The dungeon didn't breathe. It pulsed.
Cold stone veins ran through the walls like arteries. The torches didn't burn — they flickered, sputtered, gasped. And the silence wasn't empty. It was full. With tension. With history. With the soft, wet slither of something just out of sight.
Sushruth walked behind the group, steps quiet, hands gloved. Not by choice — that was his assigned place. "Rear support."
Not that he was supporting anything.
"Eyes up, newbie," growled the tank ahead of him — a bald dwarf named Brannor, shoulders wider than Sushruth's torso. "First-timers get eaten by air here."
Sushruth nodded. "Copy."
Brannor grunted. Probably surprised the healer spoke like a soldier. Not that he'd understand.
The last two hours had been a blur of dark hallways and stat check banter. Everyone had a class. A rank. A contribution. Except him. Healed no one. Fought no one. The only thing he'd done since the dungeon gate clanked shut behind them was count the seconds between footsteps.
Twelve seconds of silence. Twelve breaths before—
Growl.
Not just one.
The kind that vibrated inside your lungs before it touched your ears.
"Contact, left flank!" yelled Brannor. "Fang-bear. Two meters!"
The party broke formation with precision. Two DPS flicked forward, blades gleaming. A mage behind them lifted a hand, a symbol burning into the air. Purple flame. Sizzling.
Sushruth didn't move. His job was clear: observe. Assist. Heal when told.
The beast crashed into the corridor like a nightmare on four legs — all muscle and fang and dripping matted fur. The first slash missed. The second didn't.
A scream tore from Garrick, the dual-blade, as claws raked his side. Blood spattered the stones.
Sushruth moved.
Not because he was called. Because instinct said go.
He reached Garrick just as the swordsman fell to one knee. The wound was deep — rib exposed, breathing shallow.
"Healer, wait!" someone shouted.
Too late.
Sushruth pressed gauze to the wound. Tight. Fast. Bleeding control came first.
"Don't waste a spell!" barked the party leader — a woman named Alira, longcoat flaring with each movement.
"I'm not," Sushruth muttered. His fingers danced automatically, not magically — pressing, bracing, checking for thoracic compromise. Same as he did a hundred times on Earth. In the field. Under fire.
No spark of healing light came. He didn't try.
"He's tagged," said Alira. "He'll respawn in town. You're risking your neck for a corpse."
Garrick's eyes twitched. "I'm not dead…"
"Yet," she snapped.
"Neither was the last one," Sushruth murmured.
No one heard him.
They were too busy fighting.
The fang-bear reared back, jaws splitting wide. Brannor took the brunt of the charge, shield denting inward. A mage screamed something in old runes. Purple lightning crashed down, missing its mark.
Sushruth had seconds.
He slid a salve from his kit. Basic. Low-grade. F-Rank issue.
"This won't do anything," Garrick coughed. "You're… wasting…"
"Shut up," Sushruth said. Not cruel. Calm. "I need your diaphragm steady."
He applied the poultice. The salve hissed against blood, flickering blue. Reaction mild. But enough. The bleeding slowed — marginally.
It wasn't healing.
It was delaying death.
"Medic," Garrick whispered. "You're… not just a Healer, are you?"
Sushruth's eyes flicked up. "You're stable for now. Stay low."
A roar snapped the air in two.
The beast broke through the defense line.
One of the DPS flew backward, spine hitting stone with a crack.
And then…
The world snapped.
The beast locked eyes with Sushruth.
He knew that look. Had seen it on hyenas in a desert once. Hunger mixed with certainty. The look of something that knows it will win.
He stood.
Didn't run.
Because if he ran, Garrick would die.
"Hey," he said softly, to the creature.
It charged.
"Move, idiot!" Alira screamed.
Sushruth didn't.
But the fang-bear never reached him.
A glint of steel buried itself in its throat — the other DPS, recovered, gritting his teeth as he twisted the blade.
It wasn't elegant. It wasn't glorious. It was survival.
The beast thrashed, twitched, died.
Silence fell.
And then—
"What the hell was that?" Alira stalked forward. "Who told you to engage?"
Sushruth said nothing.
"I told you he was green," Brannor muttered. "Thought he'd piss himself first though."
"He saved me," Garrick croaked.
"No. He bought you thirty seconds. You'll still need a shrine. This team doesn't run on charity."
Alira's gaze sharpened.
"Pack your gear, Healer. You're benched."
,.
The others moved on.
The swordsman leaned against a wall, still breathing. Barely. But breathing.
Sushruth sat beside him, not touching anymore. Just watching. Breathing.
"You're different," Garrick murmured. "Not like the system types."
"I'm not."
The words came out before he could stop them.
"Then what are you?"
Sushruth looked down at his hands. Scarred. Calloused. Steady.
"A pulse too late," he whispered.
The swordsman didn't understand. Didn't need to.
A few minutes later, a system beacon flashed. Garrick's body vanished — tagged for shrine revival. His memory of this? Unclear.
Sushruth was alone again.
But not unchanged.
The stone around him thrummed.
From deeper in the dungeon, something howled.
He exhaled.
"This world doesn't care if I heal," he said aloud. "It only cares if I win."
A pause.
Then a whisper to himself — quiet, steady, a promise:
"Then I'll change what this world rewards."