Our findings had us baffled, wondering why the writer was so adamant about creating a Chimera. From what I knew, a Chimera was the amalgamation of different animal parts. Usually, when a person creates a Chimera, it is their goal to create the perfect being suited for whatever plan they had in mind. In Greek mythology, it's a mythical creature that had the ability to breathe fire and had the body of a lion, a goat's head, and a snake's head as a tail. Whichever one the writer was trying to create, the outcome wasn’t pretty.
“Laila, this isn’t good at all,” Isaac said nervously. “Chimeras are strong as shit once complete. Hell, even an incomplete one is troubling.”
“You’re not wrong, but what I want to know is why would this psycho kidnap the blacksmith?”
Isaac snapped his fingers. “I think I know why. Remember what Solgen said earlier while we were walking through town?”
“What she said earlier? Oh- when she said the blacksmith was also an inventor?”
“Bingo! The psycho probably wanted the blacksmith to build something related to its Chimera project. It makes the most sense, no?”
That’s the most likely outcome. Reading the logs this individual created and how long this research has been going on, and the recent disappearance of the blacksmith…
I turned to Isaac. “Isaac, if my hunch is correct, then its experiment is almost comp-“ The faint jangling of bones alerted me, so I twirled around. The sound was coming from a wooden door I hadn’t noticed earlier.
“Isaac, follow me!” I hissed as I pointed at the door we had entered from. He nodded and placed the leather book back in its compartment on the bookshelf. We both hid behind the closed door, ears pressed against it. The door opened with a loud creak, followed by a bang. We sucked in our breath, daring not to make a sound.
Whatever was inside stumbled around the room. I could make out the rustle of books and papers being handled. It only took a few minutes, but their footsteps retreated to wherever they came from. I motioned to Isaac to wait for a couple of minutes, just in case. After time was up, I slowly cracked open the door and sighed in relief as the coast was clear. We walked up toward the desk and shelves, quickly recognizing what was taken. Where a book once stood was a small gap filled with cobwebs and dust.
“They took the book. That could only mean one thing,” Isaac said, scratching his hair. We both stared at the door where the skeletons had busted through, and both blurted out the same sentence.
“The Chimera may be near its completion…”
****
“I hear nothing behind this door,” I whispered while inspecting the new door. Without a peephole, we had to be extra vigilant to avoid triggering any traps or alarms. Isaac cracked open the door and peered inside, revealing a wide stone hallway.
“No undead here. I’ll take the lead. Just so you know, I won't be using my finger lighter. Don’t want to alert the undead and whatnot,” he said carefully.
I stepped aside, letting my brother pass. We both pulled out our weapons from the Inventory and cautiously crept through the corridor. There were no sources of light, but that didn’t matter. While the [Night Vision] level was low, it somewhat helped. Isaac and I could make out a brittle skeleton that was slouched over a wall with many holes in its skull. Probably the work of a thick needle. The air was thick with the acrid smell of rotten eggs baking in the sun. Pieces of rock residue fell from the ceiling. From above, palm-sized spiders with fingers as legs scuttled across the ceiling.
I covered the bridge of my nose with my hand. “Ugh, this freak was experimenting on spiders, too?” While I was thinking of what else this bastard was cooking, I bumped into Isaac once again. “Ow… Why’d you stop?”
He put a finger to his lips and pointed at two heavily armed skeletons guarding a rusted iron door. Both were wearing iron helmets, and in their bony hands were a rusted sword and shield. When I laid my eyes on the undead, I instantly aimed for their heads with my magic. Two blades were lodged right in their cranium. The skeletons crumbled into a heap of bones.
“Nice. Just in case…” Isaac hopped over to the fallen bones and bashed them with the hilt of his sword, turning them into a pile of white powder. “Don’t want them stabbing us from behind, acting dead. Well, deader.”
I gave him the thumbs up for his cleverness. “They were guarding this metal door here. Something important is behind here, right?”
Isaac stepped aside as I pressed my ear against the cold iron. I heard muffled noises behind the door. “I think we finally found them. Behind this door, there are two voices, and one of them is most likely the blacksmith. What do we do now?”
Isaac glanced around the dark corridor. “This is the only entrance, and we cannot sneak inside. The only option is to bust through!”
I pondered his idea for a moment. “True… We have no other choice. On the count of three.”
Isaac agreed with my plan and got into position. I held up my fingers to start the countdown. Before I reached the count of three, the iron gate was unexpectedly flung open. I couldn’t process what happened as a decayed hand suddenly grabbed my face and threw me across the room with the strength of a gorilla. The sudden drop sent my stomach lurching as I plummeted towards the hard ground. I winced in pain as I landed right on my back… again.
“Laila!” Isaac said. Even though his voice sounded far away, he soon suffered the same fate and fell nearby. We found ourselves in a circular underground pit when we looked around. From above the pit, a tall figure gazed down at us. The figure in the raggedy black robe had its face concealed, leaving me to wonder who or what it was.
“Why are you humans so far from home?” Its voice sounded raspy- cold, but powerful. The cloaked figure was the source of the dark mana I had felt at the entrance earlier. “Fortuitously, an unexpected opportunity has come my way. The goods were scheduled to be delivered later, but this will suffice.”
The being suddenly jerked its head backwards and its body trembled. Its laugh was jarring, like the sound of sandpaper scraping against chalk. As soon as I sprang up from the ground, I lunged towards the veiled person to strike them before they could react. “I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” the figure snarled.
Upon reaching the pit's peak, an unseen mysterious force prevented my progress. A flash of electricity arched across my body as my head made contact, causing me to painfully bounce off it and land next to Isaac. “Ow! What the hell was that?” I yelped, rubbing my head.
The figure cackled wildly at my struggle. “Using mana, I have erected a barrier. Its resilience is impervious to all attempts to destroy it.” It muttered an incantation. What followed suit were groans coming from all directions of the pit. “You will need good fortune in dealing with my experiments that failed. Though I would prefer to execute you and extract your organs myself, there are more pressing issues to attend to.”
The creature then disappeared into a cloud of black smoke, leaving us stranded in a pit of ear-splitting groans. Isaac appeared by my side. Soon, four small sections of the walls descended. A mass of undead spilled out, a mixture of both monsters and humanoids, and each had small horns protruding from their skulls, reminiscent of those in Morgac’s village. Swarms of flaky skin and half-deformed faces shuffled forward.
“I-I think I’m going to be sick...”
“Stop paying attention to how they look and start hacking away!”
Isaac was busy slicing the heads of many undead with a face full of concentration. I followed his lead and stabbed the head of a quadruped monster with a skeletal head bigger than its torso. A humanoid lurched and tried to grab me from behind, but I sidestepped and sliced its head off. When I scanned around the pit, the flow of undead wasn’t slowing down in the slightest. It was as if we were in the middle of a mosh pit filled with walking corpses, and no exit was in sight. No matter how many we killed, they just kept on coming. Isaac gave up on using his sword and begun lighting his enemies on fire. Their pale skin melted off their skeletons like a candle wax figure tossed in a fireplace. Isaac’s chest heaved every time he spent his mana. I rushed on over while cutting through the hoard.
“Hey, you good? Save your mana for later!”
“You got a better idea? If not, I’ll keep on using it,” Isaac responded weakly. He then stabbed a flying undead spritsie that was gunning for his neck. A sea of sweat had formed on Isaac’s brow. His panting was comparable to a dog stranded in the middle of a scorching desert. If Isaac continued fighting while draining his mana on the undead, he’d collapse eventually.
I bit my lip in frustration as I racked my brain about what to do. The invisible barrier prevented us from jumping out of the pit, and the newly opened four openings did not provide an escape. The uncertainty of what was beyond made me decide against going. Our only options were to fight until all the seemingly endless undead were killed or collapse from sheer exhaustion as they tore through our flesh. Hastily, I looked up at the barrier erected above us and back at Isaac. I then remembered a conversation we had earlier about his magic. “Isaac! Can you somehow manipulate a small portion of the barrier so we could jump on through?” I said, cutting through the torso of a three-legged lava fish.
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He paused for a moment, and then smiled. “If you cut a path for me and hold them off while I work, then maybe.”
I rapidly looked around, searching for a spot with the least amount of undead. A section on the right had monsters noticeably smaller and fewer than the rest. I motioned for Isaac to follow. With a deep breath, I materialized one katana- thinking it would be enough- and started plowing through the mob with swift movements. The sound of bones breaking, flesh being sliced into pieces, and heads flying in different directions was all I could make out from the killing spree. In under thirty seconds, we reached the edge of the pit.
Isaac stood up front, arms out, and went to work. One skeleton tried to bite his left leg, but I quickly kicked the head off its shoulders like a soccer ball. Another one bumbled toward me with its empty eye sockets. My katana soared through the air and penetrated its skull. I felt my mana slowly slipping away as the process repeated.
“Laila, I finished!” Isaac said. Glancing upward, a hole big enough for an adult to squeeze through was there. With one last slash, we quickly scaled the wall and fit through the gap before it sealed shut. I peered down into the pit. The undead snarled as they clawed at the walls, their hungry eyes fixated on us. Before I could even take a breath, the sound of Isaac's struggle for air stopped me in my tracks. He was clutching at his chest, the fabric of his shirt creasing.
“Oh crap! Here, eat this!”
A mana crystal appeared in my hand and was jammed into Isaac's mouth. He gulped loudly, and a wave of calm washed over him as his breathing evened out and his grip relaxed. “Damn! That barrier was extremely well built. It took a lot of my mana just to create a small opening. I don’t want to do that ever again…”
The undead moans and nails scratching against the stone grew louder. I peered at the hole once more and said, “We can’t rest here. That thing took someone with him. I’m guessing it’s the blacksmith…”
Isaac stood up while patting himself down. “How about we call that thing a Lich instead? Makes it easier, ya know?”
“Whatever. Get ready to move out.”
He gave me a small salute and peeped through the System while I surveyed our surroundings. Besides the pit, there appeared to be a chamber of some sort. The tiled floor was crafted from polished stone. The wooden torches on the walls cast shadows on the nearby walls, filling the room with a soft glow. In the room’s corner were three arched bookcases embedded in the walls. A mahogany table, almost identical to the one in the previous room, sat empty before them. We found no exits.
How the hell did the Lich leave this room? There are no exits except for the iron gate. Did it really teleport out?
“We’ll have to climb up the hole we fell through-“
A sudden bellow shook the ground and walls, startling and interrupting my thoughts. A section of the ceiling above us suddenly cracked, and we heard stone raining down. Without being told, we both ran with all our might through the dark hallway, past the study room, and into the cell with the pile of decomposing carcasses. I went up first and climbed the wall, scaling it like an experienced rock climber thanks to the small grooves embedded within the stone.
Emerging from the trapdoor, I glanced around the mineshaft and did not spot the Lich. I helped Isaac up, and we finally left the mineshaft just as the entrance caved in. The crisp, clean air made me feel so relaxed I just wanted to lie down and take a nap, but I knew we had to keep moving.
“Where’s the source of the rumbling?” I panted as my body drooped from all the exertion. I heard no answer coming out of Isaac’s mouth. Curious, I turned and noticed Isaac was facing the opposite direction and pointed to the top of the mountain we hiked before. What stood there made my jaw.
A creature was unfurling its massive leathery wings, its upper body brimming with jade-like scales and two protruding horns atop its head. The lower body was a jumbled mess. It had the same thick tail as the salamander we had faced, and its body was a mismatched conglomeration of various creatures sewn together haphazardly. It howled to the skies; the sound piercing our ears like a thunderclap. The creature surveyed the hot region it found itself in, and its reptilian eyes spotted us.
“…I don’t know why, but I blame you. Are you happy to finally see a real wyvern?”
Isaac’s nose wrinkled his nose indignantly. “Ok, this doesn’t count. It’s not even a pure one. Just look at it!”
As if it heard Isaac bad-mouthing it, the Chimera released its wings, preparing to fly. A familiar feeling flashed before my brother’s eyes. “Oh shit, it’s about to chase us, isn’t it?”
“Why are you getting exci- you know what? Nevermind. I don’t have the energy to argue.”
The Chimera flew towards us, its wings beating like the roar of a bullet train. We dodged sideways in the nick of time just as the Chimera crashed into the destroyed mineshaft. As I retrieved my sword from the Inventory, Isaac was already mid-slash, battling against a struggling figure amidst the rubble.
“These scales are tough! I can only scratch it!” Isaac said after every swing.
“Look for any weak spots then!”
The Chimera finally escaped from the wreckage and hissed at Isaac. It lunged at him, jaws outstretched, hoping to devour him whole, but Isaac leaped on top of it. Summoning a set of blades, I threw them at the Chimeras salamander tail. It proved to be effective as a black liquid squirted from the wounds.
“Isaac, cut the tail off! It doesn’t have scales on that side!”
Isaac nodded at my order and jumped off the thrashing Chimera. He tried running around the Chimera to attack its blind spot, but the creature stopped moving and spun its massive body toward Isaac. Its throat started to expand. With each passing moment, the air grew thicker and more humid.
“Watch out for its breath attack!” I cried out desperately. It opened its maw wide and spewed red flames. Isaac's body became completely engulfed in flames, making his silhouette disappear from my view.
Knowing that its attention was on my brother, I dashed at its tail. Holding my blade high, I cut downward and severed its large tail. The Chimera stopped its breath attack and swiped one of its claws at my chest. Its enormous claws just barely grazed my skin, and I stumbled backward from the acid-like pain in my chest. The Chimera eyed its severe injury and whimpered. It took off for the skies, its wings beating the air, stirring up a storm of dust and leaves.
“Is it thinking of running away?” I heard someone say nearby. Upon casting a glance to the left, I noticed Isaac standing with his arms crossed and his skin uncovered from the scorching of his shirt. Some parts of his skin were charcoal black, but he seemed okay.
I ran up to him and shook him furiously. “How the hell are you still standing when you were just burned alive!?”
“[Heat Resistance] mastery,” Isaac answered while his head was bobbing back and forth like a bobblehead toy. “You can thank the heat here. Also, its breath wasn’t that hot, to begin with.”
I forgot about the [Heat Resistance] mastery! How lucky!
“Laila, it’s fleeing,” Isaac pointed out. The Chimera was in fact fleeing. The monster was heading in the direction of the Wyvern Zone. Black blood was still oozing out of where its tail used to be, leaving behind a trail of the tar-like substance.
“Why not just leave it? It doesn’t have much time to live since it’ll die of blood loss.”
Isaac glanced at me skeptically. “Did you forget? In the log, it mentioned its regenerative properties. As long as it has mana to spare, it will keep on living.”
Ah, right. It did mention that. Thinking about it deeply, it’s heading further within the Wyvern Zone. What if it can regain its mana by eating the wyverns?
“I don’t think we can catch up to it. And I don’t feel like venturing through a den of wyverns.”
Isaac smiled. “Don’t worry. I already crafted a masterful plan!”
****
“Uh, I don’t know if my [Marksmanship] skill is enough for this.”
“Don’t worry. With my help, you’ll hit it.”
I was holding a long spear I crafted using my mana. Isaac’s plan was to use a spear to skewer the Chimera. In order to kill it in one shot, he would supply the spear with whatever mana he had left over.
I steadied my aim, the target blissfully unaware of what was about to happen. I took a deep breath, and with all my strength, launched it at the fleeing Chimera. The spear hummed as it flew through the air like a jet. The Chimera detected the flood of mana behind it and attempted to steer away, only to find its efforts futile. It exploded from the Impact; hunks of its body scattered the area. Isaac’s boisterous laugh echoed across the valley.
“Hahaha! How’d you like that, huh? Once the spear made contact with a fire-breathing wyvern, it would trigger an explosion that could level an entire house if I wanted to! Am I a genius or what?!”
I rolled my eyes at Isaac’s boasting. “Dude, did you forget about the Lich? We also still haven’t found this blacksmith, ya know?”
“No need to look any further.”
A husky voice snapped Isaac out of his little enjoyment, and he spun around. A bald, burly man with a large backpack was strolling toward us. The man had a wild beard that descended to his chest, and his face had black smudges of soot. He wore a tool belt cinched around his wide waist, completed with a leather apron and a pair of steampunk goggles. A skeleton head was wrapped in his large, muscular arms.
“Are you the missing blacksmith?” I asked cautiously. The man gazed suspiciously at me and Isaac. “Er, we were sent by Morgac to find you. He said that you were missing for a while and thought you got into some trouble…”
The man scratched his scruffy beard as he looked up at the sky. “Morgac? I thought I told that fool I didn’t need any help. That youngster will receive a stern talking to…”
The head in the blacksmith’s arms began to vibrate violently. “Release me this instant! In due course, the Chimera I have constructed will tear your flesh and disintegrate you into tiny pieces!”
Isaac appeared over my shoulder as he looked on with glee. “Holy shit! Is that the Lich’s head in your arm?”
“This? A Lich?” the blacksmith snorted, revealing teeth. “This sad sap is far from it. It’s just like the rest of its creations- utter garbage.”
“How dare you call my inventions garbage! Soon, you will be overcome with a paralyzing fear!”
My brother walked over to the talking head, smiling wickedly.
“This little thing is harmless. Do whatever you wish with it,” the blacksmith grunted.
Isaac nodded at the blacksmith’s word. “Hey, shithead. That Chimera you mentioned before? It was no big deal, as it’s right now a smoking heap of fertilizer for the plants.”
The skeleton shifted its gaze to Isaac. “You killed it? Imposs-“
Before it could finish, Isaac dropped the head on the ground and merely stomped on it, crushing it to pieces. Black smoke rose from the remains, and a skull formed from black smoke. “Foolish humans… The Pillars will know of this and enact revenge on my behalf. You are only delaying the inevitable. It is only a matter of time until this planet faces destruction...”
In a puff of smoke, it disappeared into the empty air.
That was ominous… This thing was working for the Pillars? What plans do they have in mind if they want to create a Chimera? So many questions are now popping up inside my head. I’ll ask Morgac about this later.
The blacksmith grabbed a napkin off his tool belt, using it to wipe away the soot that had accumulated on his goggles. “Now then… Shall we head home?”