Chapter 23 · Steel Claw's Trophy Wall

The concrete stopped falling and Chen Feng was still alive.

He didn't know how. His ribs screamed every time he breathed. The guard wasn't screaming anymore. Chen could see him in the dark, half-buried under a slab, one arm bent the wrong way.

The cage was gone. Just twisted rebar sticking up from the hole.

"Old Xu?"

His voice came out wrong. His tongue was still bleeding where he'd bitten through it. He spat and tasted copper and rust.

"Xu?"

No answer. Chen pushed himself up and his wrist gave out. He landed on his side and bit down on a sound that would've been a scream if he had the air for it. His ribs weren't just broken. They were grinding.

He crawled instead. The floor was tilted now, sloping down into the hole. Emergency lights flickered on somewhere above. Red. Everything looked red.

That's when he saw the hallway.

It opened up under where the cage used to be. Old concrete walls. Steel doors with rivets the size of his fist. This wasn't part of the warehouse. This was older. Way older.

Chen dragged himself to the edge and looked down. Eight feet. He could make that.