I have spent the last year living in a cave. I am used to dirt. I am comfortable with moss. I have come to accept that "damp" is just a texture of air.

I was not prepared for clean.

The hallway we were limping down was offensive. The floor wasn't stone; it was a grate of dark, matte metal that didn't creak. The walls were paneled in seamless black glass that reflected our miserable, mulch-covered reflections. The air didn't smell like rot or spores. It smelled like... nothing. It smelled like recycled static and ozone.

It was dry. Violently dry. It sucked the moisture right out of my eyes and made my scales itch.

"I hate it," Splitjaw grumbled. He was leaning heavily on me, his good leg skidding on the smooth grating. "It's too quiet. Where is the dripping? A dungeon is supposed to drip."

"Maybe the plumbing actually works down here," I muttered, adjusting my grip on his harness. "Come on. Keep moving. If we stop, we stiffen up."

"If we stop, I'm taking a nap," he countered. "Wake me up when we find dirt."

We had been walking for ten minutes since the chute dumped us out. The corridor hadn't turned. It hadn't changed. Just endless, rhythmic pulsing of the blue pipes overhead. Thrum. Thrum. Thrum.

"Boss," Relay hissed from up ahead. He was scouting ten paces out, looking jittery. Every time his claws clicked on the metal, he flinched. "I found something."

We caught up to him. He was standing next to a recessed alcove in the wall. Inside sat a flat, rectangular slab of grey metal, hovering about six inches off the deck.

"Is it a trap?" Splitjaw asked, eyeing it suspiciously.

"It's humming," Relay said. He poked it with his stylus. The slab bobbed gently, like a boat on water, then stabilized.

I looked at it. I looked at Splitjaw's shattered leg, trailing a line of blood on the pristine floor.

"It's not a trap," I said. "It's a pallet jack. Or a sled."

"A what?"

"Luggage transport," I translated. "Get on."

Splitjaw looked offended. "I am the First Shield of Ashring. I am a warrior of the Deep Roads. I am not luggage. "

"You are currently three hundred pounds of dead weight with a bone sticking out of your shin," I snapped. "Get on the floating square, Splitjaw, or I will leave you here."

He grumbled something that sounded suspiciously like a curse on my ancestors, but he let us maneuver him onto the slab. It sank a few inches under his weight, the hum pitching up to a whine, then held steady.

"Comfy?" I asked.

"I feel like a garnish on a plate," he soured, crossing his arms.

"Good. Relay, you pull. I'll steer."

We moved faster now. The sled glided effortlessly, friction defeated by whatever ancient magic—or magnets—powered this place.

But speed has a downside. It means you find the traps faster.

The hallway finally ended. It opened up into a rotunda, a circular hub with twelve identical tunnels branching off like the spokes of a wheel. In the center stood a pillar of black glass, pulsing with a slow, red rhythm.

"Which way?" Relay asked, stopping the sled.

"Left," I said immediately.

"Why left?"

"Because 'right' feels unlucky today."

"That is terrible navigation, Boss."

"You want to flip a coin? Oh wait, we don't have coins. We have rocks. Left. Go."

Relay shrug and started towing Splitjaw toward the third tunnel on the left.

"Wait," I said.

It wasn't a sound. It wasn't a sight. It was a feeling. The hair on the back of my neck stood up. The air in front of that tunnel... shivered.

"Stop!" I lunged forward, grabbing Relay's tail and yanking him back.

"Hey!"

"Don't move."

I picked up a loose piece of gravel that had fallen from Splitjaw's armor—a chunk of good, honest dungeon stone. I tossed it gently toward the tunnel entrance.

The stone hit the empty air.

ZZZZT.

There was no explosion. No flash. The rock just... ceased. It disintegrated into a puff of fine grey dust that was instantly sucked into a floor vent.

Splitjaw's eyes went wide. "What is that?"

"Decontamination field," I whispered.

The System pinged, crisp and cold.

[Warning: Organic Contaminant Detected]

[Protocol: Sterilization]

[Clearance: None]

"It thinks we're germs," I said. "The dungeon isn't trying to kill us because we're enemies. It's trying to kill us because we're dirty."

"Well, we are covered in bug guts," Relay pointed out helpfully.

"Not the point."

I looked at the other tunnels. They all shimmered with the same faint distortion. We were trapped in the hub. And the red light on the central pillar was blinking faster.

"It knows we're here," Splitjaw said, gripping his broken spear. "Can we fight it?"

"You can't stab a forcefield, Splitjaw."

"Not with that attitude."

"Boss," Relay interrupted. "The lights."

The blue strip-lighting overhead flickered. Once. Twice. Then it dimmed.

The air in the hub grew heavy. Not with pressure, but with static. The hair on my arms stood straight up. And then, from the vents, dust started to gather.

Not grey dust. White dust. Chalk dust.

It swirled in the center of the room, coalescing against the black glass pillar. Lines formed. Sketches. A rough, jagged drawing of a kobold in a hood, flickering like a bad hologram.

"Is that..." Splitjaw squinted, leaning forward on the sled.

The figure solidified. It wasn't really him—it was a rough, flickering sketch made of white static. But the oversized hood, the nervous posture, the stylus worn to a nub...

"Scribbles?" I breathed. "That's impossible."

The chalk-ghost looked at us. It didn't have eyes, just swirls of white static. It raised a trembling hand and pointed at the wall between two tunnels. A solid, blank metal wall.

It mimed 'pushing'.

"He's helping us," Relay whispered.

I mimicked the gesture. Two quick taps, one long press.

Click.

A hidden seam hissed open. A panel slid back, revealing a narrow, unlit service crawlspace. The air that rushed out smelled stale, but it didn't smell like sterilization ozone.

"Backdoor," I grinned. "Still the best shortcut finder in the tribe."

We shoved the sled into the gap just as the red light on the pillar turned solid. A moment later, the entire hub behind us flashed with searing, purifying fire.

We scrambled into the dark, the heat licking at our heels. The service tunnel was tight. We had to ditch the sled. Splitjaw hobbled, leaning on me and Relay, gritting his teeth against the pain.

"How much further?" he wheezed.

"Ask the ghost," I said.

Scribbles' projection was fading, flickering in and out as we moved away from the hub. He drifted ahead of us, leading us through a maze of pipes and cables that pulsed with liquid mana.

Finally, the tunnel opened up.

We stepped out onto a metal catwalk suspended over a cavernous chamber.

I stopped. My breath caught in my throat.

"By the Flame," Relay whispered.

Below us, stretching down into the abyss, were pumps.

Massive, obsidian pistons the size of towers were cycling slowly. Thump... Thump... With every stroke, they drew thick, glowing blue liquid from the depths and pushed it upwards into massive conduits.

The heat coming off them was staggering. It wasn't volcanic. It was industrial waste heat.

I looked at the layout. I looked at the pipes ascending into the rock ceiling far above.

"The magma vent," I whispered. "The 'natural' hot spring under the village."

"What about it?" Splitjaw asked, leaning on the railing.

"It's not natural," I said, pointing at the massive coolant lines. "It's a radiator. Ashring... the whole village..."

[Lore Fragment: Geothermal Coolant Loop]

[Status: Blocked by unauthorized squatters (You)]

"We're living on a car engine," I muttered. "And the engine is overheating."

Scribbles' ghost flickered one last time. He was standing by a vertical shaft at the far end of the catwalk. A platform sat there.

An elevator.

We stepped onto it. Splitjaw collapsed instantly, his leg finally giving out. Relay checked his stylus, his hands shaking.

I looked at the rune.

"This goes up," Relay said. "Miles up."

"Back to the surface," I said.

"Back to the war," Splitjaw corrected.

I pressed the rune.

The platform lurched. My stomach dropped. We began to rise.

Slowly at first, then gaining speed. The pumps fell away below us. The pipes blurred into streaks of blue light.

I looked up.

Far, far above, through miles of shaft, I could see a tiny square of light.

It wasn't sunlight. It wasn't the gentle blue of the dungeon moss.

It was red. Angry, flickering, violent red.

"The village is burning," I said softly.

Splitjaw pulled himself up to a sitting position. He checked the edge on his broken spear. He wiped the green blood from his eyes.

"Then we're on time," he growled.

The platform accelerated, rushing us toward the ceiling, toward the fire, toward the end of our little world.

"System," I asked. "What's the casualty forecast?"

[Calculation Pending...]

[Forecast: Total.]

I laughed. It was a sharp, brittle sound in the rushing wind.

"Wrong answer," I whispered.

"Next stop: Apocalypse," I announced to the squad. "Try to look presentable."

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