Dark Fate, Chapter 99 (Patreon)

Chapter 99 – Death in the Night

You   have entered the Iahab Allah dungeon.

The   dungeon core has sensed a dungeon foe in the dungeon.

Stepping through the edge of the dungeon’s influence confirmed a few things. First, a dungeon didn’t automatically recognize dungeon foes. On the shuttle, we had been in stealth, which clearly had kept the dungeon from recognizing me as a Dungeon Foe. Now that I was on foot, and not hiding, it saw me plainly. Which brought up the question of whether there were skills I could use to hunt in dungeons while masking my title somehow. Something for future research, no doubt.

Secondly, it was immediately obvious that the dungeon had made a mistake. The warding was two-way! Yes, this prevented things like the weather outside from affecting those within the dungeon’s domain, but it also meant that the guards couldn’t spot us until we were on the inside!

The third thing I realized is that this dungeon was not just some hole in the ground. This realization was made apparent by the guard towers and defensive walls that had been put up around the area. This was no longer a mere training camp. It was a fortress.

Of course, surprise works both ways. We were surprised to see a fortress, but the guards on the nearest tower were surprised to see us, too. The difference was that, while they were tired and bored from long shifts guarding a post that was never attacked, we were expecting action, and so we moved first.

With a flap of my wings, I launched myself into the air. The guards had a crew-served machine gun, mounted on a tripod, which they were wheeling around to face me. I didn’t know what that gun could do, but I wasn’t about to let them start shooting just so I could find out. I landed atop the tower, and my scythe took the two guards’ heads before they could do more than raise the alarm.

Looking down, I saw that the guards were actually humans. Or, more precisely, the same human. Both of the guards had the same face, same build, same everything. And the blonde-haired, blue-eyed, white as hell men were wearing what looked to be a very good copy of US Army uniforms.

Loot:

Colt   1991 Pistol x2

Box   Magazine (7x .45 ACP rounds) x4

20 sp

As I reached down to check them, loot screens came up, sending a pair of loaded Colt 1991 pistols with two spare magazines of ammunition into my inventory. The next instant, the bodies disappeared, dissolving into mana. That could mean only one thing. The dungeon had created humans to play at being American soldiers.

“A… human dungeon? I know there are goblin or orc dungeons, but a human one?”

I looked over to see Zoe, in her Lamia form, carrying Rachel. The rest of my group could jump or fly the distance easily enough, but the Priestess was not so gifted. I’d have to figure something out for that, eventually, but now was not the time.

Focusing on Zoe, I smiled, grimly, “Dungeons with sentient races as their starters are rare, but they exist. There are two types of dungeons that have them. One, the ‘Slayer’ type, gets stronger primarily through deaths in the dungeon, so it can, very, very rarely, have sentients like humans as their starters. Goblins or Kobolds, or their galactic equivalents, are also possible, but those tend to be monster warrens rather than actual fortified positions.

“Of course, sentient monsters are more standard with a ‘City’ dungeon, and are, in fact, one of the default options. However, City dungeons are so incredibly rare that there may be fewer than one or two per planet, if my memory serves. The fact that this dungeon is not only hosting the terrorists as a training camp, but has organized defenses and human monsters guarding the walls? That means it is a City type. A perversion of that type, no doubt, but it is what it is.”

Our conversation was cut short by the staccato roar of weapons fire. The alarm had gone out, after all, and people were starting to overcome their surprise, and looking to stop the intruders. A bullet impacted the wall near us, telling me that it was time to move.

“Split into two teams, and sweep the walls! Make sure to close the gates, if you can! I don’t want anyone coming in or out! I’ll draw their attention to the center!”

With that basic plan in place, I leapt, laughing, from the wall, and descended upon the organized fort behind it. As I fell, I set my scythe alight with Hellfire. That showed my position, but that much was fine. The weapons these guards had could not contend with my defenses.

Soon, the cries of surprise turned to roars of anger and vows of revenge. The ‘clones’, as I was calling them for the moment, knew no fear, and had no concept of defeat. I was the enemy, and that was all that mattered.

But they were not able to hurt them, and every kill enhanced my stamina and restored my energy. The barracks were cleared out, as were the armory, and the command post. Bodies fell all about me, but the dungeon threw all the bodies it had at me, trying to overwhelm me.

It failed.

The last of the surface defenders fell next to the staircase that would lead down, to the training facility. Thankfully, dungeon writing was usually translated automatically to the reader’s language, and this dungeon hadn’t changed that. So, I knew exactly where I needed to go.

“D-demon!”

I looked, and saw that my last kill was not quite dead yet. Oh, his torso and his hips were currently lying on the floor, with a good three feet of space between them, but the human monster was not dead yet. More importantly, that wasn’t a human voice, despite the human’s mouth moving. That voice had magic, and power, behind it. It had to be the dungeon itself.

“Oh, is this the dungeon? Pretty strange for one of you lot to be awake so soon. Tell me, are you a slave, or do you help these terrorists willingly?”

The human smirked, the effect more gruesome due to the blood falling from the corners of its mouth. “Allahu akbar!” And then the soldier monster released its dead man’s switch.

KA-BOOM!

The suicide vest he had been wearing went off. Unfortunately for the dungeon, the vest used explosives and materials from the lower-half of the first Tier. Very deadly for the level 1-10 crowd, and would still ruin a level 20’s day, especially at close range. But I was level 30, in a Tier 3 race, with stats that were massively boosted by my time as the Black Knight.

*cough* *cough*

My defenses tanked the shrapnel part of the explosion, as they were meant to. The actual explosion, on the other hand, was elemental damage, which was harder to ignore. Unless, of course, you had the Shadow Armor spell. With my current mana, I reduced the damage taken from incoming attacks by 3120, after other modifiers. The explosion itself was rated for 3000 damage, according to my system logs, and the pieces of building that fell on my head were only 1000 or so each, after my defenses. All of them below the point where they would even make me take damage.

I did, however, have to contend with the dust and sand kicked up by the explosion, which made the whole ‘breathing’ process more complicated than it needed to be. More importantly, the explosion messed up my hair! Really, there was a limit to how much rudeness. I was willing to accept from someone when breaking into their home, and this dungeon was crossing the line.

“Oh well, that’ll just make the question of whether to kill it or not an easy answer.”

As the dust settled, my girls all made their way to where I was, in the center of the camp. All of them were smirking at me. However, Talia was the first to speak.

“Master, did you really need to go that far?”

“Hey! That last part wasn’t me! I wasn’t the one who dressed an officer in a suicide vest, and set it off! That was the Dungeon, controlling all these clones.”

“I am confused,” Rachel said. “If this dungeon is home to a terrorist training camp, why are the walls manned with what looks like American troops?”

Ezraekiel laughed at that. “Oh, so many reasons. First, if anyone comes in, and sees Americans, then survivors are going to get confused, wondering why they were there. And having the ‘infidel demons’ fight off other infidels to protect them from attack is some choice irony, and can be used for propaganda.”

I nodded. “Yes, but I think the real reason is simpler. The dungeon used these guards because they are what it had. And it made these guards so that the terrorists could get used to fighting, and killing, American troops, probably in a variety of situations. Killing their way in might even be a test for recruits getting sent here from other camps.”

“That’s so dishonorable,” Hibari frowned.

I nodded, solemly. “Well, that’s war, when you’re an underdog. Tactics like that are what guerillas and terrorists have used since the dawn of civilization.” I let a wicked grin cross my face. “But that doesn’t mean I’m not going to slaughter them all. Come!”

Together, we went through the portal, and into the dungeon proper. Instantly, we found ourselves in a different area. A ‘welcome room’, if you will, for either receiving new recruits, or to receive invaders. And a reception was definitely ready for us!

There looked to be a hundred of them, arrayed all around the sides of the wide-open room. Some standing on the ground, others looking down from a balcony. Instantly, I could tell that these were not the dungeon’s creatures. For one thing, they were all too brown to match the Aryan Knockoff Brigade topside. And for another, I could feel the fear and hatred in the air, like it was a palpable thing. These fighters had come to learn to fight the demons, and now a demon had come for them!

“LAY DOWN YOUR WEAPONS AND WE LET THE WOMEN LIVE!”

Kameel   al-Nassif

Human   Male

Level   25 Warlord / Mullah

Titles:   Charismatic

Highest   Attribute: CHA

Market   Value: 26500 gp

I smiled as I noted the one who spoke. A little older than the others. Some grey getting into his beard, too. Probably hadn’t changed too much when the System came online, to keep looking like someone to be respected. At least on the outside.

“Shields, girls.” Those who could, created magic shields to cover the group, while I stepped forward, drawing all eyes on me. “Kameel al-Nassif! Your days of being the misguided spawn of a camel-fucking whore are at an end! You, and all your followers, are accused of being assholes who have no better value in life than to serve as XP for those with the strength to take it! Accordingly, you have been judged by the Demon King of Ceres, and found unworthy of continued existence! Your sentence is death. Sentence to be carried out immediately.”

And then, I moved.

In a flash, I was amongst the fighters. They had System weapons, and System armor, but my blade, wreathed in shredded it, burning their body and soul. Men fell with every swing of my spinning scythe, like wheat at harvest time. The Warlord tried to direct his troops, get them to fire, but I was already too close for those nearest me to use their weapons without worrying about friendly fire, and the girls were putting all their energy into shield spells, keeping out the hail of bullets. He didn’t have long to worry about that, however. My blade swung up, under his guard, and impaled him through the gut, stabbing up into his ribcage and puncturing a lung, burning the flesh around the wound as it went, but never cauterizing it. However, he was not dead yet, and my swing lifted him up, off the ground, like a lever, and sent him face first into one of his men, hard enough to pulp both their skulls on impact.

Once he fell, the whole group fell into disarray. The girls, seeing their moment, dropped their shields and went on the attack, spreading into the crowd. A defeat became a rout, but there was nowhere for the fighters to run, and no one to lead them. The rout became a massacre.

And then silence fell, as the last terrorist breathed their last. I took a deep breath, and watched as the others went about looting the corpses, which did not immediately disappear into shards of mana. The terrorists might be dead, but the battle was not yet done.

I still had a dungeon to kill, after all.