Chapter 2309: Story 2310: The Opening Path

The thing crawling from the crack in the cavern floor moved like a newborn creature learning how to exist.

Its limbs bent backward.

Human faces pushed outward from its black flesh, screaming silently before melting back into the mass again. Bones cracked beneath its skin as it dragged itself toward Maya and Selena across the fungal roots.

Maya raised her revolver instinctively.

“What the hell is that?”

Selena’s voice trembled.

“A merger.”

The creature’s many eyes suddenly opened all at once.

White.

Empty.

Hungry.

It lunged forward.

Maya fired twice.

Bullets tore through its upper body, spraying black fluid across the cavern walls—but the thing barely slowed. More limbs burst outward from its torso, clawing violently across the stone floor.

Selena opened fire with her rifle.

This time the creature shrieked.

Not one voice.

Dozens.

The sound echoed through the underground chamber like trapped souls screaming together.

“Fall back!” Selena shouted.

They retreated toward the elevator while the creature dragged itself after them at terrifying speed. Behind it, the fungal veins beneath the earth pulsed brighter and brighter.

THOOM.

THOOM.

The Root was awake now.

And growing stronger.

Ethan stood motionless near the center of the cavern.

Watching.

His pale eyes reflected the red glow spreading through the underground darkness.

“Maya...” he said softly.

His voice sounded almost normal again.

For one brief moment, she saw the real Ethan struggling beneath whatever had taken hold of him.

“Help me,” he whispered.

Then the fungal veins across his body moved beneath his skin.

Something inside him shifted.

The Root spoke through his mouth.

“She carries resistance.”

Every pulse in the cavern suddenly focused toward Maya.

The organism had noticed her.

The walls around them began moving.

Massive fungal tendrils detached from the stone and slithered slowly across the ground toward her like searching snakes.

Selena grabbed Maya violently.

“Run!”

The merger creature crashed into the elevator platform behind them, twisting limbs around the steel cables overhead. The entire shaft groaned dangerously.

Maya fired again point-blank into its face.

A human mouth opened across the creature’s shoulder and whispered:

“We remember pain.”

Then it bit toward her throat.

Selena slammed an axe into the side of its skull.

Black blood exploded across the elevator walls.

The creature collapsed temporarily, twitching violently on the ground.

“Move!” Selena screamed.

But Ethan suddenly stepped between them and the elevator exit.

“No more running,” he said calmly.

The cavern heartbeat intensified.

THOOM.

THOOM.

THOOM.

Every fungal root in the chamber pulsed together now like a living nervous system.

Maya stared at Ethan in disbelief.

“You’re still in there,” she whispered.

For a second—

His expression broke.

Fear returned to his eyes.

“Maya...” he gasped painfully. “Don’t let it reach the surface.”

Then he screamed.

His body bent backward unnaturally as black fungal growth erupted through his skin. Veins burst across his arms and neck while bones cracked loudly inside his body.

Selena slowly lowered her weapon.

“No...”

Ethan collapsed to his knees.

The Root was transforming him alive.

A massive fungal tendril descended from the cavern ceiling and wrapped around his torso gently.

Almost lovingly.

Then it lifted him into the darkness above.

Maya rushed forward instinctively.

But Ethan looked down at her one final time.

And smiled sadly.

“Find Lucas,” he whispered.

The darkness swallowed him.

Silence followed.

Then the entire cavern began shaking violently.

Huge cracks spread across the underground walls while deafening screams echoed upward through the silos above.

Selena looked toward the collapsing chamber in horror.

“The Root is spreading.”

Far above them, something answered with a monstrous roar.

The Shepherd had arrived.