by A. J. Markam
And it was chaos. Churning, pulsing, cancerous bedlam. The Rogue Dungeon had nearly devoured all four quadrants – and had started to break through to the city above.
A couple of video windows were still open, and I watched them in horrified fascination.
One was of the Duchess. She stood on a balcony overlooking the deserted city, a look of panic on her face. She watched as the streets began to cave in, buckling and falling into the earth. A massive chasm ripped through the center of the castle, heading straight for her. She closed her eyes and hugged herself tight as the tower collapsed, taking her with it.
The video window went dark.
My heart ached for her. No matter how bitchy she acted sometimes, no matter how much she stuck her head in the sand at the very end, I had seen a kinder, sweeter side of her. She hadn’t deserved to go out like that.
Someone else did, though – but he was getting away.
Another video window showed Urik on horseback galloping through the city gates.
His face was terrified as the city streets caved in behind him –
But his horse made it over the bridge and onto the main road.
“YES!” Urik crowed. “The gods have smiled upon me once again!”
Fucking asshole.
The architect of all this misery was getting away. A city destroyed, who knew how many people dead, all because he’d wanted to control a fucking dungeon.
Power and money, just like Deek had said.
Fuck whatever ‘gods’ had helped him, and fuck whatever game designer had decided to go all George R.R. Martin and let the bad guys escape –
Suddenly a gigantic crack appeared in the road.
The horse reared up in the air and bucked Urik off its back.
The dwarf slammed into the ground and lay there, stunned, as the horse ran off.
“Ugh,” Urik groaned.
And then his eyes grew wide as he heard it:
ch-ch-ch-Ch-CH-CH-ch… ch-ch-ch-Ch-CH-CH-ch…
He sat up in a panic.
Out of the gap in the road appeared a dozen hands, which grasped at the edge of the chasm.
Urik watched in terror as human bodies crawled up onto the ground.
They were his own men: paladins of the Church of Eternity.
Except their bodies ended beneath the waist, their faces were distorted, and grotesque bumps scurried beneath their flesh.
“hUmAAANNN…” they called as they crawled towards him. “hUmAAANNN…”
“NO!” Urik screamed, and tried to get to his feet to run away. “No, leave me ALONE!”
I expected all the paladins to rear up on tentacles like the priest had – but something even worse happened.
Giant, dagger-like spider legs ripped through the palms of their hands and ribs.
And like five-foot-tall black widows wearing human corpses as disguises, the bodies scuttled over to Urik and pierced him with the tips of their black legs.
“hUmAAANNN…” they leered as they dragged him back into the chasm.
“NOOOO!” Urik screamed. “I beseech the gods, save me! PLEASE SAVE ME!”
But no gods came, and no one was saved.
The spider-corpses disappeared down into the pit, taking Urik along with them.
Then that video feed went dark as well.
Well.
I took back everything bad I’d said about the game designers. Occasionally the bad guys did get their just desserts.
I zoomed out to see how everyone else from Vos was faring.
The rest of the city’s population had all escaped into the forest, apparently beyond the dungeon core’s reach. They watched in terror as thousands of creatures – centaurs, harpies, hobgoblins, and more – burst out of holes in the ground and either flew off into the air or ran deeper into the forest.
And then they watched as their home crumbled into a giant pit in the ground.
The city of Vos was no more… but at least its citizens were still alive.
Suddenly there was a flash of light and I was back in my body. I was still holding the purple crystal in my arms, Alaria was speeding us through the sky, and Stig was hanging on for dear life to my belt.
“We made it out!” I shouted, overjoyed.
Alaria sounded amused. “We made it out 20 seconds ago. Where the hell have you been?”
“I GAVE HIM A PEEK AT THE BIG PICTURE,” Deek said. “BLEW HIS FUCKIN’ MIND.”
I checked around me.
There was Fugly flapping ten feet away.
Soraiya was a bit farther out, but still kept pace with us –
And there was a tiny golden blur zipping through the air as well.
“Good job, Wylla!” I called out.
“Thank you, Big Thing!” she said happily.
I looked down at the devastation far below. The city of Vos was now a crater in the ground, with slimy black tentacles jutting into the sky and evil-looking shapes crawling over the ruins.
“What’s going to happen to the Rogue Dungeon?” I asked Deek.
“OH, THE GUILD’S GONNA COME AFTER THAT MOTHERFUCKER WITH ALL THEY GUNS BLAZIN’. THEY GONNA GO IN, TAKE NAMES, AND KICK ASS. A THOUSAND MEN’RE GONNA DIE TO AVENGE THE ONES THEY ALREADY LOST, BUT THEY DON’T CARE – JUST AS LONG AS THEY SHUT THAT MOTHERFUCKER DOWN.”
“Yeah, but isn’t that for the best?” I asked, looking down at the giant sinkhole and the monstrosities sprouting out of it like weeds. “I mean, that thing was fucking evil.”
“YEAH, BUT YOU KNOW THEY’LL BE BLAMIN’ THIS SHIT ON ME NOW, EVEN THOUGH IT WAS THAT GOD DAMN MIDGET STARTED IT ALL,” Deek griped. “FUCKIN’ MEATBAGS… ALWAYS FUCKIN’ SHIT UP AND BLAMIN’ IT ON THE DUNGEON CORE…”
36
We travelled for hours, alternating flying and riding in shifts. Alaria would carry me as I carried Deek, and then we would all ride Balrog while she rested.
Soraiya and Fugly didn’t have a horse to ride during the downtimes, but since they weren’t lugging around an 80-pound crystal, they could easily catch up with us.
Deek still refused to be put in one of my sacks – “I DON’T KNOW WHAT THE FUCK YOU GOT IN THERE, MEATBAG” – but Stig was more than happy to get back inside with his arms dangling over the edge. It beat hanging on by his fingertips as we soared hundreds of feet over the ground.
We finally came to an uninhabited stretch of land along the coast, with rocky cliffs overlooking the crashing waves 500 feet below.
“Here?” Alaria asked.
“HERE,” Deek agreed.
She placed him on the stony ground, and suddenly it began to shift and melt around him. Within seconds he had a new pedestal and was comfortably ensconced within it.
“What are you going to do?” I asked.
“START OVER. NOBODY KNOWS I’M HERE – MAYBE IF I WORK IT RIGHT, NOBODY EVER WILL. AT LEAST I’LL HAVE A COUPLE OF YEARS WITHOUT MEATBAGS TRYIN’ TO BUST DOWN MY DOORS, LOOKIN’ FOR GOLD.”
“What about all your creatures?”
“YOU FORGET, I CAN RESURRECT THE ONES THAT DIED. ONCE I GET SITUATED, I’LL BRING ‘EM BACK TO LIFE… MAYBE SEND SOME SCOUTS OUT TO FIND THE OTHERS, SEE IF THEY WANNA COME LIVE OUT HERE. IN PEACE, FOR ONCE.” He paused, then said, “I OWE YOU TWO A HELLUVA LOT. I THOUGHT WHEN YOU SHOWED UP ON MY DOORSTEP THAT I WAS THE ONE HELPING YOU TWO – BUT IF YOU HADN’T COME ALONG WHEN YOU DID, THAT HOLY ROLLER MIDGET MOTHERFUCKER MIGHTA STILL USED THAT ROGUE DUNGEON CORE, AND I’D BE UP SHIT CREEK RIGHT ABOUT NOW. SO IF THERE’S ANYTHING I CAN EVER DO FOR YOU, JUST SAY THE WORD.”
“You got me back in my body,” Alaria said. “That was enough.”
“I DON’T KNOW IF THAT WAS REALLY A FAVOR…”
“Ha ha,” Alaria said, not laughing but still smiling.
“Can you give me 13,000 gold?” I asked.
“NAW, MAN, SORRY. LIKE I SAID, GOLD ‘N SILVER’S TWO OF THE THINGS I CAN’T CREATE. I’D MINE SOME FOR YA, BUT THERE AIN’T NONE WITHIN A HUNDRED MILES OF HERE.”
“You can tell that
?”
“YEAH, I CAN SORT OF ‘READ’ THE GROUND. AND – WAIT A SECOND – WASN’T IT 30,000?”
“Um…”
“WHAAAA? YOU WAS TRYIN’ TO PLAY ME, MOTHAFUCKA!”
“Game respect game?” I asked hopefully.
“WHATEVER. I GUESS I’LL LET IT SLIDE, SEEIN’ AS YOU GOT ME MY NEW DIGS HERE.”
Soraiya spoke up. “It looks like all’s well that ends well, so I’m going to be moving on.”
“AW, YOU SURE? I COULD CREATE A WHOLE FLOOR IN MY NEW DUNGEON JUST FOR YOU, BABY.”
Soraiya smiled. “Thanks, but I’m finally free, and I want to go see the world. Although maybe I’ll drop by some day to visit your incubi.”
“COME ON BY ANY TIME – I’LL ALWAYS HAVE A ROOM YOU CAN FUCK YOUR BRAINS OUT IN.”
She laughed, then turned to me and Alaria. “Well… I guess this is it.”
“Thank you, Soraiya,” Alaria said gratefully.
“You’re welcome.” The plum-colored succubus squinted at me. “Thanks for freeing me, warlock – even if the circumstances weren’t exactly what I wanted.”
“Sorry for… everything that happened,” I muttered. I’d been trying to forget my vicious behavior towards her back at Orlo’s compound, but I didn’t really have that option at the moment.
“It all turned out in the end.” Soraiya waved at Stig and Fugly – “Stay in trouble, you two” – and then started towards the cliff.
“Soraiya,” I called out.
She turned back to me. “What?”
“I have to know… why’d you stay? Why’d you come with us?”
“I told you, I said I’d make sure Alaria got back in her body.”
“But… you were free. You didn’t have to follow through on that. So… why did you?”
She looked at me a long time before answering.
“Every master I’ve ever had was horrible to me. They were all evil fucking bastards, and you were acting just like them. Yes, I know you thought I’d killed Alaria, but you wouldn’t listen to the truth. Whatever you thought I did was an excuse to be a vicious dick, just like all the rest of them. And then… you stopped. You let me go. None of my other masters had even considered doing that, ever. And so I figured helping you out was the least I could do.”
A weight lifted off my shoulders, and I finally felt at peace.
Alaria had been right. It was better to embrace the light than the dark, no matter how inconvenient or messy or difficult it was.
“Thank you,” I said.
“You’re welcome. But next time,” she added with a mischievous smile, “all bets are off.”
And with that, Soraiya dove off the cliff into the air, and swooped down over the sea.
Fugly scampered to the edge of the cliff to watch her go, and something caught his eye: a school of flying fish sailing over the water.
“eh!” he grunted, then dove off the cliff. He began chasing the school, snapping at them as they flitted above the waves.
“HEY!” I yelled at him. “COME BACK!”
He ignored me and got farther and farther away as he gobbled down the terrified fish.
“Shit,” I grumbled.
Making nice with Soraiya had been cool and all, but there was definitely a downside to freeing your demons.
Alaria put an arm over my shoulder and watched Fugly recede into a little pinpoint on the horizon. “Oh, darn. We lost the repulsive, snot-spitting, flying rat.”
I glowered at her. “He was pretty damn useful!”
“He was a gargoyle,” she said, as though that outweighed all other considerations.
I sighed and watched the little dot disappear. “Do you think he’s coming back?”
“I hope not,” Stig grumbled.
“You don’t like him either?” I asked in shock.
“He’s a gargoyle, boss,” Stig said distastefully.
I was about to say something else when Deek interrupted.
“WHAT Y’ALL GONNA DO NOW?”
“Yes, what we gonna do, Mistress?” a breathy little voice asked from above.
“Oh, Goddess,” Alaria groaned. “I thought I’d gotten rid of you.”
“No, Mistress, I is gonna stay with you forever and ever!”
“I’m not a dungeon core anymore,” Alaria pointed out.
“I… uh… maybe I not gonna stay with you forever, then…”
“THAS ALL RIGHT, SWEETNESS – YOU CAN STAY WITH ME AS LONG AS YOU LIKE,” Deek offered.
“Thank you, Big Dungeon Core!”
“Speaking of dungeon cores…” I pulled Alaria’s old crystal out of my bag. “What should I do with this?”
“I DUNNO – KEEP IT. MIGHT COME IN HANDY SOME DAY.”
“Can we still access its powers?”
“SHOULD BE ABLE TO. IT WAS ALARIA AT ONE POINT, AFTER ALL – AND YOU WORKED THE SPELLS, SO YOU KNOW HOW TO DO IT.”
Huh… that could be interesting…
“JUST DO ME A FAVOR AND DON’T GO SELLIN’ IT. DON’T WANT NO MORE HOLY ROLLER ASSHOLES WINDIN’ UP WITH DUNGEON CORES AND DOIN’ BAD SHIT WITH ‘EM.”
“You got it,” I said as I put the crystal back in my bag.
That was one promise I could make and never go back on, even if they offered me a million gold.
I turned to Alaria. “Well… should we be on our way?”
She touched the tip of her nose to mine and smiled. “After all that time as a robot and a crystal, I was looking forward to getting… ‘reacquainted.’”
“Wha– oh. YES. That’s an excellent idea,” I said, then looked at Deek. “Um, any chance we could trouble you for a place to stay tonight?”
“WHAT, SO YOU CAN FUCK?”
I blushed. “Uh – ”
“Yes,” Alaria said decisively.
“HAHAHA… SAME OLD ALARIA.”
“Great,” Stig griped. “Now it’s gonna be – ”
fwap-fwap-fwap-fwap-fwap
“ – all night long.”
“DON’T WORRY, LITTLE MAN, I GOTCHA COVERED. I’LL BUILD A WHOLE WING JUST FOR YOU, WITH ALL THE WINE YOU CAN DRINK.”
“Ohhhhh,” Stig said, suddenly on board with staying the night.
“You can make wine, but you can’t make gold?” I asked distrustfully.
“IT AIN’T THE SAME DAMN THING!”
“If you don’t want to give me the money, just say so.”
“I TOLD YOU, I GOTS TO MINE IT ‘N SHIT, AND I AIN’T DONE THAT FOR CENTURIES, SINCE ALL YOU DAMN MEATBAGS CAME AROUND AND DUMPED IN MY LAP WHEN YOU DIED, AND THERE AIN’T NO GOLD OR SILVER AROUND HERE FOR MILES ‘N MILES ‘N – ”
“Okay, okay, forget I asked.”
“SHEE-IIIIT,” Deek grumbled, then muttered to himself, “MEATBAG QUESTIONIN’ MY INTEGRITY… NOW THAT’S SOME FUCKED-UP, IRONIC SHIT – ”
“Can we just skip ahead to the part where you create the room where we fuck?” Alaria interrupted.
“FINE. LET’S GET THIS PARTY STARTED.”
The rock under Deek seemed to melt, and the dungeon core disappeared beneath the surface of the cliffs.
Suddenly the ground to our right crumbled, leaving behind a flight of beautiful, polished stone steps.
I took Alaria’s hand. “Shall we?”
We descended the staircase into an unbelievably gorgeous ball room underground. Seriously, it looked like something out of 19th-century Tsarist Russia – just carved out of polished volcanic rock and lit by windows carved into the sides of the cliff.
Deek had finally gotten that ocean view he’d been dreaming about.
In the corner of the room, the purple crystal glowed on his pedestal.
“ALARIA AND MEATBAG, YOU GUYS ARE OVER TO THE RIGHT. IMP-MAN, YOU WITH ME TO THE LEFT.”
Stig raced towards a banquet hall with a table stocked with dozens of bottles of wine.
Alaria and I walked down an ornate hallway into a beautiful room with a four-poster bed and a soft, plush mattress with silk sheets.
In the wa
ll opposite us, a window looked out over the ocean, and we could hear the crashing waves hundreds of feet below.
We could hear Deek’s voice rumbling through the walls, although he was apparently still back in the ballroom. “THIS IS JUST TEMPORARY, BUT I FIGURE IT’S GOOD ENOUGH FOR Y’ALL TO GET YOUR FREAK ON.”
“Thanks, Deek,” Alaria said.
“YOU’RE WELCOME, BABY.”
“And no peeking, alright?” I spoke up.
“SHEEEE-IIIIIT – DID YOU FORGET WHAT I TOLD YOU ABOUT IT BEIN’ MORE INTERESTIN’ WATCHIN’ PAINT DRY, MEATBAG? I AIN’T WATCHIN’ YOU PLUG UP HER HOLES. THAT SHIT’S NASTY. I’MMA GONNA GO HANG OUT WITH THE IMP AND GET FUCKED UP.”
“You can get drunk?”
“NAW, MAN – BUT I’M HIGH ON LIFE RIGHT ABOUT NOW!”
The last we heard of him was his echoing laughter fading into the distance.
I looked at Alaria, and she looked at me.
Without another word, we began to kiss.
37
It was slow, sensual lovemaking. I traced every curve of her body with my fingertips, kissed every inch, and took my time savoring the feel of her soft, luscious skin.
She did the same to me, heightening my desire with every gentle touch, taking the time to caress my back, my arms, my neck, my legs, my face.
When we finally did move on to sex, we took turns pleasuring each other. I kissed the delicate lips between her thighs, and gently licked her to her first orgasm. When it was her turn, she slowly enveloped me with her mouth, and brought me to the brink – though I stopped her before I could come. I wanted to be inside her when I did.
We kissed long and deep as I eased inside her. I came almost immediately, but being with her – the real her – was so erotic and pleasurable that I never lost my erection. I just kept on going, hard as ever.
Her orgasms were quiet and gradual at first, but built in intensity with each new one until it was like they overlapped – one subsiding as another began. She became more passionate and wild, then got on top and rode me hard and fast, me cupping her breasts, both of us staring into each other’s eyes as she repeatedly cried out in ecstasy.
Finally, I flipped her onto her back again and pulled her legs up against my chest so that I could plunge as deep inside her as possible. Her eyes rolled back in her head, and I felt her entire body quivering beneath me as she screamed my name over and over. Her cries tipped me over the edge, and I came deep inside her for the second time. My thrusts slowed and then stopped, and she sighed with deep contentment as we began to kiss again.
