PeterN: Thanks once again for the reviews, I think there's only four of you reading this.
Space Dragon – I could look up the information on the Mega level digimon, but that won't let me see their personas. Even though I don't really include them much I still prefer to know how they act, sound, etc…. The Keeper of Secrets watching them you think, you'll have to read to find out. Yes, you may sense some Taiora there, whether your just reading what you want to in-between the lines is another matter ^_^.
Theo 'Blitz' Leung – Nope, haven't thought of that, but you may have noticed that this Bloodthirster is more powerful than your "average" Bloodthirster. Besides, the ICF is in the way… for the moment.
Emma/Ems – Thanks. Why you asking me for thesaurus words though?
Immaterium (Part 9)
The eyes peered over the small shrubs, the things body completely hidden. Behind it thousands more eyes could be seen through the darkness. Slowly they moved forwards towards the gaping cave mouth where Sora and Biyomon where fast asleep. A single one of them moved towards the cave, the rest of them stopping. It went into the semi-light thrown off by the fire Agumon had started earlier. The small green creature crept forward, keeping lower to the ground to normal with its eyestalks sunken close to its head.
A wild jabbering of voices erupted from its companions behind it. It spun round trying to silence them before they awoke any of the digidestined or their digimon. It was too slow. Biyomon woke up and peered into the gloom, half hidden shadows flitting between the scare shrubbery surrounding the cave.
Shrubbery? I don't remember seeing any plants on the way here. Biyomon thought. Some of the shrubs fell over a little further away. For a brief moment a digimon could be seen where the shrub was before it darted behind another one. That was a…
"Sora! Wake up!" Biyomon shouted, managing to wake up the entire group.
"What is it?" Sora asked sleepily.
"Numemon! They've surrounded the cave!" Biyomon shouted as the fake plants fell to the ground revealing a seemingly infinite number of Numemon. Sora slowly got to her feet and started walking backwards while the Numemon stayed immobile.
There was a sound. Every Numemon ran forward towards the cave. Sora turned round and sprinted while Biyomon flew into the cave. "Numemon behind. Run!" Sora screamed as she sprinted past the still waking group. They saw the horde stretching as far as they could see and quickly joined Sora running.
"There's a network of caves isn't it?" Tai asked gasping for breath while ducking incoming sludge.
"Yes. Miles of it." Izzy responded, slowly falling behind. "But we can't run much longer. Still hours till dawn."
"Hurry up Izzy!" Joe shouted as he saw the Numemon gaining on Izzy.
"I can't." Izzy said simply as he collapsed to the floor. The group slowed down, not sure of what to do.
"Go!" Tai shouted as he sprinted back to Izzy and helped him to his feet. "Run unless you want to get a sludge bath Izzy!" Both of them sprinted off again, slowly drawing away from the Numemon who were also tiring.
Tai and Izzy dashed through into another cavern, probably miles from where they had started. Out of breath they collapsed to the ground, no longer capable of running from the Numemon. Murphy's Law had finally caught up with them it appeared.
"Harpoon Torpedo!" Ikkakumon shouted blasting the ceiling of the cavern. All watched the rubble fall and completely seal the cavern off from the advancing Numemon. Everyone collapsed to the ground and Ikkakumon de-digivolved back to Gomamon.
"How… many were… there?" Matt asked as he fought to keep his stomach inside himself.
"Too many." Izzy replied. "That must have been most of the Numemon on the planet…. I dread to think what could have gathered them in one place."
"I'm so glad you feel that way."
Everyone turned to the hoarse, croaking voice at the far end of the cavern. Matt instantly lost the contents of his stomach upon seeing the creature. TK, Mimi, and Joe followed suit when they saw several tiny creatures eat Matt's vomit.
In the far side was a towering hulk of flatulence, pestilence, and decay. The skin a multitude of disgusting greens and yellows. Open sore covered the creature from head to foot, its bloated stomach was open and organs spilled out in several places. Surrounding it were dozens of miniature versions of itself. Each one as putrid as the last. All of them eating either the diseased secretions from the decaying hulk, or the vomit that was steaming on the floor. In its hand it held an aged sword. It looked both fragile and horrendously powerful at the same time. The creature opened its mouth and licked its lips. A separate face was in its tongue. That too was covered in sores and leaked pus, phlegm, and other less identifiable substances. It lapped up the secretions of itself before it spoke.
"I'm so glad you could make it. I was afraid I'd miss you. I'm not in the best of health you know?" The creature burst out laughing, bile spurted out of its mouth as the hoarse, decrepit laugh echoed round the chamber, tempting to destroy all sanity.
The small creatures also laughed, a high cacophony of insanity that grated against the deep laugh of the giant hulk.
"Wh-what are you?" Joe asked as he stared in revulsion at the corpse like creature.
"I am a Great Unclean One. A Greater Daemon of Nurgle." The voice said in near perfect clarity compared to before. "I suppose you uncivilised fools do not know of the great Lord Nurgle. Still, at least you can spend eternity being tortured by Him after I destroy your mortal shells and send your souls to Nurgle."
"No way. We'll kill you…. Even if you do look like a corpse." Joe said, strangely optimistic. Several dozen pairs of eyes stared at him as everyone in the cavern wondered about his sanity.
The Great Unclean One burst out into a hoarse laugh. "Yes… I am a corpse I suppose. I like your sense of humour." The smaller creatures followed the laugh in their high-pitched voices.
"All twelve of your souls burn strongly, but that will not stop me from sending them to Nurgle. No. That will just make it all the more fun." It stopped laughing for a moment and drew its head back. It came forward again, a blob of black phlegm flying at them. Everyone scattered and watched as the floor dissolved for several metres until the last of the putrid stuff had evaporated.
"Agumon digivolve to… Greymon!"
"Gabumon digivolve to… Garurumon!"
"Tentomon digivolve to… Kabuterimon!"
"Palmon digivolve to… Togemon!"
"Gomamon digivolve to… Ikkakumon!"
"Biyomon digivolve to… Birdramon!"
"Patomon digivolve to… Angemon!"
The Great Unclean One stepped back in surprise. "Wh-what? How did you do that?" Surprise was evident in its voice. It motioned with its sword and all the small creatures swarmed towards the newly digivolved digimon.
"Meteor Wing!" Birdramon flew to the top of the cavern and unleashed her attack. Droves of the creatures were hit and exploded in a shower of putrid fluids. Wherever they landed the floor started to dissolve until the fluids were gone.
"Don't touch them." Izzy stated as he tried to get his Digimon Analyser to work on the Great Unclean One or its smaller counterparts without success.
"Try a Needle Spray!" Togemon shouted and took care of the rest of the small creatures in seconds. The Great Unclean One looked round and slowly backed away from them, sword trailing along the ground, hanging from a limp hand.
"Not so tough now, are you? Still going to kill us?" Tai asked as the digimon closed in on the abomination of nature.
"You think I'm finished?" The creature laughed loud again. "I haven't even started. Those Nurglings aren't really hard to send back home."
"Back home?"
"Yes. You didn't know. You cannot kill me. The most you could ever achieve was to destroy this body and banish my essence to the Immaterium for a while. But that won't happen." It lunged forward with supernatural speed and slashed at the caved-in rubble with its sword before retreating back to the far corner of the cavern.
Everyone watched as the rubble dissolved into a bubbling brown and green pool allowing the Numemon horde back in.
"Nova Blast!"
"Meteor Wing!"
"Needle Spray!"
"Harpoon Torpedo!"
"Electro Shocker!"
"Howling Blaster!"
"Hand of Fate!"
The attacks ploughed into and through the Numemon. Black clouds of data flew through the cavern roof and more Numemon took the place of their fallen comrades.
"You can't win. You're too badly outnumbered." The Great Unclean One laughed and lunged forward with his sword, smashing Birdramon down to the floor with the flat of the blade. It drew its head back for a moment before spewing forth steaming bile over the stunned digimon. Sora watched in horror as the putrid yellow substance hardened trapping Birdramon for the rest of the battle.
"Birdramon!" Sora screamed as she rushed to the hardened substance before Izzy, Joe, and Tai dragged her back.
"Are you mad? That stuff will probably kill you!" Joe shouted trying to hold her back.
"Greymon! Aim for the ceiling! Try and cave it in on those Numemon!" Tai shouted
"Nova Blast!" The ball of fire sailed through the air and smashed into the ceiling, rubble and dust drifted down causing the Numemon to look up. The ceiling held.
"Everyone! Hit it now!" Tai shouted out. Six attacks smashed into the roof above the Numemon. More dust drifted down, followed by rocks. There was a deafening crash and the Numemon were destroyed by thousands of tonnes of solid rock.
They turned back to the Great Unclean One as Kabuterimon was hot by another stream of bile and glued to the wall. A long echoing laugh erupted from the Greater Daemons mouth. "Two down. Five to go." It laboriously raised its sword and brought it crashing down where Garurumon had been moments before.
"Howling Blaster!" The attack aimed true for the creature's stomach. A sound of ripping innards could be heard and the attack passed through and crashed into the far wall, after making a gaping hole in the creature. It looked down at its stomach, bodily fluids poured out of the open wound on both sides dissolving the floor. It concentrated hard and the wound healed, leaving a small open sore where it had been.
The Great Unclean One vomited forth another steaming pile of bile. Aimed at the entire group. Everyone scattered as it sprayed the cavern, raising the floor by a few feet when it hardened.
"Needle Spray!"
"Nova Blast!"
"Harpoon Torpedo!"
"Howling Blaster!"
"Hand of Fate!"
The five attacks arced through the air towards the backing away Daemon. One by one they crashed into and through the thing creating holes and craters in the thing's body. It gave out a groan of pain and fell over backwards, sword falling from its grasp and landing blade buried in the ground.
"All right! We did it!" Tai shouted overjoyed.
"Tai. What about Birdramon and Kabuterimon." Sora said quietly, voice void of any emotion. Tai looked at the solid lumps on the floor and wall where the digimon had been buried alive. His face fell as he realised that they would probably not get them out.
A roar of anger diverted their attention. Staggering to its feet the Great Unclean One lent on its sword as it got up. "You think you can defeat me so easily? A Greater Daemon of Nurgle? We cannot be defeated. Decay is in every living thing! Our victory is inevitable!" It threw its sword into Ikkakumon, spearing him through the shoulder. He de-digivolved back to Gomamon and fell unconscious, blood pouring out of the wound.
"Your evil cannot be permitted anymore! Hand of Fate!" Angemon shot his attack towards the Daemon's head. It opened its eyes wide in surprise and threw itself to the floor avoiding the powerful blow by inches. Another volley of attacks blasted into its side as it lay on the floor, a geyser of pus erupting from each wound.
It clambered to its feet and staggered towards the group. "You are beginning to annoy me now." It said through clenched, black, teeth as it reached out and grabbed Angemon. "Your good cannot be permitted anymore!" It said in Angemon's voice shortly before it threw Angemon hard into the wall and quickly coated him with the entrapping bile. "You think that three of you can defeat me where seven have failed?"
"We'll destroy you if we die in the process!" Tai shouted.
"That's what friends do. And we will fight for our friends!" Matt shouted.
"Greymon digivolve to… MetalGreymon!"
"Garurumon digivolve to… WereGarurumon!"
"What? You still refuse to accept the inevitable? Just because you're bigger doesn't mean you're any harder to kill!" It lashed forward with its barbed tongue, smashing Togemon in the face, before slashing her with the sword, forcing her to de-digivolve back to Palmon, unconscious.
"Giga Blaster!" The dual missiles screamed forward towards the Greater Daemon, it deflected one into the wall with its sword and watched in horror as the other went towards its face. With a display of reflexes beguiled by its size it got its hand in the way. The missile crashed into it splattering the remnants of the arm across half the cavern. The creature looked at the stump that used to be its arm for a few seconds before screaming out in pain.
"Wolf Claw!" WereGarurumon leapt up to the creature's other arm and slashed hard and deep, forcing it to drop its sword. Its scream re-doubled in intensity, a horrifying sound in the closed cavern where echoes lasted for minutes at a time.
MetalGreymon rammed into the howling thing sending it sprawling backwards into the cavern walls. "Giga Blaster!" It fired at point blank range into the creature's hideous face. It erupted into a fountain of green and yellow, splattering the entire room forcing the remaining digimon back to Rookie level and knocking everything in the cavern unconscious.
While everyone remained blissfully unaware in the cave, no one heard a low rumbling sound. Dust started to trickle down from the ceiling at an alarming rate and echoing booms showed that the entire network of caves was collapsing.
PeterN: Wow! My longest piece to date. They may have destroyed one Greater Daemon, but things do not look good for the digidestined! How will they escape fate again? Please leave a review.