Elysium's Multiverse

Chapter 35

Riven blinked. Well, that wasn’t good…probably?

Regardless, he began to move. With the cultists doing whatever weird summoning magic they’d set their intentions on and the lurker demon sucking a corpse dry—it was time. He slipped out of the door after slowly pushing it open and thanking God it didn’t creak. There were boxes and barrels to his right on the way over to the cages, and this is where he headed with heel-to-toe movements to reduce his noise as much as possible.

The large lurker demon was rather enjoying the meal and continued like that over those next couple of seconds. It didn’t even glance his way, and Riven’s heart was pounding in his chest amid the chanting of the apelike summoners to his left when he finally reached the nearest crate and let out a sigh of relief. However, the peace was interrupted when an abrupt series of crazed roars arose from the darkness, and dozens of shadowy figures began to rush out of the dark mists from thirty to fifty meters out.

“SSSHHREEEEEE!”

“VRRRAAAAAHHHHH!”

“RRRRHHHOOOOO!”

Riven rubbed his eyes, and his jaw dropped at the fortune luck had sprung on him.

They were ghouls. Mutated and larger ones, like the first he’d fought in the ballroom. Not like some of the weaker versions he’d seen wandering around at random among the rest of the ruins. There were dozens of them, all of them looking disfigured and grotesque—but each of them slightly unique in its own way. Some were a necrotic black or gray, some were sickly green, some were missing limbs, and some had extras. They were all disfigured, yellow-eyed, and ravenous, though, and the Jabob Cultist Demons immediately dropped what they were doing just as a flash of light from the pentagram burst open through a rift along the ground. The Jabobs swore in a language Riven didn’t understand and began to meet the charge with loud, high-pitched squeals of rage.

“AMBUSH!” one of the three-eyed, red-skinned demons screamed as it sent a roaring blue fireball soaring out into the oncoming pack, exploding upon impact and taking out three of the undead before they got to the platform’s edge. This time they spoke a language Riven understood on instinct, though when he reevaluated it, he realized it still wasn’t English.

The demon quickly whipped his head back and forth, eyes growing wide at the sheer number of enemies that’d managed to make it this close without being spotted. “I THOUGHT WE CLEARED THEM OUT OF THIS AREA! WHY ARE THERE SO MANY?!”

One of the other cultists spat in response to his comrade as a circlet of blue runes lit up on the ground in front of him, and another creature the size of a small dog—a purple-skinned, black-eyed, and sluglike demon with multiple long stingers—slithered out of the summoning circle to begin belching out high-velocity globs of acid that ravenously ate through the incoming undead’s flesh. “Who cares why?! Just shut up and kill them! Negrada will have our heads if we allow the enemy dungeon to interfere!”

The lurker abomination glanced over at the oncoming horde, unconcerned, but stuffed the rest of the human’s corpse into its mouth to hurry up and finish eating. It belched loudly, showering the ground with blood as it wiped its gory face with the side of an arm, and turned to meet the new enemy. Black balls of swirling power began to form and spark on either side of the lurker before blasting forward into the oncoming wave, obliterating numerous enemies at once before the huge monster rushed forward along multiple armored insectoid legs to meet the charge.

Riven was awestruck by the offensive might of the large demon while it tore through the undead like they were children’s toys, and he nodded to himself. “Yup. Glad I didn’t go in to try and fight that thing…”

And now that the battle between the two sides had commenced, the demons all had their backs turned to his position.

He quickly rushed forward past a break in the wall of crates, then ducked down behind one of the barrels and clambered over two stacked sacks of who-knows-what. He slid around to the right while trying to keep his steps muffled, around the outskirts of the cages with the wall to his back, until he eventually came to the one with Athela and the unknown man still inside.

*BOOM*

*CRASH*

The ground shuddered and the walls reverberated with the brutal violence of the battle nearby.

The silver-haired young hunter was staring toward the battle, hands gripping the bars and a hopeless expression on his face. He was of a medium build and a little taller than average, and he had burn marks along his left shoulder. In the bottom of his cage, a puddle of piss had collected at his feet, and he was breathing heavily. Meanwhile, Athela just remained curled up in her corner of the cage while continuing to shake.

An explosion of green light rocked the platform, and one of the cultists went down screaming before he hit the ground—shriveled and dead upon impact after just having released another blast of blue fire. Apparently the ghouls had back-line casters of their own—but the majority of the horde was focused on bringing the large lurker down while the ghouls died by the dozens in an attempt to swarm the gigantic alpha monster.

For just another second, Riven paused to watch in fascination as the battle commenced. The lurker was putting in real work, but the undead just kept on coming as they rushed out of the darkness and into view, replacing their fallen comrades even as the undead corpses began to pile up. Another flash of sickly-green light rocketed forward, blasting through an erected arcane shield that one of the Jabob mages had constructed and toppling him backward—though not completely killing him, as the shield took the brunt of the attack. It did, however, eradicate three of the nearby slug demons that’d been summoned. Even as they died, though, more of the sluglike purple creatures continued to pour in from portals that the remaining Jabob cultists were creating between offensive blasts. Soon there were dozens of the small stinger-equipped, acid-spewing demons, and some entered melee combat while others stayed onstage to support the lurker from afar.

The force of another green blast from the undead side immediately drew Riven’s attention over to the caster. It was a hooded, robed skeleton with glowing blue eyes that carried a long black staff. It was slowly walking forward through the fog, and Riven wasn’t even able to identify it properly.

Bodies ripped, screams rose, magics roared, and weapons hacked amid spraying clouds of acid that ate away ghoul flesh in abundance. This area of the dungeon was obviously way out of his league.

Riven knocked on the cage bars from behind with his knuckles, startling both Athela and the man as they turned around. Riven gave a brief glance to make eye contact with the unknown human before smirking in Athela’s direction. “Hey. I can get you out of here, but I need to know where the key is. Any idea on where that would be?”

The unknown man stared his way, his sharp features set into a blank look of confusion as Athela uncurled her body and reached through the cage, gently touching his face with an outstretched limb while the spider continued to tremble. But if spiders could smile, she would be now, and she visibly began to relax as her arachnoid leg caressed his skin. “Riven…you found me…and yes, the cultists! Hurry, one of them has the keys!”

Riven glanced over doubtfully. One was already dead, but the other two were alive and well as they blasted magics while loudly screeching and summoned more sluglike minions as time went on. “Are you sure that’s the only set of keys?”

“Please!” hissed the young man, becoming frantic as he glanced over his shoulder. “This disgusting monster is right! I—”

“Shut the fuck up,” Riven interrupted with a hostile stare. “Now.”

The man looked blankly back at him, and Riven snorted with distaste, but his green eyes focused on the red-and-black spider demon a second later. “Are you okay? You’re injured…”

*BOOM*

The ground shuddered as the lurker demon ripped through the pack of undead and barreled into a wall. Debris began to fall from the tower, and pieces of stone began falling from the site of impact.

“Don’t worry about it!” she hissed, her mandibles clicking as she gave a worried glance over to the battle—then twisted her head to show him a small black-and-green collar of her own. “We don’t have time! You need to get the keys so we can leave. Then we’ll get this suppression collar off and you can bind to me again, sealing the contract so that if I die I’ll respawn. Just be careful not to get caught in the fighting!”

The other man, who was gripping the cage bars and listening to them talk, frowned deeply. Something akin to a sneer crossed his lips, and he gave a resigned sigh while putting his head up against the cage wall. “Oh. You’re a fucking warlock. Great. I might as well just kill myself now.”

*CRACK*

The mood immediately grew even more sour than it already was, and the ground shook as another blast of magic rocketed past them—tearing across the stone platform in a shower of rubble amid the screams of combatants.

“What’s your name?” Riven hissed in irritation with a sideways glance toward the nearby fighting.

“Jalel,” the man stated half-heartedly, his excitement at potentially being saved long gone.

Riven gave him a brief nod, then jabbed a finger into Jalel’s chest as his right arm continued to simmer with wisps of blood magic. “All right, Jalel. Do me a favor and shut the fuck up while I save your sorry ass. Got it?”

Without looking back to see how the prisoner would react, Riven began to make his way around the barrels back the way he’d come for a better angle on his approach with a final head nod of encouragement from Athela. Riven felt the wisps of blood magic radiating up his arm and summoned four Bloody Razors that hovered in the air—spinning around him silently just in case the creature turned around during his act of thievery. Mentally preparing himself for a very brazen and out-in-the-open attempt to steal the keys right from under their noses, he took in a deep breath. His success depended on a lot of factors.

Sure, the little red ape he was targeting was behind the dozens of acid-spewing scorpion slugs and in the back line—so that was a plus. The battle was also raging rather fiercely now, and it was very loud, but there were a lot of eyes that could turn his way to alert his target. He’d be out in the open with no cover whatsoever, only using the distraction and noise of battle to conceal his movements, so he’d have to work fast. He also cursed his inability to use his blessing, because it was on cooldown for another twelve hours.

Keeping low to the ground, he broke free from cover and began sneaking forward as swiftly as he could. His radiating right arm itched with vibrating blood magic, and he thought about how great it would be to kill this bastard in front of him. Of how satisfying it would be to see the light leave his eyes after Riven had witnessed the creature burn off that girl’s face, but doing so would certainly alert the others. If for whatever reason he was detected by a stroke of poor luck, then he could blast the bastard before trying to flee—but otherwise he’d have to let the demon live if he wanted to get himself out of there alive. The kill would not be worth the risk of drawing the attention of both demons and undead his way, and not only that…but if he died before he bonded her, Athela would die permanently as well.

*SPLAT*

One of the smaller acid-spewing abominations in front of him exploded, and a green shaft of neon light rocketed past Riven’s ears as an undead mage from the foggy back lines loosed another spell. He squinted and covered his eyes so the bodily fluids wouldn’t blind him, and a ghoul warrior’s upper half launched skyward from the brawl to land a couple feet away with a crunch.

Riven kept moving, though, his boots rolling gingerly against the stone with every step, and his breathing became light as he got within ten feet of the cultist he was targeting. Then it was five, and then he was standing right behind him. The four razors floated ready nearby, spinning rapidly—two on either side of where he stood and ready to launch. He could smell the blood on his target’s robes and feel the wind on his face whenever his target briefly changed stances while casting. The bearded little shit was cursing and screaming at the top of his lungs as he continued to throw blue flames out at the undead, occasionally erecting barriers to block incoming projectiles or enemy magics—but he was completely unaware of Riven’s presence even if Riven was close enough to feel the heat of the mage’s fire.

Riven did his best to get a good look at the cultist’s pockets before moving in for the grab, and to his relief, he immediately saw a ring of keys exactly where Athela had told him they’d be—in the right-hand pocket of the demon’s robes.

He waited for the shorter creature to adjust his stance so that the weight of the keys would be off his thigh, and when the time came, Riven struck like a viper. With nimble fingers that writhed with crimson magic and quick reflexes, he fluidly extracted the keys and, holding his breath, he turned around.

Good shit.

His heart pounded. He made as fast a retreat as he could manage without making sound and quickly oriented himself toward the nearest cover. Coming around the side of a rickety barrel, he let out the breath he’d been holding in. Dropping his head into his hands with a relieved grin, he took in a few more calming breaths as the screams and rage of battle drew closer. Looking back around the barrel, he saw that the swarming undead were still battling the infuriated lurker demon, but a couple of their number were now clashing with the smaller red-skinned casters and slug summons in close combat as they scrambled up onto the platform.

One particular ghoul, a three-armed creature with patches of scattered, rotting flesh and its intestines hanging out the front, tackled the cultist Riven had just pickpocketed like a linebacker. The short, screaming Jabob demon went down onto his back while blasting flames into the undead monster, but the ghoul still managed to sink its teeth into his neck while they rolled around on the floor amid the chaos. Some of the smaller sluglike minion summons jumped in to try and peel the flaming ghoul off their master, using their acid, stingers, and teeth to tear off pieces of the monster’s flesh, and the brawl thusly spilled onto the platform.

“RRRHHHHOOOOO!”

Riven whirled and slammed his radiating fist into a large, green-skinned ghoul’s rotting face. Simultaneously he let loose his charged Blood Lance, and the effect was devastating.

The blood magic exploded from his punch and blasted the ghoul’s skull right off, sending the remnants of its body somersaulting across the platform.

Two more gray-skinned ghouls that’d been circling around rushed him, one with five arms and another with a sharpened tongue that whipped out like a knife.

Riven dodged the tongue lash with a quick sidestep and ripped through both monsters with the summoned razors—tearing one in half entirely while the other just staggered and roared.

Shit! They were going to give away his position!

*WHAM*

He slammed his staff into the roaring mouth of the ghoul, silencing it as he crammed the wooden shaft down its throat. Simultaneously he dropped to the ground and kicked its scrawny legs out from underneath it before blasting it with another summoned Bloody Razor.

The ghoul gargled and ripped the staff out of its mouth before flinging it to the side, but the razor lodged itself in its throat and caused it to stagger back.

Riven kicked out with his boot and made contact with the ghoul’s skull to stun the monster and tried to summon another Bloody Razor, but he went pale when he realized the portion of his Blood subpillar associated with that spell had become rigid. His Blood Lance wouldn’t respond, either, also being on cooldown, so he created the only spell still available to him.

Black mana erupted from his hands and formed a net, condensing into a rope upon his will just when he went in to grapple the stronger, larger monster. He took advantage of its momentary stunned state and managed to get on its back, away from where its numerous clumped arms couldn’t easily get to him, and yanked back to securely fasten his Wretched Snare around its neck.

The rather stupid monster bucked and flailed, but he continued choking the creature while it scrambled around and tried to claw at him. He rapidly wrenched the black magic back and forth, scraping away flesh every time he yanked to one side and then the other. Sharp, burning needles dug into its flesh and then into its spine—scraping away bone while he used it like a saw to separate the monster’s head from its body.

The ghoul thrashed, but because its many arms were so bunched together, it couldn’t reach behind its body while Riven had his feet planted into its back.

He gripped his snare with everything he had and sawed right, then left, then right again, and finally felt the Wretched Snare rip through the cervical spine. The ghoul’s head flew into the air, spraying black blood all over Riven’s face and letting the body fall to the stone ground with a thud.

He hit the ground with a thud. Riven spat and coughed the viscous liquid out of his mouth, gagging slightly due to the rancid smell, and then rubbed his eyes while evaluating his surroundings. The battle was still raging, and the demons hadn’t even noticed the scuffle behind them. Checking that he still had the keys in his pocket, he picked his staff back up and started running toward the cage.