Touch of Fate

Chapter 78: Till the End

After finally managing to lose the wasp in the rocks, Julia found herself a good hiding spot next to a crude altar. She had to walk carefully around the corpses of a few demons and some raggedly dressed humans.

"Where the hell am I?" She muttered looking around.

Not too far away was a pair of ritual circles, seemingly painted in a dark red paint that resembled dried blood. One of them was extensively damaged, with bits of the circle appearing to have been washed away by some flood. The other had bits of rotting, dismembered bodies stacked in regular piles. She grimaced in disgust as she caught another waft of the putrescent scent.

There was a minor explosion as the newbie adventurer was thrown clear across the chamber, cratering the wall of the cavern. Amazingly, he was able to pick himself out of the rubble, almost as if it had barely affected him to be thrown with that kind of force.

A burning aura surrounded him as he intercepted the war hammer of the armored figure. The pair then began to exchange blows at a high rate of speed, fighting with an intensity that Julia had never seen before in person.

[So, he was definitely going easy on me last time.]

After dodging a wagon sized rock, and blocking a few more attacks, the newbie started chucking fireballs every so often. Ones that exploded with terrifying force.

[And he's a mage.]

While Julia was re-evaluating her life choices, she completely failed to notice the growing circle of primordial darkness that had appeared over the altar.

[Maybe if I can find a break in the fighting, and sneak out.....]

"Hey you! Over there by the altar!" A youthful female voice shouted from nearby.

Julia glanced around and saw a silver-haired young woman struggling to remain on her feet. Wincing in sympathetic pain, she took note of the woman's extensive burns.

With an agonized grimace the woman continued. "You need to move the idol! Its our only hope of saving the world!"

"Eh?" Julia followed the woman's pointing finger and finally saw the horrible pit of absolute darkness, and the shrouded claw that was attempting to push free from it.

"Eyah! What in the hells is that?!"

"That is a powerful demon prince that will devour you and everyone else in this city, if you don't stop it."

Julia was having a hard time processing all this. "What do you mean? What's going on?"

"JUST GET MOVING YOU STUPID CAT!"

The beastman jumped to her feet and started running up the stacked stones of the altar before she'd even realized it. Climbing the 20m or so was not an issue for the experienced thief, but something about the altar was making her deeply uncomfortable.

When she got to the top, she was greeted by the sight of the idol in question. It was a grotesque thing fashioned from the rib cage of a humanoid creature and a cattle skull. The bones had been painted in obscene glyphs that stung her eyes when she looked at them.

"Ugh. What am I supposed to do?"

There was a tearing sound above her.

"MOVE IT! PICK IT UP! PUSH IT OVER! I DON'T CARE, JUST DO SOMETHING!" The exasperated woman yelled.

"Jeez, no need to get so upset." The cat beastman replied as she knocked the idol over with one of her daggers, not wanting to touch the thing.

With almost maddening slowness, the gruesome contraption toppled, breaking into pieces on the cavern floor.

The hum of power that had filled the air, suddenly took on an almost painful whine. A swirling column of intense power circled the altar, filling the surrounding area with unearthly light.

A roar of fury shook the chamber, causing almost everyone to double over at the sheer force of it.

The claw withdrew into the pit of darkness, which quickly receded to a pin prick and then disappeared entirely.

Silence fell as the cavern became dark once more.

When Julia noticed the change, she raised herself from the crouched position she had taken. Checking herself over, she made sure she was still in one piece.

She threw her arms into the air, "Woohoo, not dead!"

The former Chosen smashed into the side of the altar with terrific force, causing it to collapse with the beastman still on it.

"Ah?" She had time to ask, before she was falling towards the debris-strewn floor.

Just as she was about to start screaming, someone collided with her.

She looked up and found herself in the arms of the glowing newbie. Staring up at those pure blue eyes, Julia felt her heartbeat speed up. With a rush of air, her savior landed, dropped her off, and returned to fighting the armored monstrosity, which had already freed itself from the pile of rocks.

[He's making it hard to keep hating him.]

After a moment of thought, she nodded.

[I guess I'll call us even.]

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After dropping the cat beastman off, Mike jumped back into the fray. The enhancement of his mental state had let him fight up to this point, but he could tell that he was outmatched. Even if he had access to his full mana pool, he'd have a hard time with this enemy.

[I'm going to have to do something to break this deadlock. I can't keep this up for much longer, and that thing doesn't seem to get tired.]

Out of options, and feeling that there was no harm in trying out one last method, he resorted to the one thing that always seemed to have an effect.

"So, I don't suppose we can talk about this? Perhaps, we can come to some kind of arrangement."

[It looks like the crisis has been averted. If I can just stall for time, we may get some reinforcements. If we're lucky that horned woman will show up and take care of it.]

The armored thing that once was Nash paused, staring at Mike. "Hiujol oyu Tal'Nakur." (You speak the ancient tongue?)

Rubbing the back of his head, Mike laughed sheepishly, "Yeah, I get that a lot. Listen, the way I see it, this fight no longer has any meaning for either one of us. We were here to stop the summoning. Now that its done, perhaps we can call it a draw? Maybe go our separate ways?"

The thing stared at the youth for a moment, as if considering him for the first time. "Pinom gol na ban rolg jukath ut findarn." (You are interesting, mortal, but I will still be taking your body.)

"Worth a shot, I guess." Mike said with a sigh.

As the two combatants readied their weapons again, there was a shimmering in the air next to the former Chosen. In a swift, confident motion, the armored thing whipped the war hammer around to strike at the air behind it. With a crunch, it slew the invisible demon that had sought to attack it from behind.

The amalgamation of serpent and praying mantis fell, dead before it even hit the ground, but Mike didn't miss the opportunity. With a quick burst of mana, he threw a blast of steam at the creature, trying to blind it momentarily.

The former Chosen struck back in response, with a horizontal sweep of its hammer, but it only hit air. Mike, having crouched low to the ground to evade the blow, sprung forward and thrust his sword into its armored chest plate. With a screech of tortured metal, the blade punched all the way through, leaving the creature impaled.

Dark crimson fluid spilled onto Mike's sword and ran in rivulets down past the hilt, soaking his hands. The war hammer clattered to the ground and the creature clasped the sword's blade with its gauntleted fingers. It seemed that this creature lacked the semi-impervious nature of the Chosen, and the blow had struck something vital.

"Rom kot nakaty mone." (A temporary setback.) The red light which seemed to be holding the creature together started to fade.

As the last fragments of light vanished from within the depths of the helmet, Mike heard one last quiet whisper. "Baol hogan erythial ne." (This is not the end.)

With a clatter, the broken shards of the Chosen's armor fell to the floor.

[Well, that's not ominous, or anything.]

He cleaned his hands off with a bit of Water Magic, and was reassured when nothing seemed to have changed about them. Shrugging, he turned to face the others with a grin.

"WE DID IT!" He said while raising an arm in victory, eliciting a pained and exhausted round of cheers from the rest of the group.

Noticing Sera's injuries, he hurried over to apply healing magic.

"How the hell did you get injured? You weren't even close to the fight. I swear, I look away for one moment, and you end up half dead."

She growled angrily at him for a moment, before sighing wearily. "I'm too tired for this. All I really want is to find a bed to fall into."

"I concur." Brenden called from his place on the ground. Mike sent him some of the last of his mana, giving the beastman the energy to walk again.

While the others were getting ready to leave, he took a moment to examine the strange wooden box the Chosen had used. Whatever the Heart of Khor was, nothing of it remained. Feeling vaguely disconcerted, he decided to report it to the guild and let them figure it out.

"What are you blind? You almost walked into that wall." Brenden was asking Tal.

"Temporary status. Will get better." The elf replied while holding onto Sera, using the woman as a guide.

Mike took one last look around the cavern, noticing that the cat beastman had vanished again.

[Oh well, I guess I'd want to disappear too, after an experience like that. I wonder if she knows that she saved the world.]

Mike joined his companions as they exited the chamber.

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The Anhilite priest, Smiler, growled in a manner that directly contradicted his name. He had arrived too late to do anything, only barely making it to the warehouse district when he felt the collapse of the ritual.

They had failed, and he trembled in the fury that came with such a realization.

However, the rage quickly passed. He was thankful for the Cabal's foresight. It seemed they needed to implement the backup plan.

"Next time we will succeed. You will be free, my lord. This, I so swear."

He turned and vanished into the deserted streets.

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