The Crack In Heaven [A LitRPG Progression Fantasy] Chapter 22: Chapter 22: What We Kept Them Alive For

Read chapter 22 of The Crack In Heaven [A LitRPG Progression Fantasy] by Adamus_Auguste on NovelPedia.

Chapter 22: What We Kept Them Alive For Marek breathed out steam with each strike, his muscles burning, his blade a whirlwind of steel that maimed elbow, wrist, and shoulder to the bone. Yet, the anchor-ghast's wrecked muscles wove back together before skin crawled to a close. It raised its bony hand, drowning the eight-legged monstrosity asleep in the glass tube in the shadows of its survival. "YOU CAN'T!" Marek's voice came out guttural, higher-pitched than usual. It ended on a broken crack from a throat choked as much by despair as it was by hate. Twenty years of damn sacrifice to forge a treasure on the verge of awakening, spilt in the sewer waters because of a single, discarded bastard, a living corpse incapable of understanding his place until his bitter end. And he had to swallow this loss? He clenched his jaw, gums bleeding as the anchor-ghast's hand fell with the ineluctability of a sledgehammer. BOOM A tremor almost tore the ground beneath Marek's feet, dust swallowing the tube and the anchor-ghast. He backflipped high and slow, his mouth ajar. It wasn't the sound of shattered glass or bones on flesh, but blasted metal and rocks. Before he met the ground, the dust exploded upward, slowly dissipating around the anchor-ghast's flung body. Like rubber, its chest swelled against the crater. When it crashed a dozen steps behind Marek, it had already recovered. But it hardly mattered compared to who did it. In a pit of his own landing, a hooded man had his fist raised in front of the glass tube. Dark gloves, crowned with diamond-shaped parts on his knuckles, radiated a soft, iridescent light. "Brannick!" Marek let out the breath he had been holding. "Brannick's here! That fat shit's done for!" As he lunged beside Brannick, the thugs erupted into cheers on the facility floors. In the ruckus, Brannick turned toward Marek. The darkness of his hood obscured his face, his cloak unmoved by his chaotic arrival. "Report this mess in a few words." His voice was not a command; it was focused on what mattered without emotional nuances. "Poor quartermaster. You look as if you're about to cry," someone said as they leapt beside them from the first floor. She swept a dismissive glance at the lacerated stomachs of the sprawled thugs. Guts and limbs lay beside their broken shields. Should be dead, yet they celebrated with wet voices. "You'd better answer. You know, if you don't want to join them." Silma Reed dusted her right shoulder with a smirk that made Marek tremble. She didn't address him by name. His lips quivered under the weight of his unworthiness. "One of the first three test subjects resupplied today. Bastard broke his anchor. I sent the researchers to fetch you while slowing it down. It's drawn to our creation." "Figured as much." Silma shrugged, her brown eyes, veering to a soft red, locked on the rising anchor-ghast. "Not what we planned." Marek didn't answer. Nothing he thought about would improve his situation. The more he added, the more likely Silma's threat would come true. Brannick shook his head. "Keep that for later. What's his distorted truth?" "Nothing dies around it. Don't know the range, not sure about the rest." Marek reported. "Do we contradict its definition, rewrite the meaning, or remove the context sustaining it—" "It was just born from a weak binder. We get rid of the manifestation." Silma jerked her hand toward the anchor-ghast. A curved knife jutted out of her frilled sleeve, the white frame glistening, while the dark edge drank the light from the torches. "You keep it busy, quartermaster. Prevent it from stabilising enough to rewrite its distortion into something worse. Brannick, would you do us the honor?" Without a glance, Brannick lunged at the lumbering anchor-ghast. He reached it in a heartbeat, the claws at the end of his gloves out. They sank into its left leg, and with an upward pull, he tore it from its waist. The anchor-ghast tumbled back. Before it could hit the ground, Marek was already on i