by Tamryn Tamer
“Okay,” Terra laughed while continuing to skewer the monsters from her perch. “Fire was a bad idea. Do you have any ideas?”
“Well,” Jericho said staring at his wind wall effectively blocking the poisonous gas. “One, but if it works, you’re not going to like it.”
“Just do it,” Terra said. “Anything’s better than dying.”
“Remember that you said that,” Jericho said while swirling an orb of wind. Jericho rarely played with wind magic on its own. It wasn’t that he disliked wind magic or didn’t see the power in it, it was just a lot more fun to use to supplement fire and water magic. When dealing with gasses though, it seemed like the only logical option.
He started by creating a simple barrier around the rampaging monster and then slowly started to increase the barrier's power. The hard part was dealing with the increasing pressure building up as the gas filled the barrier. He started feeling pushback like a balloon being filled and started to compress the barrier.
Slowly but surely the barrier shrunk pushing the endless stream of gas back into the source. After about a minute the entire room was devoid of poisonous gas and the corpse eater was rapidly increasing in size.
“No, no, no!” Terra yelled while looking for somewhere to hide. Jericho would have created a wall of stone or ice to hide behind but it was taking everything he had to keep the wind compressed on the ever-growing monster. “Fuck!”
“Yeah,” Jericho said somberly. “Fuck indeed.”
The corpse eater exploded sending reeking blood and acid to every corner of the room. Jericho and Terra managed to avoid most of the acid but they were bathed in the blood splatter and stink. Terra immediately vomited.
“Oh god!” Terra howled. “Fuck you. Fuck you so much!”
“It’s so awful,” Jericho heaved and pulled out purification potions. Normally he’d only use them if he were poisoned but it was a special circumstance. He started bathing himself in them.
“Gimme!” Terra yelled while retching over the corner of her stone overhang. “Now!”
Jericho threw her a couple of the potions and she similarly started dumping them on herself to remove the foul blood and stench.
“Are you two alright?” Mirage yelled from the entryway. She and the others successfully avoided everything by hiding down the hall. “Oh god, it smells in here.”
“Yeah,” Jericho said while creating a slide of ice to reach the stairs to the ninth floor. He followed up by creating a bridge across the room so the others could pass without issue. He continued to empty out his entire stash of purification potions on himself. Before long he was going to smell like a summer wind.
“More,” Terra said grabbing a potion from his hand and dousing herself. “I’m going to bathe in this.”
“These cost five hundred gold a piece,” Jericho said.
“How many do you have?” Terra asked.
“I had ninety-nine, I’m down to seventy.”
“I’ll buy them all,” Terra said holding out her hands. “I’ll pay double.”
“You can have half,” Jericho said before gurgling one of them hoping to kill any of the smell he’d inhaled.
“Half,” Terra said grabbing them from Jericho and dumping them on herself as they walked up the stairs. “So fucking gross. You should have told me to leave the room.”
“Like hell,” Jericho said tearing off all of his clothes and throwing them in a corner.
“Good idea,” Terra said also stripping down and bathing herself in purification potions. “I never want to touch that armor again.”
“Do you intend to face Prince Niraxi naked?” Mirage said judgmentally as Jericho ignited the pile of clothing.
“Of course not,” Jericho said as he finished cleansing himself. He took out a red and black mages coat covered in demonic runes as well as some black pants. “Prince Niraxi’s magic cuts through anything. So, defense doesn’t matter. My cursed vestments by one thousand in exchange for increasing my agility.”
“Yeah,” Terra said putting on some cloth assassin armor enchanted with agility. “We decided to just focus on output and avoidance.”
“It doesn’t matter,” Mai said heading up the stairs. “You will still die.”
“Such a pessimist,” Terra said.
“We’ll find out,” Jericho said.
Chapter 10
The Fallen Prince
“So, you’ve betrayed me Lady Latrodectus,” Prince Niraxi said as soon as they arrived on the ninth floor. It was a large open space except for the pillars holding the ceiling. On the opposite side of the massive room, Jericho saw a red-eyed shadow sitting on a throne. “Yet it doesn’t matter. I will kill these intruders and you’ll return to your post.”
“As I am unwilling to return to my post,” Mai bowed respectfully. “I would prefer to be killed with the rest of them Prince Niraxi.”
“Seriously?” Jericho scoffed. “You could have a little faith in me.”
“As you wish,” Niraxi chuckled rising from his throne. His size increased and wings shot out from his back as he slowly walked toward them. Everything within a certain radius became engulfed in the dark.
“Shit,” Jericho said. “An aura. Don’t touch the darkness.”
“It’s a nice thought,” Mirage said sweetly. “But I don’t see how I can strike him if I cannot touch anything around him.”
“Like this,” Terra said unleashing a swarm of Uzic arrows from her Darkfeather bow. Niraxi raised a wall of shadow and they vanished into it. “Shit.”
“Cute,” Niraxi laughed. “It’s been a while since I could really enjoy myself. I’ll have to savor this.”
“Jinx?” Jericho looked down at the tiny familiar twitching and muttering to herself. “Are you okay?”
“Quiet! I’m concentrating! Moron! Dolt!” Jinx growled. After a few moments, her eyes opened and Jericho felt her spirit crushing him. It was similar to the Soul Eater but different. It wasn’t causing him damage but made him feel almost powerless. She let out a deafening roar causing the entire room to tremble. “I am Jinx! Strongest of the Spirit Beasts! Weakling! Cur!”
“Fun,” Niraxi stopped and gestured her to come. “I’ve always found spirit beasts to die quickly. Let’s see how the strongest fairs.”
“Shit,” Jericho said as Jinx dashed forward. As soon as she reached the edge of the darkness, she started throwing punches and kicks as her spirit burst forth striking Niraxi. She realized intuitively that while she couldn’t make contact, her spirit could. Jericho moved to follow, “Alright! Let’s do this!”
“Hm,” Niraxi sent forth dark spikes which Jinx deftly avoided. “I expected more. Disappointing.”
“Yes,” Mai said drawing her blade. “Let us do this.”
“I’m with you darling,” Mirage smiled while drawing her daggers. Her body thinned and shrunk as fairy wings sprouted from her back. She grinned impishly as she floated above the floor. “If I don’t need to touch the ground, I don’t need to touch the aura.”
“You make a cute fairy,” Jericho said at the spritely version of Mirage.
“Save it for later sweetie,” Mirage beamed before blinking forward. She appeared above Niraxi but had to immediately blink away to avoid a rising shadow spear from the ground. “Focus on the fight.”
“You got it,” Jericho said sending out a wave of ice spikes. They were immediately devoured in a sea of shadow. He followed up with several explosive snaps which Niraxi didn’t even bother avoiding.
“Dammit,” Terra said unleashing dozens of arrows in rapid succession. “We’re not doing anything to him and he doesn’t even seem to be trying.”
“Yes,” Mai said while twisting to avoid a dark spike. “I informed you that it’s impossible.”
“Yeah,” Jericho tried to summon up an icy fog only to have a wall of dark sweep through eradicating it. He followed up with spikes of earth from the ceiling only to see them suffer a similar fate. “This isn’t even fun.”
“I k
now,” Terra grumbled. “It just makes me feel stupid. Like a new player trying to fight an elder dragon.”
“Shut up!” Jinx roared sending a shockwave of spirit energy. “It doesn’t matter how strong he is! We will win! Cowards! Runts!”
“Right,” Jericho laughed at his feisty familiar. He focused his flames into his fingertips letting the magic build and fired beams of condensed fire. Once again, they faded into the nothingness protecting the fallen prince. Jericho grinned and fired three more quick shots then one to the side, curving it around the pillar. It landed. “Gotcha.”
“Yes,” the prince responded by rapidly expanding his aura catching Jinx off guard and taking her right arm mid-swing. She managed to save herself by leaping backward. “And I’ve got you.”
“Goddammit! Fucker! Bastard!” Jinx roared as blue flames took the place of her missing arm. She continued her onslaught of spirit blasts as if nothing had happened.
“I cannot abide anyone harming my family,” Mirage said with a terrifying coldness. She appeared and vanished in a flurry of blinks around the fallen prince. She skillfully avoided his shadows but was unable to take a swing. She blinked out of the aura appearing next to Jericho, “Darling, I’m afraid I must do something distasteful, please don’t think less of me for it.”
“What?” Jericho asked as Mirage’s visage changed to that of a thousand fanged monstrosity. Her fairy wings shifted into oily demonic wings and a dozen disgusting tentacle-like arms sprouted from her body as her legs merged to become a slimy tail. “What the fuck?”
“I see why Alistair liked you,” Niraxi laughed. “But the appearance of an abyssal doesn’t make you one.”
“No,” Mirage’s voice was as dark and demonic as her visage. She blinked behind the prince and aimed her dagger at his head. A dark shadow sliced off her tentacle arm as another tentacle recovered the falling blade and managed to graze his shoulder before she blinked away. The lost tentacle sprouted back and she coughed up a little blood. “I just like the spare arms.”
“Jericho,” Terra growled while firing an explosive arrow only to have the explosion vanish. “First that nightmare mansion, then the fucking corpse explosion, and now this. I’m going to start billing you for my fucking therapy!”
“Reroll to a mage,” Jericho said unleashing a flurry of hatred fueled curving bullets at Niraxi. “The catharsis does wonders.”
“Jericho,” Mai stared at Niraxi. “I need a path.”
“You got it,” Jericho said summoning a path of ice for her to run along. The fallen prince quickly consumed the paths as they appeared but not fast enough to prevent Mai’s approach. She slashed at him only to be deflected and sent flying. “Dammit.”
Mirage continued to blink around him while losing and regenerating limbs as Jinx battered him with her spirit strikes. Mai dashed past him using whatever untouched surfaces she could find or Jericho could create to get in range before escaping. Terra and Jericho found themselves increasingly frustrated at their lack of progress.
“This is getting boring,” Niraxi said. “Time to finish this.”
“Lookout!” Jericho yelled while reflexively summoning walls of stone to protect his familiars. The dark spears pierced the stone as if it wasn’t even there. Four spears landed in Mirage who was quickly dragged away by Mai but two landed in Jinx’s stomach causing her to collapse.
“Jericho,” Terra gurgled from behind him as a single long spear looped around the room puncturing her from behind. “Fucker.”
“Fuck!” Jericho roared as Terra died.
“I liked your idea so much I decided to implement it myself,” Niraxi chuckled at his hooked shadow. “Some of my people believe that there’s nothing to learn from you lesser creatures. Personally, I’ve found that because you are lesser, you come up with the most interesting tactics.”
“Kill him! Asshole! Bastard!” Jinx roared as her mouth filled with blood. Jericho rushed to her side and began bathing her in healing potions. Her body bathed in blue flames as she reverted to her spectral kitten form.
“It would be wise to retreat,” Mai said carrying Mirage who’d reverted into her human form. He looked at her mangled body hacked to pieces. It seemed every limb she lost came with a price whether it was a finger, a toe, or a rib. “You cannot defeat him.”
“I said kill him!” Jinx roared shrinking until she was so small she could fit in the palm of his hand. “Kill him! Kill him! Kill him! Kill him! Brute! Monster!”
“That is unwise,” Mai argued.
“Yes,” Mirage smiled sweetly despite being hacked up and half conscious. “It would be unwise. But it’s what Jinx wants and my darling likes to spoil his familiars.”
“That’s right,” Jericho said fixated on the fallen prince in front of him. His heart pounded like a war drum and his elemental pathways filled with rage. Jericho dashed in front of a dark spear heading toward Mai and Mirage knocking it away with a barrier of light. “I said I’m going to kill him and so I’m going to kill him.”
“Light magic,” Niraxi laughed and sent out a dozen more spears of darkness that Jericho deflected with his body. “That’s more like it!”
Jericho was prepared to die for his familiars but in a world where he could be reborn no matter how many times he died, what did that really say about his resolve? He was resolved to try as many times as it took? The Seraphim were willing to die and their shields broke in the face of enemies like him.
Death to him was nothing. His barrier began to crack before his eyes under the relentless onslaught of dark spears.
“It was an admirable attempt,” Niraxi said while creating an enormous dark lance. “But you are no Seraph. You’re only a mage.”
“Jericho,” Mirage tried to stand up. “I’ll…”
“No,” Jericho said coldly. He couldn’t risk his life like the Seraphim but his resolve was different. He couldn’t commit himself to not getting injured because it was an empty promise. So, he’d find his resolve somewhere else, protecting his familiars. “You’ll do nothing. I’ll win.”
“You fucking better! Fiend! Devil!” Jinx squeaked.
Prince Niraxi’s massive lance dissipated on Jericho’s reinforced barrier of light. The prince let out a growl as he launched an endless stream of small lances for Jericho to deflect with his barrier. He attempted to arc some around but Jericho was watching for it and moved to stop them.
He still didn’t have a way to attack. His anger was still there fueling his elemental magic but the darkness made his magic useless for offense and defense and his light magic merely served as a shield. Additionally, sensory magic didn’t seem to do much to him.
“No,” Jericho said to himself. Sensory magic did harm him. Jinx’s strikes might not have done much damage but they landed. Her spirit could reach him and while Mirage’s abyssal form didn’t provide her much in terms of abilities it offered versatility. And as for illusions, sure he couldn’t make a pillar vanish without his opponent noticing but he learned with Mai that subtle changes went unnoticed.
Jericho felt a click inside of him as mind, body, and spirit started coming together like gears locking into place. His passive, sensory overload activated. It was completely different than elemental overload which doubled his power, instead, it was like his three abilities interlinked offering increased versatility.
“Right,” Jericho mumbled while deflecting the fallen prince’s projectiles. The prince focused on ranged attacks and even when attacked he opted to use walls of darkness rather than move out of the way. Not only that, the entire dungeon seemed custom tailored to drive out warriors. Why would the unbeatable shadow prince be so focused on keeping out melee fighters? Jericho grinned wickedly, “You’re a mage.”
Without thinking Jericho had transformed himself into a werewolf and rushed Niraxi. His barrier protected him from the darkness as he descended upon the prince with a flurry of light reinforced punches, each blocked or deflected by shadows.
“Brave,” Niraxi chuckled.
While inside of Niraxi’s aura he was surrounded at all times. A black spear struck his barrier from behind. “But stupid.”
Jericho ignored Niraxi as his spirit spread throughout the immediate vicinity. He couldn’t sense the shadows themselves, but it was about what he couldn’t sense and when a soulless nothing cut through his spirit, he knew the dark spear was coming. He dodged what he could and whatever he couldn’t the light deflected.
He started leading his punches with spirit attacks hoping to slow his opponent before the real punch followed. It worked to a point but didn’t slow him nearly enough. Jericho threw an endless stream of blows as the shadows rose up to block him like tentacles from the abyss.
“You’re still too slow,” Niraxi said as his tentacle moved to block a punch only to have the fist phase through. Jericho’s real punch came up from the bottom grazing Niraxi’s chin as he narrowly dodged the attack, a splatter of blood shot upward. “I’m done playing!”
“Well I’m still warming up,” Jericho growled as he wove illusionary punches in with his real ones. It wasn’t about large changes, just a foot in one direction, a few inches in another, just enough for him to miss his blocks. He alternated infusing real punches and illusions with spirit to make them more deceptive.
“Fuck!” Jericho yelped as a powerful blast sent him flying into a stone pillar and cracked his light barrier as well as several of his ribs.
“You’ve grown arrogant human,” the dark aura vanished as everything condensed down onto the Niraxi. His shadowy form solidified as he absorbed the darkness and his red eyes glowed more brightly than before. “You are nothing before the might of a fallen prince.”
Watching the dark prince suck in his magic to reinforce himself gave Jericho a new idea. He’d transformed into a werewolf for the enhanced speed and power the muscles offered but who was to say that was the limit? He began altering his transformation while condensing his elemental magic.
Jericho slowly released his elemental magic, but not outside of himself, inside of himself. He began by enhancing his resilience with a layer of condensed earth before releasing all of the others into his body. It felt like he was being torn apart inside and out as his skin erupted in flame. He simultaneously felt immense power and the sensation that he could turn to dust at any moment.