Chapter 17
I'm sure he's crazy too because he's bouncing off the floor
"Truly amazing, that creatures as stupid as yourselves have caused me so much trouble," a voice that came from nowhere told us. "Still, this has worked out to my satisfaction, having to sacrifice a few of my followers to trap you here. Rather beyond my expectations but I figured once the big one was pulled here, the others would follow. This you did. If I knew baiting you would work I would have done so sooner. I am of course a master baiter. There shall be no heroic last stand for you, die here in this place and bother me no more."
"Yeah no," Malachite told the voice, slicing off the demon's head. "Wait did he just say… Nah!"
Taking a quick look around I saw we were in a similar room to the one we had left, though there was a dimness, or perhaps one might say a gloom, to the whole place. I rushed to the side of the cultist and started healing him. His arm wouldn't grow back or anything, but it did start healing over so he wouldn't bleed to death.
"Uh, what are you doing?" Malachite asked.
"He may be the only way out of here," I told him. "You know how to open a dimensional portal out of the Gloom dimension?"
"Uh, no?"
"Neither do I!"
"I see your point."
I finished healing him and turned to the others. "Everyone okay?"
They both indicated they were.
"Good. Watch this guy, I see you took some hits." Malachite's armor was beat up so I assumed he was hurt as well. He was favoring one leg, I noticed.
"All in a day's work."
"Come here."
I healed him up and fixed up his armor, than refreshed everyone's spell symbols, including my own. I made another Besom who seemed glad to be back, and by this time the cultist was coming around. He was pale, he had lost a lot of blood (that I had cleaned up with the hygiene spell) and blearily looked us over.
"What a shame, I'm still alive."
"Wow," I marveled. "You people really have it bad, don't you? You know, all you had to do to enjoy a paradise at the Lord's side when your mortal time was up was not be evil. It was just too hard for you, huh? You really think this Gloom buddy of yours is going to offer you a better deal? How is he getting your soul, anyway? I truly doubt it can interrupt the soul cycle."
"Never mind that," Malachite told him, as he looked up at me confused. "Could be too much brain power in that effort. Open up a portal and take us back. Or I'll finish killing you the rest of the way. Maybe take your other arm off? Would you be able to serve the Gloom in death with no arms? Kinda want to do it."
"The portal opens at the whims of my master. He has not given us a method of calling him, he calls us."
"Marvelous!" I exclaimed, throwing my hands into the air. "We're stuck here." But wait, you and Malachite got here when you backfired a spell. What spell were you trying to do that caused that?
"But at least we have company," Hanz tried to joke.
"Hopefully more talkative than the last demon we tried to get answers from," Malachite agreed. "So… What exactly do you people want?"
"I thought that much was obvious. To bring the Gloom to the world."
"But what does that mean?You must personally be getting something from all this. Like Orchid said, your very soul is on the line here. You must have been offered something to beat the promise of Heaven to have turned your back on the Lord."
"There is no greater service than to serve the Gloom."
"So you threw away your chance at eternal paradise for…"
"Service is the reward."
Hold on. Is the Gloom actually some kind of disease? A mental parasite? A memetic hazard? He's spewing the same answers as the demon thing. Can he no longer think clearly? But how is this all being transmitted? I think we may have to put up fliers in town that this cult is recruiting around here and to report them. Something. Once they get into the cult it seems they just lose all reason.
"How tiresome," the big voice made an appearance again. The cultist dropped dead.
"And there it is," Malachite decided. "We try to understand you and your followers go brain dead and then you make them dead-dead. What pitch is suckering all these fools into your service, anyway? Hello?"
"We should be on our guard," I decided. "Assume we're under constant surveillance."
"Anyone feelth the urge to take a big dump?" Snarly asked.
"I am not," Hanz announced.
"I don't eat," I reminded him. And if we don't get out of here soon, that's going to be a problem. I can't make food or water. You all, not you Hanz, are in trouble if we don't get out of here in the next day or so.
"I get what you're going for," Malachite agreed. "Let him watch that if he wants. Come on, let's see where we are. At least there are doors. Had we simply been brought to some underground chamber with no exits… okay we could still escape thanks to Orchid but it smacks of poor planning on the Gloom's part. Anything to say?" He waited, looking around. "Thought so."
"I'll check him over," Snarly announced, going through his pockets. He had a few coins and a non-magical amulet with the cult symbol on it. Nothing more. Meanwhile we checked the doors, no handles or knobs. They seemed to be wood, but of a type I had never encountered before. Same with the walls, they appeared to be stone, and responded to a quick stone shaping spell I tried just to be sure, but it was corrupted in some way. I didn't like it. The whole place felt wrong. But at least it was somehow lit, as though it was purgatory. It wasn't exactly sunlight levels, but I didn't have any trouble seeing through it. Don't need to use a light spell.
"Nothing for it," Hanz announced. "We must press on if we are to escape from this place. Are we underground? In a building? Someone made this place and brought those undead things here. We must assume this is some kind of base for the Gloom. Others must exist here. Perhaps some kind of local resistance? Our mission should be to seek it out."
What about the Enlightenment? It went back home, right? Which is here. Come to think of it, where exactly are we? Parallel world? One that lost to the Gloom a long time ago? And now it wants our world because it's bored or something? You have this place, leave us be.
"Which door?" Malachite asked.
"As all three are equally likely to contain horrors, let us choose at random. Loading . Running. This door has been chosen." They pointed.
"Fair enough."
"Loading ."
"I have no idea what you're saying. Get into position."
We did, and he shouldered the door open. Inside were several skeletons, some rubble, no doors. Two creatures that were mostly month perked up from behind the rubble, and of course the skeletons jerked to life. Battle was once again joined. The mouth things didn't seem too phased by my magic, which was a concern, so I focused more on buffing the others while my allies harassed them. The skeletons went down fairly easily and the others turned to the mouth creatures, making short work of them as well. With the room clear we looked around, it was indeed empty, apart from a strange looking dagger in the far corner, partly buried under the rubble. Hanz was the one to find it, and called our attention to it. They said not to touch it, and I understood why, shadow seemed to be pouring off it.
"It's magical," I announced, clearly stating the obvious. "I would need to synchronize with it to tell you more."
"So neat!" Malachite decided, reaching for it.
"Wait, I can still tell if it's safe to be- and you took it."
He held it up. "Yup, think I'm keeping it."
"You know who utheth dagerth? Thith guy!" Snarly reminded him, pointing his thumbs at himself.
"Get your own," he replied, staring into the depths of it. "You got the poison sword, didn't you? This one is mine."
"Ooooohay." We all traded a look. Maybe I better just take that off his hands… Actually I'm really the only one without a physical wea- oh no.
"We can divvy up any treasure later," Malachite promised, sticking the knife through his belt. "Let's carry on."
Seems dangerous, but in a fun way. I approve. No, no, he should lose his pants only at my request, not by some random slip of a knife.
We got into position in front of the second door, after finishing our preparations of course. Malachite was holding a bottle of lamp oil in his hand with his sword in the other, and I was behind my invisible companions. He kicked the door down, smashing through it easily and revealing a large chamber beyond. From my vantage point I could see another darkness demon and two undead looking humanoids, one in red and one in blue.
"Let your defenses be nullified," I cast on the blue one. Magical energies hit it and I knew whatever it tried to do defensively in the next few seconds would be penalized.
Malachite threw the bottle of oil down and shifted his grip on the sword.
"One of them juth went out of thight," Snarly called to us.
Where is he? Oh right probably went invisible using one of his daggers… which means he's not using the sword?
"Probably trying to flank us," Hanz announced. "I'll watch the wall over here." They turned and brought up their weapon.
I gathered ambient magic into my core, then cast. "Elemental Needle!" Two slivers of wind struck the undead creature in blue, but it only staggered.
Another one of the toothy, magic ignoring creature came into view in the doorway, and Malachite breathed fire on it, lighting the lamp oil on fire as well. Snarly stuck his knives into it, becoming visible in the process, and it yelped.
Great, can't help there, it'll just eat my magic or whatever it's doing to ignore it.
The undead creature in red came out of the wall and Hanz shot it. "It ignored it!" they shouted.
One second, I can't be everywhere at once.
The undead in blue was casting a spell, I wasn't sure of the target but I didn't have time to empower my magic again. "Elemental Needle!" One sliver of wind slammed into him, but it was a shallow hit. Come on, go down!
Boline balked the undead in blue, as Hanz dodged to the side while trying to get out their ax.
A second toothy creature jumped the fire and went for Malachite, but he didn't seem concerned about it.
"Elemental Strike!" I cast on Hanz, empowering their next hit. They didn't have their ax out yet but that didn't mean I couldn't cast on the weapon itself. Can't help Malachite, those tooth creatures are too close. What can I do next- whoa!
The darkness demon appeared, shooting a beam of darkness at Malachite, and hitting his leg. He cried out but then seemed to vanish, becoming little more than a shadow of his former self.
"Malachite!" I cried. Oh no, what just happened to him?
He didn't let it slow him down though, he charged the demon, swinging his blade. The demon seemed surprised he chose to do this, but his sword did seem to impact the thing.
He's not out of it yet, okay. I better have Boline move up to fill the gap he just left or we're all in big trouble.
He did, as Snarly shoved a skeleton- where did that come from? Oh great and there are two more! -into the fire. He missed.
Looking to my right I saw Hanz still hadn't gotten his ax out. These people move so slowly, don't they? I cast a "Dazzle!" on the undead creature to help them out some, but I wasn't sure it was effective.
Boline was dodging the toothy creature now, looking for an opening.
I really need to rework Besom. While I do feel better about it being between me and all that going on, it can't attack with non-lethal force and expect anything to happen. I have to give it my wind needle spell instead when I get a chance.
Hanz drew their ax and got a hit on the undead creature, causing a flash of holy light as its magical power finally came into use. The creature was still up though.
The skeleton that Snarly tried to shove made it past the fire and looked like it was heading for me, but Boline jumped on it, smashing it to the ground. Sadly this meant she turned her back on the toothy creatures, and one bit her, causing her to vanish.
Oh come on. Spells already cast as well? That's completely unfair.
With the gap now opened the toothy creature went for Hanz, who was now beset on two sides. The undead in red cast some kind of beam spell, which they dodged, and I did a quick "Deflection" because I was right behind them.
"Thanks for that," I said sarcastically. "Look I can't take those tooth monsters. You deal with them, I'll take the undead guy."
"Right!"
"Elemental Needle!"
Hanz now focused on the toothy creature, driving it back with their ax.
Okay, there is one thing Besom can do. She shot forward, plunging her beak into the heart of the undead creature, which finally started burning away.
Wait, burning away? What are these things? I looked to the skeleton Boline had smashed, the bones that made it up were also burning up into nothing. What in the world?
Besom now took Boline's spot near the door, knowing to dodge any strike by the toothy creatures. I empowered Hanz's next strike again, which worked, they hit the creature and killed it.
Okay, looking good here. What's going on- huh?
Malachite was back, somehow, but he had lost his sword and was grappling a toothy thing. Snarly was cowering before the undead guy in blue, which wasn't ideal.
"Elemental Needle!" I cast, again not empowering my attack and only doing a single needle. I had hit the thing several times by now, undead weren't that hard to- it was still up.
One of the skeletons was stooping to pick up Malachite's sword.
"Don't you dare," he growled, getting out of the way of the third one.
He seems to have that under control. I cast a final needle on the undead in blue, and he started burning away.
Looking around it was just the two skeletons left, which were swiftly dispatched by Malachite.
"What happened to you?" I asked him, running through the fire myself. I was wearing the boots, so it was nice to finally get some use out of them.
"Not sure," he admitted. "I turned into some kind of shadow creature, and then that tooth monster bit me, and I was fine again. Also, ow, can you heal my leg?"
"Sure thing. Your pants are all ripped up too. Not quite enough, in my opinion." I considered a moment. "Maybe you should take them off so I can really see what the damage is."
"Just fix them!"
I pouted in answer.
With everyone healed and summoned and armor repaired we stood before the third and final door.
"This better lead to a way out of here," Malachite grumbled. "This place gives me the creeps."
"There is something off about it," I admitted.
"Everyone ready?"
"Ready!" everyone shouted. He smashed through the third door.
Three of the toothy creatures met our gaze, the room seemed empty of anything else but "decorated" in a hideous style. Like someone had piled up corpses of all kinds at the back of the room, and left them to rot.
Let's take care of this quickly and… huh, I have no idea. No door in this room either.
I had Boline rush forward to the furthest away creature, intending to have her attack from surprise and at least get one good hit in. This worked, she hit and the creature whirled to face her.
"Elemental Strike!" I cast on Malachite, who was about to rush into the room.
Hanz hit the middle one right in the head, and it started burning away.
Oh yeah, that's the way. We'll have this taken care of in just a second and what's that noise?
There was a moaning sound in the room, like the corpses were not all that happy to see us, and I got a bad feeling.
"Elemental Strike!" I cast again, this time on Boline, as she was still around.
Then, the pile of bodies in the back of the room rose as a creature, three times as tall as Malachite and twice as wide. It looked like a combination of dirt, dead bodies, stone, and bile, and we watched helplessly as it pulled itself up and roared at us. Snarly, bless his little heart, seemed unafraid or maybe was just trying to make up for his showing fear in the last battle and screamed in answer, rushing the thing.
What are you doing? Let me shrink that thing or something-
It finished forming and just as Snarly reached it, a vile liquid shot out of the thing, trying to catch us all. Hanz of course ignored it. Malachite took to the air and avoided it. I, on the other hand, was right across from it and the liquid sped out of the doorframe towards me. It had come out of the thing near the "head" which was 8m tall so it had to angle the stuff to try and get it through the door. It smelled awful, but hadn't I purchased magic for exactly this sort of situation? Of course I had.
"Hygiene!" I cast as I crouched down, directly on the floor. The liquid vanished all the way back to the creature, as it was all connected. Weaponized cleaning magic. I love it.
While I was congratulating myself it shot a meaty fist in the air and snagged Malachite, smashing him into the ground.
Oh crap. Wait, instead of shrinking the thing I'll make Malachite bigger. I'm sure he'll appreciate it.
I started casting, figuring I would let the spell go when the thing's hand came back up, revealing Malachite who I was sure was fine. He was tough. Being slammed around a little was fine for him. Right?
Hanz also moved forward, gripping their ax and looking up at the thing.
The creature lifted its hand and Malachite was gone again.
Oh for crying out loud. Where has he gone this time?
I let the spell go on Hanz, who grew to match the size of the creature.
Fine, see how you like that! Their ax should work on this thing as well.
I started casting again, Malachite must be around here somewhere, right? I would get him next. That creature looked like an amalgamation of bodies, like some kind of zombie that was made of other zombies. Perhaps he got pulled inside? He'll bust out, and I'll cast on him. Can't shrink the thing now, he'll get crushed. And where's Snarly? Trying to backstab the thing or what?
Hanz and presumably Snarly were hacking away at the thing, it seemed it couldn't hurt Hanz though it kept trying to punch them. Come on, come on, where are you? There!
Malachite popped out of the arm, proving he was sucked up inside the thing, and I let the spell go. He too grew to massive proportions, though not his usual flying size. Now the odds were in our favor! I would give you the same treatment, I think I can manage one more spell, if I could see you Snarly.
The three titans went at it while I watched, somewhat afraid to do any more spells given how much magic I was maintaining at the moment. I noticed Malachite had lost his sword again, and was simply tearing at the thing with his claws. Gotta get that man a strap for his sword at this rate. Hanz's ax shone with holy light with each strike, clearly taking offense to such a grotesque abomination. Finally they dealt the final blow, smashing the thing to the ground where it stopped moving.
"Ha, take that!" Malachite crowed. "Why is it still moving?"
"It was healing very quickly," Hanz told him. "Perhaps it cannot be killed in the traditional sense?"
"I'll burn it to a crisp!" He breathed a bunch of fire on it, which of course was scaled up to match his current size because anything less than that would be very silly indeed. He spewed fire on it again and again, and finally the bits stopped wiggling around and went still. My magic broke, returning everyone to their original size, and we took a quick look around the room as I hygiened everything in sight.
"No door out of here either," Malachite finally announced. "That could be a problem."
We regrouped, healed, and repaired in the center room.
"We must be missing something," Hanz decided. "We must shift the rubble and search the walls. There is no way those creatures simply appeared here. They walked into this room. Those bodies were brought in here and animated. We shall walk out of it."
"Agreed," I said with a nod.
"I'm beat," Malachite admitted. "You all do that. I'm going to meditate, like you taught me, Orchid, in case something else shows up."
"Very well. I can support that much magic and look around at the same time. Augment Skill!"
We poked around the place, shifting rubble, knocking on the walls, inspecting the ceiling. I also repaired the doors, figuring if something teleported into the three side rooms we should at least have some sort of barrier between us. I also webbed them up and made some stone to wedge them shut with. We found nothing to help us get out of there; no secret passages, no hidden trapdoors, no ladders hidden in the walls. I did find a strange scroll I read over, which seemed to be a spell to turn someone into light. It was extremely high grade, but being light could be useful in some situations, I figured.
Is this some sort of joke? Would I be more vulnerable to those shadow demons under the influence of this spell or less? Now there's an idea, cast the spell on them directly! Can they be both demons of darkness and light at the same time? Could be interesting. Still, could be useful outside that… When Malachite felt somewhat refreshed I tried a few other spells, such as phase and dimension step. Going through the walls just showed darkness beyond them, while dimension step did nothing. Detect enemies overloaded me for a second as it felt as though they were all around me, and in desperation I did a question spell too.
"What is the way back to our home plane?"
Unfortunately, I just heard the voice of the Gloom again, taunting me with a laugh and "There is no way back, your only escape is death."
Well that's cheerful. Maybe don't tell the others that…
"So now what?" Snarly asked. "How do we get out of here?"