I’ll Level Up So My Friends Don’t Die

My ribs ached. My shoulder felt like it had been dislocated and shoved back in. The last thing I remembered was the monster's hand crushing my chest and the flash of Naevia's blade. Everything after that was a blur.

I sat up.

Around me, the survivors from the Crucible were scattered across the room. A few were slumped against the walls, heads down. Others were already stretching, checking weapons, ignoring the blood that hadn't been cleaned up from the night before. No one spoke.

The bodies of the dead were gone. The screams still echoed in my ears.

I rubbed my eyes and checked my wrist. The same black sigil still burned across my skin like a brand. But now it blinked.

NEW DIRECTIVE: DEPLOYMENT IN T-MINUS 2 HOURS. REPORT TO ARMORY.

Two hours?

I'd just survived the worst day of my life, and they wanted me to suit up for another. No explanation. No debrief. No rest.

Rael walked past me without a word. His eyes locked forward, as if he'd already known what was coming. Naevia leaned against a wall nearby, arms crossed, face unreadable. She didn't even look like she'd broken a sweat yesterday. I hated how calm she looked.

Me? I still felt like I was dying.

I tried standing. My legs shook, but I held. Barely.

There was no ceremony. No recognition. Twenty-four of us had entered that deathtrap. Only eight walked out.

And apparently, that was good enough.

The armory was underground. Cold. Lit with flickering white lights that buzzed like they hadn't been replaced in years.

We were led in by a silent handler, some older guy with half his face replaced by metal. He didn't say a word. Just pointed us to a wall where gear was stacked in locked compartments.

A second later, our sigils pulsed.

AUTHORIZED LOADOUT: F-Rank Field Gear. Pull from Slot 8.

Slot 8 clicked open in front of me. Inside was… not much.

Light chest armor thin enough to be flexible, probably not thick enough to stop anything serious. A single retractable baton. A sidearm that looked like it had been cleaned three owners ago. One stim pack. That was it.

No rifle. No shield. No explanation.

Across the room, I could hear Shane's replacement, some tough-looking recruit with sharp cheekbones and a scar across his brow muttering under his breath.

"They're sending us out with trash."

He wasn't wrong.

Rael didn't say anything. He holstered his weapon calmly, like it didn't matter. Naevia didn't even blink as she checked her baton and strapped the armor tight to her lean frame.

I stood there for a second longer, holding the baton like it was a joke. Then I clipped it to my belt and strapped the chest piece on.

"What kind of mission is this?" I finally asked.

The handler looked up at me like I was stupid. Then he pointed at a monitor on the wall.

The image blinked to life. A live satellite feeds grainy, but clear enough to see the chaos.

A small city on fire. Smoke rising in thick black clouds. Screams through radio chatter. The sound of gunfire, explosions, something roaring.

SERO FIELD REPORT – INCURSION ZONE 7

STATUS: ACTIVE BREACH

TYPE: MULTI-DIMENSIONAL HYBRID THREAT DETECTED

CIVILIAN CASUALTIES: CONFIRMED

RESPONSE TEAM: RECRUIT BATCH 11

We were the response team.

The handler turned to walk out, but just before he left, he stopped and looked back.

"If you're lucky, you die fast," he said.

Then he was gone.

The dropship smelled like old sweat, burnt oil. There were no seats. Just metal benches bolted to the walls and a few hanging straps. Eight of us sat in silence, armored and armed, packed in tight. The engine roared overhead like it was trying to tear itself apart mid-flight.

No one spoke.

Naevia sat across from me, elbows on her knees, eyes locked forward not blinking, not moving.

Rael leaned back with his eyes closed, lips moving, but no sound coming out. Praying maybe. Or remembering someone.

The guy with the scar who had grumbled back in the armory was now silent too. He held his baton like it was a sword and kept tapping it against his knee. Tap. Tap. Tap.

The lights flickered once red for a second, then back to pale white.

And all the while, the comms buzzed in our ears.

Gunfire. Screaming. Operators yelling for extraction. Reports of civilians being dragged through walls, of monsters that didn't die even when shot in the head. Static. Then more screaming.

My fingers clenched around the strap above me. I realized I was shaking.

I wasn't ready for this.

We hadn't slept. We hadn't trained. We'd survived fifteen minutes in a death maze, and now we were being thrown into a live warzone.

This wasn't training.

This was a culling.

I looked at the others again. No one made eye contact. We were each in our own heads probably thinking the same thing:

Who's not making it back?

The dropship bucked hard turbulence from a nearby explosion and one of the newer recruits yelped. No one comforted him.

Then the pilot's voice crackled over the speaker:

"Touchdown in two. Zone's hot. No waiting. As soon as the hatch drops, you move."

I swallowed hard.

Outside, through the reinforced glass window, the city was burning. Entire blocks lit up with fire and shadow like something huge was moving beneath the smoke.

I caught Naevia's eye. She didn't blink. Just gave the smallest nod.

And then—

THUD.

The ship hit the ground. Hard.

Red lights flashed.

The hatch screamed open.

"Go!" someone yelled.

And we ran straight into hell.

The moment my boots hit the pavement, the heat hit me like a furnace.

Buildings burned on either side of the narrow street. The air reeked of smoke, charred metal, and something worse like rotting meat soaked in acid.

Gunfire cracked from above us. Something screamed not human and was cut off by a thunderous boom that shook the ground.

We were in a warzone.

Naevia vanished down an alley without a word. Rael stuck close behind me, his weapon already drawn, eyes darting to every shadow. The rest of the recruits scattered into formation as best as rookies could, anyway.

I followed the squad leader, a grizzled woman named Keller, one of the few real soldiers among us.

"Watch the rooftops!" she shouted over the comms. "Hostiles can phase through walls! Keep your sync up and your nerves tighter!"

I didn't know what keeping my "sync" up meant, but I didn't ask. I just gripped the stun-spear I'd been given and kept moving.

A civilian ran out from a crumbling building, screaming, waving his arms.

Before he got two steps, something slammed down from the sky and crushed him.

A hulking, insectoid thing, its body like molten armor, legs like scythes, and a jagged maw lined with glassy teeth.

"CONTACT!" Keller screamed.

The thing shrieked and charged.

We opened fire. All of us. Bullets, blasts, spears, knives, anything we had.

It didn't fall.

Two recruits tried to flank it. One tripped the creature impaled him without slowing down.

My body moved before I could think. I lunged forward, dragging the butt of my spear into its knee joint. It stumbled. Just enough.

Keller blasted it point-blank in the face with a concussive round.

The creature exploded into fire and gore.

My ears rang.

We didn't cheer. We didn't celebrate.

We kept moving.

Shadows flickered in the smoke ahead. More monsters.

Screams echoed behind us.

There was no safe direction.

No command center. No fallback point.

Just go, and hope you didn't die.