It charged.
---
The tail came first.
Like a whip finding air before it finds skin.
The sound of it sharp.
Immediate.
Bodies moved.
Left.
Right.
Not fast enough for all of them.
---
One went flying.
Hit the wall.
Slid down it.
Didn't get up immediately.
---
They moved like water around it.
Splitting.
Reforming.
Attacking from every angle at once.
Bullets finding scale.
Blades finding gaps between it.
The creature swinging through all of it.
Through the gunfire.
Through the blades.
Through the bodies in its way.
---
A claw found someone.
They left the ground.
---
Minjun hit the floor hard.
The world spun.
His vision went loose.
Everything blurring at the edges.
The ceiling moving where it shouldn't.
The sounds of the fight reaching him from somewhere that felt wrong.
Too far.
Too close.
Both at once.
---
He blinked.
Once.
Twice.
---
Saw it.
All of it.
From the ground.
The creature above everything.
The remaining soldiers around it.
How many angles were left.
How many weren't.
---
He got up.
---
Tossed the shield.
Pulled the grenade from his belt.
Started running.
---
The creature opened its mouth.
Building toward another roar.
---
Minjun jumped.
Got close enough.
Tossed the grenade in.
---
The explosion happened inside.
Muffled at first.
Then not.
Smoke poured from between its teeth.
Its jaw hung.
Barely connected.
Swinging slightly.
---
Then the system.
*Skill activation — Unholy Physique.*
---
The creature's body moved wrong.
Bent wrong.
The bones inside it lengthening.
Pressing against skin from the inside.
Reshaping.
It grew.
Not fast.
Just inevitable.
The green glow coming off it in pulses.
---
It straightened.
Bigger now.
Wrong in a new way.
---
It roared with what was left of its jaw.
Then swung.
---
This time was different.
This time things came apart.
Shields.
Swords.
Pieces of armor.
Things that had been attached to people.
All of it in the air at once.
---
Two soldiers moved together.
In unison.
Blades raised.
Parallel.
The system across both their visions.
*Skill activation — Terra Slash.*
*Marcus Slash — activated.*
*Fusion scale — activated.*
*Nightmare Slash — confirmed.*
---
The blades came down.
One cut.
The left leg.
Below the knee.
The creature's weight shifted wrong.
It stumbled.
---
It found the two soldiers with its eyes.
Tracked them.
Its body turning despite the leg.
---
Minjun saw it before it moved.
"Look out—"
---
Too late.
---
It came down on one of them.
The sound of it didn't belong in a place with walls.
The other drove their blade into its eye.
Pushed it sideways.
The creature used its body to push back.
Sent them into the wall.
---
Minjun was already moving.
His ax finding the other eye.
Driving in.
---
The tail caught him.
Full force.
Sent him across the corridor.
His back met stone.
The air left him.
---
He slid down.
---
From the floor he watched the remaining soldiers converge.
The energy building between them.
Gathering.
Dark.
Dense.
The kind of thing that takes more than one person to make.
---
It released.
---
The blast consumed the creature fully.
The corridor disappeared into it.
Dust.
Debris.
Wind tearing through everything at once.
---
Then settling.
---
Silence.
---
The creature on the ground.
Its skin dark.
Crisped.
Smoke rising from it in slow threads.
Not moving.
---
The system came.
*Boss defeated — Lizard Warrior.*
*Congratulations to all.*
*Hunters lost: 4.*
*Mana levels: low.*
*Body damage: high.*
*Mana core output: low — dangerous.*
---
Minjun read it from the floor.
His back against the wall.
His ax still in his hand.
His chest moving.
Up.
Down.
Up.
---
Four.
---
He looked at what was left of them.
Standing.
Barely.
But standing.
---
He put his hand on the wall behind him.
Pushed himself up.
Slowly.
His legs taking the weight back one piece at a time.
---
He stood.
---
Looked at them.
---
Said nothing yet.