A/N: I had a really hard time with the start of this chapter and I don't know why. Oh, well, it's done now. Thank you to all reviewers for the previous chapter! A special thank you once again goes out to FierceDeityMask for proofreading this next chapter; I may refuse to use "normal language", but I'm glad you still like to read it. ;) Enjoy!
The four adventurers plus NoLegs gaped up at the massive worm that had appeared between their two groups. The monster's body was a fleshy pink extending from the ground to end well over their heads with a gaping, circular mouth. It had no eyes and yet it twisted around to face each of the two groups dead-on, the rusted chain that was halfway fused into the creature's flesh rattling with each motion. There was a prominent stench of gunpowder and carrion emanating from the worm.
"Seriously?" Matt yelled as he readied his weapon, "We don't have time to deal with an overgrown earthworm!"
Anna gripped her Angle Wing tightly as she stepped backwards. The movement caused the Evil Worm to writhe around to face her. "Plus we still have to find a way out of here. But, I don't think it cares about our time constraints. We'll have to take it out quickly."
The worm convulsed suddenly and a massive blade slid out of its mouth. With surprising accuracy for a creature with no eyes, it catapulted itself out of the ground, diving for where Anna and Lance stood. The pair sprinted in opposite directions, just dodging the two foot wide blade that slammed into the ground where they had been standing. Rapidly, the monster burrowed under and came up further away to reveal that it had switched out the blade in favor of a large cannon and aimed for Lance. The gunner threw himself to the floor just as an earsplitting boom rang out. The shot flew over Lance and took out the wall behind him.
"Did this thing swallow a weapons factory, or something?" Lance griped, rising to his feet in time to see Matt summon a Holy Sword down on the worm.
The creature shrieked at the holy damage and dove underground again. For a few moments, there was a tense silence as the fighters waited for the worm to resurface. Natalie shifted back one step and immediately felt a rumbling came from the dirt beneath her. The mage's eyes widened and she threw herself backwards right as the monster lunged up out of the ground. Natalie dodged being eaten, but was still sent flying as the earth burst up from underneath her. She landed with a small grunt and cast a retaliating Judgement on the worm, grinning when the magic caught it dead on.
As the holy damage blackened the skin of the monster, Anna fired a Combo Shot into the worm's gaping mouth. The three arrows slammed into the back of the creature's throat and the Angel Wing's enchantment activated, summoning a hail of shining bolts down to pepper the monster. With another unearthly shriek, the worm flailed. Gastric acid spewed from monster's mouth and whatever it landed on melted in a cloud of steam with a hissing sound. Matt dove forward to dodge a splatter and used the momentum of his roll to drive his Rune Blade deep into the Evil Worm's hide. With another writhe, the swordsman was sent flying into Lance and both fell backwards in a tangled heap, groaning. By the time the two had detangled themselves, the worm had once more ducked underground.
"Everyone stop moving. This thing pops up whenever we take a step, so it must be tracking us by movement," Lance said. "We need some way to confuse it so it doesn't know where we are."
Anna glanced over at him, "Like walking without rhythm? It wouldn't know where we're going to step if we stumbled around randomly."
"I don't like that plan. How are we supposed to attack effectively if we don't have solid footing?" Natalie said with a frown. Suddenly her face brightened, "Wait, if it's underground and using out footsteps to find us, what if we gave it a headache?"
Lance threw the mage a skeptical look, "I don't think stomping really hard will be enough, Natz. None of us are that heavy, despite how much Matt eats."
"Hey!" Matt yelled indignantly, shooting Lance a mild glare. "I can't help it if three servings don't fill me up!"
Natalie heaved a sigh, "Don't call my boyfriend fat, Lance. Anyway, I wasn't thinking of stomping. Matt, summon the mammoth and have it jump around some; that should do the trick."
The swordsman shot Lance's smirking face one final grumpy look as he said, "Good idea, Natz." Matt held his sword in front of him and focused his mana. A few seconds passed before there was a flash of white light and the mammoth appeared. Immediately, the giant animal began stomping around, rearing back on its hind legs to slam its front two feet on the ground and trumpeting all the while. After a short while, the Evil Worm launched out of the ground to writhe wildly on the surface. It gargled with confusion and was completely unaware of the Wooly Mammoth stomping towards it, only of the violent vibrations that had blinded its senses. The four human watched as the mammoth tromped over the giant worm, flattening it to the ground. It gave a final victorious trumpet before vanishing.
"Well, that was effective," Anna finally said. "I didn't know you guys had gotten the mammoth as a summon animal, either." The ranger looked around the room, "Now, how do we get back up?"
NoLegs bounced out of the tunnel over to the wall the Evil Worm and blown up, "Meow!"
"NoLegs says that there's a stairway back there that should lead up to the mountain side," Natalie translated.
Anna stared at her, "You speak cat?"
The mage grinned, "And dog!"
Lance frowned suspiciously at NoLegs, "Animal-whispering aside, how does he know where to go?"
"He apparently led Natz to me and then both of us here, too," Matt recalled. He eyed the cat purring at them, "If I find out you've been helping the fur balls that took the jewels… Well, I think you remember what happened to my last pet."
NoLegs quit purring to stare at the swordsman, "M-meow…?"
With a satisfied grin, Matt nodded, "That's right: they were delicious."
Natalie scooped up the shaking cat, "You can't eat NoLegs, Matt. Besides, if he were working with the other cats, I doubt he would be here helping us now. I never would have found you if he hadn't been guiding me. Don't worry NoLegs; I'll protect you from the big hungry swordsman." With that, the mage scurried over the rubble and disappeared into the opening that had been blown in the wall.
Anna grinned and followed Natalie through. Matt and Lance shared a glance and sighed before moving to catch up with the two girls. The four found themselves in an old armory. Weapons and armor lined the walls. Most were rust or moth eaten, but hanging on a rack near the next door were a large, evil-looking sword and a gleaming black bow.
Matt stepped forward and pulled the blade down. The black cross guard was stylized to look like demon wings with the center fastened with a dull red gem that glowed faintly in the shadows of the room. Unsheathing the sword, revealed a still-sharp dull grey blade. A striped of blood red metal ran along the center of the grey. Matt grinned as he sheathed the sword again and stuffed it in his Adventure pouch.
Meanwhile, Anna stood next to him and picked up the massive gleaming black bow with red accents. She could fell the dark energy radiating out of the weapon. She rubbed her fingers over the red gems set above the grip reverently before slid tucked the weapon away. The ranger then leaned forward and rubbed her thumb over the dusty plaque set beneath where the weapon had hung, "Oh, jeez, it's been forever since Lana taught me to read this." Anna muttered for a little while, squinting at the ancient text, "Black… Widow, I think? At least that's what it would translate to."
Natalie walked up to stand next to Anna and stared at the old writing before she shook her head, "No idea, I've never seen this kind of writing before." She moved over to the plaque beneath the sword matt had picked up was, "What's this one say?" The mage shifted aside as Anna came over.
The ranger muttered running her fingers over the characters as if it would help her remember, "New birth? Dawn? Let me try to figure out the rest of this… 'of the Hell', no, wait, demon…" Anna stood up straight, "Well, directly it says 'Birth of the Demon', but the character next to 'birth' is generally used for time, so it would be 'Devil's Sunrise' if you translated it to more modern grammar."
"Not bad, Anna," Natalie said with a grin. "I didn't even know you knew another language."
"Well, I didn't know you could talk to animals, so I guess we're even," the ranger replied with a laugh.
The party then headed through the next door and walked up a long flight of worn stone steps. They broke out into the bright midday sunlight, squinting as their eyes readjusted from the darkness of the catacombs. The wind whipped past them in strong gusts and they were startled to realize that they were above the cloud.
"Okay, we're back out. It can't be much further to where the cats are. Watch your step and let's leave any suspicious statues alone, okay?" Anna said, with a pointed glare at Matt. The swordsman blinked innocently, but nodded all the same.
The four carefully made their way over rickety wooden bridges and past old marble columns and arches. Lance remarked that they were the same style as the ruins in Lankyroot. Cracked and worn statues of winged cats became more common the further the party climbed. Soon they came upon the ruined floor of an old temple. A few pillars and arches were still standing along the edges of the white stone floor. Dark clouds obscured their view of the end of the marble platform and Natalie nervously informed the others that she could sense huge amounts of mana coming from them.
The four exchange glances and started walking faster only to halt at the appearance of three large, white bears. Each animal had small angelic wings on their back and a single horn growing out of their foreheads. Despite their almost cute looks, the four adventurers shifted back from the territorial growl the animals released.
Lance cast a couple of glances at the drop offs on either side of the long, flat platform and cursed. "This is really bad place to get into a fight," he muttered.
The bears in front of them obviously disagreed with the gunner as one of them leapt fore ward to come down in a body slam on a surprised Matt. Unable to draw his sword, Matt groaned as he felt the crushing weight of the bear press down on his chest, denting his armor. A second later and a fireball slammed into the beast's side, forcing the animal off the swordsman. Matt winced as he stood up and drew Rune Blade, feeling the bruise left on his ribcage.
Natalie had no time to heal Matt as the bear she had blasted with a fireball came rushing at her in a berserker rage. The animal's charge was derailed by Matt as he stepped forward to slash at the monster. To the pair's horror, his sword bounced harmlessly off of the bear and the burn left by Natalie healed completely. The bear changed targets from the mage to the swordsman and Matt was sent flying into a pillar with a claw mark dent in his already battered Golden Armor. The moment his body impacted the ancient stone pillar, the base cracked and the whole thing toppled off the ledge. Natalie shrieked as Matt fell through the clouds with it.
Lance and Anna were firing bullets and arrows at the other two bears, taking care to avoid doing too much damage at once so that the bears wouldn't berserk. After the first arrow had bounced off on of the bear's pelts, she had stepped back to switch her Angel Wing bow out for the Black Widow. She took over running interference as Lance fell back to switch his own weapon out for his Shadow Blaster. The added darkness damage from their weapons was incredibly effective against the strange animals.
Lance had just finished off one of the bears with a Dark Shot from his rifle when he heard Natalie scream. Leaving Anna to finish off the other bear with a Combo Shot, he turned to see Natalie standing alone, staring at a broken pillar. The third bear was charging at the frozen mage. Not pausing to think about what must have happened to Matt, the gunner turned his God Hand rifle around and fired a Flame Shot at the bear. At the same time, he saw Anna's Vines magic burst up to entangle the bear, holding it in place with venomous thorns as his fire magic engulfed the bear. The two watched in surprise as the flames turned a virulent green and there was a small explosion. When the dust cleared, nothing was left of the bear except a small sooty stain on the marble. The two didn't think very long on the violent reaction of their combined attack; they dashed over to stand near Natalie.
"He fell," Natalie said her tone flat with shock as she stared at the broken base of the pillar. She shuddered, "H-he came to stop the bear from mauling me and it sm-smacked him o-over." Her two friends exchanged stunned glances.
Before Natalie could begin crying, a strangled voice called out to them from under the clouds drifting past the cliff, "Hey, if you three aren't busy, do you mind helping me out? This pillar is really heavy." Shocked into stillness Natalie, Lance, and Anna just gaped at the clouds. There was a faint grinding sound and Matt's voice called out again, "Please? I'm sorry for the statue thing."
Natalie laughed suddenly and scrambled over to the ledge with the other two following her. Peering over the side, they realized that there was a smaller ledge jutting out from the mountain side, just inside the cloud cover. Matt lay trapped on the cliff with the pillar pinning him to the ground, looking up at them with relief. A rock had kept the stone from crushing him, but his legs were still trapped under the column. His three friends slid down the rock wall to help him get free. Propping their shoulders against the pillar, Lance and Anna grunted as they rolled it enough for Natalie to pull matt out from underneath. They let the column fall back in place as Natalie worked on healing Matt.
Soon the swordsman was standing up, the dents in his armor gone along with any injuries from the fall. "Lucky thing this ledge was here, huh?" he said with a grin.
Natalie nodded, "I thought for sure that you had fallen all the way down."
Lance was already scaling the cliff back up, "Now that we know he didn't, let's get back up there and smack a few fur balls around." Anna nodded as she scrambled up after the gunner, accepting the hand he held out to help her the last few feet. Matt waited until Natalie had joined them before climbing up himself. The party sat there for a few minutes, catching their breath from the climb before Anna stood up. The other three stood as well and they walked shoulder to shoulder into the small storm head.
The magical energy swirled around the party. The excess Mana tingled against their skin and they felt completely rejuvenated by the time they broke through the dark wall of clouds. The four stopped as they saw the three missing Jewels arranged in a triangle on stone pedestals. Cats were swaying and bowing in a semicircle, their gazes fixed upon two familiar, glowing figures. A strange warbling yowl rose from the gathered cats as they sang praise to their creator.
The party froze and stared at the two aspects of Godcat. One was the glowing white cat that had attacked them in the Crystal Caverns the other the bloody shadow they had fought in the ruins of Lankyroot; Life and Death, Judgement and Damnation, Creation and Destruction. Holy power flowed over the party impassive and deadly intermixed with waves of pure darkness that pulsed with violence and evil. The opposing forces twined in perfect harmony and the sheer power crackled in the air.
"Why is there two of Them?! Does She have two bodies?" Matt asked in a panicked tone.
Anna shivered as she stared at the twin cats, "I-I don't know. That mural in the temple showed Godcat with a red outline. I thought they were just representing Her powers of destruction. But now I'm not so sure."
Lance took a deep, calming breath, "We're a lot stronger than the last time we fought Her. But now that there's two of them, that could change."
"It's too late to change our minds now, so get ready. This is going to be our greatest and toughest battle yet!" Natalie encouraged the others, her face set with a stubborn determination.
The gathering of cats parted as the dual aspects of Godcat drifted to meet the heroes that would attempt to stop Them. For a few seconds They hovered there, doing nothing. Suddenly, both cats raised Their arms in a synchronized motion and Their dual power fluctuated. Blue and red lightning crackled around the mountain peak and a freezing wind howled around the two glowing cats.
The four heroes didn't flinch at the awesome display of power. Instead, each drew their weapons and fell into battle stances. Natalie with her Seraphim staff stood furthest back. Just in front of the mage and slightly to one side was Anna, her Black Widow bow gripped in one hand with an arrow nocked and ready on the string. In front of the two determined women, Matt fell into a crouch with his Rune Blade brandished in front of him in a two-handed grip. To the swordsman's left stood Lance with his Shadow Blaster strapped to his back and his gunblade in his right hand, leveled at the glowing aspects.
Two voices spoke in the party's minds as the flashes of Godcat's power faded, "You are fools to believe you have the strength to challenge Us. You may wear the armor and weapons of the ancient ones who sealed Us away, but you are far from their equals. Tremble now as you struggle against your fates. Cry out as your friends fall around you. Plead for mercy as We destroy all you hold dear."
A/N: We're coming up on the end, everyone. The next one will probably take a while so please leave me some reviews to motivate me as I write epic god-slaying combat! See ya!