by Lucas Flint
“Should have mentioned that before I made a fool of myself,” Bolt muttered.
“If you had just stayed still a little while longer and listened, you wouldn’t have made yourself look so silly,” said Kyra, shaking her head disapprovingly. “Mommy always says to watch your feet where you’re walking, because you don’t want to trip and hurt yourself.”
“I’ll take that into account next time,” said Bolt as he rose to his feet and dusted off his pants.
“Well, if that barrier is there, then it means the Castle is safe from the Darzens, right?” said Hypno.
“I think so,” said Kyra, tilting her head to the side. “I don’t see them on the walls or in any of the towers. Maybe Mommy isn’t dead after all, because if she was, I think the barrier would have fallen down by now.”
“That’s an encouraging sign,” said Bolt. “So how do we get past the barrier?”
“Mommy needs to let it down long enough for us to get inside,” said Kyra. She frowned. “But I don’t know where Mommy is right now or if she’s even still alive, so—”
“So we’re stuck?” said Bolt. His shoulders slumped. “Aw, man.”
“Actually, I think I can open a hole in the barrier wide enough for us to enter,” said Kyra. “Mommy maintains the barrier, but she taught me how to lower and raise it, as well as how to make holes in it. Let me try.”
Kyra held out one of her small hands and closed her eyes. A deep look of concentration appeared on her six-year-old features, which would have made her look serious if she had been an adult. As it was, she just looked cute, though Bolt said nothing because he did not want to break her concentration and ruin whatever she was trying to do.
Suddenly, there was a shimmer in the air around the Castle, followed by a cool breeze blowing by suddenly. The cool breeze made Captain Galaxy and Kyra’s hair billow briefly before it went away.
Then Kyra opened her eyes and smiled. “It worked. I did it. Just like Mommy.” She sounded very proud of herself.
“Cool,” said Bolt. “What about the drawbridge?”
Just as Bolt said that the drawbridge began to lower by itself. Soon, the drawbridge reached the other side, forming a wide and stable pathway from the Endless Forest to the Castle of Dimensions. It was wide enough that all five of them could walk abreast and the people on the edges wouldn’t have to worry about falling over into the moat below.
“There it is,” said Kyra brightly. She began walking across it, gesturing for the others to follow. “Come on, guys! Mommy might be in the Castle. Maybe she retreated here after the Dread God almost killed her.”
Snapping out of his surprise, Bolt walked to keep up with her and Captain Galaxy, Aster, and Hypno followed. Bolt walked faster than the others, however, until he caught up with Kyra and slowed down his pace to match hers.
“Why did the drawbridge lower?” said Bolt, glancing at the firm bridge under their feet. “Is there someone else in the Castle aside from the Spirit who did that?”
“No, silly,” said Kyra, shaking her head. She held her arms out like she was trying to fly, putting one foot in front of the other as if she was walking on a tightrope. “The drawbridge is designed to do that when the barrier is taken down. It goes back up when the barrier goes back up, but don’t worry. I won’t put the barrier back up until we reach the other side, so you don’t have to worry about the drawbridge going up and dropping us into the courtyard or anything.”
Bolt tilted his head to the side but said nothing about that. He had seen far stranger things since leaving his home universe. A drawbridge that was apparently somehow connected to a magical invisible barrier was probably one of the more ordinary things he’d seen.
Once all five of them crossed the drawbridge, Kyra waved her hand behind her. There was another shimmer in the air, followed by a breath gust of cold wind, and then the drawbridge slowly rose back up. Bolt half-expected to see a party of Darzens burst out of the woods and try to cross the drawbridge at the last minute, but they never did. In seconds, the drawbridge closed with a soft boom, making the ground shake for a moment before everything went still again.
“Here we are,” said Kyra, turning around and spreading her arms wide. “Mommy’s Castle!”
The Castle courtyard was large and wide-open. It was about as big as a football field, which disoriented Bolt for a second because he had not been expecting it to be so huge. To the left was a stable, apparently for horses, though Bolt did not see any horses in there at the moment, while to the right was a cobblestone path which went up to a door at the base of one of the towers. Beautiful oak trees—much smaller than the ones in the Forest, though still very good to look at—stood on either side of the main path. Some of the trees even bore apples, pears, peaches, and a dazzling variety of other fruit Bolt had never seen before, including some he was pretty sure couldn’t be found on Earth. The smell of all of the different fruits made the courtyard smell wonderful, making Bolt take in deep breaths to fill his nostrils with the scent.
Directly ahead of them was another cobblestone path that led up to a wide staircase, at the top which was a set of wooden double doors with an elephant carved into them. It was an odd elephant because it looked like it had wings and seemed to be made out of branches and leaves. It was an impressive work of art nonetheless, making Bolt wonder if the Spirit made that or if it was a ‘natural’ part of the Castle.
“What a beautiful courtyard,” said Hypno, looking around with an impressed look on his face. “But … it is so empty and quiet.”
“Let me see if Mommy is here,” said Kyra. She rushed forward and yelled, in a surprisingly loud voice, “Mommy! It’s me, Kyra! I brought some people who want to help us! Are you here?”
There was no response, save for the chirping of some birds in the fruit trees. Bolt realized that was the first sign of life he had seen so far in this place, aside from Kyra. He couldn’t see the birds themselves, however, due to the thickness of the tree’s leaves and upper branches.
Kyra’s shoulder slumped. “Mommy?” She looked over her shoulder. “Sorry, guys, but I don’t think Mommy is here. If she was, she would have heard me and answered right away. She always does.”
“That’s not good,” said Aster. “The whole reason we came here was to find your mom and ask her for help looking for something. But if you’re right, then she’s not even here.”
“What should we do, Chief?” said Captain Galaxy, brushing back a strand of hair that had gotten into her face. “Go back into the Forest and try to find her out there? Or head back to HQ and see how Space and the others are doing?”
“Maybe she’s resting from her fight with the Dread God,” Hypno suggested. “Assuming she fought the Dread God and survived, she probably took quite a beating. She might be sleeping somewhere in the Castle trying to recover from her wounds.”
Kyra immediately stood up straight again, her happy smile returning. “Good idea! Mommy sometimes rests and doesn’t always hear me even when I yell at the top of my lungs. Of course, Mommy always tells me not to yell, but sometimes she doesn’t hear me so I have to yell. Mommy can be confusing sometimes.”
Kyra turned around and rushed toward the front steps, but before she took even a few steps, four dimension portals suddenly opened all around them, including one in front of her. Kyra skirted to a stop and nearly fell into the portal before she tipped backward and fell on her bottom, staring directly into the swirling portal in front of her with entranced eyes.
Before any of them could react, Darzen soldiers began pouring out of the portals. About a dozen heavily armed Darzen warriors emerged from the portals, each one armed with a spear, ax, hammer, and sword. A few of them also carried what looked like energy rifles in their hands, while another one had what looked like grenades hanging across his chest. The Darzen soldiers immediately formed a wall between Bolt and the others and Kyra, raising their weapons before them like they were daring Bolt and the others to fight them.
“Kyra!” said Bol
t, holding out a hand. “Don’t panic! We’ll save you. Just hang in there.”
A chuckle came from the portal in front of Kyra, causing her to look back into it as a voice said, “Is that the voice of Bolt I hear? I did not expect to see you here, of all places, but I shouldn’t be surprised. You have a bad habit of showing up where you are not wanted and getting in my way.”
Stepping out of the portal in front of Kyra was Graalix. He looked much the same as ever, except now he wore a set of Darzen armor, although it looked like it had been specifically altered to fit his body. He also had strange metallic gauntlets on his hands, the knuckles glowing with some kind of red energy.
“Graalix,” said Bolt, his eyes narrowing. “Long time, no see.”
“Same here, human,” said Graalix. He raised his gauntlets, balling his fingers into fists. “But I have no interesting in talking with you. The Dread God sent me here to finish what he started. And once I do, he will restore the Mother World to this life and the Pokacu shall rise again.”
CHAPTER NINE
Beams was surprised by how fast the Ariopolitan hunters ran. They were almost as fast as cheetahs, tearing through the streets of Ariopolis to reach the ruins of the temple that lay in the center of the city. Beams had to give himself an energy boost just to keep up, and even then, he found himself falling behind occasionally due to his unfamiliarity with the city’s layout. But the hunters seemed to know the city ruins like the back of their hands, running through the streets, jumping from rooftop to rooftop, and pulling off all kinds of awesome parkour moves. Beams wished he had brought his phone with him because he had a feeling that if he recorded their moves and put them online, that that video would definitely go viral.
But if it did that, the Ariopolitans would probably kill me, Beams thought as he jumped from rooftop to rooftop, trying to keep up with Joga, who seemed to have superhuman endurance and agility. And I’d probably deserve it, honestly. Now’s not the time to be worrying about going viral. Now’s the time to save an innocent woman from monsters.
From what Garus, the head of the hunters, had explained before they left the Elders, Pesa was a daughter of Scorius, as well as a direct descendant of Arius’ lineage. That surprised Beams, who asked if that made Scorius a son of Arius, which Garus confirmed, but he refused to explain why Scorius had not gotten the God Slayer. He said it was Scorius’ private business and that he wasn’t going to go around spilling all of Scorius’ secrets to outsiders like Beams.
Even so, this revelation put Scorius’ leniency toward him in a new light. Did Scorius somehow sense Beams’ ancestry and perhaps feel some kind of connection to him, which was why he allowed him to go with the hunters?
Then again, he’s not being too lenient with me, given how he’s holding my friends hostage just to make sure I don’t try to run, Beams thought. Maybe he’s just more reasonable than the other Ariopolitans or something.
In any case, all thoughts of Arius went out of Beams’ mind once they reached the Ruined Temple, which was located in the very center of the city and was apparently the building around which the rest of the city had been built. It looked almost exactly like the Temple of Dread back in the Dread City, except in much worse shape. It looked like it was about to collapse any second now, which made Beams hesitant to enter it, but he nonetheless followed the hunters into the main entrance, whose door had been knocked off a long time ago, leaving a big opening for the dozen or so hunters to enter easily.
They came to a stop in the first room of the Ruined Temple, which was some kind of amphitheater. A statue of the Dread God lay smashed in the center of the room, half-buried in snow, which had come in from the hole in the ceiling caused from millions of years of neglect. Several doors ahead of them seemed to lead into different parts of the Temple, while a set of stairs off to the right went up to the second floor. Unfortunately, the stairs had almost completely collapsed at some point, leaving only the first few and last few steps to walk upon.
“Okay, Garus, where did the Darzens take Pesa?” said Joga, looking at the old man, who had somehow managed to keep up with the much younger hunters without any real difficulty that Beams could detect.
“I am unsure,” said Garus, stroking the short beard under his hood. “The scout I spoke to said he only saw Pesa dragged into the Temple, but beyond that, he did not know where they had taken her.”
Joga’s grip on his spear tightened. “Cursed Darzens. The ruins are huge. They could have taken her anywhere.”
“Let’s split up,” Garus suggested. “Four groups of three, each group heading through one of the four doorways. If any of us find Pesa or the Darzens, yell as loud as you can.”
“Wait, what about me?” said Beams, causing Garus to look at him as if he had forgotten Beams was with them. “Which group do I go with?”
Garus pointed his staff at Beams sharply. “You stay here. You can be our backup in case we need it. Not that we will, I think, but at least you can make yourself useful that way.”
Beams frowned at Garus’ implication that he was useless, but he nodded anyway and said, “Okay, I’ll stay here. If anyone needs help, just holler my name and I’ll be there in a flash.”
Garus nodded in return, though he didn’t seem entirely happy, and then quickly divided the dozen hunters into four groups of three. Then the hunter groups split up, each one heading down a different doorway, and soon Beams was left all alone by himself in the amphitheater, standing in front of the half-buried statue of the Dread God. He shivered slightly when a cold breeze blew in, causing him to move out of the doorway in order to avoid getting blasted by the wind.
This sucks, Beams thought, standing with his arms around his body, trying to keep the warmth in. I thought I’d get to fight some Darzens, but instead, I just have to be the backup. I shouldn’t be surprised. The Ariopolitans don’t seem to have a very high opinion of me. I should just be thankful they allowed me to help at all. Could have been worse.
Beams looked around the amphitheater as he stood there. He imagined that it must have looked grand and majestic back in its heyday, but now it looked like a complete dump. Aside from the smashed and fallen statue of the Dread God on the floor, the floor was cracked and outright broken in many places, holes in the walls which gave him small glimpses of the world outside, and piles of snow stood in the corners, probably blown through the open windows. A sense of death hung in the air like Beams was standing in a graveyard, though he didn’t see any bodies, thankfully.
Without warning, anger rose in Beams. He couldn’t believe how the Ariopolitans had let this beautiful building, this temple to the Dread God, fall into such a state of disrepair. It was the ultimate sign of disrespect to the Dread God, who likely wouldn’t put up with such disrespect if he was here. Indeed, Beams thought about calling out Garus and the other hunters once they returned, because this state of disrepair was simply not acceptable.
Then Beams shook his head and thought, What? Why would I think that way? I’m not the Dread God. I don’t even worship him. Why would I be offended if his temple was neglected by his former followers?
A chill went up Beams’ spine at the answer: He still had some kind of connection to the Dread God, even if it was only a very small one. He had assumed that the Dread God had cut off his connection with Beams when he was resurrected, but now Beams was facing the very real possibility that he still had a connection to the Dread God, a connection which continued to influence his thoughts and ideas. He wondered if the Dread God was aware of this connection as well or not.
Or maybe the Dread God left a lasting influence on me, Beams thought, an influence which will affect me for a long time to come. That is probably why I’m thinking like him. Hope this isn’t permanent.
Beams was comforted by the thought that he also had a connection to Arius, but that seemed to exist only in the Dread Realm. Outside of the Dread Realm, how would Beams be able to fight off the Dread God’s influence?
Maybe the God Slayer will help me do t
hat, Beams thought. If I can get my hands on that, then the Dread God might leave me alone. It’s our best bet at this point.
The sound of metal scraping against stone made Beams start. He thought at first that the hunters had returned, but when he looked around the amphitheater, he did not see anyone else other than himself.
But then he heard the scraping sound again and looked up at the collapsed stairs he had noticed earlier. The sound seemed to be coming from the top of those stairs. It was very soft and completely lost whenever a strong gust of wind blew by outside, but there was no mistaking the sound for anything else.
Someone must be up there, Beams thought, maybe even the Darzens. Not sure how they could get up there given the state of those stairs, but it’s worth checking out.
But Beams hesitated. He looked at the four doorways, wondering if he should wait for Garus and the others to return first or if he should just go ahead and hope they would come back and follow him later.
Pesa is in danger, Beams thought. The more time she spends in the arms of the Darzens, the more likely something bad will happen to her. Besides, if I go and save her by myself, that will surely make the Ariopolitans trust me. I’ll do it.
Before he left, Beams fired his lasers into the wall, carving out a rough arrow pointing at the stairs. That way, when Garus and the others returned, they would have a clue as to where he went and would be able to follow him later.
Running up the first few steps, Beams jumped the gap. He thought he wouldn’t make it at first until he landed with both feet onto the very top step. Breathing a sigh of relief, Beams entered the doorway at the top of the steps and looked around.
He was in another hallway on the second floor of the Temple, which looked a little better than the amphitheater, but not by much. The ceiling hadn’t caved in here, but piles of snow stood on the windows and there were slick spots on the floor covered with ice. Beams would have to be careful to avoid those spots because if he slipped, he might break something.
