Lina slowly turned the doorknob, which promptly came off in her hand. She looked down at it for a moment before dropping it and pushing the door open.
The door creaked loudly as it swung open causing everyone to wince. When it finally hit the wall, it fell off its hinges and hit the floor with an incredibly loud crash.
Zelgadis smacked his forehead in frustration before leaning forward to whisper in Lina's ear, "Why don't you just tell Hellmaster that we're here? It'd probably be more subtle."
Lina glared at Zelgadis and elbowed him in the stomach in response. She cautiously looked around the entryway.
A thick layer of dust coated everything for as far as Lina could see. Admittedly that was only a few feet as there was no illumination in the building. There was a trail of footprints in the dust, leading into the darkness.
Lina knelt down and squinted at the footprints. One set belonged to a child, but there were other larger ones as well. "Damn it," she muttered quietly. "If only I had some light…"
Gourry whispered, "Light, huh?" He quietly drew the Sword of Light and held it out over Lina's head. "Light come forth!" he yelled, igniting the blade. "Is that better Lina?" he asked looking down at where she had been crouching a moment before. She was gone. "Lina?"
"You… you jellyfish!" Lina snarled from about ten feet down the hall. "You scared the hell out of me!"
"Oh. Sorry," Gourry said guiltily.
"Well, at least we can see the footprints now," Amelia said hopefully. She began to make her way down the hallway towards Lina. "It looks like a kid and maybe a woman," she commented as she examined the footprints.
"I'd be inclined to agree," Zelgadis muttered with a nod. He sniffed the air briefly and made a disgusted face. "Death. Hellmaster is here alright."
Lina nodded. "Right. And I think it's safe to say that Sylphiel was still alive when she arrived."
Gourry looked at Lina hopefully. "Do you think so?"
"Yeah," Lina said halfheartedly while pointing at the footprints. "See? She walked in here on her own. We might still have time to save her."
"Well, what are we waiting for?" Gourry said impatiently. "Let's go Lina!" He charged down the hallway looking down every now and then to make sure that the footprints were still there.
"Like a bull in a china shop," Zelgadis muttered darkly as he heard a crash and a yell as Gourry apparently tripped over something.
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"It was the 'Sylphy' that gave you away you know," Hellmaster explained to the trembling Sylphiel. He was eerily calm now that he had finally figured out what she and Phibrizzo had been doing. "Stand up and disrobe if you please. We've wasted too much time already and I'm ready to get this over with."
Sylphiel did as he commanded. As she stripped she reached out mentally, trying to find the little boy that had shown her that, despite Hellmaster's assurances to the contrary, she was not alone. Phibrizzo was unable to answer her call, trapped in the farthest recesses of Hellmaster's mind. Despair settled over her like a shroud.
"I never would have called you Sylphy. It's the kind of nickname that a child would use," Hellmaster said as he picked up some supplies from the corner of the room. He walked towards her, continuing to explain, "I never would have expected Phibrizzo to enter your mind when I did. I was even more surprised when you went back with him. That's why I couldn't read you." He stopped in front of her and held up a large needle. "Give me your hand," he commanded.
Sylphiel shook as she held out her hand to the Hellmaster.
"Now," Hellmaster said with a smirk, "This is really going to hurt." He jammed the needle into Sylphiel's palm.
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"This way?" Gourry whispered anxiously. "Or is it that way?" He anxiously looked over his shoulder at Lina for directions.
The hallway had split into two paths and with it, Phibrizzo's footprints. It was as if the boy had suddenly become twins. Identical sets of prints led down both halls into the darkness. In addition to Phibrizzo's footprints, there were far fresher ones in the dust that almost obscured his own.
Zelgadis scowled as he knelt down to examine the newer prints. "Hmm," he muttered darkly before looking up at Lina. "These are ours. We're going in circles."
"No way," Lina said with a vehement shake of her head. "That doesn't make any sense. This is a straight hallway." She eyed the juncture in the hall suspiciously. The architect must have been crazy to design the place like this. "Or it was anyway," she corrected herself.
Zelgadis rolled his eyes and growled, "I never claimed that it made sense. Here, take a look for yourself."
Lina knelt down next to Zelgadis and took a closer look at the tracks. The evidence confirmed what Zelgadis had told her. "What's going on here?" she asked no one in particular.
"Well, it's not really a normal building is it?" Amelia asked while looking around nervously.
The others looked at her quizzically.
"Can't you feel it?" Amelia asked them with a shudder. "It feels like the building's… breathing or something. I don't know how else to describe it." She quickly stepped away from the wall, moving to stand next to Zelgadis. "I think we've been walking for at least ten minutes. And the building didn't look that big from the outside." She looked over her shoulder and gasped, "Look at that!"
Lina whirled around expecting some sort of attack, but was surprised to find nothing but the front door to the building. It was only about twenty feet away. "Oh, this sucks!" she said angrily. Feeling the need to vent some frustration, she ran over to the side of the hallway and kicked the wall, splintering the rotted wood.
An instant later, the building groaned and shook violently as if it were on the verge of collapse. Vast quantities of dust fell from the ceiling and the walls momentarily seemed to twist. After a few seconds, the building seemed to return to normal.
"Was it an earthquake?" Amelia asked, almost hopefully. She would much rather chalk the event up to a natural phenomenon than the alternative.
"What the hell?" Lina whispered. She glanced down at her foot, then at the wall making the connection. Frowning, she made a fist and reared back to punch the wall. A strong hand grabbed her wrist and she turned to see Zelgadis shake his head disapprovingly.
"Don't," he whispered as he glanced around the hallway. "I have no desire to see what it does when it gets really mad."
Lina nodded slowly, seeing the logic in Zelgadis's statement. She gave up her experiment and instead turned to follow the footprints again. They had to end sometime, didn't they?
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Xellos sat in his church trying to ignore the sounds of carnage coming from just outside the door. His hands shook as he tried to pen a sermon. There was no doubt that the citizens of Sairaag would need even more guidance than usual in the days to come. They would come with their questions and he would reassure them as best he could. "Hellmaster," he muttered darkly as he balled up the parchment he was working on and threw it across the room. He pulled out a fresh sheet and started anew. He didn't know why he was bothering. The odds were definitely in favor of there not being anyone left to listen to his sermon after today.
Xellos was startled out of his dark thoughts by the loud sound of someone pounding on the door. "For Ceiphied's sake, open the door!" a muffled voice implored. He sighed and pushed himself back from his desk. He turned to the door and nodded ever so slightly.
There was a click as the lock disengaged and the door flew open. A redheaded young lady came tumbling into the church and sprawled out in the aisle.
Just for an instant, Xellos thought that it was Lina, but quickly realized his error when she looked up at him. There was too much fear behind those eyes for it to be Lina. He sighed and wondered at the fate of his young charge. He was forbidden to directly interfere in the events, but that didn't stop him from worrying about her.
Hmm? The young lady had said something. Xellos shook his head and asked, "I'm sorry?"
Anna looked up at the priest incredulously and repeated, "Help me!" Was the old man deaf or something?
"Oh?" Xellos said with a raised eyebrow. He looked up to see several of the restless dead staggering through the entryway of the church in pursuit of the girl. "This will most certainly not do," Xellos muttered angrily as he stood.
To Anna, it appeared as if the priest grew in stature as he stood. The candles on the desk that he had been sitting at dimmed, yet the room seemed to be even brighter than it had been before.
Xellos pointed his staff at the dead men and said, "You pathetic creatures have no business with the living. Return to the abyss that spawned you."
The timbers in the church seemed to groan from the force of Xellos's voice and Anna found herself cowering on the floor with her ears covered. The dead things regarded Xellos for a moment before collapsing into piles of dust before Anna's eyes. As she watched, a sudden wind roared through the church sweeping the remains of the dead out the doors and slammed them shut a moment later.
Xellos clapped his hands together, a satisfied smile on his face. "Better?" he asked Anna as he turned and sat back down at his desk. He called over his shoulder, "You're welcome to stay until it's over. No harm will come to you within these walls Anna."
Anna just stared at the priest, her mouth hanging open. He'd seemed so powerful before, but now that the danger was past, it felt as if he had receded somewhat. She stood up and hesitantly approached the desk. "Sir," she asked, her voice full of wonder, "What are you?" Under normal circumstances, she would have thought the question incredibly rude, but for some reason it felt like the right way to phrase it.
Xellos dipped his quill in the inkwell and continued to write. He finished off the page with a flourish and turned to Anna with an enigmatic smile on his face. "That, my dear," he said with a wink, "Is a secret!"
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"Damn it!" Lina shouted as the group came around to where they had started again. "You stupid building!" she said shaking her fist at the ceiling.
The hallway creaked, sounding almost as if it were laughing.
Lina looked up at the sound of wood cracking overhead. An instant later a part of the ceiling came crashing down onto her head. "Oh that is it," she muttered darkly as she shoved the wood off of herself. She climbed to her feet and drew her sword. Yelling a fierce battle cry, she charged at the side of the hallway with her blade raised.
A second later, Gourry and Amelia tackled Lina, knocking her to the ground.
"Lina, maybe this isn't such a good idea," Gourry suggested as he struggled to disarm her.
"Miss Lina, get a hold of yourself!" Amelia implored.
Lina snarled, "Let me go guys! I'm gonna kill that bastard!" as she struggled to escape from her companions' hold.
Zelgadis watched the others roll around on the ground for a moment while massaging his temples. Seeing that Lina wasn't going to calm down, he finally shouted, "For the love of Ceiphied Lina, listen to yourself! You're trying to pick a fight with an apartment building!"
"But," Lina pouted while pointing at the wall, "It started it."
Zelgadis scowled and sat down. "What we need to do is think about this." He gestured at the mazelike hallway as he continued, "Hellmaster obviously did this to throw off any pursuers."
"All the more reason that we should smash the place up," Lina said while eyeing the walls suspiciously.
Zelgadis sighed and said a quick prayer for patience. He locked eyes with Lina and said, "I really feel that you should sit down and think." He reinforced this suggestion with a mental command as well.
Lina stiffened up momentarily before getting a relaxed look on her face. She smiled at Zelgadis and mumbled, "You're right Zel. We need to sit down and think about this."
Zelgadis nodded. "Glad to hear it." He pointed to a semi clean spot on the floor next to himself.
Gourry and Amelia exchanged incredulous looks as Lina calmly walked over and sat down beside Zelgadis.
Lina closed her eyes and pondered the situation at hand. A part of her was saying that something was very wrong here. She quickly shut that part of her mind up. Zelgadis may have done something to her, but he was right. Throwing a fit wasn't going to solve anything.
Lina's breathing slowed and her shoulders slumped. All the events leading up to that moment flashed through her mind at a rapid pace. Lupin the vampire falling to her stake, meeting Gourry and spending the night in his house, the fight against Dilgear the werewolf, meeting the self proclaimed Slayer Zelgadis, fighting the twins, the day at the circus, Martina's prophesy, and battling the Hellmaster. All of it was blurred together in one brief moment.
Xellos's voice whispered in the back of her mind, "I think that Ceiphied has a purpose for all of us and finds a way to put us where we are supposed to be."
Lina's eyes flew open and she found herself holding the medallion of Ceiphied. "Ceiphied?" she mumbled questioningly as she ran her finger along the silver wings of the Flare Dragon. That was it. She stood and walked purposefully to the center of the hallway.
"Lina, what are you doing?" Gourry asked as she walked by.
Zelgadis grabbed Gourry's arm to get his attention and made a shushing motion.
Lina stared down the dark hallway and took a hesitant step. Before her eyes, the passage groaned and tore itself into two identical passages. She snorted quietly, a small smile on her face. She took another step forward and held her medallion out in front of her.
The effect was immediate. Ceiphied's silver eyes began to flicker. In a moment, Lina's pendant was glowing brightly, dispelling the darkness around the group.
Amelia and Gourry covered their eyes, trying to avoid the worst of the glare.
Zelgadis hissed in pain and attempted to cover up as the intense light seared his exposed flesh.
Lina stood tall, mesmerized by the light that had incapacitated her companions. She thought, just for a moment, that she could see Luna smiling at her from just beyond the brilliance. "Luna…" she said quietly, her voice full of reverence.
The effect on the building around them was impressive to say the least. It creaked, sounding almost as if it was roaring in pain as the walls stretched and distorted to escape the horrible light. The two hallways slammed violently into each other and quickly merged back into a single path.
The light faded.
Gourry called Lina's name and quickly darted forward to catch her before she collapsed to the ground.
"Sis?" Lina asked hopefully as she struggled to focus on Gourry. A moment later, she smiled tiredly. "Hi Gourry," she mumbled.
"Hi Lina," Gourry replied with a grin. He looked up at the hallway, which had taken on a perfectly normal appearance again. "Can we go now?" he asked her quietly.
Lina looked down the hall and nodded. "Yeah, we can go now Gourry. I don't think that we'll have any more trouble." She tried to rotate her wounded shoulder and grimaced. It had stiffened up pretty quickly. "Help me," she said wearily. "I'm really tired all of a sudden."
Gourry stood next to Lina so that she could lean on him as they made their way down the hall.
"Mr. Zelgadis?" Amelia said as she reached out to put a hand on his shoulder. "You look like you're really sunburned."
Zelgadis hissed in pain when Amelia touched the exposed flesh of his shoulder. Every bit of visible skin on his body was a bright shade of red. He reached up and removed Amelia's hand from his shoulder. "Don't touch me," he admonished quietly. "I'm… I'm not well." He quickly stumbled down the hallway after Lina and Gourry to avoid any questions from Amelia.
Moments later, they had reached the end of the hall. A flimsy wooden door stood ajar, as if inviting them to enter.
Lina reached out and yanked the door open forcefully.
A blast of hot air and a powerful stench assaulted the group's senses.
Lina immediately associated the smell with burnt lumber and charred flesh. For the hundredth time in recent memory, she recalled Luna's horrible death at the hands of the burning creature from her nightmares.
Gourry smelled the rich odor of a swamp. The smell was identical to the one that had assaulted him when he and Zangulus had fought the restless spirits a couple nights ago.
Zelgadis thought briefly that he was back in his tomb. The musty odor coming from the bottom of the staircase was identical to that of his stone prison. He shuddered briefly, wondering if he really was a monster and belonged in a tomb.
Amelia wrinkled her nose in disgust. It smelled like elephant droppings. She recalled the unpleasant days of her childhood when she had to help clean out the elephant wagons. The chore had always managed to make the normally cheerful girl incredibly surly for the rest of the day.
Moving as one, the group descended the stairs into darkness.
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Sylphiel whimpered in pain as Hellmaster set about working her into his tapestry of blood. "You and the boy almost got me," he said as he ran a length of wire through the palm of her left hand. He threaded the wire through the cheek of a corpse that was leaning against the wall as he continued speaking. "Telling Phibrizzo to manipulate me was a stroke of genius. You guessed that he had some say in what went on in this body. Or did he tell you that when you visited him?" he asked her curiously. He quickly shook his head and cinched her hand tightly to the cheek of the body next to hers.
Sylphiel looked over at the poor soul next to her. The way that Hellmaster had positioned her hand made it appear as if she were caressing the corpses face lovingly.
"That's very perceptive," Hellmaster said with a nod as he scanned Sylphiel's mind. "There's far more to Hell than death and destruction you know," he explained. "Pain, sorrow, fear, fury, and desire. All the darkest human emotions are a part of my realm," he said as he gestured grandly around the chamber.
Sylphiel looked around, seeing for the first time the horrible meaning to Hellmaster's work. At first she thought that it had been random carnage. But the more he explained, the more horrible sense that it made.
The walls of the chamber were a horrible patchwork of humanity. Dozens of Hellmaster's victims had been brought down into the basement and stitched together in what Sylphiel had originally assumed was a random pattern. But now she began to understand.
A few feet away from her a man's body had its hands covering its eyes as if weeping over some misfortune. The body next to that had its hands wrapped around the first's throat giving the appearance that he was strangling him in a fit of rage.
Further along, another unfortunate soul had been skinned and had its mouth wired open as if it were screaming. Surrounding it were four other figures, whose mouths were positioned at various points on the body. It appeared that they were devouring the first person.
Sylphiel squeezed her eyes tightly shut, not wanting to see any more of the horror. A few tears slipped down her cheeks and she silently prayed to Ceiphied for salvation.
"Don't do that," Hellmaster said crossly. He backhanded Sylphiel across the cheek, distracting her from her prayer and bringing her back to the present. "I need your opinion on something here," he said seriously. He held up the hand of the body next to Sylphiel. "Now, I was going to position this here," he said placing the body's hand on her exposed breast. "But that just seems so tame, you know? We're going for gusto here."
Sylphiel briefly wondered when her nightmare would end. She thought about Gourry and desperately tried to imagine that it was him touching her body instead of Hellmaster's dead puppet. It was a feeble effort at best as the smell of death surrounded her and the hands caressing her body were cold and lifeless.
"Hey," Hellmaster said jokingly, "Don't think stuff like that Sylphiel. You're going to hurt his feelings. "I know! Maybe if I properly introduced you, you'd feel better about this." He turned to the corpse and snapped his fingers. "Hey," he yelled into the body's ear. "Don't be rude. Say hello to the nice lady."
Sylphiel turned to look at the dead man despite herself.
The corpses eyelids flickered briefly and flew back to reveal milky white orbs. Its jaw fell open and it hissed, trying to form a greeting with its rotted vocal cords. A moment later, a rather large maggot crawled out of its mouth and fell to the floor with an audible plop.
Sylphiel blacked out.
"Spoilsport," Hellmaster muttered angrily. He turned away from Sylphiel briefly to busy himself with the last touches of the spell that would finally bring this world and his own together. He knelt in the middle of the chamber and clasped his hands together in a mockery of a prayer. He muttered words in his dark language and felt the magic begin to grow within the room. He looked up hopefully and saw the bodies along the walls begin to come to some semblance of life again.
Quietly at first but quickly growing in volume, the dead began to sing in Hellmaster's dark language.
Tony, the young boy that Hellmaster had killed several days ago, looked up from his position at the base of the wall. He had been too small to make his way up to an empty place so had instead stitched himself to another child just a few feet from the floor. He opened his mouth and tried to add his voice to the chorus, but only managed a dry croak through his slashed throat.
Mimi and Nene, their arms wrapped around one another in a loving embrace, did their best to add their voices to the spell. This was quite difficult given the fact that Hellmaster had stitched the sisters' lips together in a mockery of a passionate kiss.
Vista, a more recent victim of Hellmaster's ministrations, also made a sad attempt to sing. Black water poured from his mouth and he made strange gurgling noises. He had finally managed to find the lake that Hellmaster had told him to jump in and drowned himself. Afterwards, under cover of darkness, he had made his way to the demon's lair.
All in all, it was a horrible cacophony of darkness.
Hellmaster laughed triumphantly as the floor beneath him began to shimmer.
The stone quickly turned to liquid and then fell away completely, leaving a black hole that seemed to spiral down into eternity. The edges of the pit wobbled as if on the verge of collapse, but held steady.
"This is it!" Hellmaster shrieked gleefully. He turned back to Sylphiel. One more sacrifice and the portal would be stabilized. Then his task would finally be complete. He advanced on her menacingly. He'd do something elaborate with her. Something memorable. She looked so angelic. There had to be something he could do with that wasn't there?
Hellmaster's smile grew even larger. That was it. Sylphiel's appearance screamed innocence. She was angelic. He'd turn her into a mockery of an angel. Different methods of doing so flew through his twisted mind. He finally settled on the idea of skinning her and stretching the skin out behind her to simulate wings. That would be a lovely slap in the face for Ceiphied wouldn't it?
"How about that, you old bastard?" Hellmaster called out defiantly. As he expected, the Flare Dragon had nothing to say in response.
Hellmaster raised his knife and laid the blade against Sylphiel's throat. "Say goodnight Sylphy," he giggled.
"Hellmaster!" a familiar voice yelled, barely audible over the frenzied howling of the damned.
Hellmaster's eye twitched and he slowly turned towards the stairway. "Inverse," he hissed darkly. He laughed when he saw the pathetic group standing before him. "Oh my! Had a rough day?"
Lina leaned tiredly on Gourry, the shoulder of her cloak almost black from the amount of blood she had lost. There was still a determined glint in her eyes though as she glared at Hellmaster.
Gourry pointed the Sword of Light at Hellmaster with one hand while supporting Lina with the other. His normally blond hair looked as if it had been dyed red. A ragged bandage barely clung to the gash on his wounded forehead.
Zelgadis struggled to stand tall, but the events of the evening had obviously had an effect on him as well. His unnaturally pink skin had begun to blister and he was breathing hard. His forehead was bathed in sweat and his sword wobbled uncertainly in his grasp.
Finally, there was Amelia. The only one to come through the evening's events unharmed, she still seemed to be most ready to surrender. Her eyes darted around the room at Hellmaster's tapestry. She clutched compulsively at the ring hanging from the simple chain around her neck as she trembled uncontrollably.
Hellmaster snickered again. "I'm sorry, but do you honestly expect to fight me with these people Lina? You all look like you're ready to drop dead if you walked across the room to get to me."
Lina grinned at the Hellmaster exhaustedly. "We're not here to fight you," she corrected.
"Oh?" Hellmaster said with a raised eyebrow.
Lina grimaced in pain as she drew her sword and pointed it at Hellmaster. Her eyes burned with fierce resolve as she said, "We're here to beat you."
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Next Chapter: Lina vs. The Hellmaster
Notes: Did everyone enjoy the chapter? You sickos! Just kidding! Here's an interesting tidbit about this chapter. The scene with the tapestry of people is actually based on a nightmare I had about 6 months ago. The dream was a lot more vivid than I made the chapter. Not for a lack of trying though.
Reader Response:
Otaku girl, I try to update every Saturday or Sunday night. Just to give you an idea of how long you have to wait. Hmm, watch me not finish 16 on time now that I've said that…
Miss Gabriev, how do I keep doing that? Easily. Never make it easy for the heroes. If a hero isn't faced with difficult trials he/she is hardly heroic, right?
Dragonet, Luna involved in the story? You're absolutely right! Lina spends a lot of time comparing herself to Luna and will end up finding out a lot more about her life as a Slayer in the next part of the story.
That's odd though. You're the first person that's told me that about the Grau/Grou thing. I'd always heard that Dynast had created twin priests myself.
More Gaav Pogo? Hmm, I'll see what I can do…
CT, Zel will reveal the truth to Amelia when he's good and ready… meaning that he'll do it when he has no other choice.
Xelena, Gourry may be a goof sometimes, but not when it comes to combat. He actually gets quite lethal at times.
The land of the giant spiders, Zaber? But how ever will I update the story? Oh well. *rides off into the sunset on Spot the giant spider*
A special thanks to my guest beta reader Pogo! Excellent work!