Azaria 2-28 (Patreon)

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Chapter 28: The Queen’s Jail

Lance

I stared down the creature that was obviously taking the form of a medieval Jailor. The brute had summoned or risen all the skeletons that were in the cells. Just in this hall alone, that put our enemies at close to two or three hundred. That was only a quick count. I rotated my neck enjoying the crack. I had to admit I was getting tired, but all the upgrades that my body was receiving were keeping me even with the enemies for the moment.

“Neo, be level with me. How are you doing?” I asked since I hadn’t even noticed any sweat or any indication that he was tired yet.

“I am fine. This is merely child’s play for me,” he replied as coldly as ever.

“Don’t blame me if we leave your body behind if you drop dead,” I retorted with a scoff. He snorted before he started striding forward. The skeletons that jumped at him were quickly turned to dust. I glanced at Starburst. “Come here often?” I asked with a smirk considering the host of the dungeon seemed to know him.

He looked at me with a worried expression which I knew was insane, which to be far, I might be. He just shook his head and walked after Neo. I sighed with a shrug and jogged after the two of them. A skeleton lunged at me as I passed a cell, and I absorbed the bones without pause and without even thinking about it. My smirk grew wider with my discovery. These skeletons were basically handing me materials.

I glanced behind us to check on the dungeon cores. With a quick inspection, I was relieved that the soldiers were having an easier time with the skeletons than the dancers on the pervious floor. Their chainsaw swords were able to burn the bones into powder, while the ones still holding shields were able to block most of the passage.

Turning back around, I ran after the two. I wanted to get the parts of the jailor once we defeated him and that meant I needed to contribute a little. Neo stood in front of the still immobile jailor and stared it down. A red glow came from the eye sockets of the hood of the jailor as it stared back.

“Are you going to ask it for a date?” I asked catching up. “Let’s kill it already!”

“Jumping into a fight is foolish, especially when the enemy gives you time to obverse it,” Neo shot back.

“Yeah. Yeah.” I extended my claws, the red tint coloring the edge of my vision. I wanted to fight! I lunged past Neo aiming of the jailor’s neck. I only had time to widen my eyes, as the jailor’s lantern slammed into me and buried my at least six inches into the brick wall. I coughed as all the air was knocked from my lungs.

I managed to see the cleaver as it angled for my neck but was saved when Neo stopped it with a hand. “As I said, foolish.”

“I… had… him,” I wheezed out as I pushed myself out of the hole. All I got was a snort and it came from the until now silent jailor. I growled to cover my embarrassment then lunged past Neo as he held the jailor in place by the cleaver. This time, I was ready for the lantern and dodged it with Scurry. I brought my claws down creating five long gashes along the jailor’s chest. When I landed from my attack and turned to obverse the damage, I found that I hadn’t even broke the skin. “What the hell!?”

Streaks of light flew past me and struck the eye holes. Starburst’s attack knocked back the jailor’s head but achieved little more. The jailor looked down at Neo and his muscles started to bulge as he pushed against the man. Neo’s eyes hardened as he started pushing back and they stayed in their stalemate.

I looked the jailor over but didn’t spot anything that looked like a weakness. If I couldn’t make a hole, I would just have to use one that already existed. I charged back between the two and jumped at the jailor’s head. It looked like I wasn’t the only one learning as the lantern moved even faster as I used Scurry. A blast of energy from Starburst stopped it before it struck me.

Landing on the jailor’s shoulders, I grinned before I reached down and shoved my clawed arm down his throat through him mouth. I felt unnaturally sharp teeth start to tear at my arm, but I ignored it. I extended my scythe while my arm was in his throat and was pleased to find the flesh on the inside was a lot weaker than the outside. The blade exploded from the jailor’s chest in a spray of gore.

The jailor wasn’t out for the count yet. He dropped his cleaver then slammed his head, me included into the wall of the passage. For the second time, I lost my breath and nearly my arm as the teeth gained more strength. I yanked it free before I lost the limb. Teeth marks that went halfway through my muscle were present.

Neo kicked off from his spot and brought both hands down on the top of the jailor’s skull. There was a boom as the jailor’s head cracked and sank into his chest cavity a good three or four inches. Much further than it should naturally go. After that, Neo grabbed the upper jaw of the jailor and tore the top half of the creature’s head off.

The jailor stood for a solid ten seconds before it fell back with another loud boom. I stood up and flexed my arm to make sure I wouldn’t lose the thing. Even with my regeneration abilities, it was going to take a minute to recover this much damage. “That went well,” Azaria commented as she, Ophelia and Thomas rejoined us.

“Funny,” I retorted rubbing my arm.

“At least the skeletons broke apart once the jailor was killed,” she said patting my arm. “Could be worse.”

“Oh? How so?” I asked with only a small eye twitch of annoyance.

“For one,” she pointed past the jailor’s corpse. I followed her finger and groaned. “There could be more of them.” Another jailor stood in our path after roughly the same length of passage. There even appeared to be more skeletons in the cells. I sighed and tried to channel just a bit more Aether to my regeneration ability.

~~~

“Are we lost?” I asked even though the path we were on had been straight without turns or branches the entire time. The dungeon’s path appeared to go on forever.

“If we are, I’m blaming you. You have horrible luck, and it would take that to get us lost on a straight path,” Azaria replied. We were sitting on the corpse of the twentieth jailor. If they weren’t getting just a tad bit stronger after each fight, I would say we were in some sort of loop. Though they were getting easier as I was absorbing their bodies with each fight.

“Don’t bring my luck into this. I’m average,” I shot back.

Azaria laughed loudly. “You have the worst luck that a person can have. Hell, I’d even say it’s a negative value.”

“That doesn’t make sense!” I shouted back.

“Sue me! I’m tired. Being away from my dungeon is starting to make me irritable.”

I looked over to Thomas. “Is that true?”

“Yes. Sort of like what you humans call obsessive compulsive disorder or cluster phobia,” he answered with a nod.

“Huh. Good to know,” I said with a chuckle.

“Why?! Why is that good to know?” Azaria demanded angrily. “The city is already in ruins. Most of the dungeons are under siege. It won’t be long before even my dungeon is taken and I’ll become some sort of slave or toy for this queen character.”

“It has gotten that bad?” Neo asked, surprising me. For how cold he sounded all the time, I found it strange that he actually seemed to care deeply for the city.

“Yes. My link my be weakened being in here, but I can still get images and brief messages from Zaria. We don’t have much longer before the rest of the humans are as good as dead.”

Neo tapped his foot in obvious irritation. I couldn’t blame him. This is starting to feel like a fool’s mission. Maybe it would have been better for us to make our stand outside in the city. “Ram the city into the island,” Neo suggested.

“What?” Azaria asked with disbelief.

“If the city is already taken, then use it against them. If Neo-Chicago can’t return to Earth, then there is no way in hell they are taking it easily.”

“Give… Give me a second,” Azaria said then closed her eyes. The Aether around her grew thicker. “I can do it, but are you sure? There are still a lot of humans alive and fighting.”

“Do it. If what you say is true, then it doesn’t matter. Better if you level up and bring this bitch down with us.”

The thought of my mom crossed my mind, but if the city was as bad as they said, then she was likely already dead. It was sad that I wouldn’t get to say goodbye to her, but this was nothing less than war. At least I wouldn’t have to deal with my sister. The demons and their queen wanted nothing more than all the humans’ dead and the dungeons enslaved.

Azaria nodded before she went back to concentrating. There was a rumble that we could feel even in this twisted space. A minute or two passed before a jolt that sent us all flying rippled through the dungeon as the city slammed into the bottom of the island. I dug my claws into the wall to keep my balance. Starburst had Azaria in his arms to protect her. She screamed obviously in a lot of pain as another more resounding scream went up from the dungeon around us. It looked like that hurt.

Cracks formed that quickly turned into raining debris as the dungeon was ripped apart. Dust flew freely before the shocks subsided. Azaria’s Aether grew much denser after a few seconds. When she opened her eyes, they were glowing. “Time to get even.” I managed to sense a flow of Aether to Ophelia before soldiers started to form in front of her. They looked like they had just come off a factory line.

When almost a hundred soldiers had been created, the flow to Ophelia stopped and a magic circle appeared in front of us. It quickly grew until only the very center was visible, the rest fading off into the walls. A large reptilian looking claw burst from the wall as it exploded to make room for the building sized monster that was attempting to crawl from the magic circle.

A huge lizard head emerged before a roar that threatened to burst my eardrums sounded out. The lizard had only managed to get its torso out when its head reached the next jailor. It didn’t even hesitate and chomped down on the creature, consuming it in a single bite. The dungeon couldn’t handle the creature that was emerging and was starting to bulge out. With another roar, it crashed through to the previous floor then through the side of the building.

“Is that?” I started to ask then shook my head. I decided that I’d rather not know.

The spikes along its back lit up before a blast of pink energy exploded from its mouth tearing even more of the dungeon apart. The giant monster finished pulling itself out of the magic circle and roared as if seeking a challenger. It swiped its massive claw and brought down a nearby building with ease.

“Come. The core is close. Now that my field is washing over the area, I am in much more control now,” Azaria said, her eyes still glowing. Looks like the anger she was suppressing from her parents’ death was starting to emerge.

“Remind me not to piss you off,” I said as I followed behind her.