Surviving the Free-for-All

A total shitshow, officially certified by the system.

Yet Bennett did not panic. Even if enemies surrounded him on every side, death was far from guaranteed. In truth, the thought of rolling over and dying had never once crossed his mind. No matter the cost, he had to survive. That was how he had lived until now, and he had no intention of changing course today.

Had he possessed the luxury of time to lay an ambush—just as he had against the Drake family assassins—he could have wiped out an entire mob single-handedly. But the circumstances here were entirely different. The terrain was unprepared, and he wasn't alone; the lives of his companions were on the line.

"Our situation isn't entirely hopeless," Bennett said, prioritizing the morale of his team. "We're in a tight spot, certainly. But none of them have noticed us yet."

"That is true," Kyle murmured.

"And our position here is solid."

Bennett's party had tucked themselves into an auxiliary room tucked deep in a corner of the open-plan office. At first glance it resembled a break lounge, but closer inspection revealed peculiar appliances meant for office work mixed among the amenities. The presence of a small refrigerator and drink dispensers made it feel like a kitchenette, yet several bulky, alien apparatuses sat awkwardly alongside the furniture.

Regardless of its intended purpose, the enclosure offered virtually zero sightlines from the outside, and the single narrow approach made it easy to defend. Better still, a partition screen had been positioned across the entryway like a natural blind.

Its only flaw was the small metal placard hanging just above the doorway frame.

Bennett quietly snapped the sign—inscribed with Dungeon Language—off its mount and tucked it out of sight. So long as they avoided making loud noises, this nook served as an ideal bunker to outlast the siege. Whatever unfolded beyond the doorway, their best play was simply to wait for an opening: the factions tearing each other to pieces, or chaos clearing a path to the exit.

"Conserve your stamina. You may eat, but light no fires."

His caution stemmed less from light discipline than from fear of drifting aromas. Leaving his companions to rest, Bennett slipped out alone to monitor the room beyond. Taking the point was a leader's duty, and staying ahead of developments was the only way to react before catastrophe struck.

"Aaargh! My arm!"

"Got you now, you little rats!"

The Hunters and the rival crew were screaming at the top of their lungs, butchering one another in total ignorance of the ring closing around them. Casualties mounted by the second, their numbers dwindling rapidly.

Meanwhile, the ten-man squad choking off the stairwell stood in tense, silent standoff against another freshly arrived contingent. Even as they postured against each other, both groups kept stealing glances toward the brawl between the Hunters and their foes, like vultures waiting to see who collapsed first. And the assassins who had shadowed the Hunters from behind were nowhere to be found, having slipped seamlessly into stealth.

The air grew progressively thicker.

Hm?

Bennett's nostrils twitched as he surveyed the perimeter. A sharp, grating dryness caught in his nose and throat.

A sandstorm?

He whipped his head toward the exterior wall just as a wave of ochre dust surged through the shattered windows.

Whoooosh!

Perhaps because Bennett had pumped it full of magical disruption earlier, the destructive fury of the storm had waned considerably. Had it retained its initial ferocity, it would have pulverized everything in its path down to powder; now, its bite was largely blunted. Had the window glass remained intact, the tempest wouldn't have penetrated the office at all. Even so, it was more than sufficient to drown the vast floor in a blinding yellow murk.

The torches held by the Hunters and their combatants sputtered and died. Sudden pitch-black enveloped the floor, accompanied by the choking weight of howling grit. The men locked in melee broke apart in shock.

"Dammit! Cover your mouths!"

"I can't see shit!"

Mages on both sides hastily abandoned offensive incantations to cast light spells, but the air was already saturated with swirling sand. The faint spheres of light did little more than create milky halos in the haze, utterly useless for restoring vision. A few attempted to conjure gusting winds to blow the curtain of dust outward, but their spells merely stirred the grit into violent eddies before collapsing.

Bennett fell back to the pantry in a flash.

His comrades were equally unsettled by the abrupt gale. While their tucked-away haven shielded them from the worst of the blast, the dry, choking dust still stung their airways.

"It's the sandstorm we encountered earlier. Its strength has dropped considerably, but take these."

He reached into his Sub-space Pouch and pulled out several strips of pleated fabric with elastic loops designed to hook around the ears—disposable masks an merchant had tossed in as freebies alongside regular provisions. Once everyone had slipped them over their mouths and noses, Bennett donned his own and eased back toward the threshold.

The clash between the Hunters and their opponents had ground to a halt, but the atmosphere remained stretched to the breaking point. The real problem was the other parties: startled by the ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠gale, groups that had remained hidden until now had cried out or scrambled for cover, inadvertently giving away their positions. The more disciplined veterans suppressed their presence as best they could, but no squad was composed entirely of ghosts.

Distracted though the Hunters and their enemies were, they weren't deaf. Rigid with suspicion, every combatant swept their surroundings in paranoia.

Whirrr!

Yet their eyes were practically useless.

Channelling psionic energy into the skill, Bennett felt the entire layout of the floor map out neatly within his consciousness. He could even pick out hushed whispers carried across the howling dust.

"Fuck... like this, we won't even know who's hitting us."

"W-What do we do?"

"Hey, mage! Can't you do something about this? I can feel mana humming in this damn dust!"

"If I could control this storm, do you think I'd be crawling through a dungeon with you? I'd be parading around as an archmage!"

Listening in, Bennett sensed the inevitable. The tension had peaked; the powder keg was about to blow. And the spark didn't take long to land.

"Who the hell are you?!"

"Gah!"

Two separate squads, each seeking safer positions, had blindly collided in the murk. In an instant of panic, bodies bumped in the dark. One scavenger managed to keep his blade sheathed, but his counterpart, trembling with terror, instinctively lunged with a drawn dagger.

Squelch!

"Aaaagh!"

The agonized shriek shattered what little restraint remained.

"You bastards!"

"Die!"

Bennett, who had half-raised his Shooting Star repeating crossbow, lowered the weapon with a calm gaze. He had been prepared to cut the cord himself if necessary, but there was no need. The room was tearing itself apart without his intervention.

The skirmish that erupted in the corner spread across the entire office like wildfire. In the impenetrable blinding haze, every faction unleashed their bloodlust, hacking blindly at shadows. Without reliable line of sight, friendly fire ran rampant.

"Hold it! It's me!"

"S-Sorry—gck!"

Before the apology could finish, a scavenger creeping through the fog drove a sword deep into the man's back. The outraged comrade immediately cut down the assailant to avenge his partner, only for a stray bolt to punch straight through his skull while he knelt to check the body.

It was total, indiscriminate slaughter.

Bennett observed the bloodbath in cold silence. When the blazing fire finally consumed its fuel and sputtered into embers—that would be his cue to act.

Just like any blaze, a brawl on the fourth floor required bodies to keep burning. Once there was no one left to fight, the battle naturally ground down into an exhausted standstill.

By the time the storm subsided, the thick veil of dust had begun to thin, allowing the naked eye to piece together the carnage.

"Urrgh..."

The floor was carpeted in corpses and pools of dark blood. The copper stench of viscera overpowered the dusty air. What had once been a reasonably preserved corporate office was now reduced to splintered furniture and gouged concrete.

Bennett led his party out from the pantry with quiet, measured strides.

"If we had been swept up in that..." Kyle breathed, his face pale. "It would have been a disaster."

"More like fatal," Erika murmured.

"Stay sharp," Bennett said.

The party halted, their eyes widening. Even out of that chaotic massacre, several figures remained standing.

"...Some appear to be survivors of the melee, while others were holding back," Kyle noted.

It was just as he said. Those drenched in gore, their bodies scored with cuts and gashes, had clawed their way out of the meat grinder. Conversely, the ones with spotless gear had either slipped into the floor late or, like Bennett's team, stayed tucked away to watch from the periphery. To Bennett's eye, they looked like late arrivals—his Detection skill hadn't picked them up prior to the melee.

Silence hung heavy as the disparate survivors circled one another warily, weapons drawn.

Bennett was the first to break the stillness.

"I have a proposition."

Every set of eyes snapped toward him, rife with suspicion.

"As you can see, there is quite a haul here," Bennett said evenly. "Far too much for any single party to carry out."

Five or six parties had collided here. Disparate though their sizes had been, the sheer volume of weapons, pouches, and magical artifacts scattered across the floor was enormous. Even with Sub-space Pouches, Bennett's group couldn't haul it all away. Had he anticipated a bloodbath of this magnitude, he might have brought extra storage containers, but even he couldn't foresee every turn of events.

"So why don't those of us left alive split the spoils?"

"Fuck you!"

The vitriol erupted from the survivors of the brawl. They weren't a unified outfit; they kept their distance from one another, eyes feral with exhaustion.

"You sat on your ass while we bled, and now you want to stroll in and scoop up our loot? You got some nerve spouting that shit!"

"Damn straight! Why the fuck do you think we fought through this hell?!"

While some merely shouted, one chose immediate violence.

A fierce-looking woman brandishing a longsword broke into a sprint, blue light shimmering across her body—a Mana Practitioner surging with power.

Bennett smoothly sidestepped the whistling edge.

Thunk.

"Guh...!"

The woman froze mid-stride, her sword drooping as her gaze drifted downward. A combat dagger was buried to the hilt over her heart, having punched effortlessly through hardened leather cuirass and bone alike.

Staring in disbelief at the grip jutting from her chest, she collapsed forward. She struck the floor in an undignified heap, rear end jutting up in the air as her breath hitched and ceased. The sight of her corpse sent a chill rippling through the onlookers.

"The... the Bitch of the Battlefield? Dropped in a single strike?"

I don't know who she was, but she must have had a reputation.

Sensing their resolve waver, Bennett released an outward pulse of psionic energy.

The invisible shockwave rippled across the room, slamming into their senses. Every scavenger stiffened, faces draining of color. Capable of feeling and manipulating mana themselves, they understood precisely what this meant: an external aura burst of that caliber was a trademark exclusive to the Elite Rank.

"Does anyone else object?" Bennett asked quietly.

There was none. There couldn't be.

"N-No objections."

"It sounds... perfectly reasonable."

"Then we have an agreement."

Without warning, Bennett snapped his Shooting Star upward.

Thump! Th-thump!

"Urk!"

Startled scavengers spun around, terrified they were being betrayed, only to find several figures clad in mottled dark ghillie suits collapsing from behind overturned desks. Repeating bolts had drilled clean through their temples and sternums. They were the hidden assassins who had thought themselves undetected.

Meeting the wide eyes of the onlookers, Bennett offered a detached explanation. "They refused to show themselves to the very end. I have no fondness for knives in my back. Furthermore..."

The sights of the Shooting Star pivoted toward one specific survivor.

"He doesn't get a share either."

"W-Wait! What did I do?!"

The man cried out with an aggrieved face, but his theatrical performance was far too clumsy to fool Bennett's eye.

"It's been a while," Bennett said.

"What the fuck are you talking about?! I've never laid eyes on you before!"

"Not even when you tried to slit my throat back in the Easy difficulty?"

"W-What...?"

The man, his face smeared with someone else's dried gore, was a surviving member of the Hunters. He was the very squad leader from the LT Department Store who had botched his mission and been demoted to a disposable rookie.

"T-There's clearly a misunderstanding—gck!"

A bolt took him squarely between the eyebrows. The man dropped like a stone, and Bennett finally lowered the crossbow.

"Now we are settled."

"R-Right. Of course."

With that, the salvage began.

Bennett stood watch over the perimeter to prevent further surprises while his companions dragged their designated share of corpses into a corner and stripped them methodically. The remaining scavengers, hailing from shattered squads, banded together awkwardly.

"W-We're a team until we clear this dungeon."

"...Agreed."

It wasn't born of camaraderie, but survival. Scattered individuals on an active floor where exit gates were completely unpredictable were nothing more than easy prey.

Hands worked busily through pockets and pouches.

Naturally, Bennett's party claimed the lion's share. Having witnessed his lethal prowess, the other scavengers readily yielded the highest-value corpses without a murmur of complaint.

"Um, Bennett-nim?"

"What is it?"

Erika called out with a conflicted, unsettled expression.

"I think... you need to see this."

She was kneeling beside the corpse of the female swordswoman—the one Bennett had put down first. Stripped down to her undergarments, the woman's pale skin was fully exposed, and Erika was pointing directly beneath the corpse's left armpit.

Hm?

Bennett's eyes narrowed.

Inked into the skin under the arm was a small tattoo shaped like a pair of human lips. The design itself was unremarkable, but the ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠skin was squirming. As if having just noticed Bennett looking, the animated lips puckered and blew a silent, mocking kiss.

...Am I seeing things?

A living, moving tattoo.

"I-It's definitely moving, isn't it?" Erika whispered.

"It appears so."

He had no idea what kind of spell had animated it, but one thing was certain: it reeked of something unnatural. It stirred the exact same visceral repulsion he had felt when encountering Ra'al's fragments and the Hand of Curse.

After a moment's consideration, Bennett coated his fingertips in psionic energy and pressed them against the mark. What began as smooth human flesh suddenly shifted beneath his touch into something coarse, bumpy, and disturbingly cold.

Sssss!

The reaction was instantaneous.

The squirming lips withered and vanished from the flesh entirely. A faint, distant screech seemed to ring in the back of his mind, though it faded so quickly it might have been an auditory hallucination.

"All clear now?"

"Y-Yes."

Aside from that grotesque anomaly, nothing else stood out. The deceased swordswoman's gear and personal belongings yielded a remarkably hefty sum of coin and valuables. By the time they finished stripping the dead, the chaotic floor had settled into an eerie quiet.

"We'll be moving on ahead," Bennett announced to the room.

"W-Where are you headed?" a survivor asked hesitantly.

"Upward, for now."

"I see. Best of luck to you!"

The nodding scavengers wore expressions that clearly said they would rather die than set foot on the upper floors. For Bennett's party, that suited them fine; it meant fewer nuisances trailing behind them.

"Let's move."

"Understood!"

Weighed down by substantial spoils, Bennett and his team departed the fourth floor.

The rush of power washed through his veins in a searing wave, but Bennett merely set his jaw, absorbing the sensation without breaking stride.