"Why aren't you eating?" Carlos mumbled with his mouth full, gnawing on another artlap leg.
Fat dripped onto the fire and hissed.
Leina sat across from him.
With a stick, she stirred the embers methodically, as if hoping to find there the answer she was too afraid to speak aloud.
"Endel…" she breathed quietly, not lifting her eyes from the flames. "He's been gone for six days."
The thought she tried to chase away still broke free: what if he doesn't come back?
Carlos suddenly burst out laughing. Loudly, almost offensively. Leina's head snapped up, her brows knitting together.
He leaned back, laughed until tears streamed down his face, then wiped them away with the back of his hand.
Finally, he met her gaze—her warm, wary, brown eyes.
"You seriously think he might be dead?" Carlos' voice briefly carried seriousness. "Come on."
He jabbed the bone toward the fire.
"We survived every time only because of his decisions. Sure, sometimes they dragged us straight into hell," Carlos smirked, "but he always found another way out."
He tore off a piece of meat, chewed loudly, swallowed, as if placing a final point.
"Although I, too, still doubt why we've been doing all this for the last six days…" he muttered, glancing at the felled trees behind the camp. "But one thing I'm a hundred percent sure of. He's alive."
Leina exhaled in shock:
"You've changed, Carlos."
He only smirked, tilting his head.
"The world changes. And we have to change with it."
They chewed in silence for a few more minutes. Then Carlos suddenly frowned, as if sensing something.
"What is it?" Leina asked nervously, noticing how he lifted his head and sniffed the air.
Carlos inhaled deeply, eyes narrowing.
"Do you smell that sweet scent?.."
Leina did the same. Her heart clenched. The smell was familiar, scorchingly cloying.
"Burning resin…" she whispered.
Carlos grimly nodded.
For a moment, they simply stared at each other—the alarm in one's eyes mirrored in the other's.
Then both sprang to their feet, tossing aside food and bones, sprinting toward the place where, for days, they had piled trees into massive heaps.
The closer they ran, the hotter the air became, the stronger the suffocating stench pressed against their throats.
Soon, the night sky ahead blazed with an orange glow.
When they broke through onto the clearing, they froze.
Everything they had stacked for weeks now burned like giant pyres. Smoke poured into the sky, flames devoured the wood.
Through the wavering haze of fire, they saw a thin figure.
It moved from heap to heap, leaving behind a trail of flame.
In its hand— a torch.
Leina gasped, choked.
"Endel…"
They recognized him immediately.
But they did not understand what he was doing. Or why.
"Endel! What are you doing?!" Leina screamed, her voice cracking into hysteria.
The figure instantly turned toward them.
In the firelight, familiar icy eyes flashed. Endel. He smiled—but the smile was strange, mad.
"You're just in time! Help me!" he shouted with wild joy, swinging the torch.
Carlos and Leina froze, unbelieving.
Should they rejoice he had returned? Or scream in horror, watching him ignite with his own hands everything they had built for days?
"But why?.." Leina whispered, stepping forward.
She wanted to ask, but Endel gave them no time.
"No time! Faster!!" he roared and dashed to the next heap.
[Time remaining: one week (10 hours left)]
Carlos and Leina exchanged glances.
Hearts pounding wildly. They didn't understand the plan, but there was no other choice.
Silently—as if by wordless pact—they rushed after him.
The fire swelled, a living monster lashing tongues of flame in every direction. The wind carried sparks, scattering them across the night.
An hour passed.
Smoke clogged their lungs; each breath seared like fire inside.
Leina coughed, eyes streaming, while Carlos already felt his body collapsing with every minute. At last, unable to bear it, they staggered back, retreating dozens of meters, barely standing.
Their chests burned, as though the fire raged inside them too.
Carlos, gasping, activated his Arcana to shout over the roaring inferno.
"Endel! Where are you?!" his hoarse, desperate cry broke out.
Scouring the fiery hell that now spread onto the standing trees they hadn't felled, Carlos began to dimly grasp Endel's plan.
And the realization sent a cold shiver down his spine.
It all became clear.
Those six days of felling tree after tree, stacking them into monstrous heaps, had been preparation.
All this time Endel hadn't been making barricades. He was making fuel for a colossal fire.
And then—from that raging inferno—appeared a lean figure.
Endel.
Shrouded in charred rags, he looked as though he himself had risen from the flames.
Hair and clothes reeked of smoke, his face nearly hidden by a cloth, and only his eyes—icy blue, piercing—burned through the haze.
He stepped toward them, and both gasped, breath caught. As if a demon had crawled out of hell.
Closer, his chest heaved in ragged breaths.
His voice was hoarse, seared by the fire itself:
"We need to run… as far from here as possible. Toward our first cave… run with everything you've got…"
And with those words, he collapsed before them, almost unconscious.
Two days without sleep, endless strain—his body had reached its limit.
But he still managed to mutter:
"Wake me… in five hours…"
Then his eyelids closed, and he fell into darkness.
"Psychopath…" the Third muttered bitterly, with a strange note of pride, confirming his opinion of the original.
Despite panic and exhaustion, Carlos and Leina obeyed.
Carlos hoisted his friend's limp body into his arms, and together they rushed toward the place where the first great tree had once fallen, where their story began.
A moment—and five hours passed.
"Wake up," Leina's soft, almost whispering voice reached him.
Endel slowly opened his eyes.
The first thing he saw—the stone ceiling of the cave. The same cave where they had first taken shelter after slaughtering a pack of artlaps.
Everything had come full circle, but it all felt different now.
Leina and Carlos sat nearby, eyes fixed on him. In them swirled fatigue, worry, and a silent question—what is happening?
Endel said nothing.
He simply rose and walked to the exit.
The narrow passage led him outside. And there, with his first step forward, his eyes froze on the sight.
A few kilometers away, where they had felled the trees, raged something greater than fire.
Flames coiled around the land, devouring trunks, climbing into the sky with tongues of smoke and flame. It moved, spreading—like a living force, like a beast that would never be satisfied.
As though the devil himself had come to judge this dungeon.
Endel stood motionless for long seconds, staring at the fiery ocean. His eyes reflected the blazing apocalypse.
"…"
"My plan was simple," he finally said calmly, as if speaking of something mundane. "Destroy this dungeon."
He turned slowly toward Leina and Carlos.
His voice was firm, yet emotionless—as if it was not him speaking, but the fire itself.
And they could not answer.
Questions swarmed in their heads: what kind of plan? why like this? why vanish for so many days? what happens now? But words failed.
Instead, the roaring fire outside spoke for him.
They wanted to flood him with questions, but Endel spoke first, as if reading their thoughts.
"It all began on the first day," he said quietly, eyes still on the distant fire. "When we sat, ate, discussed how to complete the quest… but came up with nothing."
He paused, drew breath, continued:
"I kept replaying the description of this world, rereading the quest in my memory dozens of times. And then I noticed a strange detail. Why does it say: 'surrounded only by oceans'? Why not a single mention of rivers or lakes? Isn't that odd?"
Leina and Carlos exchanged looks. Endel nodded to himself.
"At first I thought: so what? Maybe that's how this place is. But then I recalled another line: 'Inhabited by a single land species—artlaps.'" His voice grew quieter, sharper. "Do you see how absurd that is? A world with only one mammal species? It defies the logic of life. Another oddity."
He sighed, eyes narrowing slightly as if reliving the moment of realization.
"And the final paragraph… nearly useless. Except the last line: 'The most adorable creatures in the universe: fluffy, kind, defenseless… but one wrong step—and their wrath with madness will turn into the greatest horror.'"
For a moment, silence hung heavy, broken only by the far-off roar of flames.
"Well, we've already confirmed that ourselves, haven't we?" Endel smirked faintly, glancing at his friends.
Leina frowned, struggling to piece it together.
Carlos clenched his fists tighter—not in doubt, but in yearning to finally understand fully.
Endel continued, his voice steady but burning underneath:
"I kept coming back to those words… and realized they held a clue. I considered dozens of scenarios, crafted plans, until one evening by the fire gave me an idea. Insane. But simple."
He fell silent, letting them think.
The cave was so quiet, they could hear water dripping deep in the cracks.
Leina and Carlos looked at each other—fear and disbelief mingling.
Finally, Endel spoke the words they dreaded:
"Burn this world to ashes."
"Wait…" Leina shook her head, as if warding off absurdity. "But why are you sure this will work? Monsters can just flee from fire. They won't throw themselves into flames like madmen."
Endel narrowed his eyes, smiled faintly.
"You're right. They would… if not for the last line of the description."
He repeated slowly, stamping each word:
"…but one wrong step—and their wrath with madness will turn into the greatest horror."
"Think about it," he added. "What will these 'adorable creatures' do when they see that strangers not only slaughtered five hundred of their kin, but are also burning their world?"
Leina and Carlos froze, realization dawning. A chill raced over their skin. This was the second step. Not just scorched earth—but driving the artlaps into frenzy, into blind rage.
"But…" Carlos finally forced out, staring into Endel's eyes. "Why die for it? They could just go to another part of the dungeon. Why sacrifice themselves just to kill us?"
Silence smothered them like a boulder. The fire's roar echoed, and within it seemed to rise a bestial howl.
Then Endel spoke again—pointing out what they had missed, what they never would have thought of.
"We're on an island. I'm almost sure… ninety percent."
Carlos opened his mouth to ask how do you know?, but Leina cut him off:
"That's why you went to the mountain? Disappeared for six days… You wanted to see for yourself?" her voice trembled. She was already piecing the puzzle together.
Endel only smirked, eyes gleaming devilishly.
Leina continued, as if condemning herself with each word:
"Now they have no way to retreat. An island. A ring of fire. They're enraged. And they'll do anything to destroy us… even if it means dying themselves."
The clearer Endel's plan became, the harder it was to breathe.
Carlos also understood—but asked the one question that gnawed at him:
"What about us? Won't the fire consume us too?"
Endel shrugged, and for the first time, his voice wavered:
"In theory… once we complete the quest, the system should extract us. Right?" He said it more as a question than an assertion.
The silence in the cave thickened, almost viscous.
"You… you've gone mad," Leina sighed heavily, staring at her friend.
"Maybe," Endel scratched his nose awkwardly and even smiled faintly, trying to ease the tension. "But did we really have a choice?"
And then the first notification appeared.
[You have killed an F-rank Artlap monster]
Then the second…
[You have killed an F-rank Artlap monster]
The third…
[You have killed an F-rank Artlap monster]
…
…and they didn't stop. Dozens. Hundreds. Then thousands.
The screen filled with a crimson flood of messages, chilling them to the bone.
Endel, Leina, and Carlos froze, realizing—the final scene had begun.
The artlaps had thrown themselves into a suicidal frenzy, and there was no turning back.
"You really did create a genocide," the Third finally spoke, after being silent all this time.
Endel closed his eyes, inhaled deeply, exhaled.
"I know. But it's them or us. We have no other choice."