The Eternal: A Boxed Set (World of Ga'em Book 6) Page 19

  5 minutes

  Range

  40 yards

  Effect 1

  +1% chance of inflicting burn

  DING!

  Congratulations! You have advanced a skill.

  Night Vision Level 2!

  You will now be able to make out more intricate features of the objects in the darkness.

  Effect 1

  None

  That’s a ton of leveling. I grinned. I walked up to Freya and noticed she was going through a few screens as well. She probably leveled up too.

  “Well, that was easier than I thought.” She turned to me, a smile on her face.

  “Yeah,” I said. “Your Wind Arts are pretty strong.”

  A flash of ghastly gray light suddenly burst into the chamber, and a chant filled the air.

  Pain struck my head and I collapsed to the floor, breathing hard. What the hell? I gasped.

  “Zoran!” Freya grabbed my hand. “We need to go.”

  The pain quickly dissipated within me. I turned around. “Oh God.” I froze.

  Runes of gray glowed on the Desert Snake’s body, and the beast’s form slowly stirred. A health bar appeared next to it and quickly filled up to its full capacity, as though it hadn’t just been killed. The snake’s eyes slowly opened, and its coiled body raised itself high above me once again.

  My heart thudded hard, and the sound rumbled in my ears. The beast towered before me in all its glory and stared with its eyes of bright gray.

  Just like the rabid wolf, I realized.

  “Run!” Freya grabbed my hand and pulled me away. She threw her other hand up in the air and muttered a word. A blast of bright light summoned before the snake, blinding it completely. The beast thrashed about, and we charged across the dark floor.

  Freya let go of my hand and ran alongside me. “There.” She pointed to our right. A collection of rubble stood there—pillars of broken marble blocking a small entrance.

  “But that’s sealed off,” I said. “We can’t get in.”

  Freya pulled her sword out and surged to the rubble. She swung hard, and the marble shattered to pieces.

  Just. Like. that.

  “Come on!” she yelled. I heard movement behind me and turned to see the snake racing after us, eating up the distance and fast.

  I picked up the pace and nearly tripped as I raced to the human-sized entrance. Freya stood there and had her hands in the air, ready to cast a spell. I kept my eyes straight and charged, surging to the entrance and diving into it.

  “Lori!” Freya yelled, and a blast of wind stormed out of her palms, smacking into the snake and pushing it back.

  She cut off her spell a few seconds later and stood still, staring into the darkness. She breathed easy only when it seemed certain the sounds of the snake had disappeared.

  “You okay?” Freya walked up to me.

  I nodded as I got up and dusted my pants. “Those runes…”

  “Yeah.” She bit her lip. “It’s exactly what we saw with the wolf. This snake was brought back from the dead using a tortured wraith as well.”

  “Phantom Lord?”

  “I don’t see who else would be capable of something like this,” she said. “Are you okay now?”

  “Yeah…” I pressed the side of my head. Why did I feel that pain before? I asked. My eyes widened. The Death Seal, I thought. Did it react to the Phantom Lord’s presence?

  My shoulders tensed. Coming here might not have been such a good idea after all. I’d been eager to meet this Phantom Lord, to ask him why he was messing around with me, why he was coming after me, but now I wasn’t so sure I was okay with doing that.

  A wind blew through the air, sending a chill down my spine.

  Suddenly, orbs of light emerged from the corners of the room.

  I turned to Freya. “What spell did you cast?” The elf stood there, her eyes wide, her arms shaking.

  “Freya?” I asked.

  The lights around us dissolved away, and a group of wraiths floated in through the walls, ghastly gray in their eyes and flat expressions on their face. I stumbled backwards. I reached for my sword and then dropped my hand. “A weapon is useless here,” I muttered.

  Freya uttered a word, and a blast of white light hit the room. The wraiths shrieked in pain but kept moving forward, albeit at a slightly slower pace.

  “What the hell are all these spirits doing here?” Freya muttered, stepping closer to me.

  “I don’t know.” I turned around and stood back to back with her. Time to use the new spell, then. I lifted my hand up and focused on my palm. “Oskis!” I yelled. A beam of fire blast out of me and surged into the nearest wraith. The flames caught onto its form, and the creature shrieked loudly. I sustained the attack and turned, letting the flames sink into as many wraiths as I could before the move ended. I quickly glanced at the health bars around me. They hadn’t even sunk down to half, and the wraiths were still moving actively toward us.

  “We don’t have any way out,” I mumbled.

  “We’ll see.” Freya lifted her sword up, holding it there for a second, and then thrust it down into the stone floor. The surface immediately cracked. A fissure opened beneath our feet and we dropped down. Freya’s hand latched onto mine, and she summoned her wind spell once again. A force pushed against us and we fell slowly to whatever was beneath.

  Darkness flowed all around, and no floor emerged underneath. However, my feet touched something hard a few seconds later. Freya let me go and dropped down to whatever was supporting us. She cast a Light Arts spell and summoned the orb of light she had used before. The white glow shone through our immediate vicinity.

  I looked up. An opening sat in the roof high above us, but none of the wraiths were coming through it. Maybe they can’t get in here, I thought.

  “Zoran.” Freya caught my wrist, and her hand trembled. “I think I know where all those tortured wraiths came from.”

  “What?” I turned around, and my eyes widened.

  Her orb threw light onto the hundreds of bloodied forms before us, and my breath froze inside my chest.

  Dead bodies.

  ***

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  I couldn’t feel my heartbeat.

  Men, women and children were all stacked within the large pile of bodies before us. The mound occupied a little more than half the room, and rivulets of blood streaked the heap.

  The elf stepped forward. “Something isn’t right here.”

  “Freya?” I asked. “Hey.” I walked behind her. I’d already had enough with the Desert Snake Resurrecting. I sure as hell didn’t want to put up with an undead army right now.

  “Look.” She pointed at the closest body—a middle-aged man clad in torn armor and ripped clothing. She knelt and pulled up a section of his metal shell.

  “Freya.” I grabbed her shoulder. “What are you doing?”

  “Look at this.” She bared a part of the man’s chest and there, on the skin over his heart, were two deep cuts made in a neat X-cross pattern. She quickly moved over to the next man, this one younger, and did the same thing. There was a similar cut over his heart as well.

  “They all have it.” She looked up at me.

  “What the hell?” I blinked. “What does this mean then?”

  “These people weren’t just murdered.” She turned to the pile of death. “They were sacrificed.”

  I blinked. “Wait, didn’t we already know that, though?” I asked. “That tortured wraiths came from people being sacrificed?”

  “Tortured wraiths can be made from any kind of death, not necessarily only a sacrifice,” she said. “This mass murder, though, is far too organized. There must be some bigger reason behind this.”

  “Can you tell who did it?” I asked.

  “It’s for certain that the tortured wraiths came from these bodies,” she said. “And we do know that the Phantom Lord was an expert at creating such terrifying spirits.”

  Figures, I thought. At this point it’
d be surprising if the Phantom Lord was not involved in something bad that had happened to me.

  What does he even want with me? I asked. I was still missing that key piece of information. At the moment, it seemed the only way to find that out was to actually meet the Phantom Lord.

  A howl rang through the air and wispy gray forms floated down to us. I clenched my fists. Wraiths.

  Freya’s hands quickly traced a circle, and she uttered a word. A rune emerged and quickly expanded out, creating a dome of light over us. The spirits stopped at the wall and floated along the surface, keeping at a distance from it.

  “These things are more persistent than I’d thought,” Freya muttered.

  Five more wraiths appeared. I quickly used my Analyze skill on them and confirmed they were all tortured wraiths. Level 25, I noticed. I wonder if we’ll be able to take them down.

  “I’ve bought us some time for now.” Freya lowered her hands. “The shield will last for a bit, but I don’t know what to do about the wraiths. We can’t keep hiding under the dome. However, if we try to leave, the spirits are going to come after us, and we know what happens then.”

  Shudders went through me. I definitely did not want to go through that again.

  “What do we do?” I asked.

  “My shield will hold up for another minute,” she said. “And once it goes down, I can’t cast it for another ten minutes after.”

  “Damn,” I said. We have less than a minute to come up with a plan. But what kind of an attack plan could one form in such little time?

  I looked at Freya. “Brute force?”

  She pursed her lips. “Well, I do have a spell from the Light Arts that I could use.”

  “As soon as the shield breaks, get past the wraiths. I’m going to cast my Blast Burn spell, and you need to get out of the attack range. The attack should take down about a third of the wraiths’ health and give them a burn status effect. You can come in immediately after and help me start picking them off.”

  “Done,” she said. “We’ve got twenty seconds before the shield comes down.”

  I nodded and put my hands up in the air. I focused on my thoughts and imagined all my strength concentrating in my palms.

  “Three…two…one.” The elf hunched down. “Zero!”

  The shield dissolved, and the wraiths surged toward us. Freya jumped into the air and twisted around. She planted her foot on the ceiling and pushed forward, sending herself clear of the mess.

  I threw my hands in the air. “Erkiela!” I yelled. The spell activated as the wraiths converged on my position. Tall flames spun out, consuming the spirits in red and orange. Health bars around me went down by a little less than a third.

  Working so far, I thought.

  Freya jumped back to the center of the action. Her lips moved and a bright flash shot into the room. The wraiths shrieked in pain and backed away. I thrust my hand up yet again and cast my Incineration Beam spell.

  “Oskis!” I yelled. A blast of fire shot out of my palms and I directed it at the spirits. “You never learn, do you?” I muttered as I hit two wraiths with my flames. Their health went to zero and their bodies dissolved.

  Wind flowed through my hair. A breeze? I looked around. This far underground?

  A twister summoned before me and shot up into the air, sending vibrations through the whole room. Freya stood in front of it and watched silently as the attack finished off the last few wraiths.

  DING!

  Congratulations! Your party has defeated:

  Pack of Tortured Wraiths (Lv 25)!

  They’re less scary the second time around, aren’t they? Reward:15000XP. Reward: Mage’s Restoration Potion (x3).

  DING!

  You have found a new item.

  Mage’s Restoration Potion (x3)!

  This potion was made for mages specializing in one or more of the magic arts and heals a part of one’s Health and Mana. Do you want to transfer the item to your Item Inventory?

  Yes

  No

  I tapped on the Yes option beneath it and the screen dissolved away.

  “Zoran.” Freya stood close to the wall on my left. “We need to keep moving.”

  I nodded and walked up to her. A small entrance lay beside her in the stone wall. It was only four feet tall—so very small—but looked like something we could fit in if we tried.

  “Do you want to go through?” I asked. “We’re not sure where it goes to, though.”

  “We don’t really have an option,” the Moon Elf said. “This is the only exit in here.”

  “That’s true,” I said. “Fine. Lead the way, then.”

  The elf nodded. She passed through the entrance and into the dark pathway. I followed right behind her, crouching down as I protected my head from the ceiling.

  “That wraith attack was not something random.” Freya’s voice echoed against the walls.

  “Yeah,” I said. “There’s no way that many of them just happened to find us. Even if we so happened to be next to the source of their…creation.”

  “Somehow, I feel like it’s because of your Death Seal.” She ducked under a small bump in the ceiling and continued.

  “You think they’re all being drawn to the seal?” I asked.

  “Yeah.”

  I stayed silent. That does make sense, I thought. We took a few more steps forward and exited the tunnel.

  The stench of blood hit me immediately, pungent and repulsive. Freya summoned her light orb and let it hover out in front of us. We were on a ledge, with a high metal railing built around the edge. I walked up to it and peered over, looking down at the ground below.

  The orb didn’t illuminate the ground much, but I could still make out what was down there.

  More death.

  Bodies lay all over, no longer in piles, but spread all over the floor instead. Marks of red colored the spaces in between, and streaks of the shade covered the forms as well.

  “They’ve been sacrificed too,” Freya whispered.

  “These dead bodies aren’t of people from the Dark Alliance, are they?” I asked.

  “I doubt it,” she said. “As far as I can tell, they were mostly adventurers and villagers. They probably wandered into the ruins and got trapped by the Dark Alliance, or the Phantom Lord—whoever was waiting for them.”

  “Why is all of this happening?” I muttered. “Why do they need so many sacrifices? This is already more than two hundred people, and there could be a ton more for all we know.”

  “I honestly don’t know what they need this many sacrifices for. It can’t mean anything good.”

  “That much is obvious,” I said. “I’m just confused about what all of this means.”

  “Same here,” she said. “I honestly don’t—” She froze, and her eyes widened.

  “Freya?” I leaned closer.

  She rushed to the edge of the ledge, and her face pressed against the metal railing. “There’s a man alive down there.”

  “What?” I pumped after her, scanning the ground beneath us. A lone form crawled through the bodies, like a half-dead worm. How on earth is he still alive? I thought.

  Freya took a few steps back, but her eyes were fixed to the railing.

  I blinked. “Freya?”

  The elf ran across the stone floor and jumped into the air without as much as another word.

  “Wait!” I yelled. She soared over the railing and down towards the surface. It could be a trap, I thought, but it was too late. The elf was already on the floor.

  Dammit. I put my hands out. “Oskis,” I said. A hot flame surged onto the railing and melted the metal. The heated bars bent, forming a hole large enough for me. I instantly dived through it and dropped down to the floor.

  “Ugh.” I tapped my feet a few times to get rid of the numbness. I quickly ran up to Freya and caught up just as she approached the man. It took him a few seconds to notice us, but when he did, his eyes changed.

  “I’m sorry!” He covered his face with hi
s hands. “Please don’t hurt me!” His voice shook, and pain and terror dripped from his tone.

  Freya didn’t get any closer. “We’re not here to hurt you,” she said. “What…happened here?”

  The man slowly straightened up and now knelt on the ground. “Those men,” he said. “They did this. To everyone. My comrades.” His eyes were bloodshot, and the veins on his face pulsed with every word.

  He’s not in a proper state of mind, I thought.

  “What men are you talking about?” Freya asked. “Do you know if they were from the Dark Alliance?”

  “The Alliance.” He froze at the very mention of the word. “They’ll kill me!” He grabbed the sides of his head. “Please, hel—”

  His eyes rolled up in the back of his head and he collapsed to the ground.

  Dead.

  A voice chuckled. “Quite the active sacrifice, isn’t he?”

  My stomach knotted. I turned around and saw an unpleasant face, a scar decorating its left cheek. “Asterion,” I muttered.

  “Hello again, Eternal.” The man of the Dark Alliance stood in front of me, a proud grin on his face. A band of men in dark cloaks stood right behind him, swords at their sides and daggers in their hands.

  “It is quite nice to see you once again,” Asterion said.

  I gritted my teeth. “Can’t say the feeling is mutual.”

  He laughed. “You’re quite the character, Zoran.”

  “High praise coming from a mass murderer.”

  Freya grabbed my shoulder. “Don’t let emotions speak,” she whispered.

  “My offer from before stands, Eternal,” Asterion said, a wide smile on his face. “Join the Dark Alliance, and we will leave you alone.”

  “That again?” I muttered. “I told you already. You’re wasting your time if you think you can make me join your Alliance.”

  He raised an eyebrow. “Well, then, I would choose your next words wisely if I were you.” His voice flattened. “They will determine what happens to your life.”