The Goliath roared, its voice a grinding of rusted plates and tortured air. To the other recruits, it was a sound of pure terror, a primal scream that bypassed the rational brain and triggered the flight response. To Andy, it was a telegraph. It was a mechanical signal of intent, as predictable as the chime of a clock. He didn't see a monster; he saw a series of moving parts that needed to be jammed.

  "Amito, listen to me," Andy said, his voice cutting through the panic like a blade through silk. "I need you to count. Three seconds. That’s the window between its roar and the next chain sweep. If you don't hit the bolts on the count of three, we all die. The armor is reinforced with grave-mana, but the bolts are simple pig iron. They are the structural failure point."

  Andy had laid down the criteria. One target. One window. One chance. He was establishing the logic of the fight before it even happened, turning a chaotic slaughter into a manageable equation.

  He didn't wait for Amito to agree. Andy lunged forward on his one good leg, dragging his broken arm like a useless weight. The pain was a dull, thumping rhythm in the back of his mind, but he had long ago learned how to file pain away in a mental cabinet. He wasn't aiming for the giant's head; he was aiming for the mud beneath its supporting foot.

  He threw the remaining fragment of the spear. He didn't throw it with the hope of a kill; he threw it to force a flinch. The wood struck the Goliath's single yellow eye—a wet, lidless thing that served as its primary sensor. The beast flinched, its massive head snapping back in a reflexive jerk.

  "One!" Andy shouted.

  The Goliath roared, a sound that rattled the bones in Andy's chest and caused the loose teeth in his jaw to ache. The monster's chain hand began to coil, the rusted links grinding against each other with a sound like a car crusher. Andy watched the gears in the Goliath’s neck grind; in his memory, the 10th-floor versions of these beasts had silver-grade dampeners that made them silent, but this Tutorial version was using raw, unlubricated iron. It was louder and slower than he remembered. It was a prototype of a nightmare, and prototypes always had flaws.

  "Two!"

  Amito stepped forward. The golden light from his sword was no longer a flicker; it was a steady, pulsing glow that illuminated the mud and the blood of the clearing. He looked at Andy, and for a split second, the boy's mask of heroism slipped. He saw a seventeen-year-old boy who was seconds away from being pulverized, his eyes wide and searching for an exit that didn't exist. Andy ignored the plea in those eyes. He didn't need a friend; he needed a delivery system for the System’s favoritism. He needed the 'Hero' to act like one.

  "Three! Hit it now!"

  Amito lunged. His blade, boosted by the System's desperate need for a protagonist, found the seam in the Goliath's neck-bolts. The iron snapped with a sound like a gunshot. The head tilted at an impossible angle, exposing the pulsing, purple core hidden within the stitched throat—the "Heart of the Grave."

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  Amito’s sword pierced the core.

  The explosion wasn't loud; it was heavy. A wave of cold, necrotic mana washed over the clearing, extinguishing the small fires and knocking the remaining Goblins to their knees. It felt like a sudden drop in atmospheric pressure, a weight that pressed against the eardrums. The Goliath didn't fall; it dissolved. The stitched flesh turned to gray dust, and the iron plates clattered into the mud as useless scrap.

  As the essence of the fallen beast rushed into him, Andy felt a series of sharp, electric jolts snap through his spine. It was the raw heat of the reclaim—three levels of pure potential forced into a body that wasn't ready for it. His broken forearm didn't fully heal, but the bone knit together with a dull, throbbing ache that was manageable. His calf muscle tightened, the tear closing enough for him to stand without the wagon's support. He could feel the new strength coiling in his limbs, a fraction of the power he once possessed, returning like a long-lost friend.

  ---

  The silence that followed was thick, flavored with the metallic tang of blood and the bitter scent of ozone. The recruits stood in the mud, staring at the pile of scrap that used to be a monster. Amito stood in the center, his sword still glowing, his chest heaving. He looked like the savior the System wanted him to be—a golden boy standing in the wreckage of a nightmare.

  Andy didn't join the cheering. He didn't care about the accolades or the wide-eyed stares of the survivors. He walked over to a small patch of grass near the edge of the clearing that hadn't been touched by the blood or the mud. He sat down.

  He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small, flat river stone. It wasn't the Traitor's Compass; it was a simple piece of smooth granite he had picked up in the first life. He began to rub it against his sleeve, cleaning away the grime with slow, methodical strokes.

  "You did it," a voice said.

  Andy looked up. His mother was standing there. She wasn't looking at Amito or the golden light that still clung to the air. She was looking at the way Andy was meticulously cleaning his stone. She sat down beside him, her shoulder brushing his.

  "I did what I had to," Andy said.

  He noticed the way her shawl was torn, the fabric frayed by the wind and the chaos. Without thinking, he reached out and tucked a loose thread back into the weave, smoothing the cloth with his thumb. It was a small, domestic gesture that felt entirely out of place in a war zone. For a second, he wasn't the specialist; he was just a son fixing his mother's clothes after a long day. He felt a small, satisfied huff escape his lungs—a human breath that had nothing to do with stats, logic, or survival.

  "Everyone thinks Amito killed it," she whispered, her voice low so the others wouldn't hear.

  "Good," Andy said, his eyes returning to the cold, calculating register. "Let them look at the sun. It's easier to move in the shadows when everyone is blinded by the light. People follow the light because it makes them feel safe, but the shadows are where the real work gets done."

  Andy had spent ten years becoming the kind of man who could look at a Level 15 and calculate the angle of its knee plate without his hands shaking. He wasn't a hero. He wasn't a savior. He was the thing the System hadn't planned for—a man who had already lost everything it could threaten him with. He was a variable that the equation couldn't account for, and he intended to remain that way.

  He stood up, his movements fluid and efficient once more. He looked at the timer in the sky. Forty minutes left.

  "The first wave is over," Andy announced, his voice carrying across the camp with a flat authority that silenced the celebratory murmurs. "But the Hub gates won't open for the weak. Collect the scrap. Sharpen your blades on the wagon wheels. If you can't walk by the time the timer hits zero, you stay in the woods. The System doesn't reward survivors; it rewards assets."

  He looked at Amito, who was currently being hugged by Sarah and thanked by Marcus. The boy looked like a king, but Andy saw the way his hands were still shaking. He noticed that Amito’s voice was two octaves higher than the deep, resonant baritone of the man who had murdered him on the 17th floor. It was a jarring reminder of how much work was left to do. The man who had betrayed him was still a child, and Andy was the only one who knew the monster that child would become.

  "We're moving," Andy said to his mother, his voice softening only for her. "The Hub is next. That's where the real game begins."