They ran.

  The deep passages twisted and turned beneath the Scab Fields, organic tunnels that pulsed with the Tower's heartbeat, walls slick with moisture and faintly luminescent fluids. Elias led the way, Blood-Sight active, scanning for obstacles, dead ends, anything that would slow them down. Behind him, Mira moved with grim determination, her wounds protesting every step but her will refusing to yield. And Lira drifted alongside them like a pale ghost, her form flickering with fear.

  Kael's voice echoed behind them, growing fainter but never disappearing entirely.

  "This way! I can see their tracks!"

  The Siphoner patrol was relentless. They'd entered the deep passage within minutes of Elias's group, their familiarity with the terrain giving them confidence despite Old Tom's notes claiming they avoided these routes. Either the notes were outdated, or Kael's determination to prove himself had overcome their usual caution.

  Either way, the result was the same: hunters at their heels, no time to rest, no room for error.

  "Left," Elias gasped, spotting a branching tunnel through Blood-Sight. The passage was narrower, the blood vessels in its walls suggesting it led deeper into the living tissue rather than back toward the surface. Risky, but better than the alternative.

  They veered left, squeezing through the narrowing gap. Mira hissed in pain as her injured side scraped against the wall, but she didn't slow down. Behind them, Elias heard the Siphoners reach the junction, heard Kael's frustrated curse as he realized they'd taken an unexpected route.

  "Split up! Cover both passages!"

  The patrol divided, their footsteps echoing in multiple directions. Elias pushed forward, praying that the tunnel they'd chosen led somewhere useful rather than a dead end.

  The passage opened into a larger chamber—a pocket of space where the tissue had formed a natural cavern, the ceiling high enough to stand upright, the floor uneven but solid. Three exits branched off in different directions, and Elias paused for a precious moment to consult his mental map of Tom's notes.

  "Which way?" Mira demanded, her breathing ragged.

  "I don't know. Tom's maps don't cover this deep." Elias scanned the exits with Blood-Sight, looking for any indication of which path might lead toward Floor 14. "Lira, can you sense anything? Any warmth ahead?"

  Lira concentrated, her form flickering. "The left tunnel has... something. Warm, but not human. Animals, maybe? The middle one feels empty. The right one..." She shuddered. "Cold. Very cold. Wrong."

  "Left," Elias decided. Animals they could handle. Cold and wrong they could not.

  They plunged into the left tunnel, the sounds of pursuit growing fainter as distance and branching passages confused the Siphoners' tracking. But Elias knew better than to feel relief. Kael had proven resourceful; he wouldn't give up easily.

  The tunnel sloped upward, the tissue transitioning from wet and living to drier, more scabbed material. They were rising back toward the Scab Fields, approaching what Elias hoped was the transition zone to Floor 14.

  Then the Stalkers attacked.

  The first warning was Lira's scream—a sharp, terrified sound that cut through the darkness. "Papa, above!"

  Elias looked up just in time to see the ceiling erupt.

  Four Scab Stalkers dropped from their camouflaged positions, their segmented bodies unfolding as they fell, serrated limbs reaching for prey. They'd been waiting here, positioned along the tunnel ceiling, perfectly still until their victims passed beneath.

  An ambush within an ambush.

  Elias activated Cardiac Overclock without thinking, his heart rate tripling, the world slowing around him as his reflexes accelerated beyond human limits. The first Stalker was still falling when his spear met it, the weapon punching through the gap between its armored plates, finding the cluster of blood vessels that fed its central mass.

  The creature shrieked and twisted, ichor spraying from the wound, but it wasn't dead. Stalkers were resilient—you had to hit them multiple times or find the precise weak point that Blood-Sight revealed as a bright concentration of arterial flow.

  Elias pulled his spear free and struck again, this time aiming for the sensory cluster on its head. The blade pierced through, and the Stalker went limp.

  Harvested Blood: +0.4 L

  No time to process the notification. The other three Stalkers had landed, their bodies already moving toward Mira and Lira with terrible speed.

  "Mira, on your right!"

  She was already moving, knife flashing as she parried a serrated limb. Her counterattack was slower than usual—her injuries limiting her mobility—but her technique was precise. The blade found a joint, severed a tendon-analog, and the Stalker's right forelimb went limp.

  Elias engaged the second Stalker, his Overclock-enhanced reflexes allowing him to dodge its initial lunge and strike at its exposed flank. The creature twisted, surprisingly agile, and his blow only grazed its armor.

  The third Stalker circled around, trying to flank them. Lira's voice cut through the chaos: "Papa, behind you! The one with the torn wing-thing!"

  Elias spun, catching the flanking Stalker mid-lunge with a desperate thrust. The spear took it through the mouth, the serrated edges scraping against his weapon as the creature's momentum carried it forward. He braced himself, letting its weight drive the spear deeper, then twisted and pulled free.

  Harvested Blood: +0.5 L

  Two down. Two to go.

  Mira was struggling with her opponent, the Stalker's remaining limbs forcing her back despite its injury. Elias moved to assist, but the fourth Stalker intercepted him, its body low to the ground, moving with a skittering rush that was almost too fast to track even with Overclock active.

  The Circuit expired.

  The crash hit Elias like a hammer, his enhanced speed vanishing in an instant, leaving him slow and vulnerable. The Stalker sensed the change, its attack intensifying, serrated limbs slashing at him in a flurry of strikes.

  He parried the first. Dodged the second. The third caught him across the forearm, opening a shallow gash that immediately began to bleed.

  Vitality: 75/100

  Elias gritted his teeth and fought through the pain, his spear weaving a defensive pattern that kept the Stalker at bay but couldn't find an opening for a killing blow. He needed another Overclock activation, but the cost—

  "Elias!" Mira's voice, sharp with warning.

  He glanced toward her just in time to see her drive her knife into her Stalker's sensory cluster, the creature collapsing in a spray of ichor. She was wounded—new blood staining her shirt, her movements even slower than before—but alive.

  Harvested Blood: +0.5 L

  Three down. One to go.

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  The remaining Stalker, perhaps sensing that the odds had shifted, began to retreat. Its camouflage flickered, trying to blend with the tunnel walls, seeking escape rather than continued combat.

  Elias didn't let it.

  He lunged forward, ignoring the burn in his muscles, the throb of his wounded arm. His spear caught the Stalker before it could fully flatten against the wall, the blade punching through its armored back and into the vital organs beneath.

  Harvested Blood: +0.4 L

  Total Harvested: 1.8 L

  Blood Reserves: 4.7 L

  The tunnel fell silent except for their ragged breathing. Four Stalker corpses lay around them, ichor pooling on the organic floor, the air thick with the copper-and-bile scent of their blood.

  "Everyone okay?" Elias managed, checking his wounded arm. The cut was shallow—painful but not dangerous.

  "Define okay," Mira replied, pressing a hand against her side where fresh blood was seeping through her bandages. "I'll live. Probably."

  "Lira?"

  "I'm fine, Papa." The ghostly girl drifted closer, her eyes wide. "That was scary."

  Scary didn't begin to cover it. They'd been ambushed while fleeing an ambush, caught between Siphoner patrols and territorial predators, and they'd survived through a combination of skill, luck, and desperation.

  But they couldn't stop. Not here, not now.

  "We need to keep moving," Elias said, his voice hoarse. "The fight will have attracted attention—both the Stalkers' nest-mates and the Siphoners."

  Mira nodded grimly. "Lead the way."

  They pushed forward, leaving the corpses behind. Elias's muscles screamed in protest, the exhaustion of combat and Overclock use settling into his bones like lead weights. Beside him, Mira moved with mechanical determination, each step an act of will rather than strength.

  Vitality: 68/100

  The tunnel continued upward, the scab tissue thickening, the air growing drier. They were definitely approaching the surface now, approaching what Elias hoped was the transition to Floor 14. But hope was a dangerous thing in the Tower, and every step felt like a gamble against odds he couldn't calculate.

  "How much further?" Mira asked, her voice strained.

  "I don't know. The maps don't—"

  Lira's warning cut him off. "More warm things ahead! Lots of them!"

  Elias activated Blood-Sight, scanning the tunnel before them. His enhanced vision revealed what his eyes couldn't see in the darkness: a cluster of blood signatures, densely packed, moving toward them with the skittering gait he'd learned to recognize.

  More Stalkers. At least six, maybe more.

  "Shit." Mira drew her knife, her hand trembling slightly. "We can't fight that many. Not in our condition."

  She was right. They were exhausted, wounded, low on supplies. A sustained fight against six or more Stalkers would end badly.

  But retreat wasn't an option either. The Siphoners were behind them, and the other tunnels led to unknown dangers or dead ends.

  Forward was the only way.

  "We fight through," Elias said, gripping his spear. "Fast and brutal. Don't stop to harvest, don't stop to rest. We punch through them and run."

  "That's insane."

  "That's survival."

  Mira stared at him for a long moment, then nodded. "Fine. But if I die, I'm haunting you."

  "Get in line."

  They advanced toward the Stalker cluster, moving as quickly as their battered bodies allowed. Elias activated Cardiac Overclock preemptively, feeling his heart rate spike, his reflexes sharpen, his perception of time slow.

  Vitality: 63/100

  The Stalkers emerged from the darkness ahead—six of them, as he'd estimated, their bodies already rising from their flattened camouflage positions. They were smaller than the ones they'd faced before, younger perhaps, but no less dangerous in numbers.

  "Lira, I need you to watch our flanks. Call out anything that tries to circle around."

  "Yes, Papa."

  "Mira, stay close. We move together."

  "Understood."

  They hit the Stalker line like a wave.

  Elias took the lead, his Overclock-enhanced speed allowing him to strike before the creatures could fully react. His spear became a blur, stabbing, slashing, creating openings for Mira to exploit. He didn't aim for killing blows—there wasn't time—just disabling strikes that slowed the Stalkers, confused them, created gaps in their formation.

  "Left side, Papa! One's trying to go around!"

  Elias pivoted, catching the flanking Stalker with a sweeping strike that drove it back. Mira took the opportunity to advance, her knife finding the joint of another creature, hamstringing it.

  They pushed forward, step by bloody step, the Stalkers falling back before their coordinated assault. One creature lunged at Elias's blind spot, and he spun to meet it—

  Too slow.

  The Overclock had expired again, and Elias's enhanced reflexes vanished at the worst possible moment. The Stalker's serrated limb was already descending toward his neck, a killing blow he couldn't dodge, couldn't parry, couldn't—

  Mira's knife intercepted it.

  She'd thrown herself between Elias and the Stalker, her blade catching the limb mid-swing, deflecting it just enough that it scraped across her shoulder instead of opening Elias's throat. She cried out in pain, blood spraying from the wound, but her other hand was already moving—a second knife, smaller, hidden, driving into the Stalker's sensory cluster.

  The creature collapsed.

  "Mira!"

  "Keep moving!" she snarled, clutching her shoulder. "Don't stop!"

  Elias grabbed her arm, pulling her forward as the remaining Stalkers regrouped behind them. They ran, stumbling, bleeding, exhausted beyond measure, but alive. The tunnel opened ahead, widening into a transition chamber, and beyond it—

  Light. Dim, reddish, but light.

  Floor 14.

  "Almost there," Elias gasped. "Just a little further."

  "Two more behind us!" Lira called. "They're catching up!"

  Elias risked a glance back. Two Stalkers had broken from the main group, pursuing them with single-minded determination. They were faster than the wounded humans, closing the distance with every second.

  "Lira, how far to the exit?"

  "Thirty steps! Maybe less!"

  Thirty steps. An eternity when every muscle screamed in protest, when blood loss made the world spin, when the sound of skittering limbs grew louder behind them.

  Elias activated Overclock one more time.

  Vitality: 48/100

  The world sharpened. He spun, spear raised, and met the first pursuing Stalker head-on. The creature was mid-lunge, committed to its attack, unable to change course. Elias's spear took it through the center of its body, the momentum carrying them both backward.

  He released the spear, leaving it embedded in the dying Stalker, and drew his backup knife.

  The second Stalker was on him immediately, limbs slashing. Elias dodged one strike, parried another, and drove his knife into the gap between its head and body. The creature spasmed and went still.

  Harvested Blood: +0.8 L

  Blood Reserves: 5.5 L

  The Overclock expired. Elias's legs buckled, and he would have fallen if Mira hadn't caught him.

  "Come on," she said, her voice barely a whisper. "We're almost there."

  They staggered the final distance together, supporting each other, Lira hovering anxiously beside them. The transition chamber opened before them, its walls marked with the familiar organic architecture that signaled a floor boundary.

  Floor 14.

  They collapsed just past the threshold, their bodies finally surrendering to the exhaustion they'd been fighting for hours. Elias lay on his back, staring at the distant ceiling, his chest heaving, his vision swimming.

  Vitality: 22/100

  Blood Reserves: 6.1 L

  Soul Integrity: 94.2%

  They'd made it. Somehow, impossibly, they'd made it.

  But they couldn't rest. Not yet.

  From somewhere ahead, beyond the transition chamber, came a sound that made Elias's blood run cold.

  Chanting.

  Low, rhythmic, in a language he didn't recognize. Multiple voices, rising and falling in unison, creating a hypnotic pattern that seemed to resonate with the Tower's organic walls.

  "What is that?" Mira asked, her voice weak.

  Elias forced himself to sit up, wincing at the protest of every muscle. The chamber ahead—the entrance to Floor 15—glowed with a reddish light, brighter than the usual bioluminescence. Through the organic archway, he could see movement. Figures. Many of them.

  "Siphoners," Lira whispered, her form pressing close to Elias. "I can feel them. So many of them. And they're all... wrong. Empty inside."

  A Siphoner outpost. They'd escaped one patrol only to run directly into a larger concentration. And from the sound of the chanting, from the number of figures Elias could dimly perceive, this wasn't just a patrol or a checkpoint.

  This was something else entirely.

  "We can't go forward," Mira said, stating the obvious. "And we can't go back."

  "I know."

  They were trapped. Exhausted, wounded, low on vitality, with Siphoners ahead and potentially more pursuers behind. The smart thing to do would be to find a hiding place, wait for their strength to recover, plan a way around the obstacle.

  But Elias couldn't stop staring at the red light flickering through the Floor 15 gate, couldn't stop listening to the chanting that rose and fell like breathing, couldn't shake the feeling that whatever was happening in there was connected to everything they'd learned about Brother Sero.

  "We need to see what's happening," he said quietly.

  "Are you insane?" Mira demanded. "We can barely stand. If they spot us—"

  "They won't. We just need to get close enough to observe. Gather intelligence." He met her eyes. "Mira, if Brother Sero is in there, if he's doing whatever it is that makes Siphoners feel wrong to Lira, we need to understand it. Knowledge is the only advantage we have."

  Mira stared at him for a long moment, then sighed—a sound of resignation rather than agreement.

  "Fine. But we rest first. Even an hour. We're no good to anyone if we collapse before we reach the observation point."

  She was right. Elias nodded reluctantly, settling back against the chamber wall. His body demanded sleep, demanded time to recover, demanded an end to the relentless pressure that had driven them for the past two days.

  But sleep wouldn't come.

  Every time he closed his eyes, he heard Kael's voice echoing through the tunnels. The medic went this way. Every time he started to drift off, the chanting from Floor 15 pulled him back, its rhythm burrowing into his consciousness like a worm.

  Mira sat beside him, her eyes open, her knife in her hand. She wasn't sleeping either.

  Lira drifted near the chamber entrance, watching the flickering red light with wide, frightened eyes.

  They were all exhausted. They were all terrified. And they all knew that the real danger was still ahead.

  The chanting continued, rising and falling, and the red light of Floor 15 flickered through the gate like the heartbeat of something vast and hungry.