Chapter 89: The Hive
Sector 44-J was a graveyard of rusted steel and shattered concrete.
The squad had spent the last four hours navigating the treacherous ruins of a pre-apocalypse city.
The red fog was thicker here, clinging to the decaying skyscrapers like a physical weight.
At the center of a collapsed financial plaza, buried beneath tons of fallen rubble, was a massive set of reinforced, blast-proof steel doors built directly into the earth.
"Old World bunker," Cole observed, running a gloved hand over the rusted locking mechanism.
"Military-grade. Whatever is down there, they wanted to keep it buried."
"The mana density below us is completely stagnant," Natalie reported, her eyes closed as she pressed her hands against the steel.
Her face was pale.
"But there are signatures. A lot of them. They are small, erratic, and practically vibrating with toxic mana."
"What else could it be other than a monster nest," Aegon concluded. He leveled his spear.
