A/N: Hey, guys. As you're probably aware, this chapter is pretty late in coming. There's a couple of reasons for this. After writing the Mrs. Afton chapter, I was feeling burned out and didn't feel like thinking about MNGF for a while. Then, when I finally got my energy for the fic back, I got hit with writer's block and couldn't think of anything to write. I didn't know what to write because I had just finished playing God of War: Ragnarok, including its recently released DLC Valhalla. I knew I just HAD to write a chapter on it, but I didn't know how. I didn't want to just make it your standard "Fun with Video Games" chapter since it just didn't felt right, and I wanted to advance the plot in some way.
But then, everything fell into place, and it was perfect. I could talk about God of War: Ragnarok, and I could teach the ghost kids valuable lessons that would be important for them when they deal with Security Breach. I'd be able to fulfill 2 goals at once, and I think you'll like the result. Especially if you happen to be a fan of Dark!Mike or the Nightmares.
Before you read this chapter, I recommend you watch any one of a number of Youtube videos showing the King Hrolf Kraki superboss fight for God of War: Ragnarok, as the chapter is heavily inspired by this battle.
ThePencilDude: 300 chapters is definitely too much. A Valentine's Day chapter isn't a bad idea, but not one I have planned right now. And Nightmare would find some amusement in Hazbin Hotel and Helluva Boss, but he'd note how inaccurate the shows are in depicting Hell and make it clear that humans have no shot at becoming powerful demons ever.
Guest: Jeremy the Night Guard doesn't exist in MNGF, as "A Legacy Laid to Rest" isn't canon to this story.
Chapter 202 – Ghost Children's Ragnarok Part 1
Mike frowned, tapping his finger's lightly on his private study's desk as he pondered the question in front of him.
Ever since Clara Afton had left from their house, he had been thinking constantly about her warning. Her words had heavily implied that he would have a much lesser role in their upcoming conflict against Glitchtrap than he had for the Special Delivery project. Mike knew full well that, as helpful and as diligent as the ghost kids had been, he had been the first and foremost fighter in clearing out that mess. It was clear from Clara's warning that, at best, he would be reduced to a supporting role in the fight to come, and that his ghost kids would need to act independently if they were going to succeed.
"So how do I help them now?" Mike thought. He knew he would need to help his kids in some other way, but he wasn't sure how. There was no way for him to even predict specific scenarios in the Mega Pizzaplex, let alone help his kids plan for them. There were so many uncertainties and unknowns that trying to prepare for each and every one of them was completely pointless. No, it was better for him to teach his kids certain lessons and themes that were more universally applicable, and therefore more fundamentally useful. And he needed to do in a "show don't tell manner", as these were lessons that would need far more than just him talking to them for several minutes for them to truly understand them. "The only question is…how do I do that?"
Before he could even think about where to begin, Gabe suddenly flew up through the floor into the study. "Hey, dad!" He cheerfully called out to him. "We finally did it!"
"Huh?" Mike shook his head out of his stupor. "Did what?"
"We finally beat King Hrolf Kraki!" Gabe declared triumphantly. "One of those two superbosses in God of War: Ragnarok?"
"Oh, yeah…" Mike realized. About 2 months ago, one of his kids had asked about the God of War series that Nightmarionne had played with them back when he had been fighting Nightmare Springtrap, and whether that game would be okay to play. Mike had privately reviewed the games, and while he had quickly shot down the idea of them playing the Greek saga for multiple reasons, he had deemed the Norse saga perfectly fine for the kids to play. The kids had been hooked on God of War 2018 and God of War Ragnarok since then, to the point that it was the only game most of them had played for the past several weeks. "How was it?"
"It was really tough!" Gabe admitted. "Hrolf was the King of the Berserkers for a reason! He had every single attack the other ones had, he had a huge health bar, and he hit like a truck! We kept taking turns fighting him because he kept killing us over and over again." The former Freddy inhabitant suddenly grinned. "I was the one who finally beat him, though! It felt so good to FINALLY cut his head off after such a hard fight."
Mike nodded approvingly. Beating an optional superboss in a game was always a noteworthy feat (assuming the quality of the game itself was good, of course), especially for gamers who generally didn't play that type of game to begin with. "Good work, Gabe," he praised. "Did you beat Gna yet too?"
"Oh, yeah," Gabe answered. "We beat Gna before Hrolf. Gna wasn't that bad, we just kept stunlocking her. Only took us like 3 tries to beat her, Hrolf was a lot harder. Anyways, just wanted to let you know since we've almost beat the game. I can't wait to try New Game Plus and see how it changes things!"
Mike chuckled. "All right, Gabe, you guys have fun with that. And good job beating Hrolf, that guy was definitely tough when I fought him."
Gabe grinned back and flew back down through the floor. A smile had also started to appear on Mike's face, but for an entirely different reason. By talking about Hrolf, his eldest son had unknowingly sparked an idea on his head on how he could teach the valuable lessons he wanted to impart onto his kids through a practical and immersive experience.
He just needed a little help to set everything up.
Mike picked up his phone and contacted a number that he would never call lightly. "Hello? Yes, it's me…" The smile on his face evolved into a full-blown grin. "I want to set something up, and I need your help with a few things…
Three Days Later…
"You wanted us all here, Dad?" Cassidy asked, head tilted in curiosity.
"That's right," Mike answered firmly. "I wanted to call a family meeting tonight." That by itself wasn't particularly unusual, as Mike had called multiple family meetings in the past, usually to discuss more important matters.
"Okay…" Fritz replied slowly. "But why the heck are we in your bedroom of all places? Don't we usually hold these family meetings in the dining room or something?"
"Fritz has a good point," Liz commented. "This is kind of an awkward place to hold a family meeting in."
"I know," Mike agreed. "But I have a specific reason why I'm calling this family meeting here. You all remember what Mrs. Afton said when she was here, right? About how you won't be able to rely on me as much for the upcoming fight against Glitchtrap, correct?"
The kids grimaced. "Yeah," Jeremy muttered. "And I don't like what that means for the future."
"You'd be an idiot if you did," Mike retorted. "It sounds like you're going to be a lot more hands-on in dealing with whatever Glitchtrap's plans are for the Pizzaplex than I am, which is something I need to help you prepare for."
"What about the protection blessing Heaven gave us through Mrs. Afton?" Susie asked. "How much is that going to help us?"
Mike shook his head. "I don't have an answer to that," he freely admitted. "The best-case scenario is that you just touching Glitchtrap is going to cause him to scream in pain like the Anathema Curse. But that's extremely optimistic, and Mrs. Afton didn't describe it like that. I think it's way more likely that the blessing is just going to act as a protective barrier that stops Glitchtrap from corrupting you. A defensive measure that's going to keep yourself safe if you get directly exposed to Glitchtrap in any way, but not anything to actually fight back meaningfully with. And you shouldn't even be getting into direct contact with Glitchtrap anyway."
"So we'll need to stop his plans in the real world and the Pizzaplex," Charlie summarized, before frowning. "I don't even know where to begin to prepare for that, though."
"Trying to prepare for specific situations is a lost cause, Charlie," Mike answered bluntly. "We don't know anything about what's inside the Pizzaplex, and the information we do have is so minimal it's practically worthless. What I need to teach you guys is general lessons and practical concepts for working under a lot of pressure…which is why I'm going to have you guys enter the world of my dreams tonight."
"Enter the world of your dreams?" Liz repeated, confused. "Don't we only do that for gaming? Are we gonna be playing a game in the world of your mind tonight?"
Mike smiled. "Well, yes…" he answered a bit mysteriously. "But it's going to be a bit more than just your standard gaming session. You guys are gonna be in for a bit of a surprise."
"All right, then…let's get going," Gabe declared. "We're not gonna get anything done sitting here and wasting time. Cass, you know the drill."
The former Golden Freddy inhabitant nodded and placed her hands on Mike's head once he was fully lying down on the bed, magically inducing him to fall asleep like every other time they had done this. Then, once they were fully certain that he had dozed off, they began to enter his body one by one.
When the ghost kids had finally arrived, they could immediately tell that the atmosphere of Mike's dream world was very different than what it normally was. They found themselves in a large circular room made of black obsidian, with a ring of black stone pillars at the edges of the room connecting the floor to the ceiling. Charlie felt a trace of fear crawl down her spine as she realized that the middle of the pillars showed the head of a horned fiend with eyes and mouth burning with an inner flame. She looked down on the floor to see a shadowy head wreathed in flames with 2 burning scarlet eyes carved onto the arena with the letters "MS" engraved next to it with one letter on each side. And hanging above their heads, at each of the four cardinal directions, the statues of much larger demonic heads akin to a Balrog's glared down at them from the walls, their lower jaws detached from the rest of the statue and suspended in the air by black chains while monstrous metal claws held black basins. And just as Charlie remembered, both the jaw and the basins held intense flames that burned like hellish torches, giving the statues a twisted sense of life as they glared down malevolently at them.
True, there was no fiery abyss beyond the confines of this arena, no pit of roaring flames to make Charlie think they were in the depths of Hell itself (as Jeremy demonstrated when he felt the black stone wall surrounding the circular arena and found only solid stone). But apart from that admittedly significant detail, the arena they were in now looked disturbingly similar to the arena where Mike had fought Nightmare Springtrap in his darkest aspects, right before unleashing his full power and tearing him to shreds.
The other ghost kids hadn't seen this dark arena in the past, but even they were significantly unnerved by how hellish their new surroundings were. Especially as Mike himself was nowhere to be seen. "…dad?" Cassidy asked nervously. "Where are you?"
"Right here," a deep and unearthly voice answered, echoing around them from seemingly everywhere and nowhere at the same time. The voice underneath it was unmistakably Mike's and while the voice itself was dreadful and imposing, Charlie was thankful that it lacked the hatred and malice that it had possessed when Mike had fought Nightmare Springtrap. "Welcome, children, to the arena where we're going to be carrying out our little education session."
The ghost kids shuddered at the voice, before forcing themselves to calm down. It wasn't any different than the way Mike had talked to them during their Trivia Murder Party game, and that had ended up being a lot of fun despite the demonic atmosphere. "So what kind of game are we gonna be playing, Dad?" Jeremy asked.
"I'm so glad you asked, Jeremy," Mike replied, and even though they couldn't physically see him, the kids could visualize the shit-eating grin on his face. "Gabe told me the other day that you beat King Hrolf Kraki in God of War: Ragnarok a few days ago. Something that I wanted to congratulate you on, since he's one of the hardest boss fights in that game. And after Gabe told me about it, I realized that I'd found the perfect way to teach you the lessons that I feel you need to learn to prepare for our next fight against Glitchtrap. I just needed to call in a little extra help, of course…"
"From Nightmarionne?" Charlie guessed. "That's who usually shows up to these gaming nights whenever a Nightmare pops up to join us."
"I'M AFRAID NIGHTMARIONNE WILL NOT BE JOINING YOU TONIGHT," a familiar demonic voice that was distinctly not Nightmarionne's answered. "I WILL BE JOINING YOU IN HIS STEAD." The black stone wall across them seemed to shimmer, and Nightmare stepped through the wall and onto the arena in all of his demonic glory.
Everyone stared at the demon lord in shock. "Wait…NIGHTMARE?" Susie asked incredulously. "Why are YOU here? You never cared about Dad's gaming nights in his mental world before!"
"UNDER NORMAL CIRCUMSTANCES, YOU WOULD BE CORRECT," Nightmare readily admitted. "I GENERALLY DO NOT CARE FOR YOUR LITTLE DREAM GAMES, NOR DO I CARE WHAT NIGHTMARIONNE DOES IN PARTICULAR SO LONG AS HE IS NOT BEING DERELICT IN HIS DUTIES." The demon lord grinned. "BUT THEN HE TOLD ME WHAT SCHMIDT WAS PLANNING FOR TONIGHT, AND I FOUND MYSELF VERY INTRIGUED. SO INTRIGUED, IN FACT, THAT I ORDERED NIGHTMARIONNE TO STAND DOWN SO THAT I COULD TAKE HIS PLACE."
The ghost kids looked at each other uncertainly. If Nightmare was showing interest in this particular session instead of his carefree and friendly brother, they had the sinking feeling that this adventure in Mike's dreams wouldn't be quite as pleasant as their other ones.
Although part of them had already figured this out, what with the fiery demonic statues decorating the arena and everything…
"As for what exactly we are going to be doing today…" Mike's voice continued, as though Nightmare hadn't spoken up at all, "…allow me to introduce your player character."
The wall to the left of the ghost kids shimmered, and a figure stepped into the arena through the wall. This time, the ghost kids openly gasped in surprise, as suddenly the purpose of their game was all too clear.
The figure that had stepped into the arena was a warrior that was almost identical to Kratos from the Ragnarok game that they had just played. He exuded strength and power, and was wearing a set of leather armor that covered most of his body but left his left shoulder and part of his abdomen exposed. The warrior was carrying an almost identical copy of the Leviathan Axe in his right hand, and attached to his back were near-perfect copies of the Blades of Chaos, both of which were ornately decorated in the same manner that Kratos' weapons had been when the kids had maximized their level.
The one big difference between the warrior and Kratos was his head. Instead of a bald man with bushy facial hair and a red line tattoo stretching from the top of his head to the bottom, the warrior was wearing the head of an animatronic. Freddy's head, to be precise.
"Holy shit!" Fritz exclaimed, vocalizing what everyone was thinking. "Is that…Kratos with Freddy's head?"
"Correct," Mike affirmed. "And he won't be the only one you'll get to work with."
The wall to the right shimmered this time as another figure joined them. This figure was decidedly thinner and less physically imposing than the Kratos-Freddy hybrid, and had a distinctly feminine appearance. She carried no melee weapons on her, instead holding a bow and wearing a quiver of arrows. She was wearing red and gold armor reminiscent of the Fate Breaker armor that Atreus and Freya had donned prior to initiating Ragnarok in the last chapter of the game's main story. But unlike either of them, the figure was wearing the Marionette's mask. The original Marionette's mask, not the Security Puppet's.
"Is that Puppet archer supposed to represent Freya?" Susie wondered.
"YOU'RE BEGINNING TO CATCH ON," Nightmare nodded approvingly. "YES, THAT IS EXACTLY WHO THIS MARIONETTE ARCHER IS MEANT TO REPRESENT."
"Together, Nightmare and I have recreated Kratos and Freya through these two characters," Mike explained further. "The warrior with the Freddy head is Kratos, and the Puppet archer is Freya. The options you have to customize both of these characters, like what armor they use, what runic attacks they use, and how their mechanics work, are the exact same as they are in the actual Ragnarok game. You guys can work out amongst yourselves what loadouts you want to use on these two. Then, when you are ready, we can begin."
Nightmare snapped his claws like a human would snap his fingers, and a menu screen suddenly flashed into existence in front of the ghost kids. One look at the menu screen showed the kids that it was the exact same menu screen as the one in the God of War: Ragnarok game. "FOR THE SAKE OF CONVENIENCE, EVERY POSSIBLE EQUIPMENT AND RUNIC ABILITY HAS BEEN MAXIMIZED, AND THE SKILL TREES FOR YOUR WEAPONS HAVE BEEN COMPLETED," the demon lord informed them. He then added with a growl, "BUT DO NOT BELIEVE FOR A SINGLE MOMENT THAT THIS WILL MAKE YOUR UPCOMING BATTLE EASIER. IF YOU FALL FOR THAT PARTICULAR DELUSION, YOU WILL BE IN FOR A VERY UNPLEASANT SURPRISE."
"I definitely believe that," Gabe muttered. He and his siblings looked through the menu at their different options. They were familiar with all of the armors in the game and most of the relics, as having 7 people taking turns playing the game at the same time meant that some of them had spent their time doing research on the different options available.
Fritz's eyes widened as he read the name of one of the relics. "Holy shit, we have the Hilt of Skofnung now?" he asked excitedly. "Guys, we HAVE to use that as our relic."
"What?" Susie replied, clearly not being familiar with it. "Why?"
"It's so OP," Fritz gushed. "It summons a bunch of ghostly swords that slice up anything around them, and they all attack the same person if there's only one. I honestly think it might be the most OP relic in the entire game, top 3 for sure. Trust me, guys, we want Hilt of Skofnung for sure!"
Jeremy whistled appreciatively. "Well damn, when you put it like that, I definitely think we should try it out at the very least," the former Bonnie inhabitant commented. "And if this relic really is as OP as people say it is, then we probably want the Berserker Waist and Wrist armors cause they refresh relic cooldowns faster and their stats are really good."
"Do we wanna use the Berserker Chest armor too, then?" Cassidy wondered. "To complete the set?"
Liz shook her head. "That armor might make us do more damage after using a relic, but it also makes US take more damage too," she pointed out. "When we don't know what Dad has planned, that's probably one of the worst possible things we could do to ourselves."
Susie cringed. "Oh yeah, forgot Soulless Warrior had a downside," she admitted. "And it lasts so long, too…"
The ghost kids continued to debate over what loadout to use for their Freddy-headed Kratos stand-in, while Nightmare silently looked on in amusement. For the most part, the ghost kids were on the same page over what equipment they wanted to use, although they spent over a minute arguing over what Runic attacks to use for the Leviathan Axe and Draupnir Spear. Eventually, though, they all came to an agreement, and Charlie glanced over at Nightmare since Mike still didn't have any physical presence to be seen. "We're done," she reported. "This is what we're going to use."
The screens vanished before reappearing in front of Nightmare. "I SEE," he mused after he read through the details of the loadout. "VERY WELL." He snapped his claws again, and the armor on Freddy-Kratos immediately transformed. The chest part remained the same, but the armor on the wrists and waists vanished before being replaced with dull golden armor pulsating with a faint, unearthly green glow. The warrior's shield had also transformed, changing from the golden circular Spartan shield into a massive tower shield large enough to cover most of his body except for his head. "AN INTERESTING CHOICE," Nightmare commented. "PERHAPS I WOULD HAVE CHOSEN DIFFERENTLY FOR SOME ELEMENTS, BUT NOT THE WORST I HAVE SEEN."
The demon lord snapped his fingers one last time, and the ghost kids found themselves being teleported right outside of the circular arena. They had been repositioned just outside the wall surrounding the arena, but could see through it as though it weren't there at all. Kratos-Freddy was standing in front of them with his back to them, giving the kids a very similar perspective to the way he was normally positioned in the video game. Different meters and bars appeared on the bottom left and right, with the ones on the left showcasing Kratos-Freddy's health, rage, and special cooldowns, and the ones on the right showing how many arrows the Marionette archer had left and the cooldown of her current spell.
A phantom PS4 controller materialized in front of them, and though there was no wire connecting it anywhere, it was obvious to everyone that the controller would be the means through which whoever was playing would control Kratos-Freddy and the Puppet archer.
"Pick someone to go first," Mike instructed, "and then we'll get things started."
The ghost kids glanced at each other. "Gabe just beat Hrolf a few days ago. Maybe he should be the one to go first?" Liz suggested.
"That's as good an idea as any, I guess," Jeremy commented.
"Yeah, I can do it," Gabe agreed. He grabbed hold of the controller and turned to face the arena. "Hey, Dad? I'm gonna go first."
"All right, Gabe, sounds good to me," Mike replied as Nightmare vanished and rematerialized next to them. At the same time, a gravestone began to form in the center of the arena, glowing with an aura of darkness. "Have Kratos-Freddy walk up to that gravestone when you're ready to begin."
Gabe did so, tilting the left joystick forward and directing Kratos-Freddy to walk up the gravestone. He was pleasantly surprised to discover that the controls so far seemed identical to the actual God of War game's, and the quick dodge-rolls he did to the left and right seemed to support that theory. "Well, time to start," he muttered. On his command, Kratos-Freddy reached his hand out towards the dark gravestone…
…only for it to finally explode in a humongous blast of darkness, forcibly shoving Kratos-Freddy back as a pillar of purple and black erupted from the ground where the gravestone had been seconds earlier. As Kratos-Freddy struggled to regain his bearings, a figure emerged from the pillar of darkness, causing Charlie to gasp in shock as she recognized him. A towering warrior wearing dark purple robes and a scarlet demonic skull emblem over his torso, carrying two black metal hand scythes with their heads fashioned in the shape of a skull and handles that looked as though they had been made out of spines even as their blades burned with the flames of darkness. An entity whose entire body seemed made out of pure darkness with purple and black flames glowing from his body, save for eyes that glowed with an intense red light the color of blood. It was a figure that the ghost children had seen on drawings and had briefly glimpsed when Mike had confronted Glitchtrap in the VR game, but none of them had actually seen in all of his nightmarish glory…until today.
Charlie gulped as she realized the exact nature of the challenge she and her siblings would be facing. Out of all the possibilities she had imagined, facing Dark!Mike hadn't been anywhere near the top of her list…and suddenly, it made all too much sense why Nightmare had insisted on replacing her brother for this exercise.
"Surprised?" Dark!Mike chuckled, his voice dripping with malicious amusement. "You all knew I had a dark side. None of you except Charlie ever saw it in its full glory…until tonight."
"WHAT THE HELL?" Everyone exclaimed as they all turned to look at Charlie. "You knew about this?" Cassidy asked incredulously.
"I did," Charlie reluctantly admitted. "This was the form Dad took when he beat the everloving hell out of William Afton as Nightmare Springtrap in the world of his mind. I didn't think I'd ever see it again." She took a deep breath and sighed. "Clearly, I was wrong."
"So the boss fight that we have to fight Kratos-Freddy is a dark, demon grim reaper version of Dad?" Susie mumbled. "I thought Dad said he was gonna teach us practical lessons today!"
"Oh, I most certainly am," Mike interrupted with a grin. "And some lessons can only be truly learned through great struggle…and a little pain. Not that I'm going to be attacking you, of course," he added hastily, realizing just how horrible his last sentence actually sounded. "The only person I'm going to be attacking is the hybrid of Kratos and Freddy in front of you. Your mission tonight is to have Kratos-Freddy defeat me in a duel to the death, in a style similar to the Berserker fights in God of War: Ragnarok." He snapped his fingers, and immediately a health bar appeared at the top of the wall separating the ghost kids from the actual battle. The kids grimaced as they realized that the health bar covered almost the entire length of the wall and was divided into 10 segments, making it abundantly clear that the upcoming fight was meant to be a superboss fight just like Hrolf Kraki's had been. Next to Mike's health bar was the emblem of a shield, signaling that he was immune to staggering from Runic attacks. "All of you may give advice and strategize with whoever is controlling Kratos-Freddy and the Puppet archer, but only one of you is allowed to actually control him at any given moment. And while Nightmare and I created the walls surrounding the arena to make sure that you physically can't enter the arena, under no circumstances should you actually attempt to enter while Kratos-Freddy and I are fighting," Mike warned, his voice deadly serious. "You are completely safe outside of the arena, but if you're dumb enough somehow wander in while we're fighting, I can't guarantee that you won't get caught in the middle of an attack."
The ghost kids gulped, remembering the powerful attacks that both Kratos and the Berserkers had unleashed as they had fought each other to the death. "We understand completely," Liz spoke for all of them. "We're gonna stay put right here."
"Good answer," Mike replied…before swinging his left scythe and cutting it straight through Kratos-Freddy's body.
"Gah!" Gabe exclaimed, so taken aback by the sudden attack that he didn't even get a chance to dodge or block it with his shield. Kratos-Freddy stumbled backward as a third of Kratos-Freddy's health bar disappeared immediately, forcing him into an immediate disadvantage right out of the gate. "Dad, what the hell?"
"This is a night for practical lessons," Mike replied, completely unapologetic as he swung his right scythe at Kratos-Freddy, though this time Gabe was able to block it in time with the Stone Wall Shield. "And here's your first one. When you're fighting against a true evil, fair fights are for morons. If your enemies are ever stupid or distracted enough to give you a free opening, then you exploit the hell out of that opening and run away with the advantage it gives you for as long as you can get away with. There's a time and place for honor, but your upcoming fight against Glitchtrap sure as fuck isn't it. Trying to act all noble against a monster like him isn't just worthless, it's worse than worthless. Because you can be sure as fuck that Glitchtrap won't give you the same courtesy."
Kratos-Freddy was able to retaliate with 2 axe swings that knocked off a moderate part of the first segment of Mike's massive health bar, but Mike leapt away from him before he could do any more than that. He stretched out his arms to the side, holding his scythes out as the purple flames on the blades began to blaze with intensity even as his dark aura intensified and concentric blue circles began to materialize in front of him. It was an attack that the ghost kids had seen before when they had battled Hjalti the Stolid and King Hrolf, a devastating attack that would take a few seconds to charge, but would unleash a massive, unavoidable, and almost certainly lethal explosion if they didn't interrupt it with a shield bash in time. It was an attack they had seen before, and in theory understood how to counter.
What the ghost kids hadn't expected was for a line of dark, shadowy spikes to erupt out of the ground as Mike held his scythes outward, beelining straight towards Kratos-Freddy as he began charging his attack. The attack had taken Gabe completely by surprise, and once again he didn't have the reflexes to block or dodge in time as the spikes skewered Kratos-Freddy, taking out another huge chunk of his health and reducing it to below half. "The hell?" Gabe mumbled. "Hrolf never attacked like that!"
"Oh crap, Gabe, hurry up and interrupt Dad's attack!" Liz pleaded.
"SHIT!" Gabe exclaimed as he remembered that Mike was still charging his massive attack. He tried to rush Kratos-Freddy towards him to interrupt him, but with all the precious seconds he had lost from getting hit by the spike attack, he was just too slow.
Mike slammed the blades of his scythes together, creating a humongous explosion of dark flames that was so powerful it covered the entire arena. It was incredibly unlikely that Kratos-Freddy would've been able to survive the explosion even at full health, and wounded as he was, he had absolutely no chance. The rest of Kratos-Freddy's health bar was obliterated instantly and the warrior himself fell backward, lifeless.
"We're not out yet!" Charlie tried to encourage him. "There's still our resurrection stone!"
"Oh, right!" Gabe realized. He clicked the square button on his controller, and the Puppet archer rushed over to Kratos-Freddy's side, bending down and channeling her energy through her hands to trigger the resurrection stone resting over Kratos-Freddy's chest. The animatronic-themed warrior gasped for breath and climbed to his feet, still badly wounded but alive and ready to carry on the fight.
Unfortunately, Mike didn't plan on giving Kratos-Freddy or Gabe any leeway beyond the few seconds it had taken for him to revive. He flew into the air out of reach of Kratos-Freddy's melee attacks, his scythes disappearing as his hands crackled with energy. "Eldingar Vengi!" Mike snarled, just as Hrolf and his servant Beigadr the Feared had done. Bolts of lightning fell from the sky, creating red circles on the ground that lasted for only a second at most before they viciously blasted the areas marked by the circles. Gabe spent the next few seconds weaving Kratos-Freddy around the blasts of lightning, knowing full well that at his low health even one lightning bolt striking him would guarantee instant death. It helped that as far as Gabe could tell, Mike hadn't changed his version of Eldingar Vengi from the Berserkers'.
As the last of Mike's thunderbolts hit the floor, Gabe suddenly realized that the shield next to Mike's health bar had vanished. Now was the perfect time for him to gain at least a little momentum back, and he needed to use every cool he could get. He activated the Hilt of Skofnung relic, and watched as Kratos-Freddy took out a sword and impaled it into the ground.
Several pale-green ghostly swords materialized in a ring around Kratos-Freddy, before shooting straight towards Mike. Everyone's eyes widened in surprise, as the ghostly swords viciously and frenziedly shredded Mike's body, attacking him relentlessly over and over again as the dark reaper-like warrior staggered backward, grunting in annoyance and pain.
"Holy shit!" Jeremy cried out in disbelief. "THAT'S what the Hilt of Skofnung does?"
"That's so OP!" Cassidy exclaimed. "Way cooler than any of the other relics we've ever used before! Well, maybe except the one that slows time, but that one's a different kind of cool."
"Hit him while you can!" Fritz advised frantically.
Gabe wasted no time in following Fritz's advice, making Kratos-Freddy close the gap to Mike and start viciously attacking him with numerous swings from his axe. Combined with the damage done from the swords summoned by the Hilt of Skofnung, he was able to completely remove the first bar of Mike's health and start dealing some decent damage to the second.
Unfortunately for Gabe, the shield protecting Mike from flinching reappeared shortly before the swords from Skofnung disappeared. Mike jumped backwards out of harm's way and launched himself high into the air, leaving no trace of his presence in the arena save for an area marked by a red circle with a black vortex pattern inside it that followed Kratos-Freddy wherever he went. Recognizing this move from many of the Berserker fights, Gabe moved Kratos-Freddy around, waiting until the red circle stopped following before immediately dodge-rolling to the left. The former Freddy inhabitant had timed it perfectly, having nimbly dodged out of the way right as Mike fell from the sky and slammed the ground where Kratos-Freddy had been just a second earlier, the impact from his crash creating an explosion of fire that Kratos-Freddy was thankfully out of the way of.
Gabe's dodge had been expertly timed and executed perfectly…but in his relief, he had failed to notice another red circle forming underneath Kratos-Freddy's feet immediately after Mike's fall. "Look out!" Cassidy cried out, but it was too late. A blast of fire fell from the sky and smashed into Kratos-Freddy, and as the Berserker's Resurrection Stone didn't actually provide that much base healing after resurrection by itself, it was more than enough to wipe out what little remained of Kratos-Freddy's health. The warrior fell backward onto the ground, and this time he didn't get up again.
"A disappointing performance," Mike commented, sounding thoroughly unimpressed. "You'll have to do far better than that if you want even the slightest chance to win against me. And I have many more lessons for you all to learn." He snapped his fingers and immediately Kratos-Freddy's position reset, along with his health and the used-up resurrection stone. At the same time, Mike vanished as his health bar also refilled, and the gravestone burning with dark flames reappeared where it had been in the center of the arena. "Pick the next person to fight, and then we begin round 2."
The ghost kids looked each other, wincing slightly as they did so. Even though Mike had explicitly warned them that he would not be as easy to beat as Ragnarok's Berserkers (if one could even call those fights easy to begin with), part of them had at least subconsciously been riding high on their recent victory against Hrolf and believed that, if they couldn't outright beat Mike on their first try, they would at least have made a good showing against him.
And their father had now proven them very, very wrong.
Fritz was the one to vocalize what all of them were thinking. "This is gonna suck, isn't it?"
/
A/N: I wonder how many of you expected to see a chapter in which a Norse-era Kratos wearing a Freddy head battled against Dark!Mike taking the role of King Hrolf Kraki. The ghost kids managed to beat King Hrolf in a standard New Game walkthrough, but Dark!Mike is fighting Kratos-Freddy as Hrolf in a New Game Plus run. And I can guarantee you that fighting Hrolf in New Game Plus is MUCH harder than his regular New Game fight, especially if (like the ghost kids) you're going into that fight completely blind. And this is assuming that Mike limits his moves to ones used solely by Hrolf in Ragnarok…which is not a safe assumption to make.
Mike isn't showing his dark aspect to all of his ghost kids now just to be a dick or give them a good scare. He is 100% serious and honest when he says that he has a lot of important general and practical lessons to teach them before Security Breach, and lessons like these can't be properly learned by just sitting down and saying a bunch of words.
Next chapter, we continue the battle between Kratos-Freddy and Dark!Mike! Hope you guys enjoyed!
