into hospital rooms, forcing a smile for her sake. The way he had spoken to debt collectors, promising another week, another payment, another chance.
His mother's laugh surfaced in his head. The one she made when he tried to steal bread before dinner. The way she had kissed his scraped knuckles after he punched a fence as a boy. Save your fists for what matters, she had said.
The memory steadied him. His mouth curved into a small, pained smile.
The dragon exhaled. Fire poured over him again.
System:HP < 5%
The sword shook in his hands. His armor burned against his skin. Tears carved lines through soot on his cheeks.
He whispered, "I won't crawl."
The dragon didn't care. Its claw rose.
Cass's thoughts reached for one last memory. The final morning. The sun had filled her hospital room, warm and golden. A bird had landed on the sill. She had smiled at it, then closed her eyes.
He had held her hand until long after it went cold.
Now, with the claw descending, the same word rose again.
"Mom," he whispered.
The claw struck.
System:HP < 2%
The cavern tilted. He landed hard, cheek against hot stone. His health bar blinked red.
System:You have died.
The words rang cold and final.
The cavern blurred. The dragon's roar faded.
Darkness closed over him.
It wasn't empty.
Pictures spilled loose, one after another. His mother waiting at a bus stop, two heavy bags in her hands, smiling at a stray dog. Her hair braided by the window, sunlight catching threads of silver. The wooden spoon she had raised like a sword when he stole food from the pot.
A pawn counter. His father's watch sliding across glass. The clerk's eyes flat as he offered less than half its worth. Cass's hand trembling as he still said, "Deal."
A loan contract spread on a cheap desk. His name signed at the bottom. The pen heavy. His gut screaming that he was tying stones to his feet, but his hands steady anyway.
Valorin's smile. Perfect, polished. "You make it easy to win." Later, colder: "Hold him."
The pain drained from his body. His lungs no longer burned. The weight in his chest eased.
For a moment, he thought it was the end.
But something shifted.
Not light. Not sound. Something deeper.
The darkness didn't close. It paused.
Like a door half-open.
Like the story had stopped mid-sentence.
Cass drifted.
He felt nothing. Yet he was pulled, slow and steady, toward something unseen.
It wasn't peace. It wasn't torment. It was a waiting.
The system prompt still hovered faintly, as if the world itself hadn't finished speaking.
A pause.
Not denial. Not acceptance.
A silence that felt like a promise.
Cass couldn't hear his own breath. Couldn't feel his body. But his mind clung to one last thought. A hand wrapped in his. Warm once, cooling slowly. Her voice, softer than air.
Don't stop here.
The darkness shifted.
And Cass drifted into it, not knowing yet that he was being pulled back to the morning when it all began.