Dungeon King: The Hidden Ruler-Chapter 35: [The Emberstone Massacre 4] - Collapse of Command

They stumbled in—gasping for air, weapons drawn but shaking, eyes wide with exhaustion... and something deeper.

Fear. Not just of each other, but of what they didn’t understand.

The final chamber of Emberstone Burrow yawned wide before them, silent and sweltering. An obsidian cathedral of molten veins and forgotten heat. Glowing furnace-pipes lined the walls, hissing with ancient breath. At the center, unmoving, slumped atop a cracked platform of scorched stone, waited the Emberforged Titan—a colossus of brass and bone, half-buried in soot.

The UI was still blank. No combat music. No boss aggro.

Just pressure.

Raven watched from above. Perched on a narrow support beam above the entry arch, his mask still worn, body wrapped in flickering shadow.

Even he was breathing heavy—quietly, carefully.

He wasn’t immune to fatigue. But this part? This part didn’t need him. Not yet.

Below, the remnants of the two guilds spread out slowly, forming semi-circles. Cautious. Staggered. Barely 30 left now—15 Crimson Blades, 15 Ebonreach. Most missing armor chunks. Several with broken weapons. Only one or two healing spells still circulating. The rest, battered. Shaky.

Healers gone. Potions scarce. Cooldowns not ready.

Perfect.

Raven looked down and smirked.

Kaelthasx, crimson mantle frayed and scorched, raised a hand toward his guild. "No one move past the lava ring. Stay clear of the center. We don’t aggro until we’re ready."

Across from him, Lymira stood bathed in the pale shimmer of frost magic. Her cloak clung to her armor with soot and ash. "You assume we’ll wait for your signal?" she snapped.

Kaelthasx didn’t flinch. "I assume you don’t want to be wiped before you respawn."

"The only ones doing the wiping were your little chain assassin."

Lymira’s voice carried now. Echoing.

Raven’s smirk widened.

"You sent someone in first," she continued. "Don’t deny it. That thing in the shadows? That wasn’t a dungeon mob."

"We didn’t send anyone. You think we’d waste a stealth build on mind games?" Kaelthasx barked.

"You expect me to believe that wasn’t yours?" Lymira pointed her mage staff toward the ceiling. "Chain. Mask. Red eyes. Your color, man!"

"I lost half my squad to that thing!" Kaelthasx snapped back. "I should be accusing you."

Around them, the remaining players exchanged glances. Some began whispering again.

"Maybe it wasn’t either of them..."

"...then what the hell was it?"

"Did anyone even get a name tag?"

"No log. No assist credit. Just... empty name placeholder."

Paranoia thickened.

A Crimson rogue cursed under his breath. "I lost my Mythic legs. They dropped."

An Ebonreach mage hissed, "All my PvP gear’s at red. I’m down to backup gloves."

Tension cracked.

"You’re the reason we’re in this room!" one Crimson archer snapped at an Ebonreach caster.

"No—you pushed us back here!" she fired back.

A gust of heated air curled through the room, making sweat bead under armor. Someone’s foot slipped in blood.

"You’re lucky our tank didn’t aggro the boss already."

"We’ve got no healer left, moron!"

Spells flared. Fingers twitched toward weapons. Two guildmates bumped shoulders, and the impact was enough—adrenaline surged, and shouts followed.

Raven whispered.

"Let them bleed."

He tapped the dungeon control interface in front of him—his own personal overlay from the Dungeon Master Room, still synced while masked.

[Boss Aggro Condition: Health/Critical Threshold Trigger Enabled]

[Priority Targeting Mode: Low HP / Critical Damage Bias – Confirmed]

Below, the tension finally cracked.

Kaelthasx’s foot hit the scorched stone with force, his blade dragging embers as he pointed it across the lava ring. "Oh, you want to come at me, Lymira?" he barked, not waiting for her guild to finish regrouping.

Lymira raised her staff with a snarl. "You already lost the right to negotiate. You brought this hell down on all of us."

"Then maybe we should finish it in fire."

A split-second pause.

Then Lymira with a scream of anger hurled a frost bolt.

Kaelthasx parried and retaliated with a cleave that echoed through the room.

Gasps turned into shouts. Steel rang.

Like dry timber in a forge, the room ignited.

What began as a clash of egos turned into an unrelenting melee.

A Crimson fire mage unleashed a cascade spell—its arc exploding too wide, catching three of his own. Someone screamed in confusion, and the return fire wasn’t far behind.

"FALL BACK! GROUP 2, COVER THE HEALERS—"

"WE DON’T HAVE HEALERS LEFT, YOU IDIOT!"

A rogue from Ebonreach blinked behind a Crimson ranger, only to get blasted mid-air by a trap spell he didn’t see—panic overtaking tactics.

Several players turned inward. Crimson’s formation buckled as one tank panicked and charged the enemy line, trying to salvage honor through raw damage. An Ebonreach shadowblade dodged behind him and slit his throat.

The noise was overwhelming.

Spell effects flashed like fireworks. Arrows whistled and found soft armor. Blades sang and screamed.

Adrenaline made them forget the fatigue. It didn’t matter they were low on potions. It didn’t matter their skills weren’t fully reset.

They wanted someone to blame.

And they found it in each other.

In one corner, two melee fighters locked blades, cursing through gritted teeth as system alerts flickered across their HUDs:

[Weapon Durability Critical]

[PvP Gear: Binding Threshold Exceeded – Auto-Drop Active]

"Kill them before we lose anything else!" someone shouted.

"You think I care about gear now? My whole party’s gone!"

An Ebonreach summoner summoned a dark construct to collapse Crimson’s flank. A counterpush surged—two DPS leaping through the chaos to flank him. He didn’t make it.

It was no longer a guild war. It was a vendetta. A riot in a cathedral of fire.

Kaelthasx and Lymira continued their duel in the center, their clashing spells and blades marking the tempo of destruction.

"You lied!" Lymira hissed. "You knew this would happen—"

Kaelthasx didn’t answer. His eyes were wild. His aura flared with every strike.

Behind them, allies tore into each other—old raid partners now dueling like enemies.

Guild chat exploded. Voice comms were a mess. Strategies turned into screams.

One Crimson player turned and launched a lightning strike—into his own teammate.

"Why were you standing still!"

"I was typing a heal macro, you asshole!"

Their screams drew others. More confusion. More breakdown.

All while Raven waited above, watching the health bars start to blink.

Raven watched with calm amusement, eyes flicking to the health bars dancing across the dungeon interface.

[Player: Eldwyn – Critical Health] frёewebηovel.cѳm

[Player: Ryza – Critical Health]

He didn’t need to lift a finger.

Because this room—the layout, the tension, the aggro trigger—was his design.

A trap hidden beneath desperation.

He lazily coiled the chain in one hand, then launched it silently across a high beam. The daggered end caught, and Raven shifted sideways like smoke—never touching the ground. A breathless relocation. Stealth and weapon, both.

It was rope, dagger, anchor, and execution all in one.

And the moment one of them dipped too low—bleeding, blinking red in the corner of the HUD—the forge answered.

The Emberforged Titan stirred.

A hiss of molten steam. A glow from the cracks in its chassis. The grind of massive internal gears turning after centuries.

Below, neither guild noticed immediately.

Until someone screamed.

"IT’S MOVING!"

Eyes turned. Weapons raised. The Titan leaned forward—its helm rising in mechanical fury, furnace-embers burning in its chest.

No one had stepped into the center. No one had pulled.

Beside him, Phantom Seer shimmered into partial view, casting Mind Shatter in a silent pulse.

No one noticed. No flash. No log entry. No debuff icon. Just... a ripple.

Below, the heat thickened. Shadows stretched.

At first, nothing seemed different. The Titan remained motionless—slumped, cracked, half-buried in scorched stone.

But then came the whispers.

Not in chat. Not over voice.

Just a low hum—crawling at the edge of their hearing.

Like metal grinding inside the walls. Like something breathing inside the stone.

A Crimson mage blinked. Had the Titan always been that... tall?

Its limbs looked longer now. Its ribcage twisted. The furnace-light inside its chest flickered like something alive.

One Ebonreach scout backed away, whispering, "What the hell is that thing..."

His party leader frowned. "It’s the boss. Same as before."

"No. No, it—look at it. It’s... wrong."

HUDs stayed normal. Target tags unchanged. No corruption flags. No status alerts.

But to their eyes?

The Emberforged Titan was no longer a raid boss.

It was awake, and it was watching.

A groan echoed through the chamber—deep, warped, like the sound of rusted lungs trying to breathe.

The cracks along the Titan’s body flared red, then black, like veins filled with molten tar.

❗ [Boss Protocol: Unstable. Aggro Detected – All Present Players.]

The room froze.

Then someone screamed.

The Titan rose— not as a scripted raid encounter, but as something older. Deeper. Wrong.

Raven leaned forward slightly, his voice a whisper only the forge could hear.

"Welcome to the show, my Titan."

The Titan turned. Its furnace eyes locked onto the nearest player— and then, its metal jaw shifted.

A smile. Slow. Deliberate. Mechanical.

Not part of any animation. Not part of the fight script.

Just a message.

I see you.

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