A loud gong echoed through the halls as Heather turned about in confusion. Alura stopped before an intersection, questioning their next move.
“Does that mean something?” Heather asked as she moved to Alura’s side.
“I have only done this once before, and I didn’t get very far that time,” Alura admitted as she went to tap the floor ahead with her sword.
“So, you don’t know?” Heather pressed.
“No,” Alura replied. “I watched a few matches as well and I can’t recall ever hearing that.”
Focused on the sound, Heather paid attention to the dungeon listening for anything more. She was rewarded with a faing clicking noise coming from someplace behind them. She walked back, daring to look down the tunnel they had just used, only to see something coming. She had to squint to make it out, but it appeared like a wave of yellowish water, reaching from the floor to nearly the ceiling. It rolled with a sickening motion, its jelly-like surface covered in mouths the size of her entire head. Just seeing the horrid thing made her skin crawl, and in a panic, she ran back to Alura.
“Something horrible is coming from behind us!” she cried as the angelic woman stood in the intersection.
“From behind us?” Alura asked and then stepped back to look down the hall. As soon as the beast rounded the corner, Alura jumped in alarm and told Heather to run.
“What is that?” Heather asked as they recklessly ran down the hall.
“It’s called a mawed slime,” Alura replied as they turned right at the next intersection without even bothering to look for traps. “They are practically immune to weapons damage.”
“So, how do we stop it?” Heather asked.
“Cold-based attacks work best,” Alura said as they headed for a door. “Fire does a little damage, but it will be gnawing on your bones before you can kill it with your little balls of flame. Are you sure you can’t take that collar off?”
“I am positive,” Heather growled, knowing full well her disguise would vanish the moment it came off. She couldn't risk it with a ballroom full of people potentially watching her every move.
They turned down a narrow hall, and suddenly the walls began to move, sliding inwards for a significant length. They were stuck with the prospect of running back and facing the slime or trying to run down the entire length before the walls closed in. Alura realized the danger and created a bubble of glowing light centered on herself. The walls collided with it and stopped, producing a loud groaning noise as they tried to crush them.
“Go,” Alura cried as her bubble started to crack.
“Go? As in leave you here?” Heather balked.
“Yes, I can't move with the bubble up, and the moment it comes down, we will die,” Alura groaned.
“Not a chance,” Heather said and fell into a spell. She began to call on plants, causing them to grow rapidly up and down the hall. By dumping more power into the spell, she could make them grow taller and thicker, becoming natural barriers to the crushing walls. She needed time to keep channeling until trunks as thick as her waist stood braced against the crushing doom. Alura cried out as her shield began to break, but it bought precious seconds that Heather put to good use. When the barrier finally failed, the walls shuddered as they collided with the growth, barely moving an inch.
“That was good thinking,” Alura panted. “But the hall is blocked. We can’t get through.”
“Flower singer,” Heather reminded as she swept up Webster and told him to cling to her pack. She then grabbed Alura's hand and broke into a sweet musical tune. A faint green glow surrounded both women as something terrible roared behind them. They looked back to see the slime monster had arrived and was biting and gnawing through the growth, rapidly clearing the way.
Without a moment to lose, Heather ran forward and used her pass through plant's ability to carry the three to safety. They arrived at the far door, for Heather to use one of her vines to tear it open. Inside was a room full of spinning gears and moving chains. It reminded Heather of being inside a giant clock, but she wasn't in the mood to jump and dodge the moving parts. Instead, she focused her sight across the room to a tunnel as a third eye opened on her forehead.
“What was that?” Alura cried as they arrived in a flash of green.
“A little trick of my race,” Heather said as they stepped forward only to have spears fire from the walls. Heather shrieked, but Alura reacted with lightning speed, stepping in front of the weapons as she created a glowing shield. They splinted on the magical barrier and clattered to the floor as the room behind them exploded into flames.
“What's going on here?” Heather cried as they stepped away from the burning gears.
“I don't know, but this place is suddenly perilous,” Alura replied.
“At least we got rid of that slime thing. Even if it survives the crushing walls, I bet it won’t follow us through those flames,” Heather said.
Alura nodded and took five steps before the floor started to shake. The walls cracked and out poured thousands of insects the size of large coins. They ran down the walls like water, pooling in the hall as a growing mass. Heather didn't wait for Alura to say anything, she simply ran as fast as she could, but the pack of coins was weighing her down.
“Now, what is that?” Heather panted as they headed for another intersection.
“It's called a hivrix,” Alura gasped. “A type of monster composed of a swarm of insects. They are terrible to fight because they crawl inside your armor and bite you.”
“Lovely,” Heather groaned and heard Webster chirping that he wanted to eat some.
“You will be eaten by them instead,” Heather snapped and came to a sudden halt as the air in front of them shimmered. Suddenly the floor fell away, and the two women cried in alarm. Before either of them could react, they landed in a sticky mass of tangled cords. Alura was wrapped tight, her wings caught, and her sword arm tangled. Heather was more comfortably sprawled but didn't like what she saw.
“Spiders!” Alura cried as Heather looked around to see they were suspended over a deep hole in a web. A dozen spiders the size of a large dog were tapping at the webs as they crawled out of holes.
“Webster! Can you talk to them and tell them to leave us alone?” Heather gasped as she struggled to get free. He chirped to indicate the answer was no, but he did have another option. Heather listened as he quickly explained it and, with a groan, told him to go ahead. He bit her in the shoulder, injecting her with a spider blessing of being able to walk on webs.
Suddenly the webs were no longer sticky, and Heather struggled to clamber toward Alura, who was beginning to panic. Above, she heard a noise like the chirping of a thousand cicadas and saw a vaguely humanoid face in a black swarm of crawling bugs looking down. She reached Alura as the spiders closed in and used her scythe to slash at one and drive it back.
“Bite her and give her the blessing!” Heather yelled as her scythe burst into flames to help intimidate the spiders.
“Bite me? what do you mean, bite me?” Alura cried in alarm.
“His bit conveys some kind of spider ability. It will free you from the webs,” Heather yelled as Webster reached the entangled angel. He did as instructed and quickly bit the Alura, allowing her to break free. She still had to untangle her wings, but the strands were no longer sticking, and she promptly stumbled to hands and knees.
“We can’t go back up or were insect food,” Heather said as she slashed at another spider. “And we can’t stay here.”
“Then we go down,” Alura said as she looked for a place to land. She spotted a ledge with a tunnel and quickly pointed it out to Heather. Heather nodded and commanded Webster to jump on her back. She then tackled Alura, and her green eye flashed. They were on the ledge in a burst of light, but the ground began to shake as dust fell from the walls.
“This is crazy,” Heather cried as they stumbled into the tunnel. “We can’t stop to catch our breath.”
“I have no idea why this is happening,” Alura panted and put a hand to her neck where Webster had bitten her. “So, he gave me spider powers?”
“He said we could climb walls and use webs without getting stuck for a short time,” Heather replied.
“Spider pets are useful,” Alura laughed and led the way at a brisk jog. They arrived at a large oblong chamber with only to be attacked by giant bats whose heads resembled the suckers of a lamprey eel. The beasts were nearly as tall as she was, and they flew down in waves, trying to tackle their prey to pin them to the floor.
Alura used her holy shield to fend them off while Heather summoned thorn whip plants to fill the air with flying needles. She used her scythe several times when the monsters dived, but eventually, they stumbled across the room and into the next hall. This one was full of smoke, blinding Alura and forcing Heather to take the lead. Her devil sight had no trouble seeing through the gloom and spotting the dozens of little creatures hidden within. They looked like red goblins, only a third of the size and with a pair of short black horns. Smoke boiled off their skin as they cackled and screeched to see the intruders.
Heather quickly described them, and Alura told her they were a type of devilkin called smoldering imps. She asked Heather to stand back, and when the imps got close, she held up a hand and called on the heavens. Light-filled the tunnel as Alura glowed with golden power. The creatures howled in pain and fled or turned to stone before crumbling into ash.
“What was that?” Heather asked in amazement as she dared to come close again.
“Turn evil,” Alura said with a smile. “If you think that was neat, you should see what it does to the undead. They literally burst into flames and burn away.”
“I don't need to see that,” Heather sighed and took the lead to navigate the smoke-filled tunnels. They stumbled into a room with a sunken floor that went down in five broad steps. There was greenish fluid at the bottom, creating a pool out of which rose a slug-like monster. It had six little appendages, three on each side of a gaping maw. Before Heather could react, it fired a sort of fluid from an appendage that splashed across her skin and started to burn.
“Heather!” Alura cried and jumped between them, Using her holy shield to block the next spray.
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“Ow! This really hurts,” Heather groaned as her plant armor burned and boiled away in large patches. She quickly fell into her healing spell, and the pulsing green glow came to her skin to soothe away the burns.
Alura charged at the beast as it lashed with unbelievable speed, trying to bite her in half. She managed to clip it and cut a gash through its hide, but it constantly sprayed streams of acid, and Alura couldn't avoid them all. She was burned several times but managed to cut two of the little nubs from the slug before Heather joined her side.
She slashed at the monster with a flaming scythe, creating burning wounds. The beast roared and thrashed as it tried to face them both, but quickly it started to falter. The two women pressed on, driving it back as they created a dozen more wounds. It dived for the pool in the center a moment later, slipping before the surface as Alura smoldered from acid.
“Let me heal that,” Heather said and applied her pulsing heal. Alura thanked her and used her own heal to speed the process. Just as they were about to step back, a sound like rain filled the room, and the pool in the center started to rise.
“We can’t catch a break,” Heather groaned.
“I have seen a dozen of these parties,” Alura replied with a shake of her head. “They were never this hard.”
“Well, it is now,” Heather quipped as they ran back and headed for a tunnel on the far side. She looked over her shoulder, wondering if that pool would flood the tunnels when they ran into another giant chamber.
“You have got to be kidding me,” Heather groaned as they stared down a giant bridge over yet another chasm. Near the center was an arch of stone on which were written glowing magical runes. Standing under the arch was a towering statue of iron plates with giant hammers clutched in each hand. It stood an easy twenty meters tall, and if they wanted to get by, they would have to walk between its legs.
“Those runes say the exit is above us,” Alura said as they looked up to see the chasm went up and up. There were ledges and bridges high above, and Alura asked if she could teleport them up.
Heather didn't know, but she grabbed Alura and focused on the closest ledge. It was easily three times the furthest distance she had ever tried before. As her third flared with light, the runes on the arch glowed to match. Suddenly a pulse of energy swept the area, and Heather's power failed.
“I can’t!” she cried and tried again. “Something just happened. It’s like the power has been turned off.”
“That pulse must have been a counterspell,” Alura said. “You probably won't be able to use it for several minutes.”
“Can you fly us up?” Heather asked as she tried to see the exit from where they stood.
“My wings are just powerful enough to carry me and some armor and gear. I doubt I could fly with this loaded pack, and even if I ditched it, I doubt you would be much lighter.”
“So we would have to throw all our treasure away,” Heather sighed and thought of the prospect of losing the contest. Webster chirped and reminded them that they could climb like a spider and suggested they simply use the walls.
“Good idea!” Heather remarked and turned to head for the wall as the whole place shook. Unfortunately, the bridge behind them began to splinter, and they had to rush toward the center to avoid falling over the edge. By the time the collapse ended, they were halfway to the middle with no hope of reaching the wall from this side.
“Do we try to wait for the counterspell to wear off?” Heather suggested as she warily eyed the iron statue near the middle.
“I don't' think we can,” Alura replied as the entire structure shook again. “This bridge might collapse before it does.”
“Which means we have to go through the statue,” Heather sighed. “You know that thing is going to come to life.”
“We don't have any choice,” Alura replied and cast a few spells on herself. “I will lead, and you assist as you can.”
Webster chirped again, and Heather paused to consider the option as terrifying as it was.
“What did he say?” Alura asked.
“He said to run under the bridge,” Heather replied as she looked at the edge.
“Under it? Alura repeated as she considered the option. “Will his power hold us even with all this weight?”
Webster chirped and jumped down, scattering to the edge and running over. Heather said that he was sure it would and they had better follow before the bridge collapsed. With no other option, both women hurried to the side and got down on hands and knees to crawl over the lip. Heather felt sick when she looked down and could feel her weight pulling into the fall, but sure enough, her feet stuck, as did Alura's, even through her boots.
“This is amazing,” Alura said as she dared to stand on the bridge's underside, her long golden hair hanging straight down.
Webster chirped to hurry them along as the bridge started to crumble again. The two women took cautious steps, feeling as if they might fall away at any moment. After a dozen steps, they began to pick up the pace and moved along, anxious to get back up.
“I can’t believe we are doing this,” Heather groaned as they ran along the bottom of the bridge.
“I want a spider pet now,” Alura laughed. “He is very useful.”
“I had no idea he could do that,” Heather grumbled. “Usually, all he does is sleep and complain that he's hungry.”
They neared the center point of the bridge and passed under the archway, causing a gong-like alarm to ring out. The two kept going as nothing of any danger presented itself until the bridge suddenly shook under their feet.
“What is causing that?” Heather asked as she nearly stumbled.
“I don’t know,” Alura replied and staggered a few steps.
Just ahead, the bridge exploded, and the debris tumbled away, leaving a hole. Then, they saw the metal of a large hammer lift away, explaining the strange shaking.
“That giant statue knows we are down here!” Heather shouted as they ran around the hole. “It’s hammering the bridge to try and dislodge us.”
“Then we have to get to the other side before it knocks one of us loose!” Alura added and tried to run faster.
Heather focused on reaching the far wall as the bridge shook from the giant's footsteps. Another hole was blasted just ahead of them, nearly sending Webster down with the rubble. Heather hurried by as the statue created yet another hole, striking at random but always someplace nearby. Obviously, the creature had some means to detect their presence even if it couldn't see them.
A hundred steps from the wall, the whole bridge shook, and half of it fell away. The giant suddenly reached through the hole and tried to swat them from the underside. Alura was closest, and she staggered away as the massive hand clenched at the underside and crumbled brick. He continued to flail as the bridge began to come apart, his enormous arm preventing them from going across.
“What do we do now?” Heather asked as the surface she clung to began to shift.
“We can't stay here, and we can't go back,” Alura said as she wiped the hair from her face. “We have to risk running by him.”
Heather nodded and two tensed to run as the bridge suddenly broke apart. The giant's weight on the weakened section sent it all tumbling into the void below. Desperate to stop its fall, the monster reached out and grabbed at both sides, hanging in the air between the gap.
Webster was the first to act, running for the giant's arm and then across it, using the monster as a bridge. Heather and Alura quickly followed as the giant roared and thrashed its head to try and dislodge them. They manage to run upright, crossing the thing's shoulders and down the other arm as it raged in anger. In a final act of defiance, it let go of the other side and tried to slap them off, but the motion dislodged it. Heather and Alura leaped from the arm to tumble on the remains of the bridge. The giant's last handhold crumbled, and with a roar, it fell into the abyss.
“Please let this be over,” Heather said as she laid on her back, looking up into the shaft that went on for what seemed like forever.
“It isn’t over until we reach the exit,” Alura panted. “Let’s use the spider power and climb up instead of risking the tunnel.”
“We will have to crawl on hand and knees,” Heather replied as she rolled over and stumbled the last few steps to the wall. It felt unnerving to place her palm to the surface without curling her fingers around a handhold, but sure enough, they stuck. Slowly they climbed out with Webster chirping and urging them on as he warned his blessing wouldn't last much longer.
“Are we even going to make it to the next ledge?” Heather asked as they hurried along, the heavy pack digging at her shoulder.
He chirped and bobbed, confident they would make it, but probably no further than that. He couldn't bite them again for twenty-four hours, so they needed to make the best use of the time they had left.
They climbed as quickly as they could while distant shrieks and booming noise echoed from someplace in the distance. Alura suggested the noise might be some of the other teams and hoped they had enough treasure to win.
“I just want out,” Heather said as they neared the ledge. “I am done with this crazy place.”
Alura agreed, and they pushed on, closing the gap with concern that their spider power might fail any second. Thankfully they reached the edge and pulled over the lip with a relieved sigh, only to discover they were not alone.
“You two are still alive?” a tall insectoid man with four arms said. He was standing beside a tall woman with dark purple skin and a single white horn growing out of her forehead.
“I would never have believed a flower singer would have lasted so long,” the woman said as she eyed their packs. “Oh, but look at all the treasure they brought us.”
Heather understood the meaning and reacted as the insect man produced four flaming knives. She created a plant wall just in time to see the four blades come through the surface and set it on fire. Alura was up in a flash, rushing to meet the woman who laughed and held out a hand, producing a giant spiked club.
Heather summoned her scythe as the insect man tore through the wall and came rushing in. He flailed at her in a rhythmic dance of blades, but she had the longer reach and even took him by surprise when she threw the weapon, spinning like a buzzsaw.
“You’re like no flower singer I ever heard of,” he growled and leaped out of the way. “But now you don’t have a weapon.”
Heather smiled and ran back, drawing him away from Alura. He pursued with a laugh, calling her a weakling until she finally turned around and snapped her fingers. The air filled with golden pollen, blinding his sight as he cursed and struck out.
“What is this supposed to do?” he laughed, then choked on the cloud. “You still can't get near me, and this will wear off shortly.”
“Maybe,” Heather replied as she stepped out of his reach. “But seeing how your knives burned my wall gave me an idea.”
“What idea?” he asked in alarm.
Heather smiled wickedly and held up a hand, calling on her devil race’s simple fire ability. The dense pollen acted like a flammable gas, exploding into flames that caressed Heather's skin with a gentle kiss. Unfortunately, the insect man wasn't so lucky, and he stumbled out of the inferno, his charred skin smoldering as it still burned in places.
Heather then held out her hand, calling on the scythe as it reformed out of smoke. The poor insectoid tried to fend her off, but she used her pollen a second time, and he collapsed. Heather left him crawling on the floor to aid Alura, who was trading heavy blows with the strange purple woman. Now double-teamed, she screamed at the insect for being a weakling and ran turned her wrath on Heather.
Despite her best efforts, Alura was a superb fighter and, with a sword raised high, pronounced a divine strike. She then raced in with a flash and produced a single thunderous slash that was filled with lightning. The purple woman was thrown back but tried to recover only to catch Heather's throw scythe in the chest. Still, she wasn't down, and before they could close, she shouted the words hail of blows. Heather was amazed as the woman's club became a cloud of rapid strikes, two of which sent Heather flying and a few more battered poor Alura.
“I am so sick of being pummeled,” Heather groaned and cast her pulsing heal. She crawled to her feet to see Alura strike the other woman with a beam of light, but still, she didn't go down. Heather was impressed at how much punishment the two women could take, but the dungeon continued to shake, and she was in a hurry. “Webster, I need a hand,” she said and turned to the insect man who was crawling along the ledge. She had Webster attach a silk to the man then leap at the purple woman. He landed on her back and attached a silk to her, leaping off as Heather kicked the insect man over the side. The woman was focused on Alura that she didn't even notice Webster or the danger as the silk cord pulled taught. The sudden jerk pulled her from her feet, and with a vow to pay them back, she went over the edge and fell into the void.
Alura fell to one knee panting as Heather reapplied her pulsing heal. They paused only for a moment to let the heal do some work before hurrying into a hall as the sound of cracking stone echoed from someplace.
“You are a devious fighter,” Alura said, appreciating Heather's skill.
“I was just getting sick of waiting for that woman to run out of health,” Heather said as they ran through a cloud of dust. “Though you seem to be hard to kill as well.”
“I am a warrior class,” Alura said as they arrived at an intersection and went left. “And my race compliments my power. Hers did, too. She was a kind of ogre with a barbarian class. I am sure she had more health and could hit harder, but my attacks are more likely to crit.” She looked at Heather with a smile and asked how she managed to produce those clouds of fire.
“I can summon a cloud of glowing pollen so thick it blinds and chokes those inside it. I figured since it was basically a plant, it might catch fire. I didn't realize it would burn like gasoline. Thankfully I am infernal, and the fire couldn't harm me.”
“But the insect man had burning knives?” Alura asked. “Why didn’t it explode when it touched his knives?”
“I think it has something to do with being my power,” Heather replied. “I created the pollen so only I could set it on fire.”
“Ha, you have to be the most dangerous flower singer in the history of the world,” Alura laughed and barreled through an open archway as a hail of darts fired from hidden openings. Her armor absorbed most of them, but a few found their way in, forcing her to stop to heal.
“We are taking a serious risk by charging down these halls,” Alura said as she cast a heal on herself. “One of these traps could be lethal.”
“Standing still appears to be lethal,” Heather said and pointed back to show the tunnel behind them collapsing. “Is this whole place about to fall on our heads?”
“I don't think so,” Alura replied as she hurried into the next room. “I have a feeling those paths are blocked, so we have to keep moving toward the exit. A lot of battle royal games work like this, driving the players into a smaller and smaller area to increase conflict.”
She suddenly came to a stop and held out her sword, the light of the blade illuminating the two dead players. They looked as if somebody used a massive spear and punched them full of holes. The two immediately looked around, but it was Webster who spotted the danger. Heather heard him squeak and looked up to see the ceiling rose another twenty meters. At the very peak was a dark patch that did little to conceal the danger.
It resembled a spider, or maybe a tick was a better description. It had eight legs, but all of them ended in serrated blades that resembled Heather's scythe. There was a crown of short tentacles, which ended in a slitted eye at the front end. Under that was a stubby pair of hooks to either side of a gaping mouth. The beast moved with terrible speed, jumping from above with all eight bladed feet pointed their way.
Alura shoved Heather out of the way and was nearly tackled by the monstrosity. She took an immediate hit to the leg but used something called champion’s retaliation to deliver a massive up swipe that threw the beast off.
Heather rolled to her feet, nearly tumbling over Webster as he scurried out of the way. She came up with the scythe in hand and used her dash ability to close the gap. With a powerful swipe, she did absolutely nothing as the beast blocked with one of its limbs then lashed back, tearing a bleeding line down her chest.
Heather stumbled back in shock, one hand clutching the bleeding gash. She couldn't believe how easily it had torn through her plant armor and how serious a wound it delivered. This wasn't a low-level monster, and the seriousness of the situation sank in as the beast lashed attacked.
She threw up a plant shield, but the beast came right through it, slashing it apart in seconds. Before Heather could react, she was impaled in the leg, shoulder and cut down one side. Thankfully Alura leaped onto the monster's back and used her divine strike to drive the blade in with an additional burst of lighting. The monster switched back to Alura, allowing Heather to crash to the floor. Heather's vision went blurry as she blacked out, the last of her health seeping away.
“Oh no!” Quinny cried as they watched Heather fall in one of the viewer windows. The party hall erupted into cheers and comments as the flower singer, who was so resourceful, finally met her match.
Frank growled in anger at how people cheered to see Heather hurt. He burned with frustration at being helpless to do anything about it and started to pace like a caged animal. He wanted to take his ghoul form and charge in after her, but that would ruin everything. Legeis saw the tension and tried to help by encouraging him that Alura could probably heal her before she died. Frank tried to see that as a viable option, but it all assumed Alura would live. From where he stood, that fight wasn't going well, and Alura would only last a minute longer.
All they could do was hope and pray that something would turn the tide. If not, then they were about to find out if Heather would respawn as a hero player or reset as a monster.