Abyss Descension: I Perform Rituals to Evolve In The Apocalyps-Chapter 50: Flesh Eater

The group of survivors remained huddled together at the spot where Kev had left them. No one uttered a word. The silence wasn’t due to exhaustion or despair—it was respect, mixed with fear. Fear of the Abyssal Burrow they were trapped in. And fear of what might come if Kev didn’t return soon.

They looked around nervously, the dim bioluminescent moss barely casting enough light to reveal each other’s faces. Shadows flickered with every twitch, every breath. Every corner of this subterranean death trap seemed to hold a lurking nightmare, waiting to pounce on the weak and the unwary.

Kev was the strongest among them. That was an indisputable fact.

They weren’t stupid. They weren’t naïve little lambs still dreaming of heroism and miracles. Each person in the group had survived countless horrors since they were forced into the Abyssal Burrow. They had seen flesh peeled from bone, friends turned into enemies, and monsters wearing human faces. If not for Kev, they wouldn’t have made it past the first few days.

He didn’t just protect them—he carried them.

He was a force of nature in human form. Every time he stepped forward, enemies fell. Every time they began to lose hope, Kev did something that reignited the fire in their hearts. And now, even though he had gone ahead alone, they knew better than to follow.

They weren’t fools who couldn’t recognize Mount Tai even when it stood before them. Kev was their Mount Tai. Their immovable shield.

Without him, they didn’t even dare to breathe too loudly.

A few of them—newer survivors, only added to the group recently—looked around with restless eyes. They didn’t know the full extent of the Abyssal Burrow’s horrors. Not yet. But the older members quickly shut down any talk of "just scouting ahead."

"Sit down," growled one of the veterans, a woman with half her face covered in scar tissue. "You take one step in the wrong direction here, and you won’t just die. You’ll wish you had."

The newer ones blinked, startled by her tone, but obeyed. 𝑓𝓇𝘦ℯ𝘸𝘦𝑏𝓃𝑜𝘷ℯ𝑙.𝑐𝑜𝓂

Someone else added, "You ever heard of the evolved Revenants? No? Yeah, count yourself lucky. Because the last group I was with met one. There were nine of us."

He held up two fingers.

"Only two of us made it out. That thing... it moved like mist, like a shadow that bled knives. Our strongest man at the time had a reinforced spine and steel arms. It folded him in half like dry bread."

The silence returned.

The air in the Abyssal Burrow was thick, almost alive. Sometimes it felt like it was pressing against their skin. Breathing was uncomfortable here. Too damp. Too hot. And too still. The deeper one went, the more the Burrow seemed to pulse like an organism—its tunnels winding like arteries, its chambers like twisted organs.

In this hell, waiting wasn’t cowardice. It was the only logical move.

Kev had said, "Wait here. Don’t make noise. Don’t try to be brave."

That was enough.

Even if hours passed, they would still wait. Because Kev said so. Because Kev had earned that much trust.

One of the young ones, a boy with dirt on his cheeks and eyes too wide for someone his age, whispered, "Do you think he’s okay?"

"He’s fine," said a woman who had once been a schoolteacher before the Burrow consumed the world above. Her voice was steady, like someone trying to convince herself as much as others. "If anyone’s going to survive out there, it’s him."

No one disagreed.

They didn’t want to imagine a world where Kev didn’t come back. Because that world was a coffin.

Some of them closed their eyes, trying to get a bit of rest. Others kept watch, peering down the tunnels where the light faded into a violet-hued darkness. Time felt stretched here, like it was slower than normal. Minutes dragged like hours.

Suddenly, a distant sound echoed through the tunnels.

All of them froze.

A scraping noise—metal dragging against stone.

Their hearts jumped. Hands instinctively went to whatever weapons they had managed to scavenge. Rusted pipes. Shards of bone. Broken blades. They clutched them tight.

The scraping stopped.

Silence returned, but this time it was heavier.

Then—

Step.

Step.

Footsteps. Heavy. Steady.

They didn’t run. They didn’t scream. They just waited.

Because Kev’s footsteps were like that.

A moment later, a shadow entered their torchlight.

A figure emerged, cloak tattered, shoulders bloodied, holding a severed head by its long, mutated tendrils.

Kev.

Still breathing.

Still alive.

And still terrifying.

No one cheered. No one clapped. They just stared in awe.

Kev tossed the severed head into the corner. "It found you. I found it first."

The veterans understood what that meant.

An evolved Revenant had caught their scent. And Kev had intercepted it.

Again.

Their survival—every last moment of it—was due to one man.

And even though he bled and staggered slightly as he walked, he still looked like he carried the world with ease.

He glanced at the group, eyes sharp. "Let’s move. I found a path. But we’ll need to move quiet."

Everyone stood up at once. No questions asked. No doubts voiced.

Because Kev had returned.

And with Kev around, they still had a chance.

In that moment, time itself seemed to slow, as if the very fabric of the Abyssal Burrow paused to witness the return of its most unwelcome predator.

Kev had come back.

The others saw him emerge from the choking shadows, his figure cast in ghostly outlines by the bioluminescent moss growing along the ceiling. His silhouette, blood-smeared and battle-worn, exuded a pressure that made the air feel heavier, as though gravity itself bent slightly in his presence. The echoes of his boots hitting the rocky floor trailed behind him like distant thunder—slow, deliberate, filled with purpose. In one hand, he carried the decapitated head of a creature that should not have existed, its fanged maw frozen in a silent snarl, its many tendrils still twitching in their death throes.

For the survivors, the sight of Kev’s return was more than just a relief.

It was salvation given form.

It was like seeing a fortress walk into a battlefield—cracked, scorched, but unbroken. There was something surreal about his presence, something almost mythological, like a war god from the ancient scriptures striding across a ruined battlefield. He didn’t smile. He didn’t boast. He didn’t utter a single word of comfort. He didn’t need to.