The tunnel was a familiar beast, an echoing throat of concrete and damp air. This time, they were leaving by choice, stepping out of the light and into the calculated risk. Three of them. Maya, a silent phantom in the lead. Leo, his phone a feeble spear of light. And Arthur, bringing up the rear, his breath a soft hiss in the quiet.
Every sound was a gunshot. The crunch of grit under a boot. A single drip of water from the ceiling. Leo's heart hammered against his ribs. He watched Maya's back, the fluid, predatory grace of her movements. She moved like she was part of the darkness.
"Stairwell in fifty feet," Arthur murmured. "Probability of encounter… twelve percent. Low. They're concentrating on the fifth floor."
They began the climb, a painstaking ascent. At the second-floor landing, they passed the frozen massacre, the bodies of goblins and humans still locked in their final, violent embrace. They kept climbing.
They reached the fourth-floor landing. The heavy, steel fire door was closed but not locked. Maya held up a hand, pressing her ear to the cold metal. After a long moment, she shook her head.
Arthur had his eyes closed. "The path directly ahead… sixty-five percent chance of being clear. To the right, a side corridor. Probability of patrol… eighty-eight percent. We go straight."
Maya nodded, pushing the door open with a low groan of hinges. They slipped into the unknown.
The fourth floor was… wrong. The legal department. A labyrinth of high-walled cubicles and dark wood-paneled offices. The plush carpeting swallowed their footsteps. No bodies. No blood. No signs of a struggle. The air was stale, smelling of old paper, leather, and the cloying scent of a forgotten air freshener.
"This isn't right," Leo whispered. He swept his light across a desk. Neat stacks of paper. A family photo, smiling. A half-empty coffee mug. An office frozen in the last second of a normal day.
"They were evacuated," Arthur said, his eyes scanning the area. "Or they just… vanished. More likely… it's a trap."
They moved through the maze, a tense, silent procession.
"Vantage point," Maya hissed, pointing toward a large corner office. "From there, we can see the gym."
"The direct path is a risk," Arthur murmured, his eyes closed again. "There's a concentration of… something… in the central bullpen. High-probability hostile encounter. Ninety-two percent. The perimeter route, through the offices, is longer, but safer. Forty-five percent."
"Perimeter," Maya decided.
They hugged the walls, slipping from one dark, silent office to another. Each one was a diorama of a life interrupted. A half-finished crossword. A child's drawing taped to a monitor. They were ghosts, haunting the ruins of a world that had died just days ago.
Halfway there, they heard it. A soft, wet, tearing sound from the central bullpen. Followed by a low, guttural crunching.
Maya froze, pressing them back into a doorway. Leo risked a glance over her shoulder.
A goblin patrol. Five of them. But they were different. Bigger, their skin a darker, mottled shade. They wore scavenged body armor—a police riot helmet, a kevlar vest, the thick leather of a motorcycle jacket. They were armed with crude short swords.
And they were gathered around the body of another goblin. Eating it.
Leo's stomach turned. He swallowed hard against the rising bile.
"They're evolving," Arthur whispered, his voice trembling. "Adapting. The System is… rewarding them."
"Their armor is a problem," Maya stated, her voice a low, tactical assessment. "My knives won't be as effective."
One of the goblins, its face smeared with blood, looked up. Its head twitched, sniffing the air. Its black, beady eyes scanned the darkness, and for a terrifying second, Leo thought it was looking right at them. It let out a low, questioning grunt. The others stopped their gruesome meal and looked up, their heads turning.
They hadn't been seen. But they had been sensed.
Slowly, the lead goblin, the one in the riot helmet, began to move toward their hiding spot. A slow, cautious, hunting stalk.
They were trapped.
Arthur squeezed his eyes shut. "Probability of winning a direct confrontation… twenty-seven percent," he hissed. "Successful retreat… thirty-four percent. Not good. Not good at all."
The goblin was getting closer. Ten feet away. It drew its sword, the blade a dull, hungry gray. Maya tensed, her body a coiled spring, ready to launch into a probably fatal attack.
Leo's mind raced. He scanned the office they were hiding in. A desk. A computer. A heavy, old-fashioned, wheeled office chair. An idea, born of a thousand tedious office moves, sparked. A helpdesk solution. Stupid. Insane.
He looked at Maya, then at the chair. He pointed—chair, goblin, push. She stared at him as if he were speaking gibberish.
The goblin was five feet away. It raised its sword, its mouth opening in a silent snarl.
"Probability of survival now… eighteen… fifteen…" Arthur was muttering a frantic litany of dying hope.
"Do it," Leo whispered.
She looked at him for one more second, a flicker of something—trust? desperation?—in her eyes. Then she nodded. With a deep breath, Maya put her shoulder against the heavy office chair and shoved.