Eric howled with something beyond terror at his own imminent death, beyond fury at the callous way uncaring fate had made his world the plaything of incomprehensible forces, inhuman abominations, and land hungry homicidal humanoids.

His heart pounded with desperation, his sharp sense of direction and internal map not only of this ruined hellhole of a city above, but the sewers below, tormented him with a madman's desperate hope as he dared to jump in the fire pit, chasing his sister into damnation as the orcs above roared with fury, pain, and delight at yet another human tragedy playing out for their enjoyment.

And no matter how many fucking videos he had seen of people walking upon a bed of white-hot coals, all he felt was pain.

Pain as he screamed for his sister, her hair already ablaze, desperately trying not to breathe the superheated air as he lurched across the bed of coals with a strength he didn't even know he had, far beyond what being shot up with steroids and worked out to within an inch of his life for months should have given him, tormented by fencing instructors and trainers and a pitiless mother who swore that medically prescribed testosterone was harmless for a young man his age, no matter how much the injections made his heart race. And damn if she wouldn’t make an action hero out of her talentless hack of a son, no matter how many years the ‘roids chopped off his life.

At least he now had the strength to pull off this act of absolute madness.

Even if for only a few more seconds.

In that awful endless moment his flesh screamed, licked by flames, the world became a nightmare heat haze as he charged through the coals, clenched his stunned sister in his arms, along with a few red hot embers in the palm of his crossbow shooter's glove now catching flame as he RACED for the porcine pit master gazing at him in disbelief at the lip of the ramp.

And he was a dead man running, covered in flame, so filled with hate it choked back the screams as he glared at the smirking pitmaster about to lance Eric with the tongs in his hand as he desperately raced up the ramp… before squealing like the pig he was, when a handful of red hot coals struck the orc right in his beady little eyes.

Eric's palm might have been scorched to a mass of charred flesh, his crossbow glove completely burned through, but it was a small fucking price to pay. Because he could now use the full weight of his sister to shoulder-check the screaming pit master, clearly off balance, even if Eric knew he wasn’t nearly massive or strong enough to actually send that six hundred pound bastard falling into his own death trap as Eric cleared the ramp.

Which made the sound of the orc’s agonized shrieks as he did, in fact, fall right into his own bed of hot coals all the sweeter as a nearly blind Eric, still ignoring the torment of his scalding flesh, finally gasped sweet gulps of cool air as he leaped free of the pit ramp, tearing past the one orc gazing at him with the porcine version of stunned disbelief, and Eric all but felt the passing of wind as a lone javelin thrown his way from the far side of the fire pit skipped in the ground where he had just passed.

What he was doing was impossible, and he didn’t care.

He was a dead man running, skin charred to ash, with only one hope of salvation.

Darting down the narrow alleyways he and his sister had so carefully strode along, less than an hour before, then sprinting for all he was worth across the still quiet street in the desperate hope that this time there was no orc retrieval party waiting to ambush them. And by some miracle there wasn’t, because why would there be, with the humans already caught? And Eric was too exhausted even to sob with relief when he finally dove through the sewer entrance hidden so well behind the rancid pile of garbage he and Elonia had been stupid enough to leave, should never have left, not even in the dead of night.

Of course, those damn orcs now knew at least the direction of where he fled, he thought, after plummeting and splashing into the stream of brackish runoff water flowing in the far corner of the otherwise dry and deliberately slanted storm tunnels that, contrary to popular belief and his own references to sewers, wasn’t filled with raw sewage at all.

Only the hissing sounds of charred meat being abruptly cooled, echoing with the shrieks of a young man no longer hiding his agony. Then the sobs as Eric used his one remaining good eye that hadn’t been baked shut to gaze down at the dying form of his sister.

Her face was covered in blisters and her hair was a singed bob. But by some miracle, she wasn't the charred mess of flesh Eric knew he himself was.

But she wasn’t breathing.

She wasn’t breathing!

Eric whimpered, quickly feeling for her heartbeat, ignoring his own growing weakness and dizziness, dragging his sister with arms steadily weakening as he approached the secret those tunnels hid so well.

A secret that had terrified him and his sister both, and had stopped their rat hunting when they realized the risks, the peril, having nearly given in to the siren call that seemed to echo through their souls, just the night before. The real reason why they had dared the surface in the first place, to get some perspective. Because for all that he had been chanting the odds like a mantra, it was Eric, not Elonia, that had to be dragged back from daring the roots of the pod, last night.

Eric froze, his one still intact eye widening in a sudden epiphany of understanding. Now forced to accept that the girl dying in his arms had risked so much not for her own sake, but to shock Eric to his senses. Her playing the over excited girl in need of a sober second opinion, forcing Eric to take the more cautious role, had been nothing more than an act, for his sake far more than her own, before the horrors they had witnessed had forced them both to abandon all pretext and just get the fuck out of there, before it was too late.

Before some slimy asshole lowlife had nearly cost them both their lives.

And the horrible bottom line he didn’t know if he could ever live with himself was… Elonia had risked her life so Eric would be less likely to imperil his own.

And now she was about to die, because he was an easily enticed fool.

He hung his head in shame, fighting back a hoarse sob of despair.

Yet the soft luminescent light that had at first so enticed him when it had first called out to them both, just a few nights ago, was now their only hope salvation.

Because the key to leveling up and surviving any injury was the glowing vegetative mass of roots, stalk, and alien sentience before him. Black Cat and Four Dog’s interviews had made that much damn clear. With very few exceptions, everyone who entered a pod came out disease and injury free, no matter how fucked up they had been before entering. And even if only a select few, like the Advanced classer, actually came out looking like they had just turned 18 again, everyone who dared the pods could still gain superhuman vitality and perhaps longevity as well. Some even went so far as to claim that the biological clock would at least halt, if not reverse, if they managed to level up and boost the right stats.

And the irony for Eric and his sister was that it no longer mattered that most who dared the pod above came out as walking horrors and a feast for the orc fire pits, just minutes later. It didn’t even matter how hideous the sights above had been.

And maybe, just maybe, there was some truth to Eric’s desperate hunch that the roots held the key, its light far more soothing, and sane, than the predatory madness above. Everyone knew you fed nutrients through the root system, after all. Only carnivorous plants took in nutrients by the leaves and stalk, and maybe the gentle roots before him were the secret to a gentle ascension, not a forced evolution into whatever zombie plant hybrids were writhing and roasting in the coal pits above.

Of course, that was probably sheer desperation talking, but it didn’t matter.

Eric knew damn well that he and his sister were dead no matter what they did, unless they could actually survive the zombie making horror before them.

Eric did his best to calm his madly racing heart, consoling himself that at least the gentle susurrations emanating from the pale fleshy white roots of the massive pod really did seem to sooth the terror in his veins as it basked his dying sister, whose heartbeat was growing ever more erratic, in a cool green light.

And Eric was finding it increasingly difficult to suck in life-giving oxygen.

His sister had felt like a feather in his arms, just a minute ago. Now, she felt like a tone of lead weights he refused to drop, no matter how much his heart raced and his muscles screamed.

Yet as much as his dying body cried out to be wrapped up in the gentle rustling music of the fleshy pod before him, he didn’t dare touch it.

Not until his sister was safe.

And never had he regretted leaving the tunnels more than he did at that moment. They were both likely to die here, and had no excuse, having forsaken a wonderful shelter any of the refugees above would no doubt kill for.

It had been no vault… but with access to clean water, beds, furniture, clothing, and at least a year's worth of food, Eric had had no complaints. It even had a constant supply of fresh air, completely free of the taint of charred wood, burning flesh, or damp stone. And it had power. Power! And there was no power, except for the occasional oddly flickering tunnel light, anywhere else in the city!

Eric trembled, not even sure why he had never thought too deeply about all those anomalies before this very moment. Not that it mattered. It had served as the closest thing to the survival shelters of his favorite games, and he had been grateful for every day they were able to live peacefully there, with what felt like a library’s worth of hardback novels, history books, and encyclopedias to distract themselves with, or just train in the tiny gym.

They even had board games!

They had been well fed and safe, and even his normally control-freak of a mother had been oddly accommodating of him and Elonia going out hunting for rats and resources, gaining some practical survival and foraging skills, as their mother put it. She had even declared these sewers to be temporarily safe until the next surge hit. Whatever that had meant.

Her only stricture having been a promise to never to go above.

And they had.

And he and his sister had both nearly died.

Might still die, if he didn’t quit puttering around and ACT! Before it was too late.

“I’m sorry, Elonia,” Eric said, his voice little more than a wheezy whisper as his heart hammered painfully in his chest, forced to accept that maybe he had taken a gasp or two of superheated air after all, despite his best efforts. It was a struggle not to be overwhelmed by his growing dizziness and the fiery throb over every inch of his body that just wouldn’t end, now that terror and fury were draining him dry, making it clear that he wasn’t long for this world either.

“But I can’t think of what else I can do,” he gasped. “This pod is our only fucking hope!”

His voice cut off with ragged coughs, spitting out gunk he refused to look at, was terrified to look at, his heart racing as if he had sprinted harder in the last few seconds than the whole time he had stumbled through that pit of hell.

He felt an awful wave of dizziness and a shivery tingle overcome him, knowing he was about to hurl like mad, tasting the black edge of spasms and death, just beyond.

So he bit his charred lip til it burst against his teeth, biting back his screams as sudden clarity and a final shot of adrenaline gave him the strength to press his sister against the root system of the massive pod.

And he pretended it didn’t sicken him, how ropy tendrils of vegetative matter caressed his dying sister before slurping her up, like giving birth in reverse.

He winced and shuddered, and that proved too much for the tingling nausea flooding through him, Eric suddenly retching and spewing bile, meat chunks, and blood, sobbing as his throat burned from the acid almost as badly as every inch of his flesh did. His blackened skin began cracking to reveal raw pink flesh that Eric was terrified even to look at, sobbing and trembling in an agonized huddle, gasping for air that just wouldn't come.

He wheezed for breath, now coughing up a constant stream of fluids as breath became a desperate struggle as he shivered upon the wet stone floor now covered in roots before the massive pod.

He prayed it was a good sign that his sister hadn’t been immediately rejected. A sigh of relief coming over his cracked lips as he tasted the edge of oblivion, knowing he was just seconds away from finally passing out. He would be free of the hideous pain that ratcheted up every moment, already worse than he had felt for those brief, awful moments he had dared to race across that hellish fire pit.

With luck, his sister would live, and become the hero of her own tale, able to level up in ways wondrous and grand, just like in all the progression novels still on their kindles.

Maybe she really would become the hero of her own life’s tale.

He smiled at the thought of her becoming a just and noble queen, just like she had been portrayed on the silver screen. And truly, he was grateful for the release of oblivion as it wrapped him up in its soothing embrace, finally able to let go of the throbbing agony that his entire body had become, slipping into darkness at last, his final act a warm smile for the adventures he and his sister had shared, no doubt the beginning of what would be, for her, a truly magnificent saga lasting a lifetime.

His only regret was that he wouldn’t be there to join her.