Dao 3 Chapter 30 (Patreon)

Blair burst forward, wrapped in diamond armor.

The queen separated herself from the burning birthing section, and a pair of buzzing wings flared out of her back as she met Blair’s charge head on. As they collided, the queen sent Blair backwards, bouncing along the ground.

Dar paused for a moment to make sure she was okay, but Blair kicked to her feet. Only her armor nicked.

Knowing that she would be fine, Dar started his own fight, jumping into the air as the ground beneath him cracked. He was filled with so much power, so much mana, that his body defied the limits of his mind.

Gripping the black ax handle in his hand, he swiped at the first surprised beetle.

All that could be seen was a black arc in the air as the beetle exploded. Dar twisted himself to the side to recalibrate when he’d been able to use more force than he’d expected.

Two more black beetles took the opportunity and slammed into his back, rocketing him back down to the ground, where the earth itself opened up and tried to swallow him.

Dar struggled, but the two beetles pushed him through the earth like it was water before darting off and flying back up through the soil, leaving him behind.

Dar screamed, buried over a dozen feet deep in the ground and barely able to move. He fought against the weight above him as he tried to move just his arms.

But being that deep in the ground was no joke. He had thousands of pounds of resistance from the earth above him.

If it weren’t for the enchantments on his body, he would have already been crushed. And releasing them to use a dao would put him in danger. But no enchantment made him able to breathe through the ground. Time was running out as the air in his lungs became a valuable commodity.

Dar decided to take a chance. He pushed on his molten dao and formed a shell of lava around him even as his enchantments cut out when he diverted his mana. There was a crushing pain for just a moment, but that was worth extracting himself from the ground.

He hurled himself and the molten shell out of the ground, taking a deep breath of air.

The beetles had forgotten about him. He watched as Cherry stood amid eight massive roots, riding one and using the other seven to keep the beetles at bay.

Blair was still getting pushed back, but she was bouncing to her feet with each exchange, her armor growing back to recover any damages. Though she was looking a little dizzy.

Dar channeled his anger and slammed a column of lava up from the ground, catching one of the beetles that was fighting Cherry. Then he lifted the column into the air and slammed it back down on the queen.

Before he could see the result of his attack, three of the remaining beetles broke off from Cherry and dove at him.

Not wanting a repeat of the prior attack, Dar stuck with his dao, exploding columns of lava up at the three oncoming beetles.

Unfortunately, they were fast. They darted out of the way even as earthen spikes threatened Dar.

He had to jump and dodge, as it seemed like the earth itself had become his enemy. One spike caught him in the side, tearing a nasty gash before he could switch his mana to power his enchantments.

With his enchantments active, he shot off the ground, tackling one beetle mid air.

It flailed and tried to bite him, but Dar snapped his fist into its face, dazing it, and switched his mana back to his dao, wrapping them both in a molten shell. He managed to cook the beetle before they hit the ground.

Dar’s enchantments flared back to life as he hit the ground and rolled to his feet. He got his footing just as the other two beetles pounded into where he’d landed.

Dar clutched at his ribs and came away with a blood-stained hand. The spike had done some damage.

The two remaining beetles faced off against him, their wings fluttering in preparation for flight, but they hadn’t lifted off the ground.

But their standoff was broken as the queen screamed, startling both Dar and the beetles.

Dar recovered first, his ax swinging for one of the distracted beetles.

But it sank into the ground as a pillar pushed Dar up, throwing his swing wide over its head and putting Dar on a pedestal. It was the perfect position for the other beetle to attack him, so Dar tumbled off the pillar, drawing the ax back into his inner world as both of them came at Dar once again.

Something crashed into Dar’s side, and he found himself face to face with the queen as she plowed him into the dirt. Her claws raked over him and destroyed his clothes, but she only scratched his skin, drawing thin lines of blood.

His enchantments held up against her.

The queen screamed in frustration and flung herself off of Dar.

Dar realized with satisfaction that she was looking extra crispy from his prior attack. He could hurt her. They might just stand a chance.

“Dar. She’s giving up on me.” Blair shouted.

With horror, he knew where she’d be going next given her attack on him hadn’t worked either.

“Cherry. Run.” Dar screamed.

His dryad only had a moment to turn before the queen was on her.

Dirt exploded in the air as the queen attacked.

He only had a moment of terror before Cherry’s hair fluttered out from behind another tree, clear of the dust cloud.

The queen shot out of the dust cloud, attacking that tree only for Cherry to appear from another. Cherry flitted from tree to tree, moving towards the forest.

The devil screamed in rage and went on a rampage, destroying every tree in sight as Cherry escaped back into the forest, where she’d be far stronger.

After he’d gotten over his initial shock, Dar got his head back in the fight. His enchantments flared to life as he jumped into the nearest beetle, throwing all of his momentary fear into a fist that popped the beetle like an old grape.

The other beetle came swinging, but a diamond spear burst through its chest before it could finish its punch. The diamond tip of the spear swelled, and spikes of diamond ripped the devil apart from the inside.

Dar looked over to see how Cherry was faring. The three devils she’d been fighting earlier were making their way towards the forest, chasing after her and the queen. And Dar’s favorite dryad was playing hide and go seek among the trees.

With her ability to pass between the trees, she would be nearly impossible for the devil queen to catch.

But the queen and the beetles had a solution for that. They were smashing all the trees.

“We need to stop the queen. Think you can hold her still for a moment?” Dar asked Blair as he grabbed her hips and launched both of them towards the forest.

“When she realized she couldn’t hurt me, the queen just stopped fighting me and went for you guys. I think unless I can harm her, it’s going to be hard to hold her attention. But she’s just too fast.” Blair growled in frustration.

“Then we’ll just have to get her attention. Hold on.” Dar landed and lifted Blair up, one hand steadying her stomach and the other cupping behind her rear as he pulled her back.

Blair’s eyes went wide. “What are you doing?”

“Go!” Dar threw Blair like a rocket.

Diamond wrapped around her as she embodied a diamond spear before hurtling into the forest and crashing into the queen. She was a lethal missile as she crashed into the queen and ripped her off her feet, hurling the two of them through another half a dozen trees.

That should solve Blair’s inability to catch the speedy devil.

Dar could see diamond spikes fly, erupting from where they crashed as he hurried to catch up.

Blair flew backwards through the air a moment later as a mangled devil queen crawled out of the divot in the ground. Spikes of diamonds still stuck in her broken wings.

“Got her good.” Blair gave him a thumbs up as he caught up.

“Now we just need to finish this.” Dar grabbed her arm and hauled her to her feet.

Cherry appeared next to them. “I can’t believe you threw Blair.”

“It worked.” Blair smiled. “I was able to get my hands on her long enough to drive those spikes through her wings.”

But as she said it, she stumbled just a little, her eyes losing focus. Dar realized throwing her probably hadn’t been great for her equilibrium.

At that point, the three beetles reached them. They flew down and tried to block for the queen, but Dar was having none of that.

Dar drew on his dao and made a wall of magma in the air, dropping it down on the devils.

Dust and steam filled the air as Dar watched, waited, and listened for what happened to his opponents.

He didn’t have to wait long. The three beetles shot into the sky, carrying the queen as she started puking.

No, not puking, Dar realized. She was wrapping herself in gunk.

“After them.” Dar was already grabbing both of the girls and using his enchantments to their max as he kicked off the ground and cleared a hundred feet in a single bound Then he jumped again, trying to keep pace with the three flying devils even as they were burdened from the queen who was rapidly wrapping herself in a cocoon.

“What is it doing?” Cherry said, disgust in her voice.

Dar dreaded what might come of it. “It’s a cocoon. Either to heal… or change.” He said the last with hope that he was wrong.

“Doesn’t matter. We will kill it all the same.” Blair narrowed her eyes. “Throw me again. I’ve got this.”

“You sure? It looked like the last one scrambled you a little.”

“Just dizzy. I’m fine now. Throw me before they get too far ahead.”

Blair was right. Even with Dar’s enchantments, the devils were out pacing Dar and the girls, rapidly getting ahead.

Dar landed with a thud and let go of Cherry as he wound up and threw Blair for all he was worth.

The air ripped as she flew through it. This time she was already forming a spearhead of diamond in front of her to help with the air resistance.

Cherry caught Dar as he sagged after the throw. “You’re using a lot of strength.”

He pulled himself up from his moment of exhaustion. “Keeping this enchantment at this level is exhausting. But we need to finish this.” He drew upon all the surrounding mana he could and tried to fill himself up, despite already feeling like he was bursting at the seams.

He couldn’t afford to be tired.

He watched as the Blair spear impacted the cluster of flying devils and spikes of diamond bloomed in the air.

Dar grabbed Cherry and returned to his massive leaping strides. He tried to catch up as the three beetles and the queen’s cocoon fell out of the sky.

This was their chance.

“Put me down.” Cherry shouted over the wind.

Dar didn’t have time to do it gently, dropping her as he landed again and pushed off, chasing the devil queen.

Cherry flickered in the corner of his eye as she passed between trees, rapidly overtaking him and shooting forward to the next battle.

He could already hear the screams of beetles and explosions of earth as Blair fought three devils on her own.

Cherry’s battle cry joined the mix as thuds of wood joined the fray and Dar finally reached the battle.

The beetles were desperately trying to keep the two women off of the cocoon, throwing their bodies and blocking hits instead of really fighting.

Dar drew the black ax from his inner world and took his moment of surprise to attack the cocoon. One swift swing was all he needed to end this.

His ax bit into the cocoon, piercing only a foot deep before it stopped.

A beetle tackled him to the ground just as the cocoon exploded, and a monstrous devil came out, holding the business end of Dar’s ax.

He barely recognized the devil that had emerged.

The queen unfurled herself. She no longer had any resemblance to a human. She had two rear legs that were more befitting a grasshopper, with a long back now covered by fully healed wings.

Her head had elongated, and sharp mandibles had covered her previously human face. And two pairs of arms, one pair of mantis-like scythes, the other closer to human arms, came out of her torso.

It was a grotesque amalgamation of an insect trying to take the best of anything it could think of and slap it together.

But she was thin, almost malformed. Dar had a feeling the transformation hadn’t completely finished.

Dar pushed the beetle that had tackled him off and rolled to his feet as the queen snatched up that same beetle and opened her mouth. Staring into her mouth, it was as if it was a black hole, devouring it in a blink of the eye.

The other two beetles flew to her, and she devoured them both, too. As she did, her body filled out, suddenly looking far healthier.

The queen took his ax and tried to break it, but thankfully the mystical weapon held up under her strength. So instead, she tossed it behind her and far away from the battle.

“Dar, how did she change so quickly?” Blair asked.

“Hell if I know.” He thought back to how quickly the larva had been maturing by the hive and wasn’t surprised this was in line with the same dao. “It’ll die all the same. Cherry, hang back and try to tie it down with roots. Blair, you are in front with me.”

Blair didn’t waste a moment jumping in with a spiked club of diamond. She threw her weight into the swing, trying to end it quickly.

Dar was right behind her. The queen might have tossed his ax aside, but he pulled out a heavy sword from his inner world.

When he’d tried to use the sword before, it had been too heavy. He’d been baffled then at how he had once been able to wield it.

But now he knew.

With all the mana he was pumping into his enchantments, he was a juggernaut. The swords that had previously given him trouble were like toothpicks as he swung for the queen.

Her mantis arms snapped out and blocked both of their attacks while her human-like arms tried to grab Dar.

He pushed off with his sword to get clear before she could get a hold of him. Thinking back to how the queen had devoured the beetles, Dar couldn’t help but feel a cold sweat creep down his back at the idea of those arms getting a hold of him and bringing him to that black hole of a mouth. He did not want to become insect food.

Cherry’s vines sprang up around the queen’s massive coiled legs, but the queen sprang forward with such speed that the wind of her passing nearly blew Dar away.

Cherry barely managed to escape into the treeline before the Queen nearly reached her.

Blair screamed and threw everything she had at the queen. Weapons of diamond rained down on the queen for just a moment before one of her coiled legs shot out, catching Blair in the chest and launching her into a high arc.

Dar wasn’t worried about Blair. She’d land relatively unharmed, but it would take her a minute to get back to the fight.

The queen’s head was already tossing back and forth, looking for Cherry.

Dar was somewhat offended that the damn bitch wasn’t focused on him.

So Dar summoned a black spear from his inner world and hurled it at the devil. That got her attention alright.

She blurred from that spot to one on his right. The next thing Dar knew, he was flying backwards.

Dar crashed into the ground, skidding along it and digging a ditch as he went before finally stopping. He noticed the light from his enchantments was flickering. He was dangerously low on mana.

The queen was back to focusing on Cherry, running through the cluster of trees as Cherry led her on a merry chase.

So Dar took the moment to let go of all the mana he was pumping into his enchantments.

Instead, he just breathed, trying to draw in as much mana as he could to restore himself and rally for one more shot. He could see Blair sparkling in the distance as she hustled to get back to the fight.

He also made a mental note that Tami needed to share her dao of speed if they made it through the battle. The devil queen was just too damn fast for them.

Blowing out another breath, Dar prepared himself. He didn’t have any more break to take. The queen was about done with the cluster of trees, and Cherry needed a distraction.

Dar didn’t activate his enchantments this time, instead, he drew on his dao. It was a risk, but trying the same thing was insanity. His molten dao had a better chance at harming the queen.

Cherry must have felt him ready himself again, because she darted through the trees towards him, leading the devil queen his way.

Dar blasted globes of molten lava at the devil queen, who dismissively tried to bat them away. But as they splattered over her arms, little tongues of fire flicked out and she screamed, flinging it off.

She tried to remove it before it did any more damage, but Dar wasn’t about to give her the chance. Two hands of magma burst out of the ground before him as they tried to grab at the devil queen.

He cursed as she darted away, once again just too fast.

But he’d been watching her movements by that point. As powerful as those two back legs were, they worked in amazingly fast, yet only straight lines.

Just before she did her second dash to him, Dar threw up a wall of magma and dropped to the ground.

The queen exploded through his wall, missing him as her scythe-like arms swished above his head and flung magma everywhere.

Dar let the wall of molten material fall on top of him and mute the queen’s screams as lava coated her, burning her.

From his hiding place, he summoned a pillar of lava up from the ground, grabbing and trying to hold the queen in place. The thick, viscous material wrapped around her legs, and Dar put all of his effort in pushing her up off the group. It gave her no purchase to move and use those powerful legs as it cooked her alive.

Despite all the power and fortitude the grand devil had shown in the fight, very few things could withstand being submerged in lava.

Dar held onto his dao, filling it with all the available mana he had as he controlled it, working to keep her powerful legs from touching anything solid.

Squeezing himself dry of every drop of mana he had, Dar’s focus narrowed down to the singular goal of keeping it trapped. It took his full attention, all sound and even his vision falling away.

It wasn’t until a diamond lance poked into his molten lava shelter that he startled and removed himself from the lava, trusting Blair.

“She’s dead, you can stop now.” Blair said. She was panting, but smiling.

Dar looked over to confirm it and took a few steps to get a better view. The queen devil was well and truly cooking through. He let the lava go, dismissing it as he lay down on the ground, letting his body collapse into the grass. His mind was comfortably blank as exhaustion took him.