Six days have passed, and only one day remains until something happens.

  Athan has been killing man-eaters relentlessly for the past six days. Of course, only those who were alone. He refused even to try to take on a group of man-eaters during this time.

  Athan, having killed dozens of man-eaters, has improved his swordsmanship skills and his overall fighting experience. Man-eaters that were alone stood no chance against Athan now—at least the base variant ones. The ones who just ate anything they saw. Talking man-eaters were something different, though; they had more intelligence than your normal man-eater. Or the man-eater Athan encountered on the peak, or even the queen, those were just entirely different. They were bigger and stronger.

  Hiding in a secluded place in the dungeon away from any man-eaters, Athan was getting some last-minute practice swings. His body was getting more used to the heaviness of the sword, but he still wasn’t entirely used to it yet, and his body was still weak. Unfortunately, Athan only had six days, which was nowhere near enough time to build up his strength.

  Still, Athan did the best with what he had. But before he heads back to the path where the man-eaters were dragging the humans, Athan wanted to try one more thing out. He wanted to try to take on two man-eaters at a time.

  This would help gauge his strength. If Athan was able to kill both the man-eaters, then he knew he had at least improved a little.

  Now warmed up from swinging his sword, Athan began to look for a group of two man-eaters.

  All the paths Athan was searching, surprisingly, had no man-eaters in them. ‘Did all the man-eaters go to that path?’ Athan continues to search, but he is unable to find any.

  Yet, he didn’t give up. He continued looking until he finally found a group of man-eaters. Only it wasn’t a group of two…it was a group of three. Athan kept the same unwavering look he's been managing to hold since he had started to kill man-eaters.

  The three-man-eaters haven’t noticed Athan, mainly because they were busy feasting on a human. Athan took advantage of this opportunity to sneak up on them and see if he could get some easy kills.

  Athan holds the sword far out from his body and carefully approaches the man-eaters. When in range, Athan swings his sword high in the air and strikes one of the man-eaters in the back.

  The man-eater squeals loudly and slowly dies. The other man-eaters take notice and begin loudly clacking their teeth.

  Athan dashes backward to try to predict a sudden jump from the man-eaters. And to his surprise, it worked. The man-eaters jumped towards him at full speed, but came short.

  Using this opportunity, Athan swings his sword towards one of the man-eaters and cuts its long spike clean off. Blood squirts out as a fountain, and the man-eater runs away in fear.

  With only one man-eater left, Athan takes it head-on.

  He raises his sword once more and dashes at the man-eater. The man-eater also takes Athan head-on and ends up biting Athan's sword.

  Not knowing what to do, Athan smashes the man-eater into the ground multiple times until it finally lets go.

  When it lets go, the man-eater is upside down, its back to the ground. Athan looks at the man-eaters' razor-sharp, blood-stained teeth. And with no hesitation, he strikes down through the man-eater's chest. Killing it.

  After taking on all three man-eaters, Athan takes a deep breath.

  ‘That was easier than I thought.’

  Killing those three man-eaters gave Athan enough confidence to finally go back to the path and see what lies at the end.

  The path was like the others. A long, wide path lit up by a couple of blue rocks found on the side of the rocky dungeon walls.

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  After what seemed like hours, Athan had reached the end of the path. And standing before him was a large, curved entrance to a vast, open space.

  Athan almost walks into the space like a dumb person, but he stops himself. He goes and hides behind the entrance and takes a peek at what may be in there.

  His eyes widened in horror. Just behind the entrance were man-eaters forcing people to do slave work. The man-eaters were demanding that they move stuff with their brutal clanking teeth, sending fear throughout this part of the dungeon. Athan examined further and noticed this part of the dungeon also had a peak at the top. But his peak was different; at the top of the peak, there were weird circular balls that had an odd sticky substance clinging to them.

  ‘Don’t tell me…are those eggs? Are they breeding more man-eaters?’ Athan grits his teeth in fear.

  Fearing what he should do, Athan crouches down and buries his head in his hands.

  ‘How can I save those people?’

  Athan ponders for a while, then decides what to do.

  First, Athan has decided that a distraction would be best. Second, he wanted this distraction to last as long as possible so he could free as many people as possible.

  The distraction Athan chose was a man-eater's call. A man-eater's call was something Athan discovered when he killed man-eaters for six days. It’s when they scream to get the attention of other man-eaters. The only problem is that not all man-eaters were capable of doing this.

  Athan had to go and look for a man-eater that stood out from the rest. They would have to be bigger than your typical man-eaters, and their eyes shone a brighter purple.

  Finding one of these man-eaters was quite tricky. They were never alone; always in groups of at least three or more. Making this part of the plan very hard.

  But Athan had no other choice. It was either that he tried this, or he would have to watch possibly a lot of people die. Athan carefully began exploring the dungeon, all while trying not to get too far from the entrance to the egg peak.

  Athan was falling short of finding this man-eater. All he came across was, well, nothing for the most part. All the other man-eaters were in the egg part of the dungeon. Athan still decided to keep trying.

  While walking, he passed a small path that ended in a dead end, and something caught his eye. A pair of bright purple eyes shone in the darkness.

  Athan took a breath.

  ‘Alright, here we go.’

  Athan knew that this type of man-eater was never alone. So he cautiously walked along the sides of the dungeon walls. And when he felt he was close to the man-eater, he just stood there frozen. He looked around and saw a dozen sleeping man-eaters, all surrounding the one he needed to kill. Well, not kill, but make it use its call ability.

  Carefully, Athan tiptoed through the sleeping man-eaters until he was standing above the one he wanted. And with a fearful look, struck one of its spikes off.

  The man-eater squeals in pain, and then, finally, what Athan was aiming for: it used its call ability.

  The noise was loud, causing screeching pain to Athan’s ears. It was messing up Athan’s balance.

  Any man-eaters that were asleep were now awake. The screeching noise woke anything up.

  Athan panicked and tried to escape, but he tripped over himself and fell to the ground. While on the ground, the man-eaters charge at Athan, but before they strike, a voice from the distance stops them.

  Emerging from the darkness was the general.

  “Don’t kill him.”

  The general walks up to Athan. “It seems we have had an intruder in our midst for quite some time now.”

  Athan’s face tightens with fear.

  “So, just what were you trying to achieve?” The general pauses. “Were you trying to free the people?”

  Athan has no words, only a look of fear mixed with hatred.

  “Instead of brutally killing you, why don't I just show you what we have been doing?”

  The general orders the man-eaters to drag Athan towards the egg part of the dungeon. Athan tried to resist, but failed.

  Once they arrived, the man-eaters threw Athan inside.

  Athan breathes heavily, but he still forces himself to look.

  The general walks up to Athan. “Look. Don’t you see the massive stockpile of eggs?” The general starts to laugh. “That’s why we have been using you docile humans so far! In just one day, those eggs will hatch, and we will be even closer to achieving the man-eater army!”

  ‘An army?’

  The general's voice suddenly gets deep.

  “I think we will use you. It’s only fair you get to see the birth of an almighty army!” The general takes a breath. “Oh, and these man-eaters are different! They will all be able to be like me! Talking, and hell, some of them will be super strong! The super strong ones will be obvious; they will stand out with their different features. They will also directly report to the queen.”

  Athan remains silent. ‘What the hell am I supposed to do here?’

  The general orders the other man-eaters to throw Athan with the rest of the people.

  Being thrown hard onto the ground, Athan looks around. There was nothing. Just a walled-off space away from where the people forced to work were. Inside the ample space were just multiple small walls not connected to anything.

  Suddenly, Athan hears a voice from above.

  Looking up was a girl sitting on one of those very walls.

  “So, what’s your name?”