Eater Blade: Grinding in Apocalypse-Chapter 36: FEEDING FRENZY PART 2.

Only fifteen seconds left on the Feeding Frenzy timer.

A fresh cluster of Eaters burst through a side door, claws scraping tile.

Johnquis grinned, chain coiling tight in his grip.

"Oh, more guests? Don’t mind if I do!"

He lunged, chain looping around the broken ceiling fixture. He swung himself up and over, dropping right behind the pack. The chain snapped out like a steel tornado, links tearing through flesh and bone. Heads rolled, limbs flew, the Eaters dropped in twitching pieces.

[Feed Count: +2,200]

[Feed Count: 38,600 / 70,000]

Dancer darted in. He glimpsed her grin, her eyes so alive. They slammed back-to-back, the swirl of chain and blade a hurricane of steel and bone.

[Feed Count: +2,000]

[Feed Count: 40,600 / 70,000]

[00:05]

The last of the frenzied pack lunged at him. Johnquis wrapped the chain around his palm, bracing.

"Last call for the buffet line... choke on this!"

He snapped the chain forward. It hooked around a broken metal signpost hanging half-off an old noodle stand. With a roar, he swung it wide. The post slammed through the first Eater’s ribs, kept going, and smashed through six more. Bone and gore exploded against the shattered counter.

Seven bodies crumpled in a single swing.

[Feed Count: +1,400]

[Feed Count: 42,000 / 70,000]

One last stray Eater crawled for his leg. Dancer stepped in front, her foot-blade sinking through its skull like butter.

[Feed Count: +200]

[Feed Count: 42,200 / 70,000]

The ping cut through the static of his vision:

[FEED COUNT FRENZY EXPIRED]

[Final Tally: 42,200 / 70,000]

Johnquis let the chain drop slack, breath tearing out of him in harsh, hungry laughs. Dancer turned, blood dripping from her claws. Their breath mingling in the haze of blood and neon.

"That was a hell of a dance... I’d be dead ten times over without you. I’m glad you’re mine, Dancer. Couldn’t ask for a better battle buddy."

She clicked once, a soft, beast-like sound like she was saying right back at you.

Johnquis turned in a slow circle, eyes wide, lungs fighting for air he didn’t even realize he’d lost.

There were bodies everywhere.

"Holy shit."

Dancer tilted her head beside him, her heel-blade dripping onto the tiles. Her eyes were still bright, but even she seemed to pause.

Johnquis ran a hand through his sweat-slick hair, smearing a fresh streak of gore across his temple.

He choked out a laugh, "Look at this place... we did this. You and me. A whole floor... just— gone."

He stepped over a corpse, chain dragging across tile.

"Back when I was unranked, I’d have been torn to ribbons before I got a single one of these bastards down."

He crouched near a shredded Eater skull, fingertips brushing the cracked jaw. He couldn’t stop smiling, but it felt wrong at the same time. A buzz of fear under the thrill.

Dancer crept closer, crouching at his side. She peered at the ruin, then at him like she was trying to read the chaos through his eyes.

Johnquis let out a shaky exhale, eyes glinting under the flickering lights.

"Hey... Dancer? Does it ever get less... fucked up?"

He laughed again but it didn’t echo this time. The mall just swallowed the sound.

"Don’t get me wrong, I love it. I love the power. I love that we survived it. But god... look at this."

His free hand rose, sweeping over the slaughter. "I don’t even know if I’m more amazed or scared right now. Or if I should be."

Dancer leaned in, her clawed fingers brushing his wrist. A soft, bone-deep click came from her throat. Not a hiss, not a snarl, just that weird, half-tender sound she made only for him.

He looked into those slit-pupiled eyes. There was no judgement there, just the beast that chose him.

A smile cracked his face. "Guess it doesn’t matter, huh? Scared or not, we’re in this. We made this mess. And we’re gonna make a hell of a lot more before we’re done."

He pulled back, scanning the still corpses, listening for any hint of more footsteps in the shadows.

"And you know what, Dancer? I think I’m finally starting to like it."

Dancer’s foot-blade tapped the floor once. A tiny, crisp sound that might’ve been her version of a laugh.

He laughed with her. Then he pushed to his feet, the monsters at his feet weren’t moving. The floor was theirs, for now.

Johnquis rolled his shoulders, breath steadying as he looked out across the ruin they’d carved together.

"Come on. Let’s find out what else is still breathing in this dump."

The mall’s broken jingle droned on somewhere above them. Something about "Seaside Savings" and "Sunshine Specials," echoing through a food court littered with corpses and shattered furniture.

He glanced around at the mountain of twitching bodies. His stomach gave a pathetic gurgle, loud enough that even Dancer’s head snapped toward him.

"Oh, all that fighting and shenanigans made my stomach hungry. Guess it’s not just my Eater Blade that’s starving... maybe we deserve a damn break."

Half the neon signs still flickered above the ruined stalls. He caught Dancer’s look, that slight tilt of her head.

"Oh, don’t give me that look. I know how to diet, okay? And look at all these food stalls... first time seeing ’em look so clean and bright. Yeah, sure, it’s fake. Some glitch by the anomaly... but—"

His stomach growled again. "Can’t help it. There’s no loot bags in here. I need something."

He kicked aside a bisected Eater, stepping behind the trashed noodle stand. Bits of signpost and spine still jutted from the counter, leftovers from when he’d smashed that pack apart.

He wandered deeper, stopping in front of a ramen house. He stared at the images above the fake counter.

"That... kinda looks delicious. All that meat... veggies... never had anything like that. All I ever got was Nana’s stew..."

Johnquis leaned both elbows on the sticky counter, peering at the bright holo-menu overhead. The images looped endlessly — steaming bowls of tonkotsu, fat slices of pork belly.

"God, look at that... so fake it’s almost pretty. Think they’d let me trade Eater heads for an upgrade? Heh."

Dancer crouched behind him, peeking around his hip, one claw tapping the side of her cheek as if confused by all the plastic food models lined up on the shelves.

He tilted his head at her, smirking.

"You ever try ramen, Dancer? No? Thought so. You’d probably dunk your foot-blade in it."

As if in answer, the broken order screen above the counter glitched, flickering from static to a crude, pixelated "ORDER RECEIVED" that made Johnquis bark a short laugh.

"What the—? I didn’t even say anything! Hey, fake ramen ghost surprise me!"

There was a low hum from behind the counter some hidden motor or relic of the old automaton chefs. Then, to his absolute disbelief, a bowl slid out through a half-cracked slot in the counter. Steam rose off it like it had just been made, the smell warm and vaguely salty, but oddly flat.

Johnquis’s eyes went wide. "Holy shit. No way. Did you see that?"

He grabbed the bowl in both hands, the ceramic perfectly warm, the broth shimmering under the flickering lights. He inhaled, it smelled... like water with a bit of plastic seasoning.

Dancer leaned closer, nose almost brushing the rim. She sneezed. A tiny puff of air that ruffled his hair.

"Oh, classy, Dancer. Real supportive. Watch and learn."

He jammed a pair of plastic chopsticks into the noodles, swirling them up with practiced exaggeration. He slurped in a mouthful.

Chewed. Paused. Chewed again. He blinked once, twice. Then he swallowed or tried to.

The noodles tasted like... absolutely nothing. Like chewing warm air. Not even the cheap-salty tang he remembered from instant cups. Just emptiness, with the faintest, soulless hint of broth.

He lowered the bowl, deadpan. "Yep. Exactly how Nana’s stew used to taste."

Dancer made a low, amused click in her throat, as if mocking him. She reached out one clawed finger and poked the noodles, watching them jiggle. Then she grabbed a single noodle with her claw-tips and snapped it apart. Sniffed then recoiled like it was poison.

Johnquis let out a laugh, "Hey, laugh it up. It shut my stomach up, didn’t it?"

He tapped his belly with the chopsticks. Sure enough, the growling had stopped.

"See? It works. Ramen anomaly magic. Who needs flavor when you’ve got... anti-hunger air noodles?"

A deep growl rolled out from somewhere below. Echoing through the broken food court. Both of them froze.

Johnquis glanced at Dancer, "That your tummy, Dancer?"

She flicked his forehead with one claw, just enough to sting.

"Alright, alright! Just joking!"

He dropped the bowl, letting the fake noodles splash across the fake counter. He flexed his grip on the chain, eyes gleaming.

"I guess it’s time to move. That wasn’t a Level 1... Let’s see what the hell’s waiting for us down there."

He twirled the chain once around his wrist, feeling the links hum like they were starving for the next kill.

"Ready for dessert, Dancer?"

She just clicked, heel-blade tapping once on the tile, her own savage toast.

Together, they stepped away from the ghost ramen house. Their footsteps and quiet laughter bounced off walls lined with corpses and broken neon. And somewhere in the dark below, the next nightmare waited to be fed to their hunger.

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