Gamez

I hated gambling.

From an objective point of view, gambling sucked. You put everything on the line—your time, your strength, even your life—hoping the dice land in your favor. Strength didn't work that way. Real strength didn't hinge on random chance; it came from the blood, sweat, and stubborn refusal to keel over. Strength was earned, bit by bit, muscle by muscle. Gambling? That was asking to get gutted because you thought maybe, just maybe, luck would take your side.

And yet, here I was, literally in the Dungeon's belly, up shit's creek without a damn paddle. Like a particularly determined parasite. 

I'd managed to pull through so far—held my own against its wrath, mild as it might've been with the Red Shadow and the respawned Goliath.

 But let's be clear: that was thanks to my wits, my grit, and my strength. My tricks might have saved me so far, but they were only as good as the fists behind them.

Then there was Golbin. The little guy was scrappy, maybe even starting to earn a smidgen of respect. But still, I'd rather wring his scrawny neck than ever rely on him. Partnership? That led to complacency, and complacency got you killed. I didn't need a herd of sheep to watch my back, and I wasn't interested in rounding up weaker fighters to help carry the weight. My strength, my rules. Maybe if I was weaker, I'd have to go looking for that kind of help. But I wasn't. Fenrir's Hunger was so powerful I didn't even know how fast I was growing anymore.

Problem was, it still wasn't enough. Not yet. Not to risk pushing deeper, where black-variant monsters could be waiting for me to stumble into their claws.

It was a trick question, what to do next, but the answer was simple, as it always was 

I needed more strength.

 So, I was swallowing my doubts—and my misgivings about gambling—for what came next.

In my claws, I held a magic stone unlike any other. Small, dark, and crimson, the kind of red that oozed bad news. Darker than blood. Like a shard of congealed venom, a warning in stone form. This thing radiated evil like a snake spitting poison, just lying there as if it dared someone to take it. 

When the Goliath went down, its body didn't even bother leaving the usual magic stone. It left this *tiny*, blood-red shard instead. Blatant trap if I'd ever seen one. But a trap that I knew I needed to spring.

I let out a sigh, half-amused. Well, if this Dungeon wanted to mess with me, I'd oblige.

I shifted into the shadows, finding the deepest, darkest corridor on the 16th floor. No one to see, nothing around but the damp silence pressing down. I could *feel* something watching me. Ever since the Goliath crumbled to dust, that presence had been there, just out of sight, like a thousand eyes itching between my shoulder blades.

I glanced over my shoulder. "You want to play games, huh? Pathetic." My words echoed, bouncing off the stone like a slap in the face.

The feeling intensified, the air getting thick, close, as if the very walls were leaning in to catch every word. The pressure built, pressing down on my back like the whole Dungeon was trying to fit its gaze right between my bones. I had to give it to him/her/them? It was a hell of a trick. It also told me that I didn't really have a choice in eating that stone. I felt it in my bones that I would be killed or chased up to the surface if I didn't obey.

I laughed, as always.

 And then, before I could second-guess myself, I lifted the cursed magic stone to my lips, teeth bared in a mocking grin, and bit down.

Instantly, copper flooded my mouth, sharp and metallic, thick like blood. The stone shattered under my teeth, shards scraping down my throat, leaving a metallic burn that tasted of rusted iron and death. I swallowed, the cursed stone clawing its way into my stomach, like a jagged nail in my guts.

And then, pain. 

Not pain that simply hurt—this was pain that exploded, tearing through me from the inside out. It felt like every bone in my body was snapping apart, each muscle shredded and reforming at once. I could feel myself *breaking*, body and mind, under the pressure. My vision blurred, red and black, teeth clamped so hard they cracked. Blood filled my mouth, thick and salty, the iron tang mixing with the taste of shattered bone.

My skin burned, peeling, ripping itself apart as the essence from that cursed core seeped into every cell, breaking me down from the inside out. It wasn't just pain; it was annihilation, an unmaking that gnawed at the edges of my soul, pulling it apart thread by thread. I felt myself unraveling, my body and spirit splintering as if I were being crushed in the jaws of a beast.

Somewhere, at the edge of it all, I could feel a dark, sneering presence, like the Dungeon itself laughing at me—a low, ugly chuckle echoing in the back of my skull, a cold satisfaction as it ground me to dust. My very soul was being stretched, twisted, ripped into pieces, pulled apart like fabric.

I was teetering on the edge of death, staring into the dark pit of oblivion that was waiting, eager to claim me. One more breath, one last gasp, and I'd slip straight into that darkness.

And then—nothing at all.