The first wave hit like a landslide of teeth.
Senrix didn't think.
Thinking was for before.
Now there was only the sword in his hand, the weight of it, the way the air shifted a fraction before the lead creature lunged.
[Combat Genius] was already mapping it, three strides, weight on the back left leg, jaw opening too wide, balance off.
He stepped left instead of back.
The blade rose in a tight arc, catching the creature under the jaw and cutting clean through cartilage and sinew.
Hot blood sprayed across his face, but he was already moving, twisting the sword free as the body collapsed. One down.
Twenty more visible.
More coming from behind them, funneling through the narrow path.
"Keep moving," he muttered.
Not to anyone else.
There was no one left to hear him.
The next creature was faster, low to the ground, built like a starved wolf but with chitin plates fused to its spine.
It went for his ankle.
Senrix jumped, using the montum to bring the sword down on its spine mid-air.
The chitin cracked with a sound like breaking ice.
The creature shrieked and rolled, legs kicking out.
He finished it with a stomp to the throat.
'Good. Bad footing. Use it.'
The path was narrow here, carved into the mountainside with a drop on one side and sheer rock on the other.
Perfect for a bottleneck.
Terrible if he got surrounded.
He moved forward, forcing the horde to co at him single file.
Every swing was asured, no wasted motion, no wide arcs.
The sword was too heavy for that, and his arms weren't that strong yet.
So he let the monsters' montum do the work.
Parry, redirect, cut. Parry, sidestep, stab.
One creature leapt from the rock face above.
Senrix heard the scrape of claw on stone a half-second before it dropped.
He rolled forward, letting it sail over him, and drove the sword up through its underbelly as it passed.
It died mid-scream.
The sll was getting worse.
Copper, rot, and sothing acrid like burnt hair.
His shirt was soaked in sweat and blood, sticking to his skin. His lungs burned.
'Still not enough. If I stop moving, I die.'
Another wave.
This one had sothing bigger in the back, taller, hunched, dragging one arm that ended in a ss of broken bone and jagged claw.
He could see it even through the press of smaller creatures. It wasn't charging yet.
It was waiting, watching, learning.
Smart.
Annoying.
Senrix adjusted.
He couldn't let it flank him.
He needed to thin the small ones first, keep the path clear, and force the big one to commit on his terms.
He feinted left, drew three of the smaller ones in, then pivoted and cut low, hamstringing two of them.
The third overextended and he drove the sword through its eye socket.
The blade stuck for half a second.
He wrenched it free with a grunt, using the body as a shield against the next attacker.
The shield didn't last long.
Claws tore through it and him.
Pain flared across his left forearm, three lines of fire where sothing had raked him.
He didn't stop to check how deep.
He kicked the attacker back, used the space to yank the sword free, and drove it through its skull before it could recover.
The big one growled.
Low, guttural, vibrating in his chest.
It was done waiting.
It slamd forward, shoving two smaller creatures aside like they were nothing.
The ground shook. Senrix adjusted his stance, feet planted wide, sword held high.
[Combat Genius] practically scread at him: 'Too fast. Don't et it head-on. Redirect.'
So he didn't.
When the creature swung, he stepped in, inside the arc of its claw, and drove his shoulder into its forearm.
It was like hitting a wall.
Pain shot through his shoulder, but the angle was enough. The swing went wide, the claw gouging a chunk out of the rock face instead of his chest.
Senrix didn't waste the opening.
He brought the sword down on the creature's exposed wrist.
The blade bit deep, but not deep enough.
Bone stopped it.
The creature roared and backhanded him.
The world went sideways.
He hit the ground hard, rolling twice before he skidded to a stop near the edge.
For a second, all he could hear was ringing.
His vision swam.
The sword was five feet away.
The big one was already coming.
Senrix forced himself to move.
He rolled again as claws slamd down where his head had been, gouging the stone.
He scrambled for the sword, fingers closing around the hilt just as a smaller creature lunged for his throat.
He didn't have ti to stand.
So he didn't.
He swung from the ground, a wide, desperate slash that caught the creature across the legs.
It fell, and he used its body to push himself upright.
The big one was on him again.
This ti, Senrix let it hit him.
He dropped his shoulder, took the impact, and used it to spin around the creature's side.
The sword ca up in a backhand slash, cutting deep into the creature's ribs.
Black blood poured out, steaming in the cold mountain air.
It roared, reared back, and brought both claws down in an overhead slam.
Senrix ducked, rolled forward between its legs, and ca up behind it.
He didn't aim for the spine, too well guarded.
He aid for the hamstring, the sa trick he'd used on the small ones.
The blade bit.
The creature's leg buckled.
It fell to one knee with a sound that shook the mountain.
Senrix didn't give it ti to recover.
He climbed.
Used the hilt, the crossguard, the creature's own hunched back as footholds. When he reached the base of its skull, he didn't hesitate.
The sword ca down.
There was resistance, bone, muscle, sothing dense and wrong.
He put his weight into it, bracing his foot against the creature's shoulder.
The blade screeched as it ground through.
For a mont, nothing happened.
Then the head lolled, and the body went limp.
The big one collapsed forward, sliding down the path and taking five smaller creatures with it.
The ground shuddered again.
Silence.
For three seconds.
Then the rest of the horde surged forward, angrier, faster, like the death of their leader had woken sothing in them.
Senrix pulled the sword free with a wet sound and stepped back, breathing hard.
His left arm was numb.
His vision was starting to tunnel.
'Not done. Not even close.'
He could see more movent further down the path.
The knights were gone.
The caravan was gone. It was just him, the mountain, and the Nightmare.
He spat blood onto the stone and adjusted his grip.
"Co on, then."
The next wave hit.
---
He killed twelve more before he noticed the pattern changing.
The creatures weren't just charging anymore.
So of them were hanging back, circling, flanking.
One of them, smaller, leaner, with too many joints in its arms, was using the rock face to climb above him.
'They're adapting.'
His stomach dropped.
"Great," he muttered, dodging a swipe and countering with a stab to the throat. "Of course it can do that."
The climber dropped from above.
Senrix caught it mid-air with a rising slash that opened it from sternum to hip.
It didn't scream.
It just stared at him with dead, glassy eyes as it fell.
More ca.
Always more.
His arms felt like lead.
His legs were shaking.
The sword felt heavier with every swing.
He was slowing down.
A claw caught him across the ribs, ripping through his shirt and skin.
He staggered, and for half a second, the world went red at the edges.
He forced himself forward, driving the sword through the creature that had hit him and using its body to keep himself upright.
The path ahead curved.
He could see the peak now, faintly, through the mist.
Close, yet too far.
Another roar.
Different this ti, deeper, older.
From further down the mountain.
Senrix's blood went cold.
That wasn't part of the first wave.
That was sothing else.
Sothing that had been waiting.
The creatures around him hesitated, as if hearing it too.
Then they redoubled their attack, desperate, frenzied, like they were trying to kill him before whatever was coming arrived.
Senrix laughed. It ca out ragged, half a cough.
"Of course. Why make it easy?"
He braced himself, sword trembling in his grip.
The last thing he saw before the next wave swallowed him was movent at the edge of his vision, sothing massive, moving through the mist below, heading up.
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