Chapter 9

“What do you think?” Shades asked, staring at the cave entrance.

Mel floated closer and inspected the opening a little more.

“Can’t see anything from here. We’ll need to go in.” She replied after a moment. “It curves a little up ahead.”

They had reached the edge of the forest the previous night, which also happened to be the final night of the countdown. That morning they came across a cave-like entrance. They didn’t know if it was a dungeon, not thinking they’d find one so soon, but they couldn’t just ignore it. Even it was just a normal den, it could still net them some Dayle.

“Alright. Let’s check it out.” He decided, cautiously moving through the entrance, deeper into the cave. Mel stayed slightly behind him, as had become her custom.

It curved a few times, jagged pillars of stone holding it up. Eventually the pair found what they assumed they were supposed to be looking for.

The roof of the cave stretched upwards to accommodate huge, stone doors. Tall stone pillars flanked either side of them. Intricate markings and engravings covered them, seeming almost ancient. There was a small round slab in the middle of them, slightly bigger than his hand. Not seeing any door handle, he pressed his hand against the round stone and felt it shift. Pushing harder caused it to press inwards with a grating noise.

It clicked after a few inches and something heavy seemed to be released with muted thud. The doors trembled, dust falling from them after centuries of apparent disuse. With a loud stone-on-stone grating noise, the doors slowly opened, like the maw of a giant, beckoning them into its gullet. A strong draft accompanied the opening before subsiding after a moment.

“That’s not ominous at all.” Shades muttered. “If this doesn’t shout ‘dungeon’ at the top of its metaphorical lungs, I don’t know what does.”

They continued forward slowly, ready for anything.

They were only a few metres past the doors when a boom was heard. Shades nearly jumped out of skin, cursing.

Looking behind them, they saw only a solid stone wall where the doors once stood. Feeling down the middle, Shades couldn’t find where the doors joined. It was completely solid.

“Guess we're not getting out this way.” He said.

“Onwards then.” Mel stated, pointing deeper into large tunnel.

Wary for any traps, they continued their journey deeper into the dungeon.

It was a few minutes further in when a low rumble was heard. Shades couldn’t feel the ground shaking. It was more a vibration through the air.

“Boy.” A voice suddenly said.

The pair spun around, searching for any enemies or anywhere the voice could have come from.

“Why…have you come?” It had a strangely deep and tired tune to it. It reverberated through the tunnel, coming from everywhere at once, as if the dungeon was talking to him.

“Who are you?” Shades called.

“You walk…to your doom.” It said, ominously.

Realising that there were no physical enemies, they continued walking further down the tunnel.

“Who are you?” He asked again, but there was no reply.

Another few minutes passed them by when they came to a large chamber. He could see a narrow stone bridge, high up in the middle of it, going from his left to right from where he entered. It looked like it was carved into the chamber, connecting two exits. There were numerous stalactites and stalagmites, connecting the floor and ceiling. They looked like they had roughly rounded, grey bulbs on them.

“Hmm.” Shades walked closer to one of the stalagmites and touched one of the strange bulb-like protrusions. The large pillars of stones were filled with them. “They don’t feel like stone.” He muttered. “They feel like…” He knocked on one of them. It sounded hollow. “…bone.”

Suddenly that same reverberation sounded throughout the room. This time, some of the bone-like things started shaking as well.

“Leeaave…” The voice said again. The sound came from all around.

“We can’t!” Shades shouted. “The door sealed shut!”

The deep bass-like vibration became louder, ringing in his ears.

“Then…you will…join us.” The last two word were even deeper. Like a final declaration.

Suddenly all sound stopped. The rumbling disappeared and the bone-like things stopped shaking. Everything seemed to pause for second. Shades and Mel didn’t move, waiting for the other shoe to drop.

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The stone around the round thing in front of him cracked.

It then crumbled and Shades finally saw what it was as it picked itself out of the pillar, like a corpse picking itself out of a grave.

‘Skulls.’ He thought. ‘They’re all… skulls.’

The skull was attached to a skeleton. This skeleton was smaller than the normal ones. It had four sharp, bony claws instead of fingers.

It was fast, Shades found, as it leapt at him.

‘Not nearly fast enough.’ He smirked, as he side-stepped it and brought his clawed fingers down on its spine. Cutting easily through it.

His smirk got wiped away when he looked around and noticed all the other skeletons waking up as well.

There had to be hundreds of them. Thousands.

The pillars of stone crumbled around him and skeletons picked themselves out of the dust and rock.

“Sheeeit. Mel?” He glanced at her floating above him. “We may be in trouble.”

She rolled her eyes. “The bridge?” She asked, pointing at the walkway of salvation in the middle of the giant chamber.

“My thoughts exactly.” He answered and sprinted to almost directly under it, before jumping and shooting up to it. He almost missed it but managed to grab it at the last second with the tips of his fingers and pulled himself up. “Hah.” He laughed. “Guess they didn’t account for us getting here so easily.”

He ran to one of the exits, wondering what else this place had in store for him.

The exit slammed shut before he could reach it, however, a large stone obstruction preventing him from leaving.

“Must you always make things worse?” She asked, throwing her hands in the air.

He inspected the stone wall. Three skull-shaped depressions were carved into it. These ones looked like whichever skull fit in there had horns.

“Looks like it needs some kind of key.” He mumbled.

“Shades?” Mel called as he pondered what to do. “You might want to take a look at this.”

He absently glanced behind him, seeing what Mel wanted, before his eyes widened.

‘Looks like we don’t have time.’ He thought as he looked at the small skeletons climbing the walls of the chamber, digging their claws into the stone and pulling themselves up. They moved like a wave of bones, creeping up the walls. They’d reach them in only a few seconds.

“It needs a key to open.” He said, running over to her. “Three skulls with horns.”

She snorted. “Good luck trying to find skulls in all that.” She waved at the mass of bones approaching them.

“Some of them have to be different.” He said, his sharp eyes scanning the horde.

Soon enough, as almost all of them were the same dull grey colour, he spotted a few black ones with horns. They were surrounded by a few hundred of the normal ones.

“Fly up to the ceiling.” He readied himself to leap down. “I’ll meet you back up here once I’ve got all three.”

She grabbed him before he could jump.

“No.” She said firmly, holding him by shoulders and looking him in the eyes. “We don’t have time for only one of us to do this, they’d swarm you before you got to all three. I’ll grab one as well.” He was already shaking his head, having none of that.

“It’s too dangerous Mel, if they swarm-”

“The same danger applies to you.” She stopped him. “You need my help.”

He saw he wouldn’t be able to change her mind on this before the swarm of Reavers reached them. He let out an exasperated breath and held her to him, hugging her tightly.

“Just stay near the bridge if you can. I’ll throw my skulls to you and distract them while you open the door.”

She reluctantly nodded, letting him go.

Turning, he leapt off the bridge to the nearest black Reaver, speeding himself up and increasing his mass as he neared it.

When he finally crashed into them, he sent the nearest Reavers flying. It only gave him a tiny gap before they crashed into him, but it was enough. He formed blades on the side of his arms and legs as well as his normal claws and kicked off the ground, spinning like a tornado and sending bones flying as he cut everything near him to pieces. Still spinning in mid-air, he made a hole in the sea on bones as he landed close enough to the black Reaver, careful not to cut it up as well. He didn’t want to know what they’d have to do if they lost the three skulls they needed.

He sped himself to almost his limit. The press of bones was becoming oppressive but not enough to cause him too much of problem. With the speed he now had, he slowed his spinning momentarily and severed the black skull from its spine. Grabbing it in the same motion with his other hand, he threw it in the direction of Mel, knowing she’d catch it.

He lost his spinning momentum but jumped at one of the walls as soon as he threw the skull, bursting out of the wave of skeletal bodies that almost trapped him. His reserves were reaching halfway, causing him to release his powers momentarily as he sailed over the sea of bones, sparing as much as he could. Nearing the wall, he decreased his mass and raised his strength and speed again as much as he could in the split second he landed on the wall.

As time slowed to a crawl, he scanned the area and got a glimpsed of black. Kicking off the wall, he shot forward like a bullet. He shredded through everything in his path on his way to the black Reaver. Luckily, he landed near it, and with his reaction speed, managed to perform the same move as before, beheading it and tossing the skull to Mel through the hole he created with his entrance.

Through his heightened perception, he watched as the skeletons slowly pressed in, sharp bones grasping for living flesh. His blood rushed through his head, pumping in his ears with the beat of a master musician. He was smiling as the adrenaline coursed through his veins.

Tensing his muscles and twisting his body, he exploded upwards, in the direction of the bridge and tore through everything in his way.

His aim was a little off but Mel managed to catch his outstretched hand and pulled him onto the bridge.

“I managed to get the other one!” She shouted through of noise thousands of bones clacking and grinding together as they ran to the door.

They placed the skulls in their sockets, causing the things to glow a deep blue. The Reavers that were climbing up to the bridge then suddenly stopped and as if something cut their strings, they all slowly toppled over and crumbled into huge piles of bones.

They breathed heavily as the adrenaline left them.

“Who going to clean all this do you think?” Shades wondered, causing Mel to just roll her eyes, though a smile did tug at her lips.

“Let’s go.” She called, hurrying through the exit.

Shades stood there for a moment, looking at the other exit and wondered what lay there, before turning and hurrying after Mel. Just as he went through the exit, the embedded skulls glowed brightly and released three large golden orbs that flew directly into Shades. Checking his interface, he found an extra three hundred Dayle now orbiting his star.

“Not bad.” He muttered.

Looking down the endless tunnel, he wondered if the difficulty of these tests would increase as they progressed.

‘Only one way to find out.’

Day 60