“It’s not working and I don’t know why,” My voice was quiet, but it echoed around the old warehouse anyways.
Carter stood beside me, throwing water at the gloopy flesh bags that I threw across the room. They had porous indentations across their circular surface, where acid was supposed to spurt out. Yet each throw left with everything to be desired. They acted merely as meat-bags, exploding across the floor, with no acid to speak of. Carter had taken to throw water at them, merely as his own target practice; we’d know if there was acid in them either way.
“Could be you’re focusing too much on the creation of them?” Vincent asked from across the room, currently training to create further modified effects with his illusions.
“No,” I replied, voice mildly disappointed, “When I make something twice…It’s like riding a bike, I don’t need to think about it too much, the details just insert themselves,”
“Maybe it needs to be consistent,” Alyssa replied from across the room, “Just because it, by nature, is disturbing and breaks the rules, doesn’t mean that it doesn’t need to be consistent. Are you just expecting the acid to come because you will it to?”
I thought about that for a moment, nodding at the sense that it made. Maybe that was the problem, there wasn’t anything to actively protect the acid, or maybe produce it. Thinking about it for a moment, I summoned another bit of flesh, before adding more to the inside, like the lining of a stomach. The flesh bag slowly started to get heavier in my hand, and I smiled as I felt the acid fill the inside. Carefully, I modified the strength of the body, and looked over the pustules that were meant to spurt the acid out. It took a moment, but I managed to recreate the structure of the body, more retrained, but, hopefully, with a larger reach when the acid exploded.
“Alright, don’t target this one,”
Carter nodded, and I lobbed the acid bomb across the room. About halfway through, acid started raining upon the ground below. Some specks got close, but not too close. When it slammed onto the floor, a great splash of acid resulted, burning straight through the concrete, and down into the basement.
After that, I focused on my right hand, the same that the tentacle focused on. It took a moment, but the dark veins started bleeding through my arm. I felt the rushing sensation as they moved towards my hand, an didn’t resist as it shot outwards. I only managed to make it stay for a second, before it shot back into my hand and disappeared.
It was a foregone conclusion, that that one basically worked as a firearm. The reach was fair, and the strength could be particularly impactful if I held the inky veins back. All that was left to test was my last ability, one that I had spent a bit of time experimenting with to get right. If I messed it up, my hand would end up severely mangled, and the damage typically took quite a bit of time to reverse. In the end, I’d only managed to get it right because of a fluke.
“Alyssa, are you up for a spar?” I asked, focusing on my hand, “Because I finally got this down,”
She nodded, walking over to the training dummy she’d pinned with her throwing knives.
I watched as the flesh of my left hand started to stitch itself together, merged rather nicely. The sharp stab of my bones forcefully fusing flared throughout my arm, before the blade made of bone punched its way through my fused fingers. Another problem, which I’d had early on, was the fact that the bones, when sprouting, would occasionally end up flat. An epiphone that occurred to me, was to stretch out the bone of my thumb, and merge it with that of my middle finger. Eventually, I’d managed to get a rather nice and sharp blade.
“All tricks, or simple blade-fight?” She asked.
“Simple fight, until I can modify the acid,”
“Okay,” Before I could react, she was slamming her knife towards me.
I jumped away, surprised, as yet another attack slammed near my throat.
One thing about Blade-focuses, is there ability with knives, swords, and other instruments of murder. Its effortless, for them, to take the advantage if a blade is within their hand. As such, as soon as she started attacking, I was thrown into the defensive. I could hardly do anything other than block, as slash after slash slammed into my bone.
Three seconds passed, before she had her knife against my throat.
The bone blade sank back into my flesh, and my hand steadily reappeared. After I’d successfully managed to make the blade, recreating my hand had been the most difficult. For an hour, my body had turned into different meshed globs of flesh, with stringlets of muscle swaying in the air. It had taken an intervention from Vince and Carter to calm me down; after that, I had finally managed to get my hand back.
“You will never be able to beat a Blade-Focus with their chosen weapon,” She said after she put her knife down, “Why don’t you work with Carter instead?”
“Because I don’t want to burn my bones,” I replied, “It’s still a part of my body, and I think it’s susceptible to melting,”
Alyssa went back to her training, and I tried to perfect the skills I’d already gotten. My week of training had passed by in a breeze, the track of time hardly noticeable, with almost every hour of my existence being taken up with something. From what I’d heard, things were getting worst, to the point where the Devil himself was actively in the loop, trying to keep most of humanity from noticing the horrors that lived right underneath their noses.
“Alright, you all ready?” Carter said after another thirty minutes.
“As ready as I’ll ever be,” Vince said from across the room.
“Yeah,” Came Alyssa’s reply.
When his eyes shifted over to me, the only thing I could do was nod. Yet another demon hunt.
-7
A cross stood, half decayed, pieces of wood shattered against the ground. The church doors were littered with grime, and chunks of pulsing skin. Taking a steady breath in, I stared towards the chapel doors, waiting. Carter walked up, the four elements swirling around him. A clump of dirt, in the shape of two hands, steadily pushed the door opened.
Everything seemed to speed up to a horrifying degree, as the racketing sound of a gunshot sounded off. Carter jumped to the side, and I felt my feet moving as I jumped over the side of the steps. Another shot went off, and I watched as Vince’s shoulder got blown out, before he fell over the side.
“What the…What the hell?!” I shouted, staring over the side, “There’s a demon in there…how?”
Alyssa stared towards me, “Remember what Carter told you. People are being affected in different ways,”
This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
“You mean…”
“They’re worshippers,” She replied, grabbing a knife from her belt, “Didn’t think they’d be here, though,”
Nausea roiled around in my stomach, as I watched Alyssa vault back over the side. I stared towards her, then looked down at Vince. I needed to do something, something to stop the bleeding. Carefully, I placed a hand upon his shoulder. Only one thing I could do.
“This is going…It’s probably going to feel really weird, okay?”
He looked up at me, pain obvious from the clenched teeth and angry lines upon his face. I felt the energy well up inside of me, and did the only thing I could think of doing. An eye steadily sprouted itself across his skin, and I could feel the foreign muscles growing upon the exit wound, blocking the blood from spilling.
When his body began to physically sag from relief, I pulled myself up, and stared over the cement of the stairwell. All I could catch was a glimpse of Alyssa and Carter, flowing side by side, with fire and knives. Placing my hands upon either side of the cement, I pulled myself up, and ran into the building. Only to have a man with a gun place the barrel directly against my temple.
“Stop or your friend dies!” The man shouted, voice echoing across the melee.
Fire burned out, disappearing in a flash. One knife flew through the air, slamming against the side of a bench. The sound of mulching flesh became the only noticeable noise, as all of the fighting within the church stopped. I stared towards Alyssa and Carter, silently willing them to kill this guy, somehow, before he blew my brains out.
I was pushed forwards by the guy with a gun. I could see the smiles spreading across the faces of the cultists. Their eyes were crazed, bodies twitching constantly, as if small wires sat underneath their skin within constant movement. Just from looking in their eyes, I knew they were going to kill me. It didn’t matter if I died by the hand of the person behind me, or by whatever sat behind the alter pew, the intention behind those sickly glassy orifices of sight, hinted at plans beyond a simple reckoning. So I reacted, my hand moving as fast as it could.
All it took was one simple meat-sack, summoned from absolute desperation. I shoved it forwards into his skin, feeling as the body unraveled, shoving acid into his gut. The scream was immediate, and I managed to duck just before the trigger went off. Without even thinking, my arm shifted into a blade, and I shoved the bone forwards, straight through his neck. As the body dropped, a shot went off, just barely grazing the side of my head. Bone-deep fear caused me to summon another acid bomb, throwing it over the heads of Alyssa and Carter. It splashed across some of the cultists, but not enough.
Another shot went off, and Alyssa threw a knife, slamming it into the skull of the perpetrator. I dodged under a bench as I saw a shotgun swaying at my head. From underneath, I managed to use a tentacle to sever through one man’s leg. I watched as Carter slammed a ball of concrete straight through a woman’s chest.
Alyssa took down the man I’d attacked, as I ran forwards, slashing through another man’s arm. Another man to my left turned his pistol to shoot; I couldn’t react in time. The world seemed to still as his finger pressed towards the trigger. Even as a meat sack summoned itself into my hand, I knew I wouldn’t be able to throw it in time. Alyssa’s knife seemed to fly through the air, cutting through time itself.
I managed to jump to the floor, just as a bullet soared where I’d once been. A lobbed Ball of Acid slammed into the wall, spreading acid across three of the remaining cultists. Alyssa’s knife struck true, bringing down a fourth. There were only five of them left.
Slamming myself forwards, I shot a tentacle towards one of the remaining five. It grazed the side of the man’s skull. Somehow, even as his brain started to slop towards the floor, he remained standing. He was screaming, as he pointed the gun directly towards my chest. Without thinking, I summoned The Eye, and quickly shot foam towards the middle of the gun. He pulled the trigger, but missed. I watched as the chord connecting his brain to his body severed, and he dropped.
“Is a human body supposed to be able to do that?” I couldn’t help but ask, as the eye dissolved, and I slammed another tentacle through the air, killing a second.
Alyssa slammed a knife into the eye of a third, and Carter quickly killed the fourth.
The fifth dropped his gun, and for a moment, I thought he meant to flee. It was Alyssa’s shouted curse, as she rushed forwards, that placed one piece upon the board. He was running behind the Alter. With a shout that slowly distorted, I watched his body disappear.
My feet were slamming against the ground, right beside Alyssa’s and Carter’s as we made it behind the alter. There stood a well of living, sinewy flesh. Drops of what I could only identify as saliva or sweat seemed to gleam across the surface of cut, pink skin, upon which pulsing rivulets of organs seemed to peak out from.
“We have to go down there, don’t we?” My voice was shaky, as I stared towards the darkness below.
“It would seem so,” Carter replied, voice even.
Alyssa took a breath, before jumping in. Carter quickly followed. I stared below, hardly able to comprehend what I was seeing. After giving myself a moment, I followed.
-7
It was damp, wet and damp. The ground felt as if we were standing on a tongue, wiry and yet soft. Slowly, I stepped towards the others. They stood, staring forwards. There was nothing to see in the darkness, other than the wiry strings of flesh and muscle, but there were plenty of things to hear. Groaning seemed to emanate from the walls, a sickly discordant note of endless pain, seeping deep into the bone. That, along with the endless hint of pulsing, somewhere off in the vast dark, left too many things to my mind’s eye.
“We should really just get going,” I said after a minute.
“Y-yeah,” Alyssa replied, voice seemingly shaking just as much as mine.
I glanced over at her, finding a strange amount of comfort in the way her legs were beginning to shake.
We walked forward as a group, each holding a different weapon. My arm was shifted into a blade, Alyssa was holding one of her knives, and a small flame was held within Vince’s hand. Our eyes were spread in every direction, waiting for an attack; yet the further along we went without one, the worst the feeling within my stomach became.
“How…How can a demon do this?”
“This isn’t something that it’s done,” Carter replied, “This is the demon’s body,”
“O-oh,” Was all that I could manage to say.
Further within this basement, sinews of muscle and strands of bone, began to mash themselves into the ceiling and floor. It was only then, that a new noise became known.
“Oh ye of the darkest light, and power unknown within the night, give me that which I need to bring down a bastardized blight!” It became a chant, of the only thing within this horror that remained human.
When the walls of flesh began to spread, becoming larger and wider, we found the last cultist. He sat in a bow, directly before a large, beating heart. Upon the heart stood five eyes, all spread in random directions, each staring directly down upon the man. The eyes were that of a fish, grimy and filled with dripping goo.
“Do we…” Before I could finish my sentence, Alyssa threw her hunting knife at him, striking him directly at the base of his skull.
“There’s no reasoning with them,” Carter said after a minute, “Whatever…Whatever happens to them, their minds end up corrupted, shifted in such a way that we wouldn’t be able to help them if we tried,”
I nodded silently, “How do we wanna go about killing this thing?”
“I’ll burn it,” Carter replied, “You two get back to the surface,”
We trudged silently out of the demon, hair wet from the couscous slime that exuded itself from the organs and skin of this monster. The pained moaning was the only hint of life, before we stepped back onto the solid wood of the church floors.
“So, cults,” I said after we’d reached the surface, and walked as far from that, thing, as possible.
She nodded beside me, “They’ve sprung up everywhere, coveting the demons and sacrificing themselves to them. There’s been worries that they might end up more organized than they are now,”
“Right,” I replied, “Don’t want to imagine what’ll happen then,”
“Exactly,” She said, her tone firm, “We’re one of the teams stationed to look out for cult activity in the city. Tomorrow, we’ll start with exactly that,”
We walked towards Vince, who was carefully looking down at his shoulder, “Might you remove the eye now? It’s disconcerting, seeing in an area not meant for sight,”
“Oh!” I exclaimed, “S-sorry, completely forgot about that,” Raising my hand, I tried to imagine the eldritch energy pulling itself from his shoulder, and back into my stomach.
The three of us watched in fascination, as the blinking fish eye slowly faded, and blood began to pour.
“I’ll get you patched up,” Alyssa said, quickly reaching into her pockets.
Minutes passed as the two worked, and the ground began rumbling. Pained cries could be heard for miles down the street, before Carter popped up from the church. He stared towards the three of us with a slightly pained smile.
“We might want to run, this street isn’t going to hold; demon was a lot larger than we thought it was,”