In the first few seconds after Iceblock melted, leaving me in a filthy puddle, I got another four (!) shields — not as strong as the ice, but still effective enough to delay the moment of death. The buffs I got were: Frost Armor, which absorbed a thousand damage; Lightning Shield, the active version, which fired electric charges at anyone who attacked me; Antimagic Shell, which absorbed all magic damage for 30 seconds; and a Small Defensive Dome capable of reflecting another thousand and a half. I’m alive! I thought, trying to figure out who was helping me. There was someone else apart from Modus and the Travelers.
But even in the instants between the effect of Iceblock and the new shields, my health fell by half. And help came — this time in an obvious form — from Michelle the dryad. Healing Wave restored my health. Abaddon’s Curse deprived me of my own health regeneration, but nothing stopped others from healing me! To top it off, some shaman stuck a Stoneskin Totem down beside me, lowering my damage taken.
I started celebrating too soon. All my allies got pushed back and bogged down in skirmishes, and there was nobody left to help me. And soon, one by one, the shields began to fall. Inspired, my enemies redoubled their efforts, quickly dropping my health into the red.
Thirty feet away stood Destiny, still alive and grinning wickedly, her bow aimed right at my face. She smacked her lips as she pulled the string taut:
“Take this!” she snarled, releasing the string and showing me her middle finger.
I prepared for death once again, staring at the demise flying straight for me. The arrow was tipped with silver.
Time as if slowed, the enemy arrow grew before my eyes, and then…
Then a miracle happened. The arrow evaporated only a foot from my face, along with all the other enemy shots heading toward me. Their attacks just petered out as if an invisible and all-absorbing shield had appeared around me. No flashy sparks, no light effects, all the attacks just faded soundlessly, as if flying into a whirlpool without so much as a ripple.
The wonders didn’t stop when the meleers surrounded me. The invisible barrier gently stopped the weapons aimed at me. Swords, axes and halberds seemed to get stuck as if in thick jelly, stopping an arm’s length away.
All that reached me was the players’ astonished curses. Coming to my senses after being unexpectedly saved once again, I studied the interface and saw an icon. The description read:
Aegis
You are protected by an Aegis, a perfect shield that absorbs all damage. The Aegis does not expire, but the shield will disappear if you move beyond its edge!
I read the text over again, unable to believe my eyes, then pinched myself — no, this was no dream. The contestants tried furiously to break through the protective dome. My heart pounded with exhilaration. The Games weren’t over for me just yet!
I carefully ran my hands in a circle around me, finding the boundary of the Aegis. In the meantime, the contestants seemed to go into a fury: spells raged in from all around, swords and daggers and speartips flashed against the shield, some players even beat their fists against it, but the Aegis had an endless supply of durability. The important thing was to stay right where I was, and I had no trouble doing that. I wasn’t going anywhere with my feet stuck to the floor.
There were actually two benefits to this: a portion of the players were distracted with me, and not attacking my allies. All the same, they had no chance to survive — all they could do was try to get a high price for their lives. In less than a minute, all those who had openly helped me were dead.
Once they’d dealt with the ‘traitors,’ as they dubbed Michelle, Dave, Hellfish and the players from Modus, the other contestants focused all their attention on me. They attacked the shield for half an hour, then realized the futility of their efforts and drifted away, scattering throughout the Pitfall.
Only the most stubborn remained, still attacking the Aegis. One orc retiarius stood hitting my defenses with a trident that scattered sparks each time it struck. A troll with a crazed face beat against the shield with his fists, swearing so furiously that the fairies pushing their way through the crowd fell down dead, and the elves’ ears rolled up into tubes.
Then a gnome called Joker approached me with some engineering contraption, placed it against the Aegis and turned some lever, shrieking excitedly:
“It’s gonna blow!”
I didn’t hear so much as a thump, although sound got through to me just fine. Once the dust settled, though, I saw that the gnomish engineer had succeeded only in blasting the paladin Blondiecat as she passed by. She survived, and sent the unfortunate experimenter flying with a kick. As he landed, he fell victim to others hit by the explosion. Four players started beating on the gnome, including the world-renowned poet Bloomer, blood flowing from his ears.
Roman the troll finished off the scuffle. His curses sounded out in an unfamiliar language, but I understood the meaning.
“I hope you get stuck there!” he said to the gnome, pointing at me. “I hope you never grow older! I hope you crap yourself!”
Squealing with fury under the effect of the three terrible curses, the gnome threw himself at the shield and slid off it in a bloody smear — apparently, the defenses considered him a weapon.
“Why’d you do that to our friend?” Meister asked in a quavering voice, having somehow survived the mayhem.
“Might make him wise up,” the troll growled. “He nearly blew up half our raid!”
“Young man…” the jeweler began, shaking his head, but didn’t have time to finish the thought.
The earth began to move, the air thickened, it got hard to breathe. My hair stood on end in anticipation of something horrible.
They all dropped their weapons and froze in limp poses, their heads lowered, shoulders dropped, knees bent…
A thunderous boom came from the gates numbered 666, then a chewing sound and a hammering (or steps?) that shook the stone. As suddenly as it had begun, it all stopped. I looked over at the gates, watched as the paladin Kharmo’Lav burst into flames with his hand on the seal, emitting a soulrending and pain-filled scream. His arm burned away in a fraction of a second, then the fire leaped to his torso, then Kharmo’Lav’s entire body collapsed into ash. The charred skeleton twisted like a transformer, took the shape of a compact cube, then rolled its way toward the gap of the opening gates.
“Finally!” came an echoing growl from within.
Heavy footfalls shook the earth. A rumble rolled through the gates, and in their opening appeared a monstrous eye — black, with veins of fire and a burning pupil, like the mouth of an erupting volcano seen from high up in the sky.
“Mor-r-r-r-tals!” the demon rumbled. “Long-ear Eynyon keeeeps his word! New souls! Del-l-lectable!”
The beast’s laughter pealed through the Pitfall, vibrating, piercing through to the brain. The walls shook. Stones fell from above. A huge boulder dropped down, crushing an elf standing near me. Nobody moved. The presence of a high demon of the Inferno pinned us like rabbits beneath the hypnotizing stare of a boa constrictor. Weak Will, the debuff icon declared.
“Come to me, mor-r-r-tals! Salvation is near! Suffer no longer your earthly tortures and privations. Come to me and find peace!”
His words carried the warmth of a morning bed, the scent of baking and fresh coffee, the sensation of a mother’s care and affection. I felt a squeeze in my chest, felt like an injured bird watching the flock fly away. I needed to go there, to join them, whatever the cost!
The three contestants standing closest to the gates felt the same. Swaying like zombies, they wandered toward the gates. A few other players took a few hesitant steps that way, but remembered themselves and stopped. Nobody ran away — the debuff must have prevented it.
The fate of the three was unenviable. The demon, whose name was still a mystery, didn’t wait for them to reach him. He stuck out a crimson scaled arm tipped with black claws and scooped them all up. I heard cries, the crunch of bone, a wet squelch.
The sounds w
ere joined by someone’s careful footsteps, the crack of breaking magma crust. The footsteps accelerated and Meister the jeweler came into view, his little legs carrying him straight past the gates and to the staircase. There he turned around:
“Eat the demon gold!” he shouted. “It removes the debuff!”
I already knew that there were demonic coins in circulation in the Cursed Chasm, although I hadn’t seen any yet. The gold dropped from the mobs and chests inside the instances. It was the money here.
Bogatyr Arioch, frozen nearby, took a glowing ruby coin from his inventory, bit it as if to test it, then straightened and bit right through it. The demonic gold turned out to be brittle. The bogatyr swallowed, waited a moment, then waved his arms and shouted:
“Eat the gold! It works!”
The next second, they all had their free will back after greedily gulping down their demonic coins. Free from the debuff, the contestants swarmed toward the staircase. Not all made it.
“Mor-r-rtal flesh…” I heard from within. “Sweet, but small. Weak souls… Fi-i-ilth! Need more!”
An arm stretched through the wide open gates again, this time to the elbow, trying to feel out another victim. However large was this nameless demon, the final boss, his narrow and flexible serpentine arm reached no further than thirty feet. Fifteen players failed to escape, and, gathering up all the ones he caught, the demon crushed them in his colossal fist, then, judging by the sounds and the fiery belch, ate them.
Not everyone took the risk of going for the staircase, and there wasn’t enough room for everyone to get past at once anyway. The climb began right next to the gates, and the demon’s hand soon stretched out again. It was six feet shy of me, and my Aegis shield was invulnerable, so I wasn’t worried.
Fruitlessly feeling around and finding no food, the arm began to thin, but at the same time grew longer. The clawed hand reached out for me. With shrieks and swears, the players pressed themselves against the wall farthest from the gates.
With my head still thrown back, I watched, feeling like a bug about to be squashed as the gigantic hand descended on my dome. The demonic palm covered the dome and clenched. A roar of disappointment boomed out from the gates. The hand lifted and disappeared back through the gap. Apparently, the arm could only get so long.
A few minutes later, I heard a measured trampling, knocking and squelching from within the instance.
Those players confined with me at the bottom of the Pitfall didn’t move for another two hours. In the end, deciding not to waste any more time, the remaining contestants — around a hundred souls — headed for the stairs. Ahead of them was a long climb which might take up the rest of their session.
I had absolutely nothing to do until the day ended. I couldn’t even go beyond the edge of the Aegis, so when the long-awaited notification arrived, it was a relief:
The third day of the Demonic Games is over!
I might have called it the worst day of the Games yet, except I was still overjoyed at my surprise rescue. And the feeling that I was no longer alone. My secret allies had revealed themselves and taken a great risk to help me, drawing the ire of their group comrades, but I still didn’t have the slightest idea who had put those shields on me. And who had given me the Aegis? The perfect shield had come at just the right moment.
I couldn’t stop thinking about it. I had to find out. Could it have been Tissa and Infect? Or Hellfish’s people? I doubted it — the Aegis was probably a prize for the best player of the day. At the opening ceremony, that had been Tissa, but we’d seen her reward — the Banshee Queen’s Cry. On the second day, the audience chose Quetzal. On the third — Roman. Could it be one of those two? No, no way… Maybe someone got the Aegis as loot.
I racked my brains, waiting with impatience for the intragel to drain away. Climbing out of my capsule, I started to get dressed and only then realized with surprise that neither Kerry nor the security droids were there to meet me.
Chapter 12. Quod servabit
IT WAS LIKE MY ASSISTANT had disappeared. She wasn’t answering her comm, and the other assistants just shook their heads with a frown when I asked them if they’d seen Kerry. Had Destiny Windsor made good on her threat? Had Kerry been fired?
In a dampened mood, on guard and expecting unpleasant surprises, I walked to the hall of ceremonies alone. The atmosphere was tense; people were arguing, shouting, throwing accusations back and forth…
I carefully caught some eyes at dinner, but noticed nothing suspicious except that it was unusually quiet in the hall. A few of the contestants eaten by the demon were even crying!
I saw Alison again, sitting with the other juniors from T-Modus, and nodded to her. The girl answered in kind and then looked to the side.
Next to her table sat a group of adult contestants. I aimed my comm at them… And there were my allies! The company was almost completely familiar to me, although only in Dis: Berstan, Koba, Kara and Equilibrium from Modus, sculptor Anna from the White Amazons and Hellfish, aka Vito Painter, the Travelers group leader…
Hellfish saw me looking at him, barely noticeably shook his head, turned away. A strange reaction, considering the whole world had watched his group help me. Whatever. We could talk after the show. Anyway, I’d long since learned that words meant nothing, actions were what mattered, and these people had shown me all I needed to see today. It was only thanks to them that I wasn’t going home.
Gamesmaster Octius danced his way onto the stage. Greeting us, he got straight down to business:
“Two hundred and ninety-eight contestants! That is how many remain after day three of the Demonic Games! But I don’t want to talk about that, I want to talk about how it all started!”
The holocube showed a video of me materializing at the floor of the Pitfall, and a description of my curse.
“Today we bore witness to a new plot, and, as on the first day, all the contestants took part in it! With the exception of Scyth, of course. But even if he had known what awaited him, I fear it would not have helped him. Fate tossed him one of the worst penalties in my memory — Abaddon’s Curse! And now, let’s…”
Some commotion began at the right-hand wall, not far from the stage. Around twenty people had formed a row and joined hands, and were pushing forward toward the stage. Octius made a signal, the music volume lowered and now I could hear what they were shouting!
“Snowstorm! Unfair play! Snowstorm! Unfair play!”
The music and the talk in the hall faded completely. Everyone turned their attention to the chanters. A short man with a beard down to his waist separated from the group of demonstrators. His eyes looked on the brink of tears.
“We demand that the day be replayed!” he shouted, his voice high, but a little tremulous. “Mr. Octius! We demand a rerun!”
“Rerun!” the group started chanting again. “Not fair, rerun!”
“On what basis?” the presenter asked in astonishment. “Let’s figure this out! Please, all of you, come onstage!”
The protesters walked up onto the stage with Octius, shouting and shaking their fists.
“Well, do begin,” the gamesmaster said, waving a hand to invite the leader of the protesters to the center of the stage. “The entire world is listening to you carefully, Mr. Yaquint.”
Mr. Yaquint, also known as Hifer the artist, stepped forward decisively, wiped away a treacherous tear, cracked his knuckles.
“Nobody!” he burst out. Nobody warned us of the new mechanic of the final boss! We should have been warned that death to the demon is final!”
Wow! For the millionth time, I mentally thanked whoever had covered me with the Aegis. Nothing else would have saved my virtual body from the fate of being devoured in the high demon’s maw.
“Hold on,” Octius interjected. “We aren’t obliged to warn you of anything of the kind! What sort of Demonic Games would that be? Every year our game designers come up with special features, surprises for the contestants, and this year one of them was final disincarn
ation! It is believed that if you fall into the clutches of the demon whose name I won’t mention, lest I accidentally summon him…” Octius paused to let the hall appreciate the joke and laugh. “If the demon from floor 666 swallows you, you’re done. The Demonic Games ends for you.”
“We demand a re-run! Or else… Or else…”
“We’ll sue you!” a long-legged woman with a horsey face said, joining Hifer. Yaquint took a step back, giving her the spotlight.
“In the names of all those who fell, I declare that we will not leave this alone!” She broke off, took in a lungful of air and continued on the outbreath: “We’ll take you to the UN court! According to the agreement we signed before entering the Games, Snowstorm is…”
The Demonic Games (Disgardium Book #7): LitRPG Series Page 18