The group of monsters just stayed at a distance and dare not take a step forward. Because they all well had seen what would happen to them if they did.
The monsters were paralyzed. Even though they were feral, bloodthirsty predators driven by corrupted mana, their primal survival instincts kept them pinned.
The sheer presence radiating from Jas Maddox acted as an invisible, impenetrable fortress. Watching one of your own kind’s strong ones getting killed like that didn’t exactly create a good impression.
But they could not run away as well, it was in their nature to look at the humans, even if they could not touch them, even if they could not approach them. Staying there and staring at the group was the only thing they knew, apart from tearing each other apart.
Unless another C-Rank Lesser Calamity Lord or the B-Rank sovereign itself descended from the volcano, absolutely nothing in that jungle would change.
"He’s right," Hide stated, breaking the tense silence as he drank water from one of the many bottles he had kept in his inventory, water was necessary, he had learned his share back in that four star dungeon. He kept his voice flat, leaning into the tactical role Claire and Maddox had drafted him for. "The low-tier beasts won’t move."
Ryan looked at Hide with glinting eyes, desperate for so analytical grounding and taking it as the opportunity. "Volter... you’ve cleared such gates before. Do you know how the beasts arrange themselves in such gates where there is a stronger being controlling them?"
Hide picked up a stick and poked the embers of the fire. He drew on the knowledge he had gathered from his past experiences.
"It’s a hierarchy, mainly, if you can call it that," Hide explained, keeping his eyes on the flas. "The bottom line is that a Higher Calamity Lord doesn’t manage its territory, these monsters do not answer to anyone. According to what I have seen... a B-Rank beast will always have two Lesser Calamity Lords acting as its servants—like the one the Commander just flattened. They act as generals or whatever."
Hide looked up, eting the terrified gaze of his teammate. "We have to hunt down the remaining C-Rank calamity beast, and then we have to kill the B-Rank sovereign. Only when the fake Dungeon Master falls will the gate yield the spatial key required to open the exit threshold. To use that, I think you know this part, that we have to kill all the beasts in order to use the keys."
Ryan nodded, accepting that. Not like he had a choice, he too knew how the loops gate worked, but this one was a bit different as it had Calamity lords inside.
Gideon groaned, rubbing his face with his massive hands. "So we have to fight another one of those... and then sothing even worse."
"That’s the job, you all clear. One information that no one must have told you. You all are familiar with how the loop gates work right?" Maddox chid in cheerfully with the question.
Sora took the lead and answered. "Yes, the beasts restore back to their normal numbers after a period of ti."
"Correct," He snapped his finger. "But unlike the other beasts, the Calamity lords do not regenerate, so it is the only ti you will face them, and to face them is the whole point of you lot being here."
"Now sleep." He commanded a beat too late.
Despite the suffocating dread and the hundreds of glowing eyes watching them from the dark, the exhaustion of the day finally took its toll. Gideon and Ryan rolled out their sleeping mats they had brought on the sand, passing out within minutes. Sora leaned against the base of a palm tree, her cap pulled low over her eyes, feigning a casual rest while her breathing eventually slowed into a deep, rhythmic slumber.
Hide lay back on the sand, closing his eyes. But he didn’t sleep. With his Vitality and Endurance stats being so high, and his cellular fatigue completely overwritten by his skills, he didn’t need to rest yet.
He waited. He listened to the crash of the ocean waves, the crackle of the dying fire, and the steady breathing of his squad.
When the timing was perfect—when the night was at its absolute darkest—Hide silently sat straight up.
As he expected, Jas Maddox was wide awake.
The S-Rank Commander sat on the log, his elbows resting on his knees, staring intently into the glowing embers. The playful mask he always wore was completely gone. In the dim orange light, Maddox looked every bit the weary, ancient soldier he truly was.
He didn’t look at Hide and said nothing.
Hide stared at his profile for a long minute before he finally broke the spell.
"Why?" Hide asked, his voice a low, steady whisper that didn’t carry past the fire. "Why did you do that?"
Maddox didn’t feign ignorance. He didn’t ask what Hide was referring to. He slowly turned his head, his brown eyes reflecting the dying flas.
"Look, Hide," Maddox said, his tone stripped of all humor, leaving only a heavy, unyielding seriousness. "You cannot say that na in front of anyone else. Not your squad, not the dia, and most of al not your friends."
Hide interrupted him. The fury he had been compressing in his chest for hours surged upward, hot and vicious. He almost raised his voice, almost shouted the words into the dark, but his discipline maintained his icy calm.
"How long?" Hide demanded, leaning forward, his blue eyes flashing with a predatory intensity. "How long are you trying to keep that a secret from the masses? You know exactly what Estopia is. You know that these gates aren’t just natural disasters—you know they can be opened and controlled."
Hide’s fists clenched until his dark-steel scales threatened to pierce his own skin. He thought of his mother, Erin Volter, bleeding out on the floor because she had stumbled too close to a truth the world refused to acknowledge.
"If you know sothing that could change the entire fundantal structure of this war, you should just tell the world, no?" Hide’s voice vibrated with venom. "If all the exterminators knew the truth, maybe they could stop the gates. But no. Instead of ending it, you are sitting in a comfortable office, hiding secrets within secrets."
Maddox stared at the boy. For a long, suffocating minute, the Commander did not speak. The wind howled off the ocean, rattling the palm leaves above them.
When Maddox finally responded, the weight of his exhaustion seed to age his youthful face by decades. He let out a slow, ragged sigh, dropping his gaze back to the ash.
"I... I am sorry for that, Hide," Maddox whispered, his voice carrying a profound, quiet sorrow that caught Hide completely off guard. "But when you see as much as I have seen, and know as much as I know... you are forced to keep secrets. Because the truth you are so desperate to drag into the light doesn’t bring salvation."
Maddox looked back up, his eyes locking onto Hide’s with a terrifying, chilling certainty that sent creeps under Hide’s skin.
"It only brings more secrets to keep and more loss to mourn."
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