Tech Duinn: An Ether Collapse Series (Ether Flows Book 1)

by Ryan DeBruyn

  Azrael was just a bystander here. A second line of defense, but he didn’t mind as long as it worked. Just as the health of the Enbarr dropped below seventy-five percent, it started to glow. Then the glow began to blur as the hair and horse started to charge back and forth in a jaw-dropping display of speed. Ogma managed to only lose five feet in the first minute but Azrael could tell it was everything he could do to keep the creature contained. The Firbolg was extremely skilled at holding the Enbarr’s attention, which was the job of a tank.

  Azrael felt his eyes widen and stomach drop as a massive glowing hair fist punched Ogma into the wall. Ogma had been holding the Enbarr right up until he landed from the punch and the ground under him broke. Azrael released the charged Soul Strike he had held in reserve for this possibility. He had stacked only five within the blade. The combat until now, and their short wait before battle, made sure he had seventy five percent of his pool still in reserve.

  The five Soul Strikes struck the creature and slowed it down at the thirty-five-foot mark, but it continued to plod forward. Like a workhorse pushing the mill instead of pulling it. It was enough to let Ogma break free of the hair and begin his assault from behind. Azrael’s skill wouldn’t last long, and he held his hand up ready to release a stored ten from his Soul Storage.

  The Enbarr’s health dropped below fifty percent and the slight glow became iridescent blue and began to smoke. The effect transformed the glow into a fire, like they had seen with Octorian. Azrael loosed the skill, shouting, “Release ten!” The skill shot forth and collided with the horse between the thirty- and twenty-foot markers. Spells continued to pepper the beast, but Azrael couldn’t find Ogma behind it.

  He watched its health continue to drop and its pace towards the ranged attackers increased even though his ten stacks of Soul Strike now assaulted it. Twenty feet. Azrael released the Fireball in his earring and heard it whoosh from his hand as it grew to the size of a dropship. The black smoke of its explosion blocked the creature from view for a time. Azrael saw a hoof plod forward to the ten-foot marker. It was close enough now that the hair was beginning to strike at Jophi, Dara, and himself. Bat stood back, keeping himself as safe as he could manage.

  Azrael shouted, “Release ten,” and simultaneously charged his sword with eight stacks of Soul Strike. Dara and Jophi couldn’t do max damage anymore with the mane striking at them. He saw it cross under twenty five percent health and the flame became bright red. Real fires broke out onto the body of the Enbarr, and Azrael released his eight stack of Soul Strike with a thrust. He had just drained his Ether pool nearly dry. He smiled, though, as the hooves of the horse were pushed back, causing dirt to be dug up and begin piling behind it.

  The health continued to drop but Azrael saw that it wasn’t going to be enough. His skills were going to run out. He charged a single stack into his blade and saw a skill up notification pop up. The accompanying headache nearly made him pass out, so reading the minimized text was impossible. He glanced at his Ether pool. Only two points remaining.

  They were going to die.

  If Ogma has any powerful skills, now would be the time to unleash them!

  If they failed here, at least they had chosen their own way to die. A vast blue fist careened the Enbarr into the wall. Azrael followed the trajectory back to see Ogma pressed into the opposite wall, the skill connected to him and literally pinning both him and the Enbarr to opposite walls. Ogma didn’t look good; his body was scored with cuts that dripped blood down the wall under him. His outstretched fist began to smoke and blister from the heat the Enbarr gave off. Azrael still wasn’t sure it would be enough. The Enbarr had just under ten percent health.

  Ogma collapsed, and his skill retracted as Azrael watched him slide down the wall. He began to charge forward, Ether-Tech-assisted legs pumping. He was willing to try to remove the last eight percent in any way he could. As he approached, two massive branches burst from the recovering Enbarr’s side, causing the creature to shake and shudder.

  The glowing stopped, and Azrael blinked at the creature.

  Bat’s voice trembled as he called, “The Yewman is now at the place where the paths meet!”

  Chapter Forty-One

  Azrael followed Bat’s pointing finger and saw a massive black tree standing in the distance. It had sunk two branches into the ground, and Azrael looked at the Enbarr, which had two dark black branches protruding from its chest. Why would the Yewman attack the Enbarr? Weren’t they on the same side?

  Azrael turned to Dara and Jophi, who both looked badly cut up along their arms and scalps. He made a motion at Ogma, who was unconscious, and said, “Retreat. I will grab Ogma!” Everyone began moving away as Azrael leaped forward and began dragging the bloody form of Ogma away from his slumped position on the wall.

  The Yewman didn’t move, but as they passed the Enbarr’s corpse, it received shocks of electricity that emanated out of the branches. Each shock twitched and spasmed the legs of the beast. His group picked up the pace and were almost around the corner when the Enbarr shot back to its knobbly knees and spoke, “Azrael, is that you?”

  He blinked and looked at his group, wanting to know if they had spoken or heard what he just had… coming from… a horse? They were looking back at him with wide eyes, except for Bat, who had his ears spread as wide as a hang glider. Azrael dragged Ogma around the corner before peeking back out and calling, “Who is that?”

  The branches removed themselves from the horse, and it trotted back down the hall to join the Yewman. However, from the floor near where the Enbarr had lain, a voice responded, “You can’t tell me you forgot me already.”

  The combination of the talking space and the voice finally clued him in, and he exclaimed, “Apep! I thought you were dead. What happened?”

  Azrael rounded the corner and approached the bloody stone where the voice emanated. Apep sighed and responded, “I tapped the three veins, and the level of power they held was far more than I anticipated. I kind of lost myself in the moment, and when I regained my senses, the cell block you had placed me in had fallen apart. With each passing day, I gained more strength as I leeched it from the Pit. When I reached the hypogeum, I managed to kill and capture more and more of the Pit’s creatures. However, I couldn’t beat that stupid horse!”

  Dara and Bat peeked out from the corner, and he motioned them over. Azrael pointed to the wall and said, “Apep, these are Dara and Bat. You two, this is Apep. He is a dungeon that I fell into, and Ogma captured. He had been working on a plan B for escape. Speaking of—can you get us out of here?”

  Apep had the Yewman shake its head before his response, “I tried to, but other dungeons reinforce the Pit on all sides but one. That side is the one down that hallway.” The Yewman pointed a branch down the fourth hallway. As if on cue, a massive trumpet reverberated through the corridors. It wasn’t as loud as it had been above, and Azrael assumed it was more distant based on that fact. Still, if Apep was right, it had come from the only direction of escape.

  Azrael made a motion back to where they had dragged Ogma. “Our friend is injured badly, and we will need him to continue. Can you do anything for him?”

  Jophi shrieked from around the corner, “Guys, come quick, a huge spider is coming to attack.”

  He remembered the insect theme of the core’s previous dungeon, and looked to the wall for confirmation. The Yewman nodded, and Azrael shook his head. Apep was the dramatic type, it seemed. “It’s one of Apep’s,” Azrael shouted.

  Azrael did run around the corner to see what the spider would do and watched as it began creating bandages from its silk webbing. If it stopped the bleeding, it would drastically increase Ogma’s recovery. Azrael returned to the wall and asked Apep, “Do we have a chance against Musth?”

  “Normally, I wouldn’t have even gotten this far but something is strange about the Pit. It has so much power, but is sluggish and slow in its responses. Almost like it is a child, or unintelligent. So, normally I would say we have abso
lutely no chance.” Apep cut off at an odd spot.

  Bat encouraged, “But…?”

  However, it seemed Apep was gone. The group dragged Ogma into the fork of paths, and they all sat down under the Yewman and Enbarr, waiting for Ogma to recover. A massive trumpet sounded again, but this time from closer than the last call. Azrael tilted his head and looked at the Yewman. “Is it coming this way?”

  Both the Yewman and Enbarr stood statue-still. Perhaps five minutes later, Apep said, “Oberan has joined Musth, and is riding the elephant down the halls. We could retreat to the central area. It is a large underground space, much like the arena above. That would allow me to use all of my minions and the captured ones as well.”

  “Wouldn’t it allow the Pit to do the same?” Azrael interjected.

  Apep had the Yewman pick up Ogma and begin retreating down the central hallway, as it shook its head. “No, I don’t think it will. Still, I could be wrong.”

  Dara, Jophi, and Bat looked at him with concern, and he blinked back. Jophi spoke up, “Hold on there, Apep, when did you become the leader?’

  Apep didn’t answer, and Azrael looked to Dara, who shrugged, and said, “I hate to say this, but this is likely our only option. I don’t think we can take on Musth, especially with Ogma injured. Definitely not Musth and Oberan. We need this core’s help.”

  They entered into a massive chamber with a flat ceiling that only cleared the twenty-foot tall Yewman by a few feet. Once they reached the center, Apep’s voice reverberated all around them, “I am going to try to capture the entirety of this space. This will force the Pit to send reinforcements from farther away—if it is even present. It should also allow me to spawn creatures and reinforce faster.”

  The trumpeting grew more frequent and louder as creatures began flowing into the room. The Yewman placed Ogma against a wall and stood slightly ahead of the center of the room. The other exit from the room slammed shut, and Azrael hoped that meant Apep had control. He asked the air, “Was that you, Apep?” and the Yewman nodded once. Okay, at least the retreat was available if they needed it. Azrael hesitated and then added another ten stacked charges of Soul Strike to Soul Storage. Once he picked himself off the floor, he turned to Jophi and indicated his earring.

  Jophi came over and whispered, “Stalagmite, this time. Underground like this, it will have a bit of added power. I used my doubling skill in the fight with the Enbarr and can’t boost the stored spell in your earring this time.”

  He waited for his Ether to tick up to fifty-five percent and managed to forgo an Ether drain headache when he put another five stack into his Storage skill. He was more or less bottomed out on Ether, but he was hoping that Oberan would want to try to preserve his plans instead of outright attacking them. Plus, they had the time it would take for the man to get here.

  A door slammed shut on the other entrance they had retreated down, and Azrael smiled. It would seem Apep succeeded in capturing the area, and that was also a way to buy more time!

  Apep whispered from right beside Azrael’s foot, “There is something above us, and I think it’s the other core. I am going to try to dig it out. I won’t be able to provide more reinforcements, though.”

  Azrael hissed, “Don’t do it now!” but it was too late. Apep was ignoring him. Just great! Azrael surveyed the troops and noticed wolves, rats, wasps, ants, beetles, and even a large number of holes in the floor, which likely signified the bees. At the head of their formation were the Enbarr and the Yewman. He hoped it would be enough.

  A massive boom sent spiderweb cracks through the stone doorway into the room. Dara cried out in alarm, and Jophi held up a hand, bracing it with the other. The air of the room shook with the next strike, and a few pieces of stone fell away on their side of the stone door.

  The third strike crumbled the door and a black elephant stumbled into the room, eyes red and angry. Oberan walked in casually behind the beast, and he had brought Gyr and Yonel. The odds just kept getting worse.

  Luckily, Oberan seemed to want to preserve his plans and called out, “Azrael, you have surprised me multiple times today. However, this is the end of this hare-brained escape attempt.” Oberan held up a gloved hand that held a sword with something glowing pink at its pommel. “It took me some time to gain control of Musth, but I control this dungeon, and so have very little to fear down here in the hypogeum. I am not sure how you have managed to wrest control of these spawns from the Pit, but I assure you, Musth and I do not need to worry about them.”

  Azrael watched Oberan gesticulate and include the whole room in his gesture of disgust. He also saw Oberan’s eyes alight on Ogma, and a cruel smile played across his lips as he sneered. “Good, my cousin still lives and conveniently can’t try to perform any heroics…”

  Oberan looked up and saw Azrael was also looking at Ogma. “Did he get you this far? Is it one of his skills that controls my Pit’s creatures?” As he spoke, he caressed the pommel of his sword. The item pulsed pink and Azrael blinked at the crystalline heart, trying to recall if he had ever seen anything like it. The shape wasn’t circular, and Azrael doubted that it was a functional counterweight. It vaguely reminded Azrael of a dungeon core, but its form and glow were different. This thing flickered like trapped fire, and the pulsing was from some sort of enchantment that surrounded the piece.

  Trying to stall for more time, Azrael tried negotiating, “If you give us a ship and let us go, I will give you full control of your Pit again. Otherwise, you will continue to lose what little control you have over it until it turns against you.”

  Oberan stepped back and looked around him, then glared at Azrael, “You lie. You don’t possess that kind of power!”

  Azrael was bluffing, of course—he didn’t possess that kind of power. Still, Apep might be able to pull it off. The dungeon core had put up a good show this far. “Think about it, Oberan. You started losing control long before we entered the hypogeum. Probably right around the time my cell block collapsed.”

  Oberan looked to Gyr and Yonel, then to Azrael. He continued to stroke the pommel of his sword. Azrael took the opportunity to look around at the massed forces on their side of this conflict. He tried to calculate their odds and knew it wasn’t good. Even without Gyr and Yonel, they would have lost to Musth and Oberan. The addition of the latter two just added to the opposing scale.

  Oberan murmured, “I can let your three friends go free on the surface, but you and Ogma must remain here.”

  Azrael blinked seriously, stunned that he had gotten anything out of Oberan. He wasn’t going to take that offer. He wasn’t a hero, despite what he had led Oberan to believe. He responded coolly, “That doesn’t work for me. You can keep Ogma—your family is none of my concern—but the rest of us get to leave.”

  Oberan smiled wickedly, turned to Gyr, and cooed, “Do you think you can torture the information out of him?”

  The silent, stoic Gyr smiled for the first time Azrael could remember. He wished the man would take it back. The look sent shivers running through his body—starting at his scalp, arching over his shoulders, and down the backs of his legs. Gyr didn’t say a word. His look was enough confirmation, and Oberan’s eyes crinkled fondly around the edges before he commanded, “Musth, destroy them.”

  Azrael had just enough warning to brace himself inside the Ether-Tech suit before a trumpet blast shook the roof and walls of the room.

  Chapter Forty-Two

  Musth charged forward, its eyes glowing pink for a brief moment before morphing into a deep red. Each loping step shook the ground, and each bounce hit the ceiling, causing the entire room to shake and rumble on its approach. The shaking seemed to wake Ogma, who sat up and shouted, “Danu!”

  Azrael didn’t have time to process the shout because the Yewman shot its branch arms into the ground. The ends exited shortly after, right in front of Musth, and were subsequently batted aside by the elephant’s massive trunk. The thick branches weren’t out of the fight, though, and began to wrap around Mus
th’s feet. At first, the elephant was able to pull its massive legs out of the bindings, but then the Yewman seemed to grow thorns that bit and scratched the hide of the legs. Musth fell to the ground in a colossal heap that bounced Azrael.

  The Enbarr was holding back Oberan, Yonel, and Gyr—its mane segmenting into single strands in some places and vast collections in others. Oberan and Yonel both slashed expertly at the hair, cutting off pieces of the whips that then fell around them. Damaging the Enbarr simultaneously. Gyr moved in and out, scoring hits against the legs of the powerful mini-boss. Within a few seconds, the Enbarr began to smoke, and Azrael felt himself grow cold. They already had it reduced to seventy-five percent health.

  Musth flared red, and all of the restraining vine-like branches withered and died around it. The Yewman convulsed and pulled back what remained of the branch-like arms, severing the damaged parts in the act. Musth trumpeted again. Azrael fell to the ground, the Ether-Tech suit failing to stop the stun debuff this time. The other skills that had been peppering the massive elephant ceased immediately, and Azrael assumed his friends had also been stunned.

  After a few seconds, he stood back up and relocated Musth, who was now violently stomping on the Yewman. The bottom of each foot glowed red before impact and flattened the demon tree where it contacted. The tree must have come out of the stun at the same time though, because suddenly it became a flurry of movement. Each whip-like appendage was growing twelve-inch thorns and striking Musth. Azrael checked his Ether pool to find it at seventy four percent. He shot his hand forward and readied all of his attacks when Ogma’s massive phantasmal fist rocketed Musth off the Yewman.