DISCLAIMER: I own nothing. All the characters belong to their respective creators(apart from those created by me).
Now this is my first story. So don't go apeshit on me if its not upto the mark.
I'm time-skipping a bit(only 2 years) ….
Chapter 6: the "Dark" DEVI …(part 1)
They say death is what all men fears, but it's oblivion that fear itself fears …
You know I thought having gamer powers was cool. I thought I could do anything, even channel earthquakes through my body. I tried it and all it got me were a couple of broken ribs, fractured limbs, ruptured kidneys, spleen, liver, a punctured heart and oh it somehow turned my genitals to paste … my dick was turned to paste ….. how ….. I suffered the ultimate humiliation, self castration.
But enough of self pity (involving lots of chocolate chip cookies and ice-cream ….. yay ice-cream), I finally decided to try out the dog dungeon.
On a completely unrelated note I've discovered that any living thing, if stored in my inventory, actually stays alive for an indefinite amount of time.
How? Well after conquering the spider queen ( super sexy model) I had forgotten about them totally . so when I opened my inventory after a week I was surprised to find those buggers were actually alive. As soon as I released them, they kind looked around a bit and scrambled off.
A few days later I found them building a small nest in an abandoned shed near my apartment. The webbings turned out to be a profitable, sustainable source of very good quality silk with a rather high price and demand in the market. So now I have a lot of "pocket money" by selling the silk, anonymously of course, through the gaming system.
Who knew I could actually buy and sell through it? Talk about having awesome powers. He he he …
Oh and the skill books that I got from killing the spider queen were all a bust, because apparently I needed to be a son of Athena of one of the mind gods to even learn them. But I stored them anyway; you never know when you might need them to negotiate.
Any way after stocking up on food and other essentials I went to my usual hiding spot at the park and
ID CREATE
Once again the real world shattered giving way to the dungeon world. Unlike the spider dungeon which was a tropical forest, this one was a semi-desert with sparse vegetation, undulating sand dunes and fierce but somehow arctic cold winds … even with a huge scorching sun hanging overhead. Talk about weird worlds.
Ping
Quest 3: clear the dungeon
Kill the huskies.
Kill the blood hounds.
Kill the Boss hound.
Hidden: Find the ?
Rewards : experience, loot, ?,?
Accept Decline
You know if I'm not wrong the boss hound would be some kind of a Cerberus but it was the blood hounds that sounded ominous to me. Still if I wanted to evolve I needed to accept it. So
Accept
Anyway after walking for about a mile (well a mile to me), I saw my first enemy….. a bunch of cute and cuddly huskies playing around in a small clearing. Owww so cute, I love huskies.
So instead of slaughtering them I decided to skirt around, but of course knowing my luck, they got my scent and charged me, snarling and spitting.
Observe:
Huskies:
HP:300 CP:300
Though they look cute and cuddly, the huskies are have been infected by a parasite resulting in them becoming cannibalistic beasts that would rend anyone, even their own young, for food. They have little strength but are extremely agile and hunt in packs lest they themselves become food.
They have a poisonous bite and can infect the victims with diseases.
Weak to earth/lightning spells. Immune to poison (unless you are a god).
Well they seemed agile (judging from their speed), so I released a devastating earthquake In order to stall them while preparing to release the scorching volley spell.
But it turns out; the earthquake was so strong that it was a KO move. Talk about being anti-climatic.
Anyway while searching around I systematically killed off another 8 packs of different breeds of dogs. Having an ability that allowed me to manipulate the earth itself made the hunt very easy and unfair (to them).
I would use my danger sense skill to detect the dog packs and then use the earth spells to kill them off. Sometimes sniping them off with the stone bullets or trapping them in quicksand and the impaling them with earth spikes.
I even trained my water whip and water capsule spells as well. When the long range got a bit too boring, I decided to change my tactics. Using the Malice skill I would first stun the dogs and take them out one by one using the dagger. Apparently the morning glory poison around the blade was corrosive to them as well. That was until I met up with the alpha hounds.
Bigger than a grown man, with slick muscled bodies, powerful legs, twin heads, maws of razor teeth and wine red eyes the looked extremely intimidating. Their skin was however most frightening. Almost transparent it clearly showcased the muscles and blood vessels below giving a hellish appearance.
Blood hounds: level: 10
HP: 800 CP: 500
Born of innocence, fueled by pride these dogs had the audacity to criticize Artemis on one of her hunts and hence were cursed to become such abominations. They hate all demigods and the "?".
These "things" can drain about 3 liters of blood with a single bite, while pumping the prey full with high voltage electricity. Beware of its flame breath which can melt steel.
Weak to water.
I know it's kind of scary, facing a pack of two-headed demonic canines even in ones dreams but to face such demons in reality in a kill or be killed scenario….it scared me too. However I needed to eliminate them if I wanted the boss to reveal itself.
Thankfully they were weak to water which is my specialty. But I needed to distract them somehow first and separate them. As a pack I stood no chance against them.
Anyway I crawled towards them, as close as I could without detection, and hid behind some bushes. There were 12 of them but were thankfully too busy squabbling with each other, to pay attention to me.
I took advantage of their distraction. Concentration on the earth, I fed it my energy not unlike when I used my earthquakes, but in a much more controlled fashion. I could feel it slithering towards my targets along the crust, trying to escape my control and lash out at everything but I preserved and clamped down on it with an iron will….. thank you gamer's mind. I guided and spread the energy near them in an intricate pattern around them and released it suddenly.
The reaction was frightening to say the least. Like a napalm bomb the earth blew up below them forming multiple fissures lined with rows of spikes, lifting them upwards like ragdolls only to be brought back by gravity and impaled on the spikes.
Only 3 survived but were severely injured, I could tell from the dripping holes on their bodies. Without giving them any chance to heal, I sprinted towards them. The first one I decapacitated with a single strike from my dagger while simultaneously nailing the remaining two with water bullets.
Only one survived, though one of the two heads was mangled beyond last one however opened its mouths and chomped down on it's fallen brethrens slowly rejuvenating and regenerating its health in front of my eyes.
I knew it would be extremely hazardous to my health if I allowed it to gorge itself on anymore flesh. So I attacked. Summoning my water whips I directed them towards the dog, intending on skewering it alive but succeeded only partially.
The dog avoided my attacks, weaving through and dodging the whips like a pro-ballerina and tried running away from me. Unwilling to let my adversary escape, I unleashed an earthquake to destabilize its footing. As I rushed at the hound I saw it was getting ready to spit something towards me. With lightning fast reflexes I shielded myself using the water capsule spell and not a moment too soon a giant flamethrower spewed out from its mouth straight at me.
This is why I loved water spells, for their sheer versatility. What was meant as a prison to capture and drown enemies, now acted as a barrier for me against the flames and being the son of Poseidon I could breathe underwater indefinitely. So it was a win-win situation for me. However I was soon proved very very wrong, as my defense turned into my greatest liability moments later.
As the hellish flames collided with the water barrier, it started to evaporate very fast…well faster than I could generate it at any rate. In a few moments I could feel the heat already penetrating the shield while boiling the water and I knew if I did not do something I was screwed. I would be boiled alive if I stayed in the capsule any longer. But if I let it down now I would be burned to crisp in moments.
Wedged between the devil and the deep sea I did the only thing I could. I tried to lower the temperature of the water capsule to combat the rising temperatures. Remembering some of the lessons from some books I tried to remove the excess energy from the water by channeling it in the earth through me.
Pretty soon I realized it did nothing, and I was still getting boiled but this time from inside out. So I concentrated on the water, its soothingness, its fluidity, its coolness and willed it to freeze. I grew desperate as I pushed more and energy while concentrating on the cold feeling when suddenly
Ping
Water manipulation has leveled up.
Ice magic skill tree unlocked.
New spell created.
Ice shard: level 1: Creates a cloud of icy shards sharp enough to pierce steel.
Finally success; but I had no time for cheering. Concentrating on the feeling of ice I allowed the spell to accumulate on my palm in the form of a tight, glowing icy sphere and just as I pointed it towards the fire, it suddenly spluttered and died out. Observing the dog I realized it was out of MP and so was I.
But I had the advantage. Activating my divine ocean heal skill I not only restored my HP but my MP as well, while the dog was busy restoring itself by cannibalizing on its fallen allies. Without a warning I attacked it with my new spell.
As Shards of razor ice flew towards the hound, intent on skewering it, the dog once again blew out a flamethrower which instantly overpowered my spell. That was understandable given I had just unlocked it. I jumped out of its path and charged the dog, dagger in one hand the spell on another, weaving around the fire balls that now spewed from its mouth jaws.
Not that I was idle as well. Every time it took a breather, I would launch my own attacks of ice shards and water whips. It became a battle of attrition and stamina which eventually I won.
But before I could celebrate however, the entire dungeon shattered like it has been forcefully struck by a hammer and a terrible force seemed to pull my very soul into darkness unknown, and it was succeeding. It felt like my entire existence was being erased, as if the very gods have decided to personally drag me into hell. Unable to withstand the power, I blacked out.
I woke up god knows how many hours later, nursing a massive headache. As I tiredly opened my eyes all I could see was darkness, an impenetrable layer of inky black darkness. Even my other senses were dulled to an extreme end, except for my danger sense which was screaming at me to move, run, hide …. do anything but remain lying there in the open.
Unfortunately even the slightest movements caused so much pain that it felt I've been moves through a grinding machine. I tried activating my healing skill; even concentrating on mana caused extreme pain. But I needed to find shelter. Dragging through the pain I somehow sat up. Now that my eyes had become accustomed to the dark, I realized I way lying in an opening at the middle of a forest, made of the skeletons of long dead tree husks.
It was eerily silent; not even the usual chirruping of the nocturnal insects was audible. Only flickering shadows, blacker than the night itself was visible as they hypnotically danced between the branches, like some unknown sentry of this dead forest.
The Absolute silence, compiled with darkness, starless skies, the shadowy remains of the trees made me nearly piss my pants in fright. I crawled towards the nearest tree and luckily found a hollow in its stump, and holed myself there, soon drifting into an uneasy sleep.
After sometimes(I have no idea how much), I woke up completely still sore from last nights ordeal when the gamers body should have generally taken care of all my pains while sleeping. I knew something was wrong.
As I wracked my brain for a possible reason, my ADHD riddled mind brought up a number of possible situations ranging from a simple harmless dream at one end to a possible "Matrix" movie situation at the opposite end, a voice suddenly spoke out;
Perseeeoussssss
At first I thought it as a figment of imagination and had nearly dismissed it when suddenly
Perseeeoussssss Jackson
I knew I was in dip shit, like literally…. here I was trapped in an unknown world while a mysterious voice spoke out my name. Listening closely I realized it was not a single voice, it was an amalgamation of 10 different voices coming from 10 different directions…each voice subtly different from seductive to gravelly, from regal to savage, from motherly to divine. However one appealed to me the most. It awoke something in my chest that I had never felt before. LONGING .
But one thing was for sure it was not a monster calling me, no the voice was divine in nature, most definitely a god/goddesses and very very powerful and something was telling me to follow it.
As I came out of the hollow I took to my surroundings. Everything was strangely natural; green trees, birds chirruping, a bright blue sky illuminated by a black sun, skeleton heads hanging from trees. Yup everything was normal … wait a second a skeletal headed fruits, BLACK SUN … WTF …. Earth doesn't have a black sun.
As I contemplated the impossibility of the fruits and the colour of the sun the voice nudged me again…clearer this time and powerful.
Following the voice at a random direction soon I came to a large clearing in the forest. Opposite to me was the entrance to a cave blocked by the most intricately curved doors I've ever seen. It detailed battles; great battles between strange looking humans and demonic beings wielding weapons of great power.
Perseeeoussssss Jacksonnnn come to me, my child ….. enter my temple and be freed from all you insecurities, all your longings …..come child, come.
There was no mistaking this time, for as soon as I had stepped into the clearing the gates opened by themselves seamlessly.
The voice was heard again urging me to enter the cave. It was clear full of primordial, barely restrained power yet to me it felt surprisingly soft, welcoming and strangely motherly. It awoke long forgotten feelings in my chest, feelings that I thought I had buried away forever. Feelings that I had as a child when I still longed for a mother to hold me, love me, hug me and fill me with affectionate kisses. Feelings that I no longer wanted to experience.
I knew logically it could be a trap; no it was definitely a trap, but yet I bounded towards the voice uncaring of any possible consequence. I was no longer a demigod, not a gamer, or a rational thinker….. no I was a simple child, a child that has been separated for song from its mother and now just longed to be reunited with her once more , at any cost.
So I ran and ran; into the darkness of the cave ahead for I wanted to meet the voice and perhaps get to witness a real mother, someone who I have urged for since forever.
To be continued …
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I need some reviews about the skills that Percy can develop related to necromancy and shadow magic.
Oh and a special weapon as well.
Also can you guys guess who the dark goddess mentioned here is?