Chapter 13: selfish survivor
Slurp. Munch.
The silence was broken by the wet sound of creatures chewing. And then, hell broke its final shackles. The panic was no longer a whisper; it was a wildfire. Aris's barrier shattered with a deafening noise of glass breaking under the pressure of the other serpents that charged all at once, taking advantage of the leader's fall.
"Run!" someone screamed, but the command was lost in the terror.
Yukeli stepped back. He felt the cold of the cave wall against his bare back. The sweat on his body turned icy. He looked at Maeron, who fought as if trying to close the gap that the death of the woman who had assumed the role of leader had just caused, and at Leena, whose eyes were now bleeding openly, leaving red trails on her pale cheeks. Hope hadn't just died. It had been devoured before everyone.
The situation had just changed. The sound of tearing flesh was rhythmic, almost hypnotic. Yukeli couldn't look away from Naira's body. He expected a reaction, a miracle, a glow of Essence that would bring her back. But what he saw was only the naked reality: her blood wasn't golden or heroic. It was just red. Dark, hot, and common, staining the stone he himself had molded to protect them.
"Naira... no..."
Aris's whisper was a snap of pure terror. Yukeli saw her retreat, hands covering her mouth not out of grief, but because she realized the only pillar keeping her alive had collapsed. Without Naira's command, Aris's barrier flickered violently, wavering like a candle in a gale. Without the firm shield, the serpents didn't hesitate. It was an avalanche of scales and fangs upon those closest.
'It's over.'
The thought came cold, devoid of any emotion. Yukeli felt a tug on his arm. It was one of the men from the group, his face disfigured by panic, eyes begging for a salvation that didn't exist.
"Help... please, you have the power... open a path!" — the man sobbed, fingers digging into the skin of Yukeli's arm, transferring sweat and fear —
Yukeli looked at the man's hand. Then, he looked at the solid rock beneath his own feet. There was no exit there. No planned escape route. Naira had failed, and her plan had died with her. Yukeli's mind worked with icy speed. He felt the throbbing in his skull, the warning that his body was at its limit. If he stayed, he would die fighting a lost battle. If he tried to save the others, he would die along with them.
'I am not their hero.'
The realization brought no fear, only brutal clarity. He let go. It wasn't a sudden movement of anger, but a slow, deliberate detachment. The man's fingers slipped across his sweaty skin. Yukeli didn't say a word. He didn't apologize. He just ignored the clamor around him and focused all his perception on the black stone below him.
'Open.'
He pushed the rest of his mind against the mineral structure. The pressure in his skull was unbearable, as if a porcelain vase were about to burst, but the stone obeyed. A crevice opened beneath his feet, a dark mouth leading straight to the unknown abyss.
"Where are you..."
He heard Leena's voice, heard the sound of Maeron being surrounded, but he didn't turn back. Yukeli threw himself into the crevice. In the millisecond his feet lost contact with the edge and gravity pulled him, he concentrated the last bit of his sanity to give the final order, using the closing motion of the rock itself as the impulse that would hurl him into the depths.
'Close.'
With one last pulse of his ability, he forced the stone to seal again. The sound of the rock clashing echoed like the closing of a tomb above him, isolating Yukeli from the chaos of the cave. The scream of someone calling for help was the last thing that reached him before the silence of the vacuum swallowed him.
He was falling into an unknown abyss, but for the first time since emerging from that egg, he felt the weight on his shoulders had lightened. He had survived. And for him, in that moment, that was the only thing that mattered.