Ben sat in front of the next section of the trial, staring at the door of it and heaving a long sigh.
“Man, I really don’t want to do this.”
They’d finally gotten to the death section and he couldn’t imagine it going particularly well. He’d been expecting to deal with the life section first so when he first saw the enchantments indicating that he’d been wrong it had thrown him off completely. He at least had a decent understanding of death magic, but considering it was the one most suited to finishing them both off for good he really didn’t want to actually go through with it.
His only other option though was trying to forcibly raise the trial to another layer of reality and hope the gods would drag them out, which was really more of a desperate gamble than anything. It wasn’t like he’d been able to discover what every bit of magic on the trial did, even if he could activate the bits he didn’t understand, there was always the chance he would activate something that would kill them both, it just wasn’t worth the risk.
Ugh, no getting out of it, we need to go in.
“Feeling ready Greed? I’d bet decent money you’re really gonna need to work your healing for this bit.”
“As I’ll ever be. Just gonna keep telling myself we’re almost there.”
“That’s the spirit.”
He cast one last look around, trying to see if there was any excuse he could use to put off entering the next section for as long as they could and finding nothing, so without waiting more he took his first step through the doorway, into whatever they were about to face.
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When they entered the empty expanse, the exit wasn’t immediately visible like it had been the last few times. What he could see though were specks off in the distance, whatever they were too far off to say for sure but the only indication that there was anything in the trial at all, with his thoughts only being broken by the cursing of Greed.
“Damn it all! Not exactly surprising, but this section is really gonna suck for me. Hurry up and get moving so we both don’t die legs.”
“Oh god what’s happening already?”
“Can’t you feel it? The moment we stepped inside my vitality started being drained.”
“Shit, okay focus on yourself for now, I have a few skills that should protect me for at least a little while, plus my resistances. For now, I guess I’ll start moving to that stuff in the distance.”
The fact that Greed was already feeling an effect through the armour was all sorts of worrying for them. Ben had enough benefits in his status that he could put off being concerned for now, and the crab had buffed both of their vitalities and regeneration rates, but this meant that Greed would be getting no breaks, instead needing to constantly regenerate his own lifeforce, and eventually Ben’s as well. It wouldn’t be a problem immediately, but if it ever reached the point where he’d have to use more mana than he could regenerate then they’d be all but doomed.
It was as Ben was wandering that he tried to figure out just what else the trial would throw at them. He couldn’t help but wonder if the things he was seeing in the distance were weapons of some sort, maybe items made of deathstone or something else entirely, but that wouldn’t match what he’d seen from the other sections. Whatever was thrown at them would be purely in the death affinity, nothing else.
Still, there’s only so much you can do with death mana. Gotta be on my guard for beams of the stuff coming out of nowhere and killing me instantly I guess, and if there’s anything that can injure me I need to watch out for it making the wounds worse, but what else could we run into?
It was at the same time that he was finally able to see the exit off in the distance that he got an answer to that question, his relief in seeing that he’d been going mostly the right way, only needing a bit of correction, was also taking them to something that he should have predicted but didn’t.
“Damn it!” He yelled. “Of fucking course it would do something like this! Of course it would!”
“What? What’s happening legs?”
“Those things off in the distance? They’re getting closer. I’m pretty sure we’re about to go against some corpses.”
It was an aspect of death magic he’d never gotten to personally see put to use but had known it was more than possible, he just hadn’t expected the trial to come pre-stocked with any to take advantage of.
Being controlled like puppets, the bodies wouldn’t be limited by what they could do in life, instead being able to go beyond their maximum potential, being pushed until they fell apart from the strain, and as they got close enough that Ben could see their features it only left him cursing all the more.
While he was able to finally make out what the race of the god who’d made the trial looked like, hominid types with squids for heads, that fact barely registered as he took the rest of them in and realised one very important fact.
It looks like this trial likes to recycle.
Not just the bodies of that unknown race, but over a hundred others, all examples of the groups that lived on the world, and all likely former trial-takers who hadn’t survived.
Their bodies were beaten and broken, bare of any clothing or equipment since it had always ended up in the areas between sections, but the speed they were coming down on them from was already more than enough to put them in danger, the entire herd focusing in on them and not leaving any hope that they could be avoided.
“Legs, you think you could do something here? I’d rather not become a body to use for the next time some sucker makes it this far!”
“I think this is more you than me man! Light magic has a purifying aspect, right? Can’t you do something about this?”
“If it was one or two then maybe, a crowd that big though? Come on legs, be realistic here!”
Great. They had some time, but not much as Ben pushed all of his minds to think, trying to come up with a solution to the problem rapidly approaching them as he considered everything he knew about death magic and what they had available to them. Even with his armour, his joints could be bent and broken, and while there was a chance his magics might be applicable to help, he wouldn’t be able to do anything to a crowd like that all at once. As for Greed’s blessing magic…
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Wait.
“Okay, I have an idea. A really really bad idea. Lot of room for it to go wrong but I can’t think of anything else.”
“Hell legs, I don’t think anything we’ve had to do in here has been anything more than desperate. Out with it already.”
“Alright,” Ben said as he laid down on the ground, using his material magic to slowly lock every joint of the armour together. “I guess the question is, what are the odds you can buff a corpse?”
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“I’m pretty sure I’m going to have nightmares about this for the rest of my life,” Greed muttered to the sounds of clanging and squishing that were reverberating through the armour. “Don’t get me wrong legs, I’m glad it’s working, but…”
“I’m not exactly loving this either but we need to focus, we’re almost done.”
His idea had been simple, even if the results had been horrific. The bodies of past trial participants were clearly coming to attack and being strengthened by death magic to get them to release far more power than they had in life, they were just making them go even further beyond.
Since life magic would grow closer to death magic as it leveled up, Ben had theorized that it would be possible to use on the dead, forcing more strength and power into its muscles so that once it was combined with whatever power the trial was giving them, every punch and kick to the armour was enough to shatter the arms and legs of the creatures throwing them. Add his destruction magic into the mix, carefully directing the mana through his body where each impact was going to occur and it had only taken a few hours to have the numbers almost completely reduced, though the experience was far from pleasant.
While he’d understood in theory what he was going to be going through, in practice it was much, much worse. The armour he’d made with orichalcum was able to easily withstand such physical attacks, but he hadn’t stopped to consider how unpleasant it was to hear.
Even after arms and legs were destroyed they kept throwing themselves at them, the sound of squishing meat becoming a constant companion as the bodies kept up their attacks for as long as they could, even resorting to shattering their jaws in the end to try and bite through, and while all of that was going on the drain effect on the whole of the trial was only getting stronger, making Greed need to work all the harder to replace his own vitality, as well as getting to the point where he needed to begin doing the same for Ben, at least a little.
It was only once the attack stopped, the area around them slick with meat and blood, that Ben did his best to quickly but carefully separate each piece of armour he’d had to merge into a solid whole and go back on their way to the distant exit, hoping to make it there before the drain effect could no longer be handled.
He ignored the notification as he ran with all of his might, not wanting to see whatever else the trial might throw their way. They’d already been stuck in one spot for far too long and he didn’t want to deal with the consequences of that. He knew things would only get more extreme the longer he was stuck there, he didn’t want to learn just how creative this god could get with death magic.
It was only as he saw the end in view though, not as a distant light but as a genuine exit, that he was able to see to just what extreme the god who made this trial was willing to go to, as well as just how far his willingness to recycle whatever made its way into the trial went.
“Unbelieve,” Ben muttered. “Assface was definitely an evil god, nobody’s changing my mind on that. Think you can do anything about this Greed?”
“I’m already getting to my limits for just keeping myself alive. The drain effect’s getting bad legs, I don’t think I can keep up with it for much longer, at least for myself.”
“Alright, don’t worry about topping up my vitality for a while, we’ll focus on getting through all of these fucking ghosts and then get out of here.”
There had to be a dozen of them between him and the exit and it left Ben cursing the trial’s maker all the more. Souls of the long-dead trial takers, each waiting to attack.
Ben had read up enough on the topic while researching souls to not want to deal with ghosts at all costs. While normally harmless like the one he’d once seen with Thera, there were two things that changed that. If one managed to exist on the mortal plane for long enough to comprehend what it was, allowing it to exert whatever magic it had access to in its life, or else if it was being controlled by a death mage, ending with it being forced to use whatever magics it had access to in life on its master’s orders.
Having died once himself, the very concept of ghosts left him deeply uncomfortable, but he ignored that as he got closer, to both them and the exit.
He’d been right initially, there were only a little more than a dozen, meaning everyone who’d ever taken the trail wasn’t still doomed to be trapped within its walls, but it was still bad news as they came towards them. Ben had no way of knowing what they would do until the first shot was fired, a black beam of mana directed right at them that he had no choice but to throw themselves out of the way as more and more came.
Right, this is the death trial, there must only be souls that could use death magic. At least that narrows it down.
“Greed, I’m going to try to get close to them one by one. Purify them if you can and then get as much power out of my body as possible. We’re booking it to the finish line.”
“Can do.”
He continued to throw himself forward, constantly avoiding each attack, though with far too many close calls as Greed did what he asked.
At first, it seemed like things were working. With a burst of light, the first two ghosts vanished and it gave him enough confidence to push onward to more. Five, six, seven, each continued to disappear thanks to Greed’s magic, helping them leave the plane they were stuck on to advance to whatever came next, right up until they tried it on the eighth.
At that one Greed failed. It wasn’t that his magic had gotten weaker so much as it was that the effect of the trail had gotten stronger, providing all the more power to the ghosts and keeping them on that plane of reality, but that failure had its cost.
Far too close to avoid an attack, it fired a beam of black mana directly at them, Ben turning to keep Greed from getting hit and taking the full force of it himself.
It passed through each defense Ben had set up until it made contact, and despite his skills and his unnaturally high death resistance he immediately felt an effect infinitely worse than any time he put on his ring to train his vitality.
He felt his life force plummet and continue to do so, the only thing keeping him alive being Greed's fast acting, beginning the healing process the moment Ben turned away and put his all into it.
“Alright Greed, change of plan. Get as much power out of me now as you can, we’re going to sprint for it.”
“Legs, you’re in rough shape right now we need to-”
“There’s no time and you know it. Come on man, if you can’t purify those ghosts then all we can do is run.”
The crab knew he was right, even if he thought it was too dangerous. There wasn’t a single part of their situation that wasn’t after all so he took a risk himself, he stopped healing himself to push as much mana as he could into the other man, ignoring any risk to Ben's body to get more speed then it would ever want to give and focusing his all to repair the damage it caused as fast as he could. If Ben was going to risk dying then so was he.
With a burst of speed and a feeling of his muscles exploding in the process he was off, in seconds blowing past the ghosts as if they hadn’t been expecting anything like that and shooting towards the exit, keeping it in his sights as he went.
He did minor zigs and zags to try and avoid any attack that might come from the back, but he could look to see where it might be coming from. He couldn’t. All he could do was depend on whatever bit of luck he might have, praying to the universe to cut him a break as he went until he launched himself to the exit, ending up safely on the other side.