Runebound Reverse Tower of The Dead-Chapter 155: Breathing Room

Kael stared at the notification a second too long. It had a clear goal.

Survive and kill.

Survive the Zombies, and kill the Ifrit.

Kael had a worry that if he were to fight the Ifrit alone, he would never beat it.

Even with his runes, even with gauntlets and clever words, Ifrit wasn’t a goblin. Ifrit wasn’t a basilisk. It was a boss designed to punish arrogance, and Kael’s arrogance had already shortened the floor’s clock.

But at the same time, he couldn’t rely on the Sun Clan; they betrayed him, and he betrayed them.

There was no room for reconciliation, no room for friendship.

He didn’t romanticize it. There wouldn’t be a handshake later. There wouldn’t be apologies. They’d tried to take his loot and his life. He’d answered by feeding them to monsters. That kind of relationship didn’t heal. It only escalated.

But survival comes above all else.

They’ll have to help Kael if they want to leave; they’ll have to help him kill the Ifrit.

And if they don’t want to. Kael steeled himself for the worst-case scenario.

"I gotta do it myself," and that’s why he was heading deep into enemy territory.

Among the Zombies that couldn’t locate him yet, since he still had a few precious seconds of [Presence].

The gray haze of Presence still clung to him, thinning his existence, dulling the world around him. It wasn’t perfect stealth. It was a discount on being noticed. And Kael was spending that discount fast, because the corridor ahead was already shifting with movement, dormant red dots waking, turning, smelling, becoming hungry.

He crossed the fifth pathway and door. The red circle was closing in fast from where he saw on the map.

It wasn’t a metaphor to him. It was geometry. It was the Ifrit’s expanding territory chewing through the city like fire through paper. Each minute wasted here was a minute closer to the tunnels becoming a furnace. Kael could practically feel it in the air already, the faint increase in warmth that didn’t belong underground.

It was eating away at the tunnel system, and he needed to reach his goal before it closed in on the rune he needed.

The Momentum Rune.

Just from its name, he could already picture its abilities, but he held his thoughts from wandering as he realized dreaming only mattered when you were able to dream.

Meaning, when he was alive to dream.

From his map, he noticed that there was one more section to cross before reaching the Zombie that had the rune.

It was another utility room, similar to the one where he crafted his gauntlet at .

It had one way entrance, a door, and could be barricaded.

But there were two red dots inside it.

Kael’s throat tightened. Two active, not gray. Two that would turn the moment he entered if Presence dropped.

His internal energy bar wasn’t full. It wasn’t even close. He could feel that hollowness again, the body-level exhaustion creeping up, heavier than mana-drain ever was. Presence was expensive, and panic was more expensive.

Kael didn’t hesitate to breach through. His internal energy was in the red, a few more seconds of presence, or one more punch before he is out cold.

Just as he opened the door, he released Presence to stop the energy bleed.

The world snapped back into sharpness. Sound slammed into him. Smell too. Rot hit like a punch. The air in the room was warmer, trapped, thick with that sweet-ugly stink of old flesh.

The moment he did so, the zombies inside the room and the ones behind him on the passage all turned.

They sensed the living.

And he was like a beacon, since he was never dead.

Kael jumped forward, clutching the first Zombie’s face with his gauntleted arm.

Without even wasting a breath, he twisted his hand, ripping the Zombie’s head off.

The motion was brutal and efficient. Fingers clamped, wrist turned, and the neck gave with a wet snap that made his stomach lurch even though he’d done worse. The head came away too easily, jaw slack, eyes dull, and the body staggered for half a heartbeat like it hadn’t received the memo that it was finished.

And in the same breath, he let go of the head and let loose the final spark of energy that he had left.

A fireball shot out and blasted right into the second Zombie’s torso.

It wasn’t strong enough to pierce through, not with his exhausted Internal Energy pool.

But it did the second-best thing.

Fire liked flesh, and the zombie turned to smoldering screeching flames, though it was in mortal pain, still approached Kael with the will to tear him apart.

The burning didn’t slow it the way a normal body would slow. It didn’t scream and fall. It screamed and kept coming, arms reaching, fingers clawing, the smell turning from rot to cooked rot, thick enough to make Kael’s eyes water. It was the worst kind of enemy: one that didn’t care about pain and didn’t stop when damaged.

Kael’s head was going blank, and in that last moment, he shut the door behind him while the zombie staggered forward.

Burning, yet full of hate for the living or hunger for their flesh.

The frame rattled as something hit it from the other side. Kael’s shoulder throbbed from the motion, his muscles screaming for rest that the Tower refused to grant cleanly.

Kael fought exhaustion and unconsciousness with sheer grit, just as the burning arms of the zombie reached him. The latter fell to the ground, dropping a couple of cores.

It collapsed like a puppet with cut strings, flames still licking at its clothes as it crumpled. The cores clinked and rolled on the floor like coins in a nightmare.

Kael’s knees almost buckled anyway, because the fight had taken the last real fuel he had. His vision narrowed, edges darkening slightly, the world threatening to tilt.

Kael slumped down, with back to the door.

His spine hit metal, and the cold jolt helped keep him awake. The door vibrated again, faintly, as more movement pressed against it outside. Nails scraped. Teeth clicked. A chorus of hungry stupidity trying to find the living thing it smelled.

Thankful that he made it to a safe location before he was mauled to death.