Julius turned to face the rest of the pack.

The remaining wolves advanced as a few others poured from the gate. The other parties held off their share as Julius and his party focused on the ones that approached them.

A wolf approached him just as he sent the wardstone into the draft. It was faster than the others.

[Architect Eye Activated]

His vision sharpened as the world became a blue overlay of structural information. The Wolf was a reddish mass against the blue grids he saw.

It lunged just as the Eye had predicted. Julius dropped a bit low and drove the dagger under its belly as it passed but the wolf still managed to get a scratch on him.

Slash! Slash!

A couple of slashes from Yumiko’s claws were enough to finish it off. Julius smiled. He had expected the nekari to sit up in a tree but it seems she was intent on seeing this through.

Lumi had already put down two and was going for the third. A thrown knife to its midsection and two double claw strikes from her were enough to put it down.

The wolves were all down.

Around them the other parties were finishing their own engagements. A group of four had handled their wolves cleanly.

Another group of three had one member sitting on the ground with a hand pressed to their side on an injury. The others stood over them as they tried to tend to their wound.

Julius assessed his own party. Lumi had a shallow cut across her forearm and Yumiko had no visible injuries.

"You two alright?" he asked.

"Fine." Lumi said. She tore a strip from a spare bandage wrap at her belt and wrapped it around the wound.

Yumiko gave a nod.

Julius looked at the fallen beasts. The corruption that created them was already condensing into mana cores. He watched the other teams extract theirs and instructed Yumiko and Lumi to do the same.

I am the party leader after all.

Yumiko went to pick the cores of the wolves she had killed but Lumi was hesitating. The Lycan’s ears were low. Julius didn’t know what was happening until he made the distinction.

He walked up to her.

"Do you have a problem extracting the mana core?" He asked which caused her get startled for a moment.

"Nothing really, it’s just...I’d like to bury them once this is all done." There was a pause as she considered. "If it’s alright?"

Julius looked at the Lycan. The same hot blooded woman who had almost attacked him at the gym had a soft spot for wolves.

He couldn’t understand it. They were animals to him but they meant something else to her.

"I have no issues. Although, I may extract their parts. Would that be a problem for you?"

She thought long and hard before answering. "No it’s not." Then she proceeded to extract the cores.

Julius approached one of the wolves and put his hand on them. He wanted to confirm if he could harvest them

[Dire Wolf - Harvest?]

I guess that confirms it. I’ll have to do it later, away from the eyes of the other adventurers when the gate closes.

If the gate closed.

Julius couldn’t explain it but when he used the eye. He felt uneasy. For one there was no after effects of the stinging sensation and the second was the system pop up from before was still there.

[Revising Parameters...]

He dismissed the screen. He and the other parties had done their part. It was time for them to rest and leave it for the others to close the gate.

They found a position near a tree a few meters from the gate and settled down. Lumi worked on her bandage some more while Yumiko sat with her back to the tree. Julius stood and watched the breach.

The top parties had entered minutes ago. No sound from inside. No signal. The white tear hung in the air like a crack in the air.

Julius’s eyes widened for a moment. White? I could have sworn the gate was black. Also why does it look like it’s getting bigger.

The unease he had felt was back. The new system notification confirmed it.

[WARNING: Dimensional Breach destabilizing.]

’What? Did the parties that went in clear it?’

[Breach Spawn has fused with tether.]

What the heck does this all mean?

[...]

There was no response. The system was acting differently. There were no Iris notes this time. Whatever was in that gate was no Nemesis boss.

Julius looked at the last message.

[Breach Spawn has evolved.]

He had an Idea based on the information he had gotten earlier but he wasn’t sure enough to conclude.

---

Inside The Gate

The Boss chamber was large. It was made entirely of black rocks like the inside of a cave. It only had one entrance where the adventurers had come through. There was a chair made of stone at the other end with scratches all over it.

The entire area was clouded with mist.

The floor was littered with bodies of adventurers and broken equipment. A shield was in pieces and there were several severed bodies littered about. The sight was nothing short of a Massacre.

The ’high ranked’ parties that had entered intending to clear did not expect what they would come to find.

Branthir was still alive, alongside two of his party members. The dwarf from earlier with the red greatsword was the only survivor of his party. There were so four other survivors from various parties and Daren’s group who had come to lend a hand when they saw the carnage.

The Nemesis Boss. Fenrir, stood in the center. They had the body of a wolf, three times bigger than an orc.

Their fur was grey and stained red with the colour of blood. The creature stood on their hind legs. They were three times the size of an orc and held Daren’s throat with one arm and his dagger in another. He was in good shape considering the beating the Nemesis boss had given them.

The rest of his party members weren’t so lucky. Neznala and Kieran were unconscious in pools of their own blood. Joan was bleeding and Xavier tried to cast healing magic on her.

The only reason they were still alive was because Fenrir had a fixation on Daren’s dagger.

His nose twitched as it took in the scent on the blade once again. It opened its mouth to speak. It’s foul breath almost made the half-elf faint but he held on.

"There is a human in this world. Where are they?" Fenrir asked Daren as he dangled him like a fruit on a tree.

Daren struggled to breathe. "I have told you already. Humans died three hundred years ago. I lent my dagger to a veshari."

"Veshari? The subhumans?" Fenrir took a moment to consider his words. "No. This is the smell of a human."

There was silence as he considered something before speaking again.

"I have a deal. One of you will get that ’veshari’ and I may allow the rest of you to go." They wolf howled with laughter.

"And if we refused," Branthir spoke up. His breathing was uneven.

Fenrir gestured to the pile of bodies around. "Then you will die a slower death than the others."

---

Outside the gate. Julius watched the rift expand slightly. The dead flora around the gate were increasing. A few moments later, and the gate shifted as someone emerged from it. Xavier.

Julius alongside the others rushed to meet the elf.

A lot of them had many questions as the elf struggled to compose himself.

He was bruised with cuts over his body but none fatal enough to be serious. He explained the situation.

They managed to defeat the wolves they encountered and went to help the higher ranked parties who went to deal with the nemesis and the tether

Except there was no tether. The nemesis boss was the tether and they had to defeat him to close the gate.

The elf held his sniffles as he continued.

It ended badly and just as Daren was about to be killed, the boss took an interest in his dagger and he was sent to fetch Julius.

There was a moment of silence as everyone processed his words.

Some people were in disbelief, others were in an uproar claiming it was a lie. A ruse to hoard loot and they went into the gate.

"Idiots," Xavier said as they dispersed.

Just as Julius was considering his options Xavier pulled him aside. "The boss insisted that there was a human in this world but you and I know humans went extinct three centuries ago, right?" the elf watched his eyes as he asked the question but Julius didn’t budge.

Eventually, Xavier gave up and lost his composure, tears welled up in his eyes. "This is all a ploy to kill all of us right? There is no human. It is just taunting us and there’s nothing we can do."

Julius could feel the elf’s despair. He had lied about his race but the boss’s cruelty had nothing to do with that. This was his first dungeon after all.

The system screen from earlier had resolved.

[Parameter Revision Complete]

[Trial Mode Available]

’Trial mode?’

[Host can temporarily use skills of the tier above the current one. This mode can only be used for fifteen minutes.]

’What skills do I get’

[Skills are unlocked when Trial mode is active. Trial mode is only available within the breach]

Julius read the message. The system wanted him to go into the gate. He didn’t like the idea. Whatever was strong enough to take on people stronger than him needed caution.

But Daren and the remaining survivors’s lives were betting on him going in. He turned to Lumi and Yumiko.

"I’m going into the breach,"

Both of them tensed. He understood why they were afraid.

Lumi stepped forward. "I’m getting a bonus right?"

A chuckle came from Julius. "Of course."

Yumiko elected to stay behind so Julius asked her to watch Xavier. The Nekari nodded.

Julius and Lumi approached the breach. It was almost clear like crystal, like a series of shattered glass fragments against the air.

He made sure Lumi was ready and they both stepped into the gate.