by Ryan DeBruyn
Azrael looked at the group. Ogma was likely too powerful already to have the armor be anything other than a hindrance to his speed—once he recovered. That left him, Jophi, or Dara for the armor. The two ladies were both ranged fighters though, and that meant the one who would benefit most from the Ether-Tech gear was him. Still, taking the gear would likely spell the death of Bat.
“Hold on to the armor for now, Bat. I may take it from you later,” said Azrael.
Bat nodded but looked unsure. “Okay, well, I agree that we should move away from the stairs. I will let everyone know what I see before we reach it.”
Azrael looked at Ogma, “Can you recover as we walk?”
Ogma nodded and pushed himself off the wall in response.
Every tunnel was likely a death sentence but maybe they could avoid some of the stronger creatures. Azrael nodded and looked back to the entrance hallway. Verimy had given his life to buy them this chance; they needed to move forward.
Bat went to go pick up Dara and had his hands slapped away. Dara looked around herself, her eyes fogged over but clearing quickly. She shot to her feet and shouted, “Where is Verimy?”
Azrael understood her anger at the man. Verimy had taken away her choice. Perhaps saved her life, but she had been ready to die by his side. Verimy had robbed her of that decision. Azrael pointed above them, “Verimy is keeping the guards busy with his Demon Hunter skill.”
He expected more anger, perhaps for Dara to rush back down the hallway. Azrael did not expect her to fall back to the floor and cry. Crying wasn’t even the word for it. She hugged her knees to her chest and bawled. Azrael watched as Jophi went to sit beside her and hugged the woman close. Similar to what she had done with him. Azrael had been taught not to create strong connections with people. Again, he was reminded why. Dara, one of the strongest women he had ever known, was a puddle of worthless on the floor. A lesson he had never fully understood finally made complete sense. Be grateful for the people around you, enjoy their company, and respect their contribution to your life, but in the end, they were just chess pieces.
The main point of that lesson had been to make sure you can drop any person out of your life and leave when it becomes necessary. Azrael finally saw the reason why close attachments were a weakness, and felt sad to see Dara hadn’t taken that sage lesson to heart.
Azrael felt a huge knot form in his stomach and wondered when the last time he ate was. They had breakfast that morning, hadn’t they? Yeah, it was gruel, unfortunately, and not Louis’ great cooking. That was probably where the knot was coming from.
Azrael wondered why he had forgiven his trainer so fast. His anger at the man flared and banished his hunger. Verimy had been weak and likely was up above sacrificing his life to make it right. That was the warrior’s way.
Strangely, no one disrupted Dara in her floor puddle. They appeared to want to allow her to regain her composure by herself. No one broke the silence that seemed to surround them like his Soul Cloak could. Azrael had examined his feelings and come to his conclusion. Perhaps that was what everyone else was doing now for Dara?
Azrael shrugged and moved away down the hallway, catching Jophi giving him a look out of the corner of his eye. Somehow the look conveyed a deep sadness that he couldn’t explain. Dara and Jophi had barely known each other and still Jophi felt for the other woman. Bat followed Azrael, and wrung his hands as they walked.
Azrael asked, “Do you sense something nearby?”
Bat shook his head, his long-ears almost slapping him in the side of his face. Then reached out and patted Azrael twice on the shoulder before squeaking, “I am sorry for your loss. Also, I never really thanked you for keeping me… umm, alive. Thanks for taking me with you through all of this.”
Azrael rolled his eyes and shrugged. “Don’t mention it. Let’s keep exploring for now. Tell me if you sense anything, okay?”
Bat tilted his head, but when Azrael turned on his heel and left, he heard the blue-skinned man follow. A couple hundred meters further, Bat hissed, “Tigers patrolling up ahead. They are coming this way. Can we go back to the group?”
Azrael smiled and charged forward. He had wanted to fight something. For some reason, he just felt it would make him feel better. He pulled his sword and loaded it with Ether. The roar that echoed towards him only caused him to bare his teeth. When he heard the creatures begin running towards him, he felt something inside him catch fire.
The striped cats came into view, and Azrael entered Threshing Wheat. A stance designed to make low strikes that connected together but left many openings for retaliation. His blade connected with the first tiger as it leaped at him. The attack caught it in the chest and its reciprocating nature tore into the tiger’s body before flinging the corpse away into a wall. He reversed and pivoted on his front foot, contracting his abs and reversing his sword direction in a full spin. He struck the second tiger mid-air as well. This sword form was dominant in an enclosed space, with a limited hitbox. He turned again and felt claws dig into his back—and there was the weak point in this style.
Azrael turned on Soul Cloak, crouched low, and jumped back into the wall while driving his sword under his arm and into the abdomen of his enemy. He heard the tiger yowl loudly behind him and shrugged his shoulder to dislodge the claws and move his sword simultaneously. Azrael smiled at the final tiger that approached him, then opened his mouth wide and roared.
His sword had impaled the now-dead tiger behind him and sunk partway into the stone behind. Azrael abandoned the sword and rolled forward, below the last enemy’s pounce. He shot back to his feet still roaring, somehow fueling the continued cry with an anger he hadn’t known he held. His roar cut off as the last tiger collided with Azrael’s art deco installation. A moment after the collision, Azrael landed on the creature’s back, both hands charged with a Soul Strike. He performed two piercing strikes and felt one hand hit a rib just as the other destroyed a lung.
He stood over the corpses of three tigers and felt himself shudder. Azrael looked at his shoulder, where the second opponent had bit and clawed him deeply. What had he been thinking? He knew how aggressive Threshing Wheat was. He knew it had a glaring weakness. Why had he chosen it?
He clenched his bloody hands together and then relaxed them before cleaning them on one of the dead cat’s fur. He stood back up and retrieved his sword with a vicious pull. As he turned to look back down the hallway, he saw his group standing and looking at him. An armored Bat looked worried and hunched over. Had he run to get the others?
Dara had tears running down her face, but she had the same look on her face that Jophi held. They looked like two bookends, heads tilted away from each other, eyes large and glinting with water. Ogma had his arms crossed, and he seemed to be surveying the scene indifferently, but he wouldn’t meet Azrael’s eyes.
Azrael shrugged and turned to continue down the hall, leaving the looting to others. He didn’t know how to respond to the silence the others offered and chose to keep going. That fight had helped him decide, at least.
He would keep going. He would never stop fighting for a way out. Going back was certain death. Moving forward had only a chance of death. Dara fell in beside him a moment later and nodded. Jophi took up the other side but stared straight ahead. He felt his back straighten, and his breathing grow more even as they moved down the hallway. He heard more than saw Bat scrape his feet as the batman joined him.
Azrael didn’t look back to find out if Ogma followed. He didn’t care. If dying down here would take away something from Oberan, then he would die in the hypogeum. He remembered a quote his Swordmaster had lived by, “The right to choose how to die is the one thing all living creatures are entitled to.”
Chapter Forty
Ogma had followed Azrael and continued to recover, which made the next creatures they ran into easy fights. Often a single punch from the strengthened Master was enough to end the life of the mobs. The group followed along behind him and discovered numerous open ca
ges built into the rock as they passed. Ogma explained, “A hypogeum usually keeps monsters spawned in cages and transports them above for fights. Now that we are down here—maybe the dungeon has opened all the cages to eradicate the intruders?”
Azrael considered his statement and found a few oddities. He pointed them out, “Some of these cages look broken, though. Why would the monsters break out if the Pit released them?”
Ogma shrugged and admitted, “I have never been down to a hypogeum before. It is typically a bad idea. It could be that it removed the enchantments on the bars to release the monsters.”
Azrael didn’t respond to that and pointed at the cage they were passing. The bars had ascended into the roof and still glowed with an enchantment. Ogma gave him a shrug but didn’t comment further. Bat called out, “The next hallway holds a horse.”
The group stopped, and Jophi turned to Ogma, “The Enbarr?”
Ogma nodded and spat, “There isn’t any other horse in the challenges. Is there a different route, Bat?”
Bat pointed back the way they had come, and the group turned around. Azrael asked the question he assumed some of the others were thinking, “Most of these creatures don’t seem native to Tech Duinn. What is the Enbarr?”
“Well, as you know, it’s the fifteenth challenge of the Pit. It is from the planet of Neptide and is considered to be the fastest horse ever found. According to my cousin, Manannan Mac Lir, they can even run on the wind. I would rather not challenge the beast if we don’t have to. We might have a slightly better chance than Octorian because we are in a group, but the creature is strong,” Ogma responded as he passed Azrael.
Azrael glanced back once and swallowed. If the Enbarr concerned Ogma this much, avoiding it was pragmatic. The group retraced their path and took a different turn they had skipped before. This led them to some Phooka, which were a kind of bunny rabbit. However, they were more massive than the wolves and tricky. Another issue was they attacked the group in a large open hallway, and with numbers.
He used Devilish Dance and caused the bunnies small injuries with each attack they attempted. This tactic worked well against creatures that shied away from pain and usually worked for evolved herbivores. Dara sunk arrow after arrow into the twenty or more who stacked six or seven deep on Azrael’s side. He left Jophi and Ogma to deal with the others, and Bat stood in the center, offering whatever aid he could. Azrael thought Bat was just cowering until one of the leaping bunnies dropped unconscious at his feet – eyes rolled up into the back of its head.
Azrael finished off that creature with a quick stab between its eyes. The fight continued, and Azrael and Jophi had managed to kill five animals when Ogma arrived to help. Azrael kept fighting, but immediately felt the weight of the combat lift from his shoulders. With Ogma’s strength beside him, he could forgo the small cuts meant to caution the Phooka and changed to killing blows.
The group took a break after the Phooka were dealt with and Jophi sat beside Azrael. She explained, “Those Phooka were the sixth challenge. They would be slightly easier than the Wendigo mini-boss according to Ogma. I never saw forty of them at once, though. Do you think the dungeon is scaling up the numbers to eliminate us?” She asked the final question while turning to Ogma.
Ogma pursed his lips and shook his head, “While I do believe the dungeon would spawn more creatures to kill intruders, when Jophi and I watched the sixth challenge, there were only five of the creatures. To go from five to forty would take far longer than the Pit has had.”
Dara, who hadn’t spoken much, murmured, “Maybe they were scaling up the difficulty for Azrael’s attempt at the sixth challenge?”
Bat stroked his chin then shook his head. A dull slapping came from inside the helmet as his over large ears likely slapped him in the face. “No, that would create unrest and a platform for martyrdom. Everyone knows the strength of the challenges. So, making Azrael fight harder opponents would just give people an excuse to revolt. No offense, Azrael, but you didn’t even make it past the fifth challenge. Scaling up challenge difficulty would seem excessive.”
Azrael didn’t take offense to the comment; he had thought the same thing. He did ask, “We never did see the tenth challenge in our two days up in that box. What is it? Some sort of tree?”
Ogma clenched his jaw. “Yewman. Similar to a Treant, but more demonic and aggressive. Truly a terrifying opponent.”
Azrael turned and tilted his head as he looked at Ogma, who realized the unspoken question and continued, “This creature is from Tir na n’Og, another planet, and was donated by another relative of mine, Morrigan. She has some very bizarre tastes. She keeps the Yewmen as guards on her private Territory on the planet.”
This whole dungeon seemed like a nightmare menagerie put together by Ogma’s family. Azrael could see why this place upset the Firbolg.
After catching their breath, they continued to follow Bat’s directions and even managed to avoid a pathway that led to the Yewman. However, a little farther on, they ran back into the Enbarr. “Did it move?” Azrael asked.
Bat shook his head, “Unfortunately not, it is planted at an intersection of four paths. We came up a different one this time. I am not sure we can avoid this fight. Retracing our previous route put us on a new path, and I assume we will just discover the third one if we go back.”
Ogma nodded. “Alright, then let’s come up with a plan. I will be up front—the rest of you attack from range.”
Azrael blinked. That wasn’t a plan. That was a tank and spank. He opened his mouth, but Jophi gave him a look that told him to let it go. He shrugged, knowing Ogma was their best chance of getting through this fight alive, but he asked, “Any weaknesses that might help?”
Ogma looked at him and shook his head. “Don’t let it get around me. It will close the gap to you all in a split second.”
Yeah, if they made it out of here, Azrael would be coming up with plans from now on. He wondered if Ogma had really chosen to stay in the Master ranks or if he was just stupid.
Azrael shook his head and shrugged. It wasn’t like he had a better idea.
Before they moved forward, Azrael asked Bat, “Do we have some time to stay here for a bit?”
Bat nodded, and Azrael continued, “I am going to need that armor, Bat.”
Bat took off the Ether-Tech set, and Azrael put it on before he checked his Soul Storage. He had a single ten stack of Soul Strike still charged from the fight with the Wendigo. He recharged the other slot in his Soul Storage, which caused him to fall flat on his helmeted face.
This opponent was unlikely to feel even those, but it was best to have it ready just in case. Jophi checked his earring and recharged it with a regular Fireball. She kept her powerful doubling skill for herself this time.
About ten minutes later, his headache finally receded as his Ether topped back up.
Ogma stood from meditation, looking fully recovered as well. “That storage skill is powerful, but sure takes some preparation time. I assume everyone else is ready?” The group nodded, and he held up a hand, which glowed blue for a moment, then red, and finally a golden yellow.
Strangely, Azrael felt a drop of liquid on his tongue during each flash. The first tasted of glacial water, the second of hibiscus berries, and the third was sweet honeyed beer. Three buffs jumped onto Azrael’s bar, and he blinked when reading them.
Beverage of Glacial Strength
● This beverage has increased your Strength and Stamina by 5.
Duration: 5 minutes.
--
Beverage of the Power Berry
● This beverage has increased your Wisdom and Intelligence by 5.
Duration: 5 minutes.
--
Beverage of Nectar
● This beverage increases your health and Ether regeneration by 10%.
Duration: 5 minutes.
Ogma didn’t wait after his skill assisted buffs were added and charged around the corner. Azrael assumed they weren’t adding much for
a Master ranked individual, but for him and the others, these were extremely beneficial. Azrael charged around the corner behind him and nocked an arrow into a spare bow the group had purchased.
It wasn’t anything fancy, but it would add some damage. He only had twenty arrows and no skills to imbue them with. His current plan was to act as the second line tank if the creature bypassed Ogma. His twenty arrows were only meant to hinder the creature, and so Azrael picked his shots carefully.
His first five arrows struck joints, and his next five landed in an even spread on the ground between Ogma’s back and the group. If his markers were accurate, they were standing and firing from fifty feet away. Dara and Jophi held their skills, waiting for Ogma to hit, and hopefully anger the horse. Azrael hadn’t worried about his non-skilled arrows. They were just pinpricks meant to irritate and maybe slow down some of the Enbarr’s movements.
After his markers were in place, he charged Soul Strike five times on his sword and stood ready.
Ogma smashed into the creature with a resounding boom. Azrael felt a wave of air buffet him, and his brain absently tried to calculate the force that collision must have held. Ogma’s fists glowed with light, and he moved quickly, connecting each strike with a knee of the twenty-foot-tall horse. The mane of the Enbarr took up the entire hallway, but the horse itself was only a quarter of it.
As Ogma dodged the striking hair whips, Azrael Analyzed it.
Enbarr
Master-Flowing Mane
Level 88
Health Points: 10734/11500
Strong Analyze has failed to provide additional information.
Dara and Jophi joined in and began peppering the horse with blindingly fast skills. Green, black, red, orange, and yellow arrows started to strike the Enbarr. Some got caught in the mane of the beast, but others sank home with a sizzle or percussive boom. From his other side, ice, fire, wind, and the chipped stone walls themselves became weapons that hurtled towards the Enbarr. These magical missiles would collide with hair and break up into small strikes.