Chương 32: The Seven-Second Window

Meno should have slept. He stood in front of the open Soma-X7 with his phone still in one hand, Lysa's last message glowing on the screen, and his head full of every word he had just said to Aureliana. The apartment was quiet now, which made the silence ugly. His stomach kept twisting like it had found a dungeon mechanic of its own, and food sounded impossible even though his body had already filed three complaints. Nearly six hours before he had to leave for Lysa's house.

Enough time for a nap, food, a shower, normal human behavior, and maybe a chance to stop giving motivational speeches after being emotionally cornered. He climbed back into the capsule. The seal closed around him with a soft hiss. The Soma-X7 mapped his body, adjusted under his shoulders, and loaded Veyrath cleanly enough to make the real world feel like the bad client. Meno hated that comfort came so fast.

He appeared in Westmarket, near the crafting district, still reputable, still undergeared, still carrying enough gold to buy a house and absolutely nothing useful in this one. His mind replayed BrineSaint's stream again. Shield planted in burning sand. Worm at fifty percent. Seven seconds underground. Flame eruption. Death. Again, again, again, while Meno had been stuck hammering Common trash because every real crafter belonged to a banner. It infuriated him.

He turned the stream fully back on and did not wait for chat to settle.

"Crownfall, listen up." His voice came out sharper than intended, then kept going because tilt had already taken the wheel.

"I'm about to leave the city with my Common III sword. If you want to gank me, go ahead. I'll feed you negative karma all day until your players can't enter a city without guards checking their pockets for moral disease." OH NO lol he was gone for 2 minutes speech arc Crownfall tagged apple martyr strategy Meno kept walking.

"You think camping gates makes me stop? I die for free. I have apples, junk, and spite. You kill me, I come back. You kill me again, I come back again. You waste players, burn karma, lose time, and while you're babysitting me, Highbanner, Silverwake, and Stormhold keep farming." A player near a fountain turned to stare. Another pointed. Meno ignored both and headed for the north gate.

"If you grief me, I pay it back a hundredfold. I might die a million times, but I will figure out a way to make your lives in Veyrath absolutely miserable. Believe me when I say this: you will stop competing. You will stop farming. You will stop running dungeons because I'll find something nasty in the route and make it your problem." THREATBEADGOD legal team drafting he has 50 apples and a dream He hit the main road and broke into a run.

"So go ahead and try me," Meno said.

"Let's see what you're made of." The gate came into view. Westmarket's yellow-stone arch rose ahead, guards posted on both sides, the safe-zone boundary shimmering faintly at the road's edge. Beyond it, two Crownfall players waited exactly where they had waited before. Lethren leaned against a stone marker with his staff angled over one shoulder. Vexil crouched near the road, daggers visible, head tilted as if Meno's whole speech had been a weather report.

[Lethren_Crownfall | Class: Sigil Arcanist — Level 25 | Ability: Arcane Binding] [Vexil_Crownfall | Class: Shade Knife — Level 25 | Ability: Backline Execution] Same levels. Same setup. Same insult. Meno stopped at the boundary and looked at them.

"Is this it?" For a second, neither moved. Lethren's grip shifted on his staff. Sigil light crawled over the wood, faint and ready. Vexil's smile stayed lazy, but his feet had already set for a cut-in. Then Lethren stepped aside.

"Just go." Vexil turned his head.

"What?"

"Not like he can do anything," Lethren said.

"I'm sick of standing here too."

"We were told to block him."

"And we did. For hours." Lethren's mouth tightened.

"I'm not eating negative karma because this idiot decides to sprint into us until we're locked out of every city service worth using. You heard him. I believe him." Meno said nothing, because agreeing would ruin it.

"I'm calculating." Lethren tapped his staff once against the dirt.

"We kill him, we get apples and maybe junk. He gets clips, we get karma loss, and he keeps coming. All we accomplish is making one lunatic personally interested in our schedule." Vexil's jaw worked.

"Wait. I'm talking to Kestrel. We do have a contract, and I'm not quitting because you got spooked by a broke streamer's villain monologue." Meno waited. One minute passed. Then two. Vexil stared at whatever private panel he had open. Lethren looked out across the road like he had aged five years in guild duty. Chat kept screaming for Meno to run, jump, dance, throw an apple, or ask if Crownfall had dental. By minute five, Meno's patience was down to a sliver.

"Clock's up." Vexil's eyes refocused.

"You can go. For now." His smile returned, smaller and uglier.

"We aren't finished." Meno crossed the boundary and walked between them without thanks, relief, or the smart thing to say, because the smart thing would admit they had let him through. Inside his head, the promise formed hard and clean. One day, with a real weapon, he would find a way to one-shot an entire Crownfall raid with Panic Pump and Hundredfold Cleave, even if he had to break Veyrath's combat log in half to do it. Not now. Soon enough. He ran.

North of Westmarket, the land opened into familiar starter grasslands. Low hills rolled under scattered trees, with cart tracks cutting through patches of yellow flowers and scrub. A few players farmed wolves near the road. Others escorted NPC wagons or argued beside a broken fence over whose quest tag had counted first. Meno ignored all of it. The grass thinned as he ran. In the far distance, the ground rose toward gray-brown mountains. That had to be the way to the dunes.

Honeygrave had said Melrai Dunes north of Westmarket, and BrineSaint's stream had shown desert. Close enough. The road ended at the mountain. Meno stopped, breathing hard, and stared at the stone wall where the path simply gave up.

"There has to be a tunnel," he said. gate is locked ask npc road quest lmao dragon time mountain skip He looked up. Jagged ledges ran along the slope, broken by brush, bird nests, and narrow cracks in the rock. The proper route was probably somewhere nearby: gate, pass, caravan entrance, maybe a guard post with a quest named Responsible Travel. Meno bent his knees.

"I have False Wings. I don't need a road." He jumped. The first air-step caught under his boot with that half-real buzz, and he kicked against nothing. His body snapped upward toward a slanted ledge. He landed hands-first, scrambled, stood, and jumped again before loose gravel could steal his momentum. The climb became ugly and fast. Jump. Kick. Kick. Grab. Kick again. Skid on one knee. Curse. Jump.

The Soma-X7 caught each movement cleanly enough that every mistake felt like his fault, which was both useful and irritating. A pair of nesting birds shrieked from a cracked shelf above him. [Hostile: Ridgehook Kite | Type: Starter Beast | Threat: Low | Trait: Dive-Peck] They dived anyway. Meno ignored the first. The second came closer, beak aimed at his face, and he air-stepped sideways just enough that it cut through empty space and smacked into the cliff behind him.

"Low-threat wildlife," he said.

"Respectfully, get out of my way." At the ridge top, the world changed. Desert spread beyond the mountains in a vast sheet of pale gold and rust-red dunes. Heat shimmered over the sand. Far ridges bent under sun glare, and dark shapes moved beneath the surface in long, slow curves. The Melrai Dunes stretched farther than the stream overlay had made them look. Meno opened BrineSaint's broadcast again as a small overlay. Still fighting.

The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon. Still wiping, probably. The current attempt showed the same burning circle, the same Sleepwalker, the same evolved worm smashing its head into BrineSaint's shield with the patience of a siege engine.

"He's still there," Meno said. steal kill careful he has 2m viewers worm arc carrying trash sword Meno equipped the Common III Balanced Iron Sword and jumped off the ridge. False Wings turned the fall into travel. He let himself drop, then kicked once forward, then again lower, landing in a sand-slide that carried him halfway down the slope. The dunes swallowed his boots up to the ankle, forcing his stride wider and slower than grassland. He adjusted, leaning into each step.

"Anyone watching BrineSaint on multistream?" he asked.

"Serious question. Where is he? Give me direction." Chat answered like a hydra with brain damage. north turn left at worm east northeast wrong dune follow sun"Be serious for once." The spam got worse while Meno ran north. Ten minutes later, the first normal sandworm hit him. A line of disturbed sand curved toward his path. He saw it late, jumped right, and the worm erupted where his legs had been. It was large, but nothing like BrineSaint's nightmare version: tan plates, grinding mouth, dusty hide.

[Hostile: Melrai Sandworm | Type: Desert Beast | Threat: High | Trait: Burrow-Lunge] High. Killable. Decent XP, maybe materials, and maybe enough durability loss to ruin the weapon before the real fight. Meno ran parallel to its burrow line, baited the next lunge, then kicked off empty air and drifted over its open mouth.

"Later." The worm crashed down behind him and lost interest after another missed burst. He kept going. The dunes were not empty. A half-buried camp of skeletons rattled near a broken stone arch, some carrying curved blades, others raising bone charms that leaked dark heat into the sand. [Hostile: Sunken Bone Hexer | Type: Undead Caster | Threat: High | Trait: Withering Chant] Grouped enemies. Melee plus caster. Classic punishment package. He circled wide.

Past that, a pack of swirling sand elementals spun around the ruins of an old well, their bodies twisting into little tornados with ember sparks trapped inside. [Hostile: Dune Spiral | Type: Elemental | Threat: High | Trait: Erosion Body] Meno gave them more distance than pride wanted. Chat slowly, painfully, built consensus around northeast. Enough viewers were watching BrineSaint, comparing sun angle, dune formations, and the jagged silhouette of distant rocks behind the fight.

It was still chat, so half of them lied for sport, but the signal improved. northeast confirmed big red stone arch on Brine cam follow broken aqueduct he passed skeleton camp good more right not that right Meno adjusted. A second sandworm chased him, and he evaded with one air-step and a hard roll. A third burst from a slope, forcing him into a double-kick that left his stomach swinging inside the capsule.

He passed another ruin half-swallowed by sand: black pillars, cracked stairs, and a dungeon entrance framed by two leaning statues. [Dungeon Entrance Discovered: Glassdry Catacomb]"Marked," he said, and kept running. Finally, he saw the resurrection shrine. It sat at the base of a cluster of tall dunes, pale stone half-buried in sand, blue light struggling against the desert glare. BrineSaint's stream overlay showed the same shrine behind his party before they moved out.

Meno closed the overlay, ran past the shrine, and climbed to the top of the dune, where the fight spread out below him. Seeing it through a stream had flattened the scale. In person, the burning circle around the Sleepwalker looked wider than a town square. The sand inside it glowed orange-black, flames crawling low across the ground without fuel.

The Sleepwalker walked slowly near the far edge, following one of BrineSaint's archers, who kept backing away and firing arrows that seemed to pass into the cloak and vanish without consequence. The evolved worm thrashed in front of BrineSaint. [Evolved Greater Sandworm | Type: Dream-Burned Beast | Threat:??? | Trait: Flame Burrow] BrineSaint had changed the strategy. The support stayed behind him now instead of kiting the Sleepwalker.

A thin gold-blue chant flowed from the support's hands whenever BrineSaint attacked, making the shield and mace flash brighter for a few seconds. The support had to stand close enough to channel, which explained the earlier problem fast. When the worm slammed into BrineSaint's shield, fire burst outward after the block in a wide explosion. The support took the edge of it and staggered, HP dropping hard. The support existed to make the lower-level damage dealers relevant while BrineSaint soaked the XP. Smart route.

Bad matchup. The explosion radius punished anyone trying to amplify the tank. Meno inspected him when the support shifted into view. [StillBurst | Class: Hymn Architect — Level 26 | Ability: Chorus Surge] The worm was near seventy-five percent HP. The two archers not on Sleepwalker duty moved behind BrineSaint as the worm began to curl. StillBurst followed, close enough to keep the buff going.

The Sleepwalker-kiting archer kept backing away at the edge of the burning field, trying to shoot while dragging the hazard circle out of the main fight. The worm spun. Fireballs sprayed everywhere. This time, the party was ready. The two archers and StillBurst tucked behind BrineSaint's shield. Fireballs hammered golden light, exploding on impact. Chip damage still leaked through. The support's HP fell low. One archer ate a splash and nearly dropped. But they lived.

"Improved," Meno said. BrineSaint stood at around forty percent HP. He had not used the full heal yet. He pushed forward as the spin ended, mace rising in clean rhythm. The archers spread out again. StillBurst moved between them and BrineSaint, channeling short bursts that made weapons glow at the moment of impact. The worm slammed its head down. BrineSaint blocked. Fire exploded. StillBurst survived with maybe ten percent HP and kept casting. The worm dipped below sixty. Meno started moving down the dune.

The sand fought every step. He angled his body and used short False Wings kicks only when the slope tried to eat his speed. He kept his sword in hand for now, then thought better of it. He needed both arms free. The Common III sword vanished into inventory. The worm attacked again. BrineSaint punished. Gold marks detonated. The worm dropped under fifty. It jumped. All four players scattered. Bad target roll.

The worm ignored BrineSaint and lunged at one of the archers instead, crashing down hard enough to kill them instantly before plunging beneath the sand. BrineSaint reacted fast. He dashed toward the impact point, shield angled down, full-heal light beginning to gather around him. He was trying to bait the underground eruption back onto himself. Meno counted. Seven seconds from burrow to eruption. Roughly. Maybe six and a half. Maybe enough to be stupid. Four. He sprinted harder. Three. StillBurst saw him first.

"What are you doing?" Two. Meno took one long step in, hooked BrineSaint under the arms from behind, and grabbed tight. BrineSaint did not fight him. He went passive in Meno's grip instantly, reading the motion faster than anyone had a right to. Meno jumped with everything he had, knees snapping up, then kicked off empty air with both legs forward. They jerked backward as the sand below them glowed, and the worm erupted like an infernal rocket. Still too close.

Heat washed over Meno hard enough to make his vision flare as BrineSaint angled his shield forward, armor flashing gold against the blast. Meno waited one sick fraction longer. Then he threw BrineSaint into the worm's mouth and kicked away with his second False Wings step. The world cracked into noise. Meno hit the dune shoulder-first, rolled twice, and came up with sand in his face and one thought ringing cleanly through the tilt. That better have counted as useful.

HE THREW BRINESAINT INTO THE WORM FALSE WINGS ASSIST RANK 1 AMMO WHAT IS THIS YOU CAN DO THAT?! The worm landed and began thrashing. Golden light pulsed from behind its teeth as its head swayed, slammed into the sand, and snapped at nothing, its body twisting out of rhythm. BrineSaint was alive in there, or at least his Radiant Aegis was making the worm regret swallowing him. The remaining two archers stared for half a second, then resumed shooting. Meno pointed at StillBurst.

"Buff me!" The Hymn Architect stared back as if reality had just asked for a raid invite.

"Buff me!" Meno shouted again.

"Now!" StillBurst's hands lit. [Temporary Buff Received: Chorus Surge] Damage dealt increased by 25% for 15 seconds.

"Please be multiplicative," Meno muttered, and equipped the Common III sword. He charged, slamming the first hit into a burning plate near the worm's lower side. [Compound Swing | Chain: 1 | Damage: +10%] The sword bit shallow, heat licking along the blade and into his hands through the haptics. Meno jumped back before the worm's twitching body could graze him, clearing the flame aura without losing HP. Good, because he was already too low, and one sloppy touch would kill him. [Chain Broken: Stop] He did not care.

[Technique Activated: Panic Pump] [Compound Swing | Chain: 100 | Damage: +1000%] [Current HP Set: 1] The world narrowed. One HP. Every ember spark became lethal. Every twitch of the worm's body counted as a boss attack. The sand under his boots, the heat in the air, the spinning segments, the roaring mouth full of BrineSaint's golden light, all of it became spacing, timing, and places he could not afford to be. Meno lunged in and swung. The Common III sword struck with Panic Pump's stored violence behind it.

A chunk of burning scale cracked loose, and the worm screamed through its whole body. The worm convulsed, its burning side sweeping toward him. Meno jumped out with False Wings, then kicked back in through the air parallel to its body before the chain starved. Hit. Jump. Kick. Hit. The worm thrashed like a rabid thing, head slamming into the sand, body rolling half over itself. Meno moved around the edges of those impacts with no room for dignity.

He kicked sideways off empty air, landed on a sliding patch of sand, cut once, then used the next air-step to bounce over a sweep of burning plates. [Compound Swing | Chain: 110 | Damage: +1100%] StillBurst refreshed the buff when the glow began to fade. [Temporary Buff Refreshed: Chorus Surge] Meno expected more from a Hymn Architect, then remembered they were not in a party. Maybe the good stuff required party links. Maybe StillBurst was already doing everything the system allowed.

Meno had no attention left to complain properly. The two archers fired into exposed cracks. Their damage was still tiny, but tiny mattered when the worm had a tank stuck in its mouth and a red-eyed idiot carving it from outside. [Compound Swing | Chain: 150 | Damage: +1500%] Meno barely saw the notice. The worm's head slammed down near him. He jumped forward instead of back, because back was where the shock of sand and flame rolled outward. He kicked forward again, body nearly horizontal.

Stabbed backward without looking. The blade caught on something solid. Valid resistance. The chain lived. Momentum carried him into a backward somersault. At the top of the turn, he kicked upward off the second air-step, driving himself down into a cut with a horrible twist through his stomach. He tucked his legs beneath him, landed in a crouch, and stabbed forward before the chain could starve. dance dance dance rank one movement???

1 HP GAMING this is sick sword durability screaming check brinestream brine pummeling mouth from inside [Compound Swing | Chain: 200 | Damage: +2000%] BrineSaint's golden light pulsed from inside the worm again. Maybe blocking. Maybe detonating marks from within. Meno did not care. The worm was stunned badly enough to move ugly instead of precise, and that was all he needed. The worm rolled left. Meno kicked up as its head snapped down.

Dropping under the movement, he cut once across a glowing seam, then air-stepped backward with both legs tucked to avoid a flame ripple that would have erased him. [Compound Swing | Chain: 230 | Damage: +2300%] The Common III sword felt wrong in his hand. Too much heat. Too much impact. Durability bleeding under every strike. StillBurst refreshed the buff again with a hoarse shout. The archers kept firing. [Compound Swing | Chain: 235 | Damage: +2350%] The worm froze all at once.

Its body straightened, segments locking into a crooked tower of burning plates and trembling meat. Meno jumped back on instinct, kicked twice more for distance, and landed in a hard slide down the dune. For one second, nothing moved. Then the Evolved Greater Sandworm broke apart. Its body split along every golden-lit crack, burning plates falling away from within.

Segments collapsed into the sand in a steaming heap, fire guttering out across its hide and leaving blackened glass, charred flesh, and molten sand cooling into ugly clumps. [Kill Confirmed: Evolved Greater Sandworm] [Contribution Recorded: 25%] [XP Awarded: Assisted Threat??? Kill] [Level Up | Level 28] Meno stood with one HP, sword lowered, lungs tight.

LEVEL 28 25% CONTRIBUTION HE HELPED BRINESAINT RANK 1 AMMO HOW DID THIS WORK WORM ATE THE WRONG TANK PANIC PUMP VALUE PRAYERBEADGOD OP From under the collapsed worm pile, something moved. A goo-covered golden shield shoved a slab of charred scale aside. BrineSaint emerged from the mess slick with slime, soot, and burning sand, his armor dimmed but intact. He stepped down from the corpse and looked at Meno with calm, exact judgment. Meno clapped once, still breathing hard, like that explained everything.

"Good pull?" Across the burning sand, the archer kiting the Sleepwalker shouted, "Hey! This thing is still here!" The Sleepwalker kept walking, slow and silent, the burning circle moving with it.