“You were right,” Ren said, pushing herself up into my blurred vision. “I would get used to it.”
It took my brain a couple of seconds to catch what she was even alluding to, before my blinking eyes cleared. We had both fallen asleep in our magician outfits, way too tired to even undress beforehand. It wasn’t the first time, but she had remembered way back near the coast when she had first decided to take up the mantle of being my protégé.
“Of all the things we have gotten used to,” I said, pushing myself up in to a seated position. “That is probably the least worrying.”
The elf gave me a peck on the side of the head before slipping off onto the floor to stand and stretch out. “How’s your health report today? Any complications from your head injury?”
I brought the screen up, and it was blank. “Full recovery.” I tried not to think about what it had said yesterday. The axe blow to the back of my head had almost done me in—I had been running on pure fumes and willpower for way longer than what was healthy. Standard at this point.
“Do you have any business to deal with in hell, or can we just leave?” The way she was looking at me hinted that she was insinuating we should definitely do the latter.
“There’s someone who wants to challenge me for the throne, but I made them a job offer instead. Best that I should see where that’s at first.” I gave her an apologetic grin, which she begrudgingly accepted.
I understood it. We were on the precipice of our final battle. Any distraction was just delaying the inevitable. Still, with there being a time dilation, a few minutes here wouldn’t affect our time back up top by much. Plus, you never knew when a side quest could give you something usable against the final boss.
My suit could do with a fix as well. I hit the button to tell the System to just that, dropping myself down to my underwear.
“Come on,” I encouraged her, “we’ll be done before my suit it ready, I promise.”
Ren rolled her eyes, but followed along as I left the bed to head to the throne room. Once we emerged, I was partially surprised to see that the long meeting table was empty. Over beside my throne, my patron demon hovered. The sword turned to face us as I walked over.
“Had to dispose of another council group?” I asked.
He made the approximation of a shaken head, turning briefly from side to side. “No, my king. This one has actually survived three meetings without breaking the rules. Too early to celebrate, but we are gradually weeding through those too power-hungry or sinister.”
I nodded. “And of my challenger?”
“She has been killing through the others intending to step against the throne, but insisted that she would only talk to you.” The eye on the hilt stared impassively. “So she has neither accepted nor declined your offer.”
“Rats.” I pulled a face and looked at Ren, who was now standing with her arms crossed.
“Before the suit comes back, you said.” Her glare had no anger in it, but I had a feeling she’d hold it against me if I broke that promise.
“I’ll go see her now,” I told my patron. “Are you… able to teleport us, or at least guide me to do it?”
“Yes, my king.” A purple sheen of energy washed over him, and then we were transported.
Straight into what looked like a fighting pit. Sharp metal poles encircled a crater that had been dug into the stone. Dried blood and aged bones littered the perimeter. Right in the middle was my challenger.
A large demon, easily… eighteen feet tall. At first I thought she was hiding behind part of the fighting arena, before I realized it was a tower shield of immense proportion. It looked like some manner of eldritch monolith, eight feet wide and just over twenty tall. Runes danced with foul light up and down it. I imagined she could only work with the weight of it due to her size and having six arms.
Her three left hands held this giant shield, while her three right each had a long whip. I wasn’t sure how she was able to utilize three whips at the same time, and wasn’t keen on finding out. At the end of each weapon was a barbed metal shape.
“Hello,” I said.
She turned her head down to gaze at me, her red eyes a stark contrast to the dull gray of the rest of her skin. “My king,” she said, her voice low and rumbling. “What an honor to finally meet you… in my fighting pit, of all places.”
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I eyed up the edges of the arena, now seeing a crowd of yellow eyes peering down through the shadows above. Part of me wondered if showing up here in just my underwear was a good idea. That said, I was almost wearing more than the demon, so I was in good company.
“You have received my job offer. In exchange for your fealty, I will spare your life,” I said and smiled.
“Sounds like king is scared,” she growled, her own grin crossing her face.
“I come to you without my regalia or battle dress, arriving in your home turf. Unfortunately, I have nothing to fear from you.” She was tensing her hands on the handles of her whips. I was clearly close to being tested.
“You are a tiny human. I think I have a chance.” Her tongue ran across her sharp teeth.
As much as I liked getting rid of threats, she was actually useful down here for filtering out all the other dregs trying to vie for my crown. More importantly, I didn’t have the minutes to spare before my outfit came back on.
“Any hand that opposes me, I will cut off. If you think you have a chance, I will take that head as well.” I held my hand out and frowned. “Do you have an umbrella, though? Feels like rain.”
The demon furrowed her brow, unsure if I was pulling her leg. “No rain in hell,” she snorted.
But then it started. A patter that increased in severity in a moment. It was blood, and the screams that started up from the crowd watching us signaled who it had come from. A simple card thrown out while nobody was looking, to swirl around and cut at any throat it could find.
“Not threatening.” The demon shrugged.
“Then strike me.”
I didn’t even have the chance to roll my eyes alongside that statement before she lashed out with the trio of whips. Faster than expected, but by now, I should be expecting that. The barbed metal tips cracked against my body in an instant, completely severing me into several fragments.
Interesting. She had used a skill called
I stepped out of invisibility as she gloated over the piles of what remained of my body. “The crown stays with me, I’m afraid.”
She turned her head and lashed out with her whips again. I switched place with a hell-dove, the bird bursting into a cloud of feathers. “Stand still!” she yelled.
“As you wish.” I smiled and held out my hand, waiting for her to turn around. This time, she didn’t get the chance to attack.
Ren and I stepped out from hell back into the dungeon just as my outfit popped back on.
“Dickbag,” she murmured, her arms still crossed. More than my perfect timing, she was more annoyed at getting sprayed with blood - leaving her suit looking worse than mine had been. Almost.
Percius stood, blinking away the screens that had lingered in his eyes for too long. “Ah, back already.”
Wolf was still asleep, and Magnus looked bored out of his skull. The caster had managed to disenchant perhaps a quarter of the large hoard.
“If only you had my Inventory skill,” I said, “you’d be done in minutes.” By my rough approximation, we had gotten a solid twelve hours of sleep in hell. Out here… maybe four had passed? Not even that.
“Or if they made mana potions not taste terrible,” he countered. “The other teams are doing well. The others don’t have the luxury of getting that sort of rest.”
We could have safely slept out here like the rest, but the more time we spent active and alert in the real world, the better we could watch over the others. A bit much to put all that responsibility on our shoulders, but given that we were so powerful it felt only right.
“No rush to complete the dungeon then?” I looked over at the green light seeping through the cracks in the pile of loot I had left there.
Buk’la had accepted the offer to be my champion. Whatever that meant. While having a right-hand that killed any of my detractors would eventually give rise to rebellion, that was a can I was kicking further down the road. Did I need to worry about that just yet? No.
Percius shrugged. “If we are aiming to exit at the same time as the others, then we don’t need to do it if they are still sleeping.”
That meant we needed to do something else to pass the time. I watched as Ren walked across the room, before sitting and leaning against the sleeping bear. Perhaps a few minutes of not putting ourselves in danger would be nice.
I joined her, and although Wolf grunted, he didn’t stir. Ren leaned her head on my shoulder and we remained at peace.
It took another couple of hours before Wolf stirred and Percius made some headway with the pile of magical items. After ten minutes where he kept gagging after taking a mana potion, I allowed him to stop.
While he transmuted the shards into Power Tokens, I went around and vacuumed up the remaining loot.
“How did you get covered in Max’s blood?” the bear asked Ren, sniffing at her outfit.
“It wasn’t by choice.”
I rolled my eyes as I returned to them. “It wasn’t mine either. For a change.”
With the others ready and eager to stretch their legs, we went to descend into the dungeon.
It was a wholly underwhelming experience. Perhaps it was because we were over-leveled or just overpowered. Undead themed. A necromancer and skeletal soldiers. Either one of our main trio could have soloed it, so having all three of us here was overkill.
We cleared every side path, bonus Monster, and even let some of the events run over time to kill more rather than do the intended mechanics. We played rock, papers, scissors for who got to kill the final boss—the necromancer himself—even though Wolf didn’t really understand the concept of the game.
Ren won and put a bullet straight through the Monster’s skull before we even got into range for him to start a monologue. It was pretty terrible experience and loot even for Percius and Magnus.
The plan had been to farm this all of today. The sleeping curse had put a big dent in that plan, and now I was unsure if I could even palate running this even one more time.
[Max: Anyone else run the dungeon yet?]
[Fiona: Halfway]
[Max: Decent experience/loot?]
[Fiona: Not fantastic. Simple and safe.]
[Tanya: We’ve done the first couple of rooms.]
[Quinn: And it’s pretty bad^]
I drummed my fingers on my belt. There was an executive decision to be made here. Our options were either to grind this for whatever it was worth… or head to the city tomorrow. Every hour wasted was time she and the Crimson Shadow grew in power.
Ren stepped up beside me, clearly able to hear the thoughts echoing around in my skull.
“What do you think we should do, moonflower?”
“I think tomorrow we save the world.”
With a smile, I nodded my head. Sounded like a show for the ages.