Following Mythy’s theory about the 'mana vacuum,' the air on the third floor seemed to grow twice as heavy.

  "Keep formation tight. Maximum alert," Mosin ordered, his voice cold and absolute. "Do not drop your guard for a single second."

  Despite the clear command, the ingrained arrogance of a top-tier party made them just a little too comfortable. They flawlessly maintained their roles, but the true tension hadn't quite reached their bones.

  BANG!

  A sudden, sharp impact echoed from the darkness ahead. Instantly, an overwhelming wave of killing intent flooded the corridor. Uncle and Michael slammed their massive shields into the stone floor simultaneously, bracing for the impact of whatever nightmare was coming.

  Instead, a figure stepped casually out of the shadows.

  It was Meijin. The young Assassin spun a dagger around his finger and let out a loud laugh. "Come on, look at your faces! It’s just a C-Class dungeon. Why are you all sweating so hard?"

  SMACK!

  The sharp crack of a palm against flesh rang out. Meijin’s head snapped to the side from the force of Mosin’s strike. For a second, the entire dungeon felt dead silent.

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  "Pathetic," Mosin hissed, his eyes devoid of any amusement. "Failing to value your own life, treating this like a game when the fundamental logic of this dungeon is collapsing... it’s nothing short of suicide."

  "Hey! It was just a joke!" Meijin snapped back, instinct causing his grip on the dagger to tighten. Anger flared in his eyes.

  "That's enough, both of you!" Uncle barked, stepping his massive frame between the two. The cracks in the flawless S-Class party were beginning to show.

  And in that split second of distraction—it happened.

  A High Lone Wolf, massive and mutated, launched itself from a blind spot directly above them. Its jaws unhinged, mana dripping from its fangs as it dove straight into the center of the broken formation.

  It was too fast. The instincts of Mosin, Meijin, Uncle, and Michael screamed at them, but their bodies, caught off-balance by the argument, couldn't react in time. For the first time since they had Awakened, a fleeting shadow of despair crossed their eyes. They weren't going to block it.

  BOOM—!!!

  A deafening explosion of displaced air ripped past their faces. The sheer concussive force of the blast shook the entirety of the Sanhell Dungeon like a violent earthquake. Dust and loose stone rained down from the ceiling.

  When the ringing in their ears stopped, the High Lone Wolf was gone. It hadn't even touched the ground. Only a cloud of fine, gray ash drifted down where the beast had been suspended in mid-air.

  Mythy lowered his hand. His index finger and thumb were still shaped like a gun, a thin wisp of hyper-condensed mana smoking from the tip.

  "Come on, chill out," the thirteen-year-old said, his voice completely flat, completely unbothered. He shoved his hands back into his pockets. "Uncle Mosin, you're taking this way too seriously. Meijin, you joke around too much. It doesn't matter. It's still a breeze."

  He walked past the frozen adults, not even looking at the ash on the floor. "Let's just go to the next floor."

  High Lone Wolf or visualizing the S-Class party, drop a comment or hit me up in the DMs. Let’s build this dark fantasy IP together.