Notice: You are immune to non-magical weapons.

  Well, good for me, I thought, as several tons of rock held me down like a clingy lover who didn’t understand the concept of personal space. The system prompt hovered in my vision, smug and useless, like it had just won an argument I didn’t remember starting. Immune to weapons, sure. But not to gravity.

  I wasn’t in pain—not exactly. Pain needed nerves, and I didn’t have those anymore. What I had was pressure. Crushing, unrelenting pressure that pushed into every part of me. My ribs creaked faintly as I shifted, and the sound was... uncomfortably educational. Bones were not designed for this kind of stress.

  So I lay still.

  The dust had begun to settle, drifting through narrow shafts of light that filtered down from somewhere above. It painted the ruin in soft gray layers, quiet and deceptively peaceful. The kind of calm that only comes after chaos has had its way and left everything broken behind it.

  How many were gone? Kobolds. Adventurers. Krix. I hadn’t seen who got out when the ceiling came down. Just noise, motion, and then this—buried, alone, waiting for an answer I couldn’t get.

  The silence was wrong. Too deep, even for this place. No clatter, no shouts. Just stillness and the faint hum of magic fraying at the edges of my mind.

  And yet, somehow, this felt inevitable.

  I hadn’t been here long. Not long enough to belong. But long enough to care. And now, pinned beneath the rubble of my own dungeon, I couldn’t shake the thought that maybe none of it had ever been mine to hold in the first place.

  Then a stone shifted—loud, sharp, jarring. Light broke in around it, harsh after the dark.

  For a second, I thought it might be him. That Garrick had survived. That he was here to finish what he started.

  But it wasn’t a knight.

  It was a goblin.

  Grib’s face appeared through the dust, wild grin in place, teeth sharp and far too numerous for comfort.

  “Boss!” he cried, voice full of manic relief. “Boss alive! Boss not squish!”

  I blinked—whatever passed for blinking—and couldn’t speak for a moment. Seeing him alive, breathing, still somehow smiling... it hit harder than I was ready for.

  “Grib,” I managed, voice rasping from somewhere low and hollow. “You’re alive.”

  “Uh-huh!” he chirped, slime wobbling cheerfully on his shoulder. “Grib strong! Grib clever! Ceiling no stop Grib!”

  Relief hit me in a wave. Not graceful. Just raw and heavy. “Good,” I said, though my thoughts were already racing. If Grib was alive, maybe the others were too. Maybe Krix. Maybe—

  “What about the kobolds?” I asked. “And the adventurers?”

  Grib’s grin twitched, just slightly. “Some kobolds alive,” he said carefully, clawed hands already working another stone loose. “Some... squished. Not many.”

  “And the knight?” My voice tightened. “Garrick?”

  That brought the grin back in full force. He crouched lower, eyes shining.

  “Knight... splat.”

  “What?” I tried to sit up, but the weight wouldn’t let me. “Grib, I need more than that.”

  He pointed, urging me to look. “There, Boss! See?”

  I twisted my head, following the line of his finger.

  At first, it was just debris. Shattered stone, jagged angles. Nothing special. And then I saw the blood. Thick, dark, pooling beneath a slab of rock large enough to have crushed a bear. It was seeping outward in slow rivulets, thick as oil, glistening faintly in the light.

  “Are you sure?” I asked. “Absolutely sure he’s—”

  Grib made a very enthusiastic squishing motion with both hands. “Very sure! Knight squish good!” He nodded proudly. “No more fire sword. No more shouty man. Just... splat.”

  I stared at the pool of blood, half-expecting the knight to rise from it like some unholy phoenix. But he didn’t. The blood stayed where it was. Dark. Thick. Unmoving.

  For the first time in what felt like hours, I let myself breathe. Or at least simulate it. Garrick—whatever he’d been—was gone.

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

  I didn’t know whether to laugh or collapse. Instead, I looked at Grib, still grinning like he’d just won a prize.

  “Good work, Grib,” I said, voice steadier than I felt. “Really... good work.”

  Grib puffed out his chest, slime jiggling in approval. “Boss smart too! Ceiling crush—best plan!”

  I didn’t have the energy to correct him.

  He started pulling rubble away, piece by piece, wiry limbs moving with manic purpose. Krix joined in not long after, claws swift and precise. The remaining kobolds followed slowly. Hesitant, but obedient. Together they worked, a strange blend of desperation and care.

  When I finally stood, my bones ached. Not pain, exactly. Just the kind of deep stiffness that says you shouldn’t be alive right now. I leaned on my staff and let the quiet hum of its enchantments settle through me. Around me, the kobolds waited. Wide-eyed. Silent.

  “I need to see him,” I said. “The knight. I need to be sure.”

  Grib nodded, already motioning for the others. “Boss check knight splat! Grib help!”

  He didn’t seem to notice the weight in my voice. Or maybe he did and didn’t know what to do with it. Either way, he barked sharp commands, and the kobolds scrambled to clear the rubble.

  I followed. The room was chaos—cracked stone, twisted beams, the stench of dust and old magic clinging to the air like smoke. The kobolds peeled back the wreckage with practiced claws, exposing dark streaks of blood smeared across the floor. Thick trails led toward a mound of stone too large to ignore.

  My chest tightened. Not fear. Just pressure. Like the air didn’t want me breathing it.

  “Here, Boss!” Grib called, stepping back from the blood-soaked corner of the chamber. He gestured grandly, like unveiling a gift. “Knight go splat! Grib right!”

  I approached slowly. The staff tapped hollow against the stone. The air here felt heavier, as if the fight hadn’t finished echoing yet. Magic still clung to the walls in frayed threads that twitched at the edge of perception.

  The kobolds fell silent. Watching me. Watching the blood.

  The blood was real. No question. Thick and black-red, spreading deep into dust and stone. Garrick had been here. The ceiling had come down. It should’ve been enough.

  But where was the body?

  I crouched. Ran skeletal fingers along cracked stone, tracing fault lines that should have broken bones. I should be looking at twisted limbs. Bent steel. The stillness of death, clear and final.

  But there was nothing. Just blood.

  Dread crept in slowly. I reached deeper. Brushed aside debris. Hoping for armor. Bone. Anything.

  Grib crouched beside me, confused. He slapped the rubble like it owed him something. “See? No more fire sword. No more yelling. Just splat.”

  I didn’t answer.

  My fingers closed around something smooth, half-buried in the dust.

  I pulled it free.

  A shard of deep blue crystal. Unnaturally shaped. Faint light still pulsing at its core. The moment I touched it, something shifted. That cold flicker in the back of my skull. Deathly Perception stirred.

  Teleportation Crystal (Used)

  I went still.

  For a long moment, I just stared at it—the faint glow pulsing from the crystal’s broken edge. Understanding didn’t hit all at once. It sank in slowly, like a stone disappearing into deep water.

  Not splat. Not crushed. Not dead.

  Gone.

  Somewhere out there, he was alive. A sound slipped from me. Not quite a sigh. Not quite a growl. I squeezed the crystal fragment in my grip until I felt it grind against my bones.

  Garrick had been here. Broken. Bleeding. But he’d planned for this.

  Grib tilted his head. Still grinning. Still oblivious.

  “Boss? Why face like that? Knight extra dead, yes?”

  I exhaled, long and slow, and forced my fingers to unclench.

  “No, Grib. Not extra dead. Not dead at all.”

  Grib’s grin twitched. He squinted at the shard, his face shifting from victory to something smaller. Slower. “Oh.”

  Krix stepped forward. He hadn’t said a word until now. His claws flexed at his sides. His tail flicked once behind him.

  “Then... he coming back?” His voice was careful. Like he already knew the answer and didn’t want it confirmed.

  I didn’t take my eyes off the crystal.

  “Yes,” I said. Colder than I meant to. “One day.”

  Everyone was quite for a long moment.

  And then Grib let out a sharp puff of air, shoulders slumping. “Pfft. Cheater.”

  I almost laughed. Almost.

  Instead, I turned from the blood, from the wreckage, and looked at what was left of my kobolds.

  They were watching me. Waiting. For orders. For reassurance. For something I wasn’t sure I had.

  So I said nothing. Just looked.

  The chamber was a shattered thing. Jagged stone and drifting dust. The air thick with scorched earth, blood, and the bitter tang of burned magic. The dead were still where they’d fallen—some buried, some curled around broken weapons and crumpled limbs.

  But we were still standing.

  The kobolds had fared better than I expected. Not unscathed, but not destroyed. A few dozen remained upright. Limping. Bloodied. Bandaged in whatever scraps they could find. But alive. Still here.

  Krix stood among them, spear in hand, body coiled like he didn’t trust the silence. I couldn’t blame him.

  Grib, for once, didn’t speak. His mace hung loosely at his side, his wide goblin eyes scanning the chamber with something almost like calm. Not grief. Just inventory.

  I made myself do the same.

  It wasn’t regret I felt. Not exactly. Just weight. Something heavy and nameless, lodged beneath my ribs. But as I looked at those who remained—those who had fought and not fallen—I knew one thing with absolute clarity.

  This was the first time I’d won.

  Not survived. Not endured.

  Won.

  The thought had barely taken shape when Grib raised his mace high in both hands, his voice breaking through the dust and silence.

  “For the Bone King!”

  It echoed off the stone. Raw, but certain.

  The kobolds took it up. First a few. Then more. Louder. Stronger.

  “For the Bone King!”

  Krix hesitated. Just a second. Then his spear lifted too.

  The chant rose, rebounding through the ruined chamber. It filled the space where fear had been, where silence had settled.

  And for the first time, I didn’t feel like a skeleton pretending to matter.

  I raised my staff. The soft glow of its enchantment pulsed in my grip like a heartbeat.

  “We’re not done yet,” I said. The words cut clean through the chant. “Where are the other adventurers?”