## Chapter 13: Routine Shattered
The morning sun streamed through the blinds, painting stripes of light across the worn carpet. Elara stood by the door, backpack slung over one shoulder, keys jingling in her hand. Her eyes, still shadowed with the lingering unease from last night, scanned Kelvin as he sat at the small kitchen table, nursing a cup of weak tea.
"Promise me," she said, her voice firm but laced with an undercurrent of anxiety. "Promise me you'll take it easy today. No heroics. No trying to lift heavy boxes you *think* you can manage now. Just... rest. Read that terrifying alloy book. Watch terrible daytime TV. Heal."
Kelvin met her gaze, summoning the familiar mask of weary compliance. "Scout's honor," he rasped, managing a small smile. "No heavy lifting. No daring feats of domesticity. Just me, the couch, and possibly a deep dive into the riveting world of daytime court shows." He raised his mug slightly. "Go learn about gate harmonics. I'll be the picture of docile recovery."
Elara hesitated, the unspoken questions – about the scratch, the missing pillow, the impossible speed of it all – still hovering between them. But the clock was ticking. "Okay. Call me if... if anything feels off. *Anything*." Her gaze lingered on him for a final, searching moment before she turned and slipped out the door. The lock clicked shut behind her, a sound that always felt like the sealing of a fragile peace.
The moment the sound of her footsteps faded down the hallway, the forced relaxation bled out of Kelvin. He placed the mug down, the clink loud in the sudden silence. The apartment felt charged, waiting. He pulled up the **System** interface, the familiar blue glow overlaying his vision.
**<< NEW DAILY QUEST AVAILABLE >>**
* **Quest:** Foundation Forged
* **Objective:** Complete a rigorous physical regimen: Run in place for 5 minutes continuously, perform 30 sit-ups, perform 30 push-ups.
* **Reward:** 300 EXP, +1 STR, +1 VIT
* **Warning:** Do not exceed current physical limits. Monitor HP/Stamina.
* **Failure:** Physical injury, setback to recovery facade.
* **Accept?** [Y/N]
---
Simple. Brutal. Necessary. The rewards were modest, but STR and VIT were the bedrock stats he desperately needed. More importantly, it was a safe, contained test. No chains. No bloodlust. Just the raw, demanding push of his newly reforged body against its limits. He needed to know what it could *really* do now, away from Elara's watchful eye.
**"Accept."**
He pushed the small kitchen table aside, clearing a patch of floor. Taking a deep breath, he began. Running in place started easy, a rhythmic thudding of feet on the thin carpet. But within a minute, his breath hitched. His lungs burned, unused to sustained exertion. His legs, though miraculously functional, protested the unfamiliar demand. Sweat beaded on his forehead. He focused on his breathing, on the **System's** subtle guidance on pacing – a faint, internal metronome only he could sense. **<< Running: 2:15/5:00 >>**
The five minutes felt like an eternity. His heart hammered against his ribs, his shirt clinging to his back. But he pushed through, the **System** tracking his progress with cold precision. When the timer hit zero, he staggered, gasping, but didn't stop. He dropped to the floor for sit-ups.
Each crunch sent fire through his core muscles, weak and atrophied from weeks of enforced stillness. The betrayal wasn't just emotional; Vincent's sabotage had been profoundly physical. But the **System** didn't care about past weakness. It demanded thirty. He forced himself up, again and again, gritting his teeth against the burn. **<< Sit-ups: 17/30 >>** ... **<< 25/30 >>** ... **<< 30/30! >>**
Collapsing onto his back, he panted, staring at the ceiling. The push-ups loomed. He rolled over, planting his hands shoulder-width apart. The first few were shaky, his arms trembling. Memories of physiotherapy – the struggle to lift a half-pound weight – flashed through his mind. Now, he was pushing his entire body weight off the ground. **<< Push-ups: 5/30 >>**
His muscles screamed. His shoulders threatened to buckle. The **System** offered no comfort, only the relentless countdown. He channeled the cold focus of the **Combat Acumen**, treating it like a battle against his own frailty. *One. Two.* He visualized the EXP, the STR point, the VIT point. *Ten. Eleven.* He thought of Vincent's sneer, the need for strength to face what was coming. *Twenty. Twenty-one.* His arms burned like molten lead. *Twenty-eight. Twenty-nine.* With a guttural groan, he pushed up one final time, holding it for a second before collapsing face-first onto the rug.
**<< DAILY QUEST COMPLETE! >>**
**<< Foundation Forged >>**
**Rewards Claimed:**
* **+300 EXP**
* **+1 STR**
* **+1 VIT**
---
**<< LEVEL UP! >>**
**<< Kelvin Vance has reached Level 7! >>**
**All HP/MP restored!**
**+5 Stat Points to allocate!**
---
The chime was sweeter than any music. He rolled onto his back, gasping but exhilarated. Level 7! He pulled up his Status, quickly dumping the 5 points into AGI (3) and PER (2), further refining his speed and awareness. His body ached fiercely, but it was a *good* ache, the ache of progress, of muscles rebuilding under the **System's** demanding regimen. He felt stronger, more solid, the persistent ghost of spinal damage receding further with each level.
He dragged himself to his feet, wincing but smiling faintly. He grabbed a towel, mopping the sweat from his face and neck, then shuffled towards the kitchen for water. As he passed the coffee table, his phone screen lit up with a notification cluster – news alerts, bypassing his usual mute settings. Probably another Baltic update.
He picked it up absently, taking a long gulp of water. The screen showed a local news banner, stark red letters screaming:
**BREAKING: DUNGEON BREACH - IRONWOOD DISTRICT**
His blood ran cold. Ironwood. That was... *Elara's district*. His thumb fumbled, tapping the alert. The screen filled with shaky, chaotic footage shot from a distance. Thick, unnatural fog choked a familiar intersection. He recognized the coffee shop on the corner, the bus stop Elara used. Flashes of sickly green light erupted from within the fog. Silhouettes – too many limbs, wrong shapes – moved erratically. Police barricades were hastily erected, sirens wailed like a chorus of panic. A terrified reporter's voice crackled over the feed:
*"...unconfirmed reports of a spontaneous dungeon manifestation near the Ironwood Collegiate campus! Emergency services are responding, but Hunter Association containment teams are still en route from downtown due to the Baltic surge deployments! We repeat, residents in the Ironwood district, particularly near the Collegiate campus, shelter in place! Do not approach the fog!..."*
The glass of water slipped from Kelvin's numb fingers, shattering on the floor. Ice water splashed his ankles, but he didn't feel it.
*Collegiate campus.*
*Elara's school.*
The Baltic Anomaly was a world away. This was here. Now. Where his sister was trapped. Trapped in a dungeon breach, with Hunter teams delayed, with only local police and whatever low-rank campus security existed standing between her and whatever horrorsz had boiled out of the unstable reality.
The carefully constructed facade of recovery, the hidden **System**, the secret levels, the controlled exercises – it all crumbled into dust. Panic, raw and primal, seized his throat. The **Blood War Chains** beneath his skin pulsed, not with hunger, but with a sudden, terrifying resonance to the chaos on the screen. His sister was in a dungeon breach.
The apartment was silent except for the frantic, tinny voice of the reporter and the rapid, thunderous pounding of his own heart. The daily quest, the level up, the stats – meaningless noise against the horrifying image of Elara caught in that green-tinged fog.