Dungeon Master 2

by Eric Vall

  “Bite your tongue, you insolent fox,” the god bellowed, and Rana flinched in response. “You have no idea the skill, the very prowess that it took to create my puppets. They were nothing before I found them. Useless bags of flesh wandering around without purpose. I gave them a purpose. I made them beautiful, I turned them into masterpieces.” The god’s horrible teeth spread into a wicked grin, and his eyes glowed intensely. “You called them sick. That’s because you lack imagination. My puppets are works of art, each one unique and perfectly designed.”

  “How did you come by these bodies?” I asked bitterly.

  “Did you kill all of these people?” Carmedy said as she summoned up her courage and gestured to the army of human puppets.

  “Hmm, some were already dead, and others, well, they weren’t truly living anyway,” the deity said with a hoarse chuckle. “Living or dead, if I see a body part that catches my attention, I take what I need.”

  “You mean you chopped up dead bodies to stitch together these, these monsters?” Carmedy said with anger dripping from her voice. “And the others you killed them just to take their body parts?”

  “Such ignorance,” the deity hissed. “They’re not monsters, but yes, that is how I came by my… supplies.”

  “You can’t do this,” Carmedy said furiously. “It’s vile, it’s despicable it’s--”

  “It’s art!” the god shouted, and he raised his hands to manipulate his puppets. The bodies jerked into the air and began to swirl around us. “See how I make them dance? I suppose I can’t expect any of you to understand.” He let out a raspy sigh. “Such is my curse to be a misunderstood artist. But no matter. You may not appreciate my art, but you soon will be part of my collection.” The deity leaned his hooded head back and cackled.

  “I will give your lives meaning,” the deity wheezed as his yellow eyes roamed over Morrigan. “You are of high elvish descent are you not? I’ve never had the pleasure of working with elf parts before. Your white hair would look lovely stitched onto one of my puppets as would your pointy ears. Ahh and you’re a mage novice too, you’re a rare one indeed. It’s been long since I’ve come across skin with mage markings. Your body is quite perfect and elegant. Yes… I might just keep you intact as my plaything.”

  “How did you know that I am a novice?” Morrigan gasped, and I tried to stifle the surge of anger I felt when the disgusting being talked about making her his plaything.

  “And you!” The deity nodded to Rana, ignoring Morrigan’s question. “Fox parts are hard to come by. Your paws will do nicely. My goodness, how many pockets those paws have picked? That sorcerer picked the right fox to do his bidding.”

  “How do you…?” Rana began to ask, but the god continued.

  “Oh, I do hope your tail is in good condition. The last fox I used had lost his in battle.”

  “Lay one finger on my tail, and I’ll claw your eyes out,” Rana snarled, and she placed a paw on her tail protectively.

  “I’d prefer it if you didn’t struggle!” The god chortled. “I wouldn’t want such a fine tail to get damaged, but if you insist on being stubborn, I shall have to take it from you,” the deity said as he continued to make his puppets dance around us.

  “You won’t be taking anything from anyone,” I said, but a small part of me wanted to hear more from this twisted entity who seemed privy to such vast knowledge. I had no doubt that my power was hundreds of times greater than his, but there were still things to be learned from someone who had focused their magic in such a unique way.

  “Is that so?” the god narrowed his yellow eyes at me. “Hmm, there’s something different about you. I can feel the darkness pulsating inside of you. It rages within that husk you call a body,” the deity wheezed. “You’re like me, aren’t you?”

  “You compare a kitten to a tiger,” I laughed, and I noticed the shoulders of my minions relax a bit when they heard I was not worried.

  “Oh, but you are indeed like me, though not nearly as creative,” the god sang out, and he twitched his fingers so that his puppets moved to circle around me. “You are a fallen god just as I am, and you have minions just as I do, only mine have been made perfect by their creator, and yours are… pathetic.”

  The shrouded deity cackled and flashed his gruesome smile, and the human puppets whirled around me in a menacing dance. They bobbed up and down and extended their arms out to me, and I swatted some of their hands away as they reached to touch me. None of the soulless servants attempted to attack me though, they just seemed to be taunting me for their master’s own amusement.

  “I have no use for your body, I find it unimpressive,” the deity continued. “I will, however, relieve you of your head. I’m sure you won’t miss it, you’ve only just grown accustomed to having one.”

  “Ridiculous.” I twirled the God Slayer in my hands and brought its blade down hard on the ground. A sound like thunder erupted in the air, and the force of my weapon sent the puppets flying as they scattered in every direction. My minions looked on at the corpses that lay lifeless on the cavern floor, and their eyes were open with shock.

  “Did he kill them?” Carmedy whispered. No sooner had the feline spoken did the deity’s patched together minions spring to life. They writhed against the floor for a moment and then leapt to their feet all at once.

  “Foolish cat,” the god said with a maniacal laugh. “My pretty puppets can’t be slain. Many have tried, and when they did, well, you see what became of them.” A group of the hideous puppets bowed in unison as he referenced his revolting works.

  He wiggled his fingers to manipulate the invisible strings that bound his undead followers to him. With his movement, half of the puppets jerked into the air and landed behind us. Both groups began to march toward us, their soulless eyes fixed upon us. The bodies surrounded us and advanced with outstretched arms and heads tilted to one side. They moaned and snarled and gnashed their decayed jaws as they gazed at us with eyes devoid of life.

  “I suggest you surrender.” The deity snickered. “You’ll only prolong the inevitable if you choose to fight. One way or another, you will all become part of my collection.”

  The five of us formed a tight group and stood back to back to cover each of our angles.

  “Now what?” Rana hissed as she tightened her grip on her daggers.

  “We fight,” Annalíse said darkly as the puppets dragged toward us. I glanced at her and saw the flicker of savagery that always came to her eyes when she was faced with a challenge.

  “There’s like fifty of them,” Rana grumbled. “I’m not liking our odds.”

  “That just makes it more fun,” Annalíse said with a twisted grin.

  Chapter 9

  Without hesitation, Annalíse let out a battle cry, charged into the mob of puppets with her swords in each hand, and slashed at the disfigured creatures relentlessly. As two puppets attempted to grab her, the swordswoman sliced through their arms, and the limbs dropped to the ground. No blood spilled when the parts were severed, and the walking corpses merely snarled and continued toward her. The now limbless foes opened their decayed jaws wide while a few others slunk along the ground and grasped at her ankles in an attempt to pull her to the ground.

  The first of the armless puppet to try to bite down on Annalíse’s shoulder collected a kick to its stomach. It went flying backward as my minion tore Bloodscale’s blade through the other’s neck. The female warrior grunted as she continued to tear through one corpse after another, and wicked smile spread across her face as she dismembered three more puppets and beheaded another. She seemed to be enjoying herself.

  “Classic Annalíse,” Rana rolled her eyes as she jogged to join the fray. “She’s always gotta be in the middle of the fight.”

  “Rana, look out!” Carmedy cried in warning as the fox ran toward the throng of snarling, gaping, undead creatures. Rana looked over her shoulder to see two puppets raise into the air and fling themselves at her. The fox narrowed her eyes and stood her ground. J
ust as the twisted puppets were about to jump on her, the fox ducked down, rolled out of the way, and came back to her feet in one smooth motion. The puppets crashed into each other and flopped to the ground.

  “You’re a spry one, aren’t you?” the god wheezed in amusement. “I admire your spirit, but no more games. Now be a good little fox and stay still so I can take that lovely tail of yours.” He wriggled his fingers and swayed his hands, and within seconds, the puppets who had attacked Rana were back on their feet. Then they snarled and lurched toward her as they gnashed their teeth.

  With alarming speed, Rana sent a series of well-executed punches into one of the puppet’s chest and head. She grabbed hold of its arm, twisted it around behind its back and severed its neck with her elven dagger. As the head thudded to the ground, and the corpse crumpled in a heap, the fox crouched down to the floor and swept her leg across the ankles of her other attacker which sent him crashing down. No sooner had the puppet collided with the floor, the fox-tailed woman pounced on top of him and stuck her dagger in between his lifeless eyes.

  “You know, I hate to do this to you guys,” Rana stood to her feet as she spoke to the now-motionless corpse. “You’ve already been carved up like a roasted chicken, but no one’s putting their hands on this tail.” The fox smirked and swished her tail in the air as though to emphasize her point and then joined Annalíse in the mob of undead underlings.

  Just then, something grabbed me from behind. One of the human puppets had leapt onto my back and wrapped her mismatched arms around my neck in an attempt to strangle me.

  I casually grabbed hold of the woman’s wrists with one mighty hand and tore the corpse’s limbs away like I was pulling apart an over ripe fig. As the wretched creature fell to the floor, her arms were left in my hands. I tossed them away and walked past her to confront the dungeon’s deity directly. As I strode by, the armless female bared her teeth at me, hissed at me, and attempted to crawl toward me using only her legs. I ignored her and pointed the God Slayer threateningly at the puppet master god who hovered in the air above me.

  “This ends now.” I spun my weapon in my hands and channeled my dark energy into it. The halberd began to glow with a sinister red light as my power fused with it. A humming sound ripped through the air as I spun faster and faster and gathered power. A disc of crimson light formed around the circumference of my spinning God Slayer, and the dark energy pulsated within it and myself as my palms tingled from the sensation of the fusion of our power.

  This insufferable god would know my wrath. My weapon forged from dark magic would extinguish his soul, and his ashes would be spilled throughout the very dungeon that he called home.

  With a fierce cry, I released the power, and the scarlet colored disc rocketed toward the floating puppet master. His yellow eyes shone beneath his dark hood as his lips formed a self-satisfied smirk. Just as my deadly disc of energy was about to split the puppet master in twain, he yanked suddenly on his strings, and a group of his puppets were pulled into the air to form a wall in front of their master. The corpses lined up side by side, linked arms, and formed row after row one until a barrier of ten corpses long and five deep stood between me and the puppet master.

  My spinning disc struck the human wall, tore the puppets into pieces, and sent their body parts flying through the air. The energy of the attack was diffused, absorbed by the five-body deep wall, but a crackling edge of the disc managed to get beneath the deity’s hood and cut into where I presumed his cheek was. He yelped from the sudden impact, but then his eyes shifted back to the same look of defiance and complacency that they’d held before, and he shot me an evil grin.

  He thought my attack hadn’t done nearly as much damage as intended.

  He was wrong. That had only been the smallest fraction of my power, and I had thrown out the magical attack to see how he had responded. I wanted to learn how he used his powers, so that when I took them, I wouldn’t have to start from an uneducated level of learning.

  Still, I didn’t need to let the idiot know what my plans were, so I scowled up at the shrouded god as Carmedy breathed from beside me, “They protected him. He treated them as nothing more than meat shields, and they protected him.” As she spoke, she hurled one of her pouches at a puppet that clawed at her, and upon impact, the stitched monstrosity was immediately engulfed in orange flames.

  “Of course they did!” The deity burst into raspy uncontrollable giggles. “I am their master, they do as I tell them. Now, do you see? Resistance is futile, I cannot be beaten!”

  “Don’t speak as though these people have submitted to you,” I snarled. “These wretched creatures have no will of their own. They have no minds, no souls. You control their bodies and force them to do your bidding. You were a god once, did no one follow you willingly and offer their reverence? Is this why you must create these puppets? Because no one would acknowledge you or worship you otherwise? You disgust me, true deities didn’t have to resort to such vile tricks to obtain followers. They achieve that by a combination of fear and respect.”

  The deity’s eyes narrowed, and he bared his jagged teeth at me. “You know nothing!” the god bellowed.

  “How are we supposed to beat him if the puppets protect him?” Carmedy asked fearfully as she threw another explosive bundle at one of our nearby undead enemies.

  “Uh, guys, that’s not the only problem that we have,” Rana called out in a very concerned tone.

  Carmedy and I turned to see Rana and Annalíse standing before piles of slain puppets while fending off the still-animated ones in an effort to keep them off Morrigan, who seemed to be standing with her hands at her side. Heads, limbs, and other appendages were strewn across the cavern floor. At first, I didn’t see the trouble that Rana had spoken of, it looked as though they had managed to defeat most of the undead beings.

  Then I saw it. A few severed arms begin to twitch back to life, then one by one, the other dismembered limbs began to tremor and gather together. The fingers of the torn arms wriggled and dug their misshapen nails into the ground to drag themselves across the floor. Legs rocked themselves so that they stood upright and slowly hopped to join the other appendages. Puppets that had been severed below the torso crawled along the ground and screeched savagely. Two legs rolled toward one of the torsos and attached themselves to form a complete body.

  “They’re stitching themselves back together,” Carmedy whispered, and her green eyes bulged at the sight, but the puppets didn’t stop at reassembling themselves. As the pieced-together body stood to its feet, two more arms dragged themselves toward it. The limbs crawled up the puppet’s body and fixed themselves beneath the arms that were already there. My expression grew dark as I realized what was happening.

  The puppets weren’t just piecing themselves back together, they were merging together to form larger and more fearsome creatures. Carmedy gasped as a severed head rolled past her and knocked against the feet of another puppet that had already put itself back together. The undead creature bent down to pick up the head and pressed it onto the monstrosity’s shoulder beside its other head. Both sets of eyes blinked in unison and let out a blood-curdling shriek.

  “Isn’t it magnificent?” the puppet master god cried out. “No other god can perform the miracles that I can. I warned you that your efforts would prove useless. Your incessant struggling only fuels the endless cycle of art, the back and forth between creation and destruction. I created something beautiful, and you destroyed it, only for my masterpieces to be transformed into something even more breathtaking.” As the deity wheezed, his puppets continued to piece themselves into even more horrifying beasts.

  “We can’t keep doing this,” Rana yelled as she sliced off the head of another puppet that lunged at her. “If we keep fighting them this way, they’re only going to keep doing, well, whatever that is.” The fox gestured to a human puppet that had just stuck two extra arms into its shoulder and side.

  “If we do nothing, they’ll overtake us,” Annalíse
shouted as she brought her sword down on the head of one of the soulless monsters. “Morrigan, why are you just standing there? Do something!” The swordswoman frantically gestured for the tattooed woman to join the battle before she sliced through the torso of another puppet.

  The pale elf still stood unmoving to one side while the rest of us had dealt with the relentless puppets. “There is nothing I can do.” Morrigan shook her head with a look of shame. “I cannot perform soul exorcism on these creatures as they are not living, and the Death Fog spell that Master taught me only works on living beings. I am not useful to you in this battle.”

  “But you can be useful, Morrigan,” I called out to the white-haired woman as I used my halberd to cut down a puppet that flung itself at me. “Attacking them with mere weapons isn’t going to suffice. You must use death projection to disintegrate the bodies.”

  “I cannot!” Morrigan shook her head again. “I have never used this technique in battle. There is too much chaos, too many enemies. I cannot risk harming one of you.”

  “While we appreciate the sentiment, I don’t think we have much choice right now,” Rana said as she kicked away a lone arm that clutched at her ankle.

  “I have an idea,” Annalíse said with a raspy grunt as she skewered a puppet’s head with Bloodscale. “Master, Rana, and I can cut them down and toss them out of the way, so that you can follow behind to finish them off, Morrigan. We can all work together to get rid of these puppets, and you won’t have to worry about putting us in harm’s way.” The female warrior side stepped a corpse who clawed at her face and ran her sword across its stitched together jugular.

  “That’s an excellent plan.” I nodded to Annalíse.

  “I am not sure that I--” Morrigan started to say.

  “You’ll be fine,” I interrupted. “As Annalíse said, they’ll toss the puppets out the way. The rest of us will be out of your range. As long as you focus, there shouldn’t be a problem. We’ve practiced this countless times, you can do this.”