Chapter Twenty-five #2
For one dizzying moment, it is impossible to tell where anything is coming from. The Dark One’s throne room turns every shout into a thunderous war cry and every clash of steel into the deafening clamor of a hundred blacksmiths hammering away at once.
Demons surge toward the iron doors to block access, while even more demons throughout the Great Hall engage in battle with... what, exactly? Freed prisoners? Palace guards? Kidnapped warriors from the Games? Probably all of the above.
The massive iron doors finally blow all the way open, nearly tearing free from their hinges. Pretty sure a powerful magical blast does the job. Is Baltazar out there? Had the arena’s great wizard finally turned against the Dark One? And if so, is he the one who freed all these people?
And I use the word “people” very loosely. Most of the non-demons look like something straight out of a nightmare. Or a cheesy horror movie. Or the overactive imagination of a certain writer I know.
Ugh. Great. J.R. Rain is at it again, emptying every dark corner of that twisted mind of his and letting the creatures out to play. And by “play,” I mean engage in battle with some of the most hideous demons I’ve ever seen.
Speaking of which, they often move as one, a black tide of horns, claws, blades, and leathery, useless wings.
Oh, and snarling slits for mouths. They charge the warriors and prisoners now flooding into the massive room.
Many of the warriors and prisoners are very much mortal, complete with auras.
Real people are dying down there, getting heads and limbs cut off, and torsos stabbed through.
The sound of painful death is everywhere.
Ugh, I have to stop this.
“Azul, can you create a protective bubble for you and the prince?”
“I can, yes.”
“Good, because I’m going to need to enter that battle, and I can’t do that with you two clinging to my back like a pair of gibbons.”
“A monkey on your world?”
“Technically a small ape, what they call the lesser apes, though there is only one example.”
“The gibbon.”
“Yes. Okay, onto the shield!”
Just like that, Azul and Prince Pickles float off my back, fully contained in a shimmering orb. Azul’s eyes are closed. I see it is taking all his energy or magic or something to produce the shield. No, I don’t need one for myself. I will take my chances.
Below us, a second wave of freed warriors and prisoners slams into the demon horde.
I spot Salt Creek’s diminutive people almost immediately.
The wood sprites dart through the air in flashes of browns and greens, moving so quickly they are little more than blurs.
Elsewhere, towering gladiators meet the charging demons head-on.
One swings a hammer the size of an anvil.
Thor, is that you? Another carries a spear longer and thicker than a telephone pole.
Behind the gladiators come former prisoners armed with whatever they have managed to find.
Some carry heavy demon swords. Others wield kitchen knives.
A few have lengths of chain wrapped around their fists.
Quite a few have nothing at all but their bare hands and years of fiery fury.
Fury seems to be doing the trick.
A blue-skinned woman with four arms spins through the melee, knives flashing in each hand.
Nearby, a shaggy beast-man lowers his head and barrels through a cluster of demons like a living bowling ball.
A tall silver-haired creature with transparent wings lifts two demons high overhead before dropping them onto the stone floor.
All of this is well and fine, except none of these beings can actually kill a demon. Indeed, the horned bastards just get up and continue fighting, albeit often with missing limbs.
Likely only the Devil Killer can actually put the demons permanently down and return them to the Origin.
Meanwhile, the Dark One stands before his throne of bones, doing nothing but watching. Actually, that’s not true. I suspect he is controlling the various waves of demons, directing them this way and that, siccing them on the biggest and greatest of the warriors.
Watching how other wood nymphs deftly avoid blades, spears, and clubs, I have an idea. “Azul, can you release Salt Creek from a distance? I think she will want in on this.”
“Yes, Sam. But...”
“I think she can take care of herself.”
“But... she could be harmed.”
“I don’t think she will, and she will want to fight with others of her kind. She could keep them safe, I suspect.”
“Okay, Sam. It is done. She is free. But she is barred from entering the arena. You were only able to break in and out because of the prince.”
“I believe all magical locks and spells have been broken.”
“Baltazar...?”
“I think he’s on our side now.”
Azul nods. “Only Baltazar could have lifted the palace wards. Only he could have released the prisoners.”
“He’s definitely on our side.”
Azul’s eyes widen. “Then we have no greater ally.”
“Maybe not, but Salt Creek is a close second.”
“You believe she will come?”
“I know she will. Her brothers and sisters are here, fighting. She will want to be with them.”
With that, Azul and Pickles drift away in their shimmering bubble, safe for now. The bubble comes to rest in the shadow of a massive stone pillar in the far corner of the throne room. They should be safe there, hidden mostly in shadows.
Next, I move as fast and as fierce as I can, the Devil Killer flashing over and over, side to side, up and down, with all the speed and strength I can muster.
The demons that taste the sword simply disappear.
There is neither screams nor blood, not even collapsing bodies.
Only ribbons of black smoke twisting upward as though the creatures had never been.
I have known what the sword could do. Knowing it and witnessing it firsthand, however, are two very different things.
Nothing, but nothing, can survive this thing.
Where the demons go, I have no idea. Likely back to the Origin.
But is the Origin of my universe the same as the Origin of this one?
Are there multiple Origins? Or just one overseeing all of creation?
Yet another question I don’t have an answer to.
Anyway, another demon lunges. I slash upward, and it vanishes as thoroughly as the others. White-gold light shimmers along the Devil Killer’s black edge. The surrounding demons recoil from it instinctively, though their hesitation lasts only a few seconds before they foolishly charge again.
One of them swings a massive, double-bladed battle axe toward my head. I duck beneath the near-lethal blow, step inside its reach, and drive my shoulder hard into its massive chest. I might as well have shoulder-checked a brick wall. The demon doesn’t move an inch. It merely snarls down at me.
I smile back up. Then sweep the Devil Killer through its midsection. The demon vanishes in a burst of black smoke. Its battle axe drops to the stone floor, where it is quickly scooped up by a hulking, weaponless guard.
Waste not, want not.
Chapter Twenty-four
I watch the guard turn and whip it at another charging demon.
The weapon buries itself deep into the entity’s chest. It staggers but refuses to fall.
Apparently ordinary steel does little against these things.
I know that. That’s where the Devil Killer comes into play, necessary to banish the creatures forever, likely the only weapons ever forged that could do such a thing.
Something small suddenly shoots up between the demon’s legs. The tiny figure bounds up the demon’s back with impossible speed.
Salt Creek.
She flies up, faces the demon, then plunges both of her short swords into the beast’s eyes. Ouch! The creature screams, clawing wildly at its face as I come up behind it and put it out of its misery with a mighty swipe of the black sword. It immediately dissolves into a whorl of black smoke.
Salt Creek lands lightly on my shoulder, balancing there with ease.
“Some sword,” she says, whistling. “Magical?”
“Angel magic.”
“Wow-weeee! It’s big. Too big for me.”
“Yeah, probably.”
“Heavy?”
I shrug. “Not for me, but yeah, I think so for most people.”
“You are strong.”
“I am.”
She giggles, then springs from my shoulder as an idiotic demon rushes at me.
It swings an enormous wooden club with spikes.
Salt Creek’s flashing blades quickly sever the demon’s hands from its wrists.
Hand and club fall. I step in and finish the job with a forward thrust through its skull. No blood, just... poof, and it is gone.
Next, I watch her disappear into the melee, darting between legs, racing up backs, and springing from horn to horn.
She is impossibly fast. Every few seconds, another demon howls as one of her tiny blades finds an eye, an ear, or some other vulnerable spot.
Sadly, the mortal fighters are no match for these near-indestructible demons.
The mortals can wound the demons, maybe even slow them down, but only the Devil Killer is capable of finishing the job.
I have to end this for all the vulnerable fighters here. Except, there is only one of me and hundreds of demons. Hmm.
A gladiator with great, curling ram horns crushes a staggering demon beneath an enormous hammer, but the demon does not die, though it probably wishes it could. So I fly over and sweep my sword through its already broken neck, obliterating it.
Nearby, the blue-skinned woman I noticed earlier spins through three opponents at once, all four arms moving independently.
Across the chamber, a winged silver warrior snatches one demon off the ground while another former prisoner buries a spear through its chest. No demon dies or disappears, but at least they are weakened.
Indeed, the battle is changing. The demons still outnumber us, but for the first time, they are losing ground.