Azaria 2-27 (Patreon)

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Chapter 27: The Queen’s Truth

Azaria

The dancers changed right in front of our eyes. Much like mannequins, they stiffly turned toward us bearing their weapons. Lost look was present in their eyes. The scene reminded me of a zombie movie. Ophelia ordered her women forward, while Lance and Neo charged ahead. Their power sets had made this much easier than it likely would have otherwise been.

The ballroom that we were in seemed to stretch on forever, but I knew that couldn’t be the case. The passage both up and further down into the dungeon was located somewhere in this room. Even if some sort of mind-blowing space magic was involved there had to be a way to beat it. That rule was hardwired into dungeon magic. Even cut off from the gods, or their prophets, I didn’t doubt the rules were still holding strong.

“Thomas. We need to find the passage before we’re over run… again.” There appeared to be hundreds if not thousands of the dancers turned armored soldiers. I didn’t know how Neo’s powers worked, but I was certain he would reach a point that even he was exhausted. Lance had been fighting long before we came in here, I felt it would be hard on her to keep it up for another long period.

He nodded with a grimace. “Already on it. I’m tracing the Aether flows, but it’s going to take some time. Her field was dense outside. I feel like we’re in three different dungeons at the same time right now.”

“That might be the case,” I commented as his statement rung a bell in my head. My field had encompassed the other dungeons of the city. I was willing to bet the same had happened for the Queen. If she didn’t outright kill them, then they could be working together. That meant the dungeon heading up was a different entity.

I focused and carefully spread my own field around me. I honestly didn’t know I could do it until I tried. The various waves of energy started to collide as my field acted as a rock that disrupted the currents around us. “Hurry! I can’t do this for long,” I said trying not to burn through all my Aether instantly.

“On it!” He exclaimed and started moving his hands. I felt it was more of a thing to help him concentrate.

“Starburst. Go help them,” I said straining against a sudden pressure. It looked like the cores in the building weren’t too happy with me upsetting the balance between them and were trying to break my will.

“Are you sure? I’d rather not leave you undefended,” he replied with some hesitation.

“Go. When we find the entrance, we won’t have much time to act before they realize we’re heading for the next floor.” Dungeon cores could listen to the interaction of parties in their halls, but they couldn’t act on the floor. That meant the entrance would be easier to break through until they realize we were heading to the core rather than the avatar. She might have heard us talking outside, but that was a chance we would have to take. There was a considerable amount of Aether flying around that should make it hard for a dungeon core to concentrate on the people. At least, that was the case for me. When too much Aether was poured out, my dungeon instinct tended to takeover.

“Understood.” He leapt into the air and started flinging spells at the dancers that the soldiers were fighting. Looking around, Lance appeared to have a better handle on these creatures than the ones from the first floor. She was tearing through flesh with a wide grin and partially crazed eyes.

Neo was being, well, Neo. He would phased through a body part and it was disintegrate over a few seconds. The combination of those two with the soldiers was keeping the dancers at bay, but it was taking a fair amount of energy. The dancers were. fast, strong, and well-coordinated. They were mainly working in pairs, but in some cases, there were upward to four working together.

Lance was almost unrecognizable with her various monster parts on full display. She was playing the part as well as she tore through a demon’s stomach and then placed the intestines in her mouth for a bite. I noticed that when she did so, her Aether grew a bit denser. It looked like she was absorbing the parts as she fought.

“I think I’ve narrowed it down,” Thomas said after almost a minute had passed.

“What do you got?” I asked quickly.

“The room looks infinite, but there is almost a mirror effect. The flows rebound at certain points. If we moved without knowing, then we would have been stuck in a loop. I found the path to an entrance that appears to lead down.”

“Alright.” I turned toward the others. “Thomas knows which way to go. Let’s go!” I shouted and we moved toward the front line.

I resisted the urge to use magic to speed up the process of cutting through the demons. Lance, Neo, and Starburst were fighting full steam. The soldiers fell back into a circle to protect Thomas and I as we moved. It took nearly ten minutes of constant fighting to reach our goal.

About halfway through, the dancers started to lob magic at us which slowed us down even further. Even though I tried to stay out of it to preserve Aether, I had no choice to join in to reduce the pressure on the others. Thomas helped by using a sort of stone magic that created a shotgun spray of pebbles that proved to more effective than I expected.

We reached a spot that still appeared to continue forever, but Thomas reached out a hand and channeled some Aether. After a few seconds, a wall appeared with a slit. Neo reached forward and with a bit of flexing, the slit grew into a passage that we could descend. I nodded in appreciation to Thomas for his good work. I might have been able to find it after some struggling but having an older dungeon core that understood the flows of Aether really helped.

We rushed into the entrance as more demon dancers were approaching. Neo and Lance turned and forced the door shut once everyone was through. I had to resist grinding my teeth when I realized we had lost nearly half of Ophelia’s soldiers. They might be replaceable, but they were still made from my Aether.

“This is only the second floor. I dread going forward,” Thomas commented with a tense chuckle.

“We might have to deal with stronger minions, but there should be less. Maintaining even a few minions much stronger than those dancers would become quite draining over time.” At least that was the rules from Earth. It was hard to say if that would be the case for this world.

“Congratulations! You survived. And even found my passage. Darcy is going to be upset she won’t get to eat anyone today,” the voice of queen returned.

“It wasn’t too hard,” I called back with a level voice. Although we lost a few soldiers, Lance, Starburst, and Neo were mostly unharmed. Though they were all breathing heavily after the large amount of Aether they likely had to use to defeat the dancers.

“I like your bolster. I wonder how long it will last when I have your core chained up and I’m using you to finally bring about my will on this planet and those in the neighborhood. The veil is already weak to your home planet. Maybe that should be our first target.” The voice started to laugh, amused by itself.

“You’re having trouble with a single city. Earth has many more just like this. Open a portal to Earth and you’ll find that Earthlings might have a thing or two to say,” Lance shouted with her arms crossed.

“Trouble?” The voice asked with obvious glee. “I was just testing the waters.” The tower shook around us before images appeared all around us. A fleet of ships much larger than the one before was descending on the city. Even with the dungeon cores helping, it would be hard to push back that many demons. Just from a quick glance, I could see it was mostly hybrids and whatever the dancers were considered.

“Are you sure you want to waste those on the city. You haven’t even stopped us yet,” I said then mentally called for Zaria. “A large force is on its way. Get as many of the humans to safety as you can, but the dungeon’s safety is priority.”

“Understood,” Zaria replied though I could barely understand it from the static that it was covered in.

“Who you talking to sweetie?” The voice asked with a pleasant tone. “I can bring them here.”

“Don’t worry about it. When I crush and absorb you’re core, I’ll make sure to use your soul to make a nice greeter for my entrance,” I taunted back.

“Was it perhaps these people?” Another image appeared and the Powered and dungeon monsters we left outside appeared. The battle must have been raging on since we entered as most of the humans and lizard men were dead. Only my parents, and the Powered named Axe remained. They were heavily wounded and fatigued. As we watched the last of the lizard men were slaughtered.

I grabbed Thomas’s hand, as I knew he cared about them much like I cared about the minions in my dungeon. No matter the situation, you didn’t like watching your friends being killed. Part of me also grabbed it for my own support. I couldn’t see my parents making it out of that mess.

“It will be in your best interest to leave them alone,” Lance said with a glare toward the image.

“I only have one interest. That is the girl with you,” the voice said before the demons surrounding my parents rushed in. They must have realized that my mother couldn’t be wounded if the armor was clean. Magic users in the back were creating large dust storms that covered the area. My father was already wounded and appeared unable to put up a fight. A small flame burst from him, but it didn’t do more than force the demons to hesitate for a minute.

I should have talked to them when I had the chance. Consequences be damned. Now they were going to die. I forced myself to watch as they were stabbed by no less than a dozen different spears. Even then it looked like my mother was determined to fight some more, but her body just couldn’t support her desire.

She collapsed over my father and he embraced her as I saw the light leave their eyes. I ground my teeth trying to suppress my anger. “When I find your core, not only will I absorb you, I will make you suffer for as long as I live.”

“Ah. They must have been important to you. I do apologize. Bonds are a weakness, best to throw them off while you can,” the voice said matter of factly before it started to laugh crazily.

I turned to the rest of the group ignoring the images. “Let’s go kill this bitch,” I growled.

The others didn’t need anymore convincing and we rushed down the stairs. We came to a more medieval version dungeon. There were cells had rust covered bars and moist moss covered bricks. Skeletons that had horns on their skulls and stubs where wings would have been connected were chained to the walls. Judging from the cracks and cuts on the bones, they were horribly tortured before they died.

At the end of the wide passage lined with cells stood a large figure that was easily over seven or eight feet tall and a good two or three feet wide. He held a lantern that glowed red along with a large cleaver. His head was hidden by a black cloth. His Aether was as quite thick. Those in front braced themselves for whatever might come, but the figure just stood there without moving.

Lance, Starburst and Neo exchanged a look before they started to creep down the passage. When the figure, which I decided to call the jailer still didn’t move, they picked up speed. We were about halfway down the passage, when the jailer lifted his lantern and the red light flared through the hallway. The skeletons started to twitch.

“Shit! A manipulator!” Thomas shouted.

“Yeah, so?” I replied with a raised eyebrow.

He looked at me with a nervous frown. “They only cost one soul, but they can summon more minions in exchange for Aether. From the density of his Aether, this might be quite the challenge,” he explained.

“I know. Ophelia is a manipulator,” I retorted.

“I’ve tired for the last three months to create a manipulator,” Thomas said with a even deeper frown.

I just shrugged as I decided it was best that I not mention that all my main minions were manipulators. It might make him upset, not mention, we didn’t have time for that as the skeletons were slowly emerging from their cells. “Ophelia, do you think you can handle the skeletons?” Their Aether felt much weaker than anything we’d fought so far, but there were hundreds of them. At least we had the hall to choke their numbers against them.

“Leave it to me, my lady,” Ophelia stated with a salute before she turned and started positioning the soldiers in rows to defend me and Thomas.

“We’ll handle the big guy!” Lance yelled as they three of them pushed forward.