F-Rank Mimic Chest: My SSS Mimic Skill Lets Me Become Anything

Three turns beyond Dane’s slab, Brant’s hook found a floor joint that answered hollow.

Vera stopped behind him. The next stone looked level until her boot touched it. Her heel rose. Her toe sank with the plate.

”Plate!”

The far edge dropped onto a catch. Counterweight chain ripped through the right wall, and an iron bar shot from a rib-high slot.

Brant crossed its path while Vera kept her weight on the plate. His shield met the bar with a bronze crash. The shoulder strap sheared; its buckle struck the wall and vanished under the iron track. The shield twisted across his body.

His braced left forearm took the force that remained.

Bone cracked inside the bracer.

Brant hit one knee. The rim below his elbow split skin, and blood ran over the shield face before Vera caught his shoulder.

”Stay on the plate,” he said. The words came out between his teeth. ”If it resets, that bar comes again.”

A gate dropped behind them, cutting off the route back to Dane. Its stone teeth struck floor hard enough to shake grit from the joints.

Holt went to Brant. Tess hauled the chained goblin weapons clear before the gate could catch them.

”Left forearm,” Brant said. ”Still attached.”

Holt unfastened the bracer rather than dragging it over the break. Wet metal peeled away. He pressed clean folded cloth to the cut and put two fingers against Brant’s wrist.

”Contained fracture. Pulse is there. Tell me what you feel.”

He touched Brant’s fingers in turn.

”Three.”

”Keep naming them.”

The gate began to lift for its reset. Stone teeth climbed past Brant’s boot.

Tess opened the weapon chain. The short sword and skinning knife stayed together. She pulled out the chipped cleaver by its haft.

”This one is broad enough to hold the track.”

”And the gate is fast enough to take your hand,” Brant said.

Tess crouched outside the teeth. ”Then count instead of worrying.”

Brant counted the opening in shield widths. At two, Tess drove the cleaver sideways into the track and let go. The gate dropped half an inch. Its teeth folded the blade around the lower guide, but the gap stayed high enough for a crouched adult to pass without turning a broken arm.

Vera stepped off the plate. The bar stayed in its slot.

”Arm now,” she said.

With Vera bracing shoulder and upper arm, Holt packed fresh cloth beneath the bracer cut and held the left forearm straight. Brant kept naming three fingers. The bleeding remained heavy, but each fold of cloth bought them a little more time.

Tess snapped the charred head from their damaged torch. Holt placed the straight handle along the outside of Brant’s forearm.

”Rigid piece is set,” he said. ”I need broad leather and a buckle. The shield strap is gone.”

Tess lifted the chain. Holt shook his head before it reached him.

”That will cut through the padding when he swells. The sword and knife carry rust to the edge.”

She dug through her pack and came up with two narrow cords. Neither could spread pressure across the arm. Vera’s belt still held her crystal case and field kit; stripping it would leave both loose for the backtrack.

The gate settled another grain against the cleaver. Metal creaked.

”Keep the handle against him,” Holt said. ”Shoulder and wrist. We can move if we hold the line, but I still need that fastener.”

* * *

The first iron impact reached Dane through the slab and shook all five of his shallow coppers. The next blow ended in a wet crack. Then came the gate, the scrape of chain, and words arriving in torn pieces through the old pipe.

”...left arm...”

”...three fingers...”

”...broad leather... buckle gone.”

Blood began tapping somewhere beyond the first turn. The pipe carried the rhythm better than the voices.

Dane held his lid shut and searched his mouth for the shape they lacked.

His tongue passed the five coppers. Deeper weight kept the thin silver against the square-holed coin and its red string. Toma’s stiff glove, the scarf scrap, Nate’s return charm, and Saint Rust’s knife stayed caught in their familiar layers.

Near the front gutter, something older had almost stopped being an object.

His tongue found a brass corner under living grain. A handspan of leather lay behind it, flattened into the mouth floor by years of half-finished conversion. The buckle had come from nameless dungeon gear. Brackenvault had already pulled one corner into the tissue between two boards.

The chest wanted the metal left where it was. Brass under the lockplate promised a harder bite and a cleaner close. Ownership heat gathered around the black nail when Dane worked his tongue beneath the leather.

The scar left by Toma’s ring remembered outward pressure. Dane pushed the leather onto his front rim and caught the strap under one tooth so its rotten edge stayed off his gums.

The conversion filament tightened.

He pulled.

It stretched from brass into the meat between the boards. The ownership nail burned hot enough to draw his lid against its band. Dane drove his split hinge into the stone beneath him and pulled again.

The filament tore.

Wet pain opened across the mouth floor. The buckle moved one inch, then his body dragged it back through the new abrasion. Lure shine crawled over the brass.

Dane ground the buckle into mouth dust until the shine dulled. The movement filled the groove with blood and grit, but it kept his lid down.

Two coppers came out of the five-coin warning. One jammed the buckle tongue open. The other pinned the leather flat while Dane rolled the bundle toward his rim. Three coppers stayed behind. The old paired warning collapsed with them.

He loaded leather against tongue, brass against wood, and one tooth beneath the strap. The buckle crossed his gums. Leather dragged through the fresh cut.

Dane opened only far enough to clear the objects.

The bundle fell beside the inner slab seam and scraped wetly across stone, one channel away from the pepper oil on Tess’s cloth-wrapped token. Dane angled the loose leather farther from the scent. Neither metal nor copper touched her offer.

His lid shut.

The scrape traveled into the floor.

Far down the route, footfalls stopped. Tess’s voice reached him without its beginning.

”...chest door. Something moved.”

Brant’s reply broke at both ends. ”...go back. Keep the arm straight. Nobody enters... reach.”

The gate complained as bodies returned beneath it. Stone pressed harder against the cleaver; the bent blade answered but held. Holt counted pace while two uneven loads crossed. Vera’s staff struck once on each cleared joint.

Their steps grew sharper through the second turn, then the first.

At the slab, whole words returned.

”Handle stays against the left forearm,” Holt said. ”Vera has his shoulder. I have the wrist.”

Brant’s shield edge settled outside the opening lane. ”No one reaches under that slab. Tess, keep my hook ready. I call the strike.”

The chained sword and knife settled behind his shield. The hook butt struck once beside Tess’s lighter step.

”Ready,” she said.

Vera stopped where her chalk line met the lower seam. Cold ward pressure followed the old route into the room. It passed over Tess’s pepper-scented cloth without taking hold, found brass and leather on the other side, and recoiled once from the torn conversion root.

”Old leather. Brass buckle. Two coppers,” Vera said. ”Conversion residue on one corner. My crystal finds no active venom channel.”

”Treat it as a trigger until Holt clears it,” Brant said. ”Keep the lid between us.”

The cold pressure drew the buckle bundle grain by grain through the seam. No hand or living skin came near Dane. Tess’s token remained inside, unchanged and unreachable.

Vera stopped the bundle outside. ”Holt decides.”

Cloth rasped over leather while Holt checked the edge. ”Clean layer between this and the cut. Use it.”

”Handle on the outside of the left forearm,” Holt said. ”Vera, hold his elbow.”

The torch handle knocked against Brant’s bracer. Clean padding rasped around wood and arm; Dane’s leather followed it. The buckle tongue entered its catch with a rough brass scrape.

”Three fingers?” Holt asked.

”Still three. Thumb is warmer.”

Holt pulled the leather one notch.

Brant’s heel drove against the wall. His breath stopped, returned, and slowed.

”Copper under the tongue,” Holt said.

One bent coin clicked against brass. Holt drove it into the damaged catch until the buckle held and the torch handle stopped shifting.

The second copper ticked under Tess’s knife and onto spare cloth.

”Wrapping the other,” Holt said. Cloth folded twice; the prayer-case clasp opened and closed.

”Pulse remains,” Holt said. ”Fingers are warming. Bleeding is down to a contained soak.”

Only then did Tess speak beyond the work.

”I hate that the chest packed better than I did.”

Nobody answered her.

The System opened inside Dane.

/==[ Brackenvault System: Utility Lure ]==\

| Item: Retained Belt Buckle / Partial Conversion

| Presented Function: Splint Fastener

| Lure Value: Increased

| Aid Result: Accepted Under Protest

| Trust Result: Decreased

\==[ Help: Filed As Bait ]==/

”On your feet,” Holt said. ”Left arm stays straight.”

Boots shifted against stone. Brant rose between two supporting steps. The torch handle gave one wood creak and held; no fresh blood joined the pipe’s slow drip.

Brant put his weight through the right foot, then the left. His shield edge settled low on his right side. ”If the chest can hear what we lack, it can learn what brings us back. Treat that as part of the trap.”

Holt touched the evidence packet beside his prayer case. ”It tore out converted metal and broke the five-coin pattern. It could have listened while you bled.”

”I heard you. Keep both facts.”

Vera stepped under Brant’s uninjured side. Cloth pulled tight across his ribs. ”You can argue motive after Holt checks the arm at the post.”

Holt’s prayer cord clicked inside its case. ”The cost gives me one question. I can ask it with a mercy witness.”

”Keep the ritual out of this route,” Brant said.

”Upper post first,” Vera said. ”We rest. If the gate still holds, we return with the slab sealed and the withdrawal line marked.”

”Tess keeps the hook,” Brant said. ”Holt, take the sword and knife. My right hand has the shield.”

Chain tightened around the two remaining blades. Vera and Holt took Brant’s weight on either side without disturbing the splint.

They left the slab.

Three turns away, the pressure gate ground down on the cleaver as they passed beneath it. Brant counted each body through. The bent blade remained in the teeth.

Beyond the first turn, voices thinned to cadence. Brant’s uneven steps continued toward the upper post until the pipe lost them.

Inside Dane, three coppers rested where five had once warned people away. The torn conversion root pulsed beneath the missing buckle. None of the coins reached the rim.