They Called Me Trash? Now I'll Hack Their World-Chapter 214: Die! Die! Die!

The cavern rang with the deafening, rhythmic clang of iron meeting steel.

Garf planted his boots firmly in the rubble, taking another vicious flurry of dagger strikes against his heavily dented shield.

He grunted, violently shoving the attacker back with a surge of raw strength, and spat a thick wad of blood onto the dusty stone floor.

"Dammit," Garf rumbled, his chest heaving as he tightened his grip on his war axe. "These rascals are fast."

Off to the side, crumpled against the jagged cavern wall, lay two of the cloaked figures, one completely motionless with a feathered shaft buried in his throat, the other clutching a shattered knee and groaning in the dirt.

But the remaining two assassins were a blur of lethal, coordinated motion, weaving around Garf’s defenses like smoke.

Cowering just behind the safety of Garf’s massive frame, Tessa trembled violently.

She had her knees pulled up to her chest, her knuckles turning bone-white as she gripped the hilt of her small hunting knife.

Her wide, terrified eyes darted frantically between the flashing blades and the spraying blood.

Are we going to die? The thought echoed in her skull, cold and suffocating. Right here, in the dark?

A paralyzing wave of regret washed over her.

There’s so much I haven’t done yet.

She squeezed her eyes shut, fighting back hot tears as the sounds of the battle raged inches away.

I never told Grandfather I loved him. Never thanked him properly for everything. Never got to run the alchemy facility we planned. I haven’t seen the capital.

Never married. Never had children. Never grew old watching grandchildren play.

The knife shook in her hands.

I’m still young. I’m supposed to have time. Supposed to have a future.

This isn’t fair.

"Gah!"

Garf’s sharp grunt of pain snapped her eyes open.

One of the assassins had feinted low, his dagger slipping just past the edge of the iron shield to slice a shallow, bleeding gash across Garf’s bicep.

"Get back!" Mira screamed.

The archer stepped out from Garf’s shadow, her bowstring humming a deadly tune.

She unleashed a blinding barrage of arrows, forcing the assassins to flip backward to avoid getting skewered.

Mira reached over her shoulder, her fingers grasping empty air.

But...

Her quiver was empty.

Without missing a beat, Mira dropped her bow and whipped out a wicked, curved hunting knife from her thigh sheath.

She lunged forward, parrying a lightning-fast thrust from the nearest assassin in a shower of sparks, before backpedaling smoothly to regroup beside the tank.

"You alright, big guy?"

Mira asked, her breathing ragged. She quickly swiped her storage ring, and a fresh bundle of iron-tipped arrows materialized in her hand.

She seamlessly scooped up her bow and began to reload.

"I’ve had worse scrapes shaving," Garf grunted, raising his shield to cover them both again.

Watching them bleed just to keep her safe, something inside Tessa suddenly snapped.

No, she thought, her grip tightening on her knife until her palms ached. I can’t die... Not yet.

She stared at the remaining assassins, analyzing their flawless, deadly footwork. I’m not a fighter. If I step out there, I’ll just be dead weight. I can’t cross blades with them...

But her eyes drifted upward, past the flashing steel, looking at the jagged, unstable cavern ceiling above the assassins’ heads. The recent cave-in had left the entire structural integrity of the floor hopelessly compromised.

Wait... could it...

Tessa didn’t hesitate. She swallowed her panic and focused her mana directly into her eyes.

"Material Analysis!"

The world around her instantly shifted.

The dim, dust-choked cavern dissolved into a glowing wireframe of structural data, highlighting the density, weight, and stress points of the stone.

Her eyes darted frantically across the ceiling above the assassins until they locked onto a massive, jagged limestone stalactite suspended directly over the enemy vanguard.

It was hanging by a literal thread of cracked stone.

"Mira!" Tessa screamed, her voice cracking with sheer desperation as she pointed a trembling finger straight up at the ceiling.

"The pillar! Shoot the base of that cracked pillar right above them!"

Mira blinked, weighing down.

But then in one fluid motion, she drew her bowstring back to her ear, aimed straight up into the gloom, and let her newly nocked arrow fly.

And it slammed perfectly into the microscopic fissure Tessa had pointed out at the base of the massive limestone stalactite.

For a single, agonizing heartbeat, nothing happened.

Crack!

Then came the deafening sound.

Tons of jagged stones sheared away from the cavern ceiling. It plummeted like a meteor, smashing into the ground with the force of an explosive charge.

A thick, choking cloud of pulverized rock violently plumed outward.

The assassins were caught completely off guard.

One managed to dive backward, but the resulting shockwave threw the other violently off balance, breaking their synchronized rhythm.

Tessa didn’t stop. Her material analysis was still burning in her eyes, painting the world in weak points and stress fractures.

"Garf!" Tessa screamed over the settling dust, pointing at the uneven terrain beneath the recovering assassin.

"The loose shale by his left heel! Strike the ground there!"

Garf didn’t ask any question.

He just pivoted, raising his massive iron shield, and drove the heavy bottom edge into the exact patch of stone Tessa had targeted.

"Take this!"

The impact shattered the brittle shale. The ground beneath the assassin literally gave way.

"What the...!"

The figure wobbled, his arms windmilling for a fraction of a second to catch his balance. It was a fraction of a second too long.

Garf’s war axe flashed in the dim light, a brutal, horizontal crescent of steel.

Shhhk!

"Argh!"

The assassin let out a blood-curdling shriek as his right arm, still clutching a dagger, was severed completely at the shoulder.

It hit the dirt with a wet, heavy thud.

The tide of the battle instantly turned.

Now they had the upper hand.

But the relief didn’t even last a full second.

Screaming in absolute, blinding agony, the one-armed assassin staggered backward.

Blood geysered from his stump, but his remaining hand darted frantically into his cloak.

When he pulled it out, his fingers were clamped around a jagged, violently glowing orange crystal.

"Go to hell!"

The mana inside was wildly unstable, pulsing with a destructive, suicidal heat.

Mira’s eyes widened in sheer horror. "Shit! He’s going to blow!"

She raised her bow, but the other figure threw himself directly into her line of fire, his daggers flashing desperately to protect his dying comrade.

"You can’t pass me."

He locked Mira and the last one locked Garf in a frantic, suicidal melee, physically blocking them from reaching the bomber.

Tessa froze.

He’s going to detonate it.

The orange glow illuminated the dust around her.

He’s going to kill us all.

Her entire body screamed at her to run, to hide, to curl up in the dirt. But there was nowhere to go. If that crystal shattered, the cavern would become their tomb.

She didn’t have time to think. She only had time to survive.

Tessa scrambled over the rubble, her boots slipping on the bloody stone. She closed the distance in three frantic strides, throwing her entire body weight forward.

And drove her hunting knife directly into the side of the assassin’s ribs.

The blade sank to the hilt.

"Urgh!"

The assassin let out a choked, wet gasp, his body stiffening. The glowing artifact slipped from his trembling fingers, landing harmlessly in the dust.

Tessa ripped the knife out, tears streaming hotly down her face. Adrenaline and sheer, animal terror hijacked her brain.

"Die!" she sobbed, thrusting the blade again. "Die! Die!"

She stabbed him again and again, the sickening resistance of tearing muscle and scraping bone vibrating up her arm.

The assassin’s knees buckled. He collapsed onto his back, gasping for air that wouldn’t come. Tessa stood over him, her chest heaving, the bloody knife trembling in her fist.

The fanaticism in the assassin’s eyes was completely gone. As his lungs filled with blood, he looked up at her, his gaze wide with a sudden, profound terror.

He weakly reached his remaining hand toward her, his fingers coated in his own blood.

"Please..." he bubbled, his voice a pitiful, terrified wheeze. "It’s so cold... I... I don’t want to..."

Then his hand dropped to the dirt. His eyes fixed blindly on the cavern ceiling, the terrible, fragile light of life completely leaving them.

He was dead. 𝐟𝕣𝗲𝕖𝕨𝗲𝐛𝗻𝗼𝐯𝗲𝚕.𝗰𝚘𝐦

Silence washed over them...

Then, Tessa’s fingers went numb. The hunting knife slipped from her grasp, clattering loudly against the stone.

She stared down at her hands.

They were smeared with hot, sticky crimson. A heavy, suffocating weight settled into her stomach.

She had seen Jin kill. She had gutted terrifying beasts herself.

But this was different. The heat of his blood, the terrible fragility of his dying words...

I killed him, she whispered in her mind, her breath coming in shallow, panicked gasps. I just killed a person.

A heavy thud echoed behind her.

Tessa flinched, turning her head. Mira was pulling her blade from the throat of the last assassin, while Garf leaned heavily against his war axe, catching his breath.

Mira wiped a streak of sweat and dirt from her forehead, walking over to Tessa with a fierce, approving grin breaking through her exhaustion.

"Hell of a call back there, Tessa," Mira panted, clapping her hand on the trembling girl’s shoulder. "Finding those weak spots in the cavern... you were hell of cool. You saved our asses."

Mira then looked down at the bodies, her adventurer instincts instantly taking over. She dropped to one knee beside the assassin she had just killed.

"Alright, let’s check their pockets," She instructed, patting down the dead man’s cloak. "These fuckers must have something valuable on them."

Garf let out a booming, tired laugh.

"Aye, the victor gets the spoils," he rumbled, dropping heavily to his knees to begin searching the other corpse.

Tessa swallowed the thick, bitter lump in her throat.

She forced her trembling legs to bend, dropping to her knees in the dirt beside the man she had just stabbed to death.

She reached out, her bloody fingers hesitating before sliding into the inner pocket of his dark cloak.

But, she didn’t find coins or a spare dagger.

Her fingers brushed against a small, cold piece of metal.

She pulled it out.

It was a cheap, slightly tarnished silver locket.

With a shaking thumb, Tessa popped the tiny clasp. The locket swung open.

Inside was a small, beautifully painted miniature portrait.

It showed the man smiling brightly, his eyes full of warmth, standing with his arms wrapped around a beautiful woman and a little girl.

A thick, warm drop of blood dripped from Tessa’s fingers.

It landed perfectly inside the locket, smearing a red, irreversible stain right across the smiling little girl’s face.