Beaumont lay sprawled on the cold stone floor, his body a battlefield of agony. Severe bleeding poured from his nose and ears in hot, sticky rivulets, staining the ancient masonry beneath him. A raw, guttural scream tore from his throat, echoing through the vast chamber like the cry of a wounded beast. The sonic cannons' invisible waves still drilled into his skull, a relentless frequency that vibrated his teeth, rattled his organs, and turned his heightened senses into a storm of painful static. His vision blurred, the world tilting violently as nausea clawed at his stomach. Blood trickled down his chin, mixing with sweat and dust.
His four Ternere Aegis shards, were still yielding, responded to the looming threat. They snapped into a tight, overlapping formation above his prone form, glowing with a faint amber light that formed a makeshift barrier. The reinforced slate hummed with residual mana, absorbing what sonic energy it could while bracing for the next assault.
The rocket-propelled projectiles—eight sleek, fire-trailing harbingers of death were only a hundred inches away now, closing the distance with merciless speed. Beaumont's mind screamed for action, but his body refused to obey, locked in the disorienting haze of the sonic barrage.
Then his wild instinct kicked in.
Warm amber sigil circles flared to life around both wrists, spinning wildly like vortexes of raw power. Mana surged downward in a frantic torrent, embedding into the stone floor beneath him. The solid rock responded instantly, liquefying into a churning quicksand pit with a wet, grinding churn. Beaumont felt the ground swallow him whole, his body, the protective slates, everything sinking rapidly as the magical earth parted around him like hungry jaws. He forced the depth to increase, channeling every ounce of focus into widening and deepening the confined space his body carved out. Eight feet down, the pit sealed above him just as the rockets struck.
The impact was cataclysmic. A heavy explosion erupted on the surface, the shockwave rippling through the earth like a thunderclap buried underground. Stone and debris rained down in the aftermath, leaving a massive crater where Beaumont had knelt moments before. The blast's force compressed the air in his makeshift underground refuge, squeezing his already battered ribs and drawing a fresh grunt of pain from his lips. Dust and faint traces of explosive residue seeped into the pocket of space around him.
He lay there in a folded, fetal-like posture, hands still clamped desperately over his bleeding ears. Slight drool mixed with blood escaped the corner of his mouth, his breathing ragged and shallow. Rage ignited in his chest like an inferno. His blood pressure skyrocketed, turning his hazel eyes a menacing, bloodshot red. The pain fueled something primal within him. Mana circulation began to rage wildly outward from his inside, uncontrolled and volatile. Cracks spiderwebbed across the walls of his earthen confinement, small stones tumbling loose as the pressure built.
Above, in the fourth wave's devastated section, the sonic cannons and rocket launchers fell silent. Their targeting systems, unable to detect the intruder's signature any longer, powered down with mechanical whirs and clicks. The chamber grew eerily quiet, save for the distant settling of dust and the low groan of stressed stone.
Several minutes passed in suffocating darkness. Then, without warning, an uproar of demolishing cracks erupted from the crater. The fissures spread like living veins of destruction racing outward to the fake walls concealing the lined-up sonic cannons, then climbing the reinforced pillars and vaulted ceiling. Everything began to crumble. Massive sections of the ancient architecture groaned in protest before collapsing inward with cataclysmic force. Tons of rubble and dust cascaded down, burying the defensive emplacements in an avalanche of their own making. The chain reaction swallowed the fourth wave entirely, the roar of falling stone thundering through the dungeon like the wrath of an angry god.
Beaumont's mana-fueled outburst had turned the trap against its creators.
A few minutes later, the descending debris and choking clouds of dust began to thin. The entire section of the fourth wave had been reduced to a ruined wasteland of shattered masonry and twisted metal. At the very boundary line leading into the fifth wave, the stone floor began to dissolve and liquefy like thick, flowing mud. A powerful surge of earth mana erupted from below.
Beaumont burst forth from the churning sludge with explosive force, mud spraying outward in a wide arc as he propelled himself upward. He landed heavily on solid ground at the threshold of the fifth wave, his boots sinking slightly into the residual mire before stabilizing. Covered head to toe in slick, gritty earth, he turned his head sharply to the right and coughed violently.
"Ahem—cough-cough!" Mud and blood splattered from his lips. He paused, spitting forcefully. "Ptuh!" A thick glob of the foul mixture flew from the corner of his mouth. "Can't believe it got into my mouth," he growled, wiping his face with a muddy forearm. He glanced back toward the devastated fourth wave, his bloodshot eyes narrowing with a mix of fury and reluctant respect. "You almost had me back there. That was highly effective, I'd never expected something like that." Another pause, then a cocky smirk broke through the pain. "…But I'm exceptional."
He straightened up, though his body protested with fresh waves of ache. The last of his light orbs had been lost during the sonic cannons' brutal assault, crushed amid the chaos. Complete darkness now enveloped him, thick and oppressive, pressing against his senses like a living entity. Beaumont stamped his right foot firmly against the ground, sending a pulse of mana downward. His tremorsense activated, vibrations rippling outward through the stone and soil like invisible sonar. He closed his eyes, focusing entirely on the feedback.
Chunks of iron scattered across the ground ahead… Metal? What the hell can they do? The readings felt off and dense. And up toward the ceiling… sentinel steel. It gives off the same feeling as the ones I came through earlier. Not on the walls this time, but the ceiling.
He remained motionless for a long moment, appraising the threats. It's not attacking yet. Seems I have to get closer before it reacts to me. Beaumont spat again, clearing the last of the mud from his mouth. "This time, I'm not blindly marching in like you expect me to. I'm doing this my own way."
He dropped into a solid stance, feet planted shoulder-width apart, knees slightly bent. Warm amber sigil circles bloomed around his wrists once more, spinning with controlled intensity as mana generated and coalesced. He struck forward with a folded fist from his standing position. The stone floor split violently in two with a deep, grinding crack. The ground erupted upward on either side as a narrow passage formed in the center, a controlled tunnel carved straight through the hazardous zone. Beaumont extended it further with intense concentration, pushing the earthen corridor ahead until it reached just beyond where the chunks of metal littered the floor, six meters of safe passage.
"Wooh!" He straightened up, rolling his shoulders with a satisfied grunt. "Now that's what I'm talking about."
He stepped into the freshly formed passage, the walls of compressed earth and stone smooth yet reinforced under his mana's influence. The tunnel provided cover from above and the sides. As he reached the center of the path, a heavy mechanical click echoed from the ceiling. A sentinel turret—sleek, rifle-like barrel gleaming with cold steel locked onto his position. It fired without hesitation.
A powerful shot descended with terrifying force, the bullet wreathed in crackling magic. Beaumont's Ternere Aegis shards snapped together into a reinforced shield just in time. The impact slammed into the slates with bone-jarring power, driving the entire formation downward and knocking painfully against the top of his head.
"Argh!....Ow-w-w!" He crouched low, one hand rubbing the blooming bruise on his scalp. "Hff!....Ugh!" Pain flared brightly, but he forced himself to look up, eyes blazing. "How the hell? It packed that much power?"
The rifle fired again. This time, his tremorsense caught the subtle vibrations of the mechanism activating. Beaumont dove forward in a desperate roll. The shot struck the ground behind him with a heavy impact, causing a localized explosion that showered him with sharp fragments and kicked up a cloud of dust. The blast's heat licked at his back.
He sprang to his feet, breathing hard. "That's not ordinary." His appraisal eyes flicked for a brief second, analyzing the lingering magical residue in the air. "The shots are coated with magic? That's it, I'm out of here."
He turned forward and dashed ahead at full speed, his powerful legs pumping with earth-enhanced strength. The ceiling rifle recalibrated with eerie precision, continuing its barrage as he advanced. Each shot carried devastating power, the magical coating making them punch through stone like paper. Beaumont weaved and maneuvered through the narrow passage like a seasoned warrior on a battlefield, using the earthen walls for cover while occasionally summoning small barriers or shifts in the floor to disrupt the turret's aim. He surfed brief liquefied sections of the path, accelerating his momentum and dodging predicted trajectories with acrobatic grace.
The end of the wave loomed ahead. Beaumont pushed harder, the tunnel sloping upward as it crossed into the transition toward the next section of the floor. The rifle made one final, clean shot. His defensive slates intercepted it perfectly, locking together in a brilliant amber glow. The heavy impact erupted in a shockwave of force that lifted him off his feet and slammed him to the ground. He rolled painfully across the dusty stone, momentum carrying him several yards before he flipped mid-roll and attempted to stand.
His foot betrayed him for a critical second. He staggered, muscles burning and vision swimming from the accumulated punishment. "Nice try," he snarled through gritted teeth, his body still wiggling unsteadily, "but you can't touch me."
The adrenaline was fading, leaving raw exhaustion in its wake. "I have to sit this one down before I drop like a dead beast." He lowered himself onto the stone floor near the wall closest to the entrance descending back toward the fourth floor, leaning his back against the cool, unyielding surface. His chest heaved as he caught his breath, the sounds of settling rubble and distant mechanical whirs fading into the background.
Beaumont shoved his right hand into his bag pouch, fingers closing around a small vial. He pulled out a healing potion, the liquid inside glowing with soft restorative light. With a quick motion, he popped the lid and downed the contents in one gulp. Warmth spread through his body almost immediately—knitting together minor wounds, easing the throbbing in his head, and staunching the last of the bleeding from his nose and ears. When the vial was empty, he tossed it aside with a soft clink against the stone.
He turned his gaze toward the darkened entrance behind him, a weary sigh escaping his lips. "I should've brought three light orbs." He gasped, the words heavy with regret as the oppressive darkness pressed in once more.