The Apocalypse Grinder (LitRPG Apocalypse, Timeloop)

Author's Note:

Chapter Warning:

Brutal murder/imprisonment scene.

I mentioned in the story's blurb that there were one or two scenes that some people might not want to read. This chapter contains one of them. Click the spoiler if you want to know what it contains. There is no description of the events, simply the after-effects and how the main character must deal with the people affected.

Terry and Jackson were backed up against a door on the opposite side of the tunnel. The rough stone ground had given way to shoddy tiles that were cracked and uneven.

Signs of civilisation. Or a facsimile of it that the goblins had made for themselves in the mountain. Keith was to Ronan's right, shaking like jelly but with steely determination written on his face. Dana was on his right, while he was the sacrificial lamb chosen to smash the door in.

He honestly didn't know what to expect inside. Goblins, obviously—but they were growing more varied in this place than simply warriors and archers.

Ronan turned to the group one last time. Everyone had grim but fierce expressions. They were ready to unleash hell at the drop of a hat. "Ready?" he asked.

Everyone nodded. "Alright, here goes nothing. Three. Two. One," he said, raising his knee on two and smashing his foot into the door on one.

It was surprisingly heavy. Two thin iron bars were set across it, hammered in with rusty nails. Even so, his prodigious strength was able to blast it open with ease.

The top hinge burst out of the stone, but the bottom held. The door smacked against the wall. Splinters sprayed into the room. Ronan rushed in, yelling and holding his fists up in preparation.

Dana slinked in behind, whip at the ready. Even Keith had a semblance of a fighting stance, while Jackson and Terry had shots at the ready.

The first thing to hit Ronan was the putrid scent of rotten meat. His eyes started watering as a second wave of foul scents struck—faeces and vomit. Then he saw what was giving off the acrid stench.

"What the fuck is this?" Dana exclaimed, before gagging.

Ronan furrowed his brow, but when he took a look around the room he didn't see goblins. No. It was far worse. This was the aftermath of their vile behaviour.

He raised a hand to cover his nose and mouth, but the taste already coated his tongue like a spoiled red wine. They'd joked that this place reminded them of a dungeon from a video game. This room was an actual dungeon. A single torch cast orange light across the stone brick cell, but he almost wished it didn't.

Thick iron rings were set into the stone at regular intervals. Most of them had chains attached, leading down to the prisoners shackled on the ground—well, what was left of them, anyway.

The corpses of five women, stripped and covered in scars, bruises, and lesions. A few even had nasty welts that leaked pus onto the ground, which ran over dried bloodstains.

"Fuck I hate goblins," Ronan spat. And the system. Did this even really happen or did it just conjure this fucking nightmare scenario to terrorise us? Some sort of twisted test?

Keith vomited. The smell barely made a difference to the already horrifying conditions. Terry walked inside, Jackson still waiting. The boy tried to follow, but the moment Terry saw the horrifying scene he held out a steel arm and stopped the kid from entering.

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"Don't come in, son. That's an order."

Jackson didn't protest. His father's tone was unyielding and firm. Dana walked over to one of the corpses and knelt down beside it. This one was the least decomposed. Dana reached out a hand, stopping right before she touched it.

She clenched it into a fist. Her knuckles went white. A drop of blood dripped from a cut in her palm, her sharp nails digging into it.

Ronan placed a hand on her shoulder. "Don't worry, we'll kill every last one of them," he said, voice trembling with rage.

"That won't bring them back. It won't save them. This whole… tutorial. This system. It's too much," she said, her voice barely above a whisper.

Ronan knew there was nothing he could say to comfort her right now. "Come on. Let's get out of here. All we can do is move forwards."

"Yes. Forwards. Back to Earth, where god-knows-what awaits us," she said dejectedly. The usual mischievous passion in her eyes was gone. She stood up abruptly and stormed out of the room.

Ronan shared a look with Terry. Then they followed after her. Keith was leaning against the wall, cleaning his mouth. "What was inside? Why can't I see?" Jackson asked as they exited and shut the door behind them.

He'd hated the goblins before. But it had been a rough hatred, forged in the heat of battle. Almost a grudging respect borne of their rivalry. Seeing that, however…

Ronan's blood boiled. This was unforgivable. He would tear the spines out of every single goblin he encountered until he reached the end of this cursed tunnel.

Then, when he got out of this shitty tutorial he would claw his way towards whoever ran this accursed system and beat the shit out of them too. That wouldn't even satisfy him, but he needed to do it anyway. His mouth stretched taut as he clenched his jaw hard enough that his face went white. Then, with a great force of will, he shoved it down and prepared himself to move onwards.

"Let's not dwell on it," said Terry. "We're alive. We can make it through this tutorial and get back home, whatever that might mean. I'm sure we all have our own histories and secrets, but right now survival is all that matters."

"Let's just move on. I'm fine," Dana muttered.

The group looked at the other two doors leading out of the tunnel. One of them had to lead further in, but the other… None of them wanted to see that shit again.

"We're going to slaughter every last one of these filthy green fucks," Ronan eventually declared. "Whatever it takes."

"Damn right," Dana agreed, hand on her whip.

Terry nodded. Even Keith, now that he'd stopped throwing up, had a much fiercer cast to his face. Ronan wasn't sure he was glad to see the man ready to fight—at least not when it had taken… that.

Jackson hadn't seen what was inside, but he saw the revulsion on their faces. He nodded in agreement too.

One door led forwards in the same direction as the tunnel. That was probably the exit, so they left it for last.

This time, Terry took point, opening the door with less force. He peeked inside, hesitation on his face.

His steely gaze softened a little. He swung the door open and stepped inside, motioning for them to follow him.

Ronan stepped in second. Seeing no chains buried in the wall he let out a sigh of relief. Any other time he might have been ecstatic to see what this room contained, but right now he couldn't muster a single scrap of joy.

Most of the room was dominated by a towering mountain of coins. Mostly silver and copper, but Ronan spotted a few flashes of gold in the stack. It wasn't just money, either.

There were rusted weapons tossed about as well as jewels and trinkets. Whether they were system recognised items or just baubles remained to be seen, but they'd struck it rich.

The others walked in, reflecting Ronan's sombre mood. None of them could find joy in their discovery. They stared at the treasure with heavy hearts and dour faces.

An eerie silence hung in the air. "Well, let's put it away and keep moving. I just want to hit something right now," Ronan said, moving towards the pile of gold.

"Hold on," said Dana.

Ronan stopped and turned to face her.

"How are we going to split this? It's not that I don't trust you guys, but…" she continued with a shrug of her shoulders.

"I mean we can just split it into five piles? There's plenty to go around," he replied.

"Surely there's some way the system can handle the split. It seems to cover everything else so far," Jackson added. "Oh! What the hell! Why wouldn't it explain this like… three stages ago!?" he suddenly exclaimed, staring at the air in front of his face.

They all turned to look at him with confused expressions.

"One second," he muttered.

A system message suddenly flashed in front of Ronan's face and he couldn't help but sigh. This system really hates explaining anything useful… he moaned to himself.

You have been invited to join a party by [Jackson Wright]!

Warning: Experience, loot, and aggro are shared between party members!

Accept the invitation?