Dungeon Master

by Eric Vall

  How dare she use Isolda to taunt me.

  “You’ll pay for what you’ve done,” the goddess said haughtily. “You won’t attack me, not while I’m like this.” She gestured to her new body. “Oh, don’t worry, dear. I’m not going to kill you. Not yet anyway. I’m going to have some fun with you first. You’ll wish you were dead by the time I’m finished with you. I’m going to savor your screams.” She licked her lips.

  “I don’t think so.” I glared at the disguised deity. Then I took a step back and raised my hand. A cloud of gray dust began to materialize in the air in front of me, and it separated into twenty fragments. The pieces began to swirl and stretch just as when the goddess had taken her new form, but my magic was of a much higher caliber than this ridiculous woman’s. And she called herself a deity, what nonsense. She didn’t know the meaning of the word, at least not yet.

  I would now teach her.

  The twirling matter moved around me, and the goddess’s mouth gaped open as each of the twenty swirls began to form bodies. Each of these figures resembled my own. Every last one of the magically crafted men looked exactly like me down to the last detail. They had the same hazel eyes, curly brown hair, and tall, robed frame. They blinked when I blinked, and even their breathing pattern matched my own. The illusionary men began to form a tight mob around me. We weaved around each other and intermingled as though we were a horde of busy ants. It would be near impossible for the goddess to guess which one was the real me. Finally, we stopped our movements and collectively folded our arms.

  “Now this is an illusion.” My copies spoke at the exact same time as I did, and our voices melded into a choir of identical intonations. My conjured images were flawless. Far better than the nonsense she had slapped together. This was the work of a true deity.

  The enraged goddess’s eyes darted to each of the duplicates. Her mouth twisted into a grimace, and she released a guttural yell before she flung herself at one of my replicas. She had made her mistake. Her anger had gotten the best of her, and her rash act would prove to be costly. The female deity had already lost the battle, she simply didn’t know it yet.

  As she began to frantically claw like a voracious wild beast, I proceeded to draw the pink mist away from my comatose minions. Every time the goddess slashed through one of the copies, they reverted back to gray dust and scattered into the air. The particles floated in the atmosphere and tangled themselves in her hair and dotted her white gown, but she ignored them and continued to cut down my duplicates one after another.

  By the time she had gotten to the sixth illusion, I had nearly removed all of the enchanted fog, and unbeknownst to the furious, distracted deity, I had begun to move the magical mist in her direction. It hovered over her head and began to surround her. She had just extinguished the tenth when she suddenly realized her predicament. Her eyes widened at the sight of her magic being turned against her.

  “No!” she screamed. She tried to run from the thick fog, but it was too late.

  She was enveloped in the delicious smelling haze within seconds, and her screams were soon quieted. Her eyelids began to droop, and she swayed back and forth as if she had consumed one too many ales. She fell to the floor in a heap of wheat-colored hair and white linen.

  Then her eyes blinked lazily before they finally shut. She sighed deeply, and a smile came to her lips as she mumbled something dreamily. Never again would she be able to ensnare someone in a fantasy world. She was now trapped in one of my creation, and my magic was strong enough to keep her there for eternity.

  As soon as the goddess’s eyes closed, a radiant orb of fuchsia light emerged from her body and hung in the air above her. It bobbed and dipped in the atmosphere as it began to float toward me. The glowing orb pressed against my chest, and it slowly pushed until it disappeared inside of me. Power began to course through my body. My skin grew warmer and began to tingle, and my heart thumped wildly as the female deity’s strength melded with mine. It was an indescribably remarkable sensation, unlike anything I had ever experienced. If this was how I felt after harvesting just one deity’s power, and a weak one at that, I couldn’t wait to acquire more.

  As my heartbeat began to return to normal, I extinguished my remaining duplicates with a slight hand gesture. One by one their bodies disintegrated, and as gray particles filled the air, I gazed at the goddess on the stony floor. It bothered me that she still had Isolda’s form, but there was no way that I could reverse it. Unfortunately, she would have to remain this way.

  I jogged over to my minions and tried to rouse them one by one.

  “Carmedy, wake up,” I said as I gently shook the cat’s shoulder. The small woman began to stir, and she slowly moved her head side to side.

  “Hmm, just one more slice for me thanks,” Carmedy mumbled with a smile, and she licked her lips. Apparently, the feline’s dream included food, probably some sort of sweet treat. I might have guessed as much. I chuckled as I recalled the sight of her chocolate covered face through the window of the bakery.

  “Come on, Carmedy,” I said a bit louder as I gently slapped the cat’s cheek. She groaned and scrunched her eyes and smacked her lips together. Her eyes fluttered open, and she looked at me in a daze.

  “Wha-what’s going on?” she asked as I helped her to her feet. “What happened to my chocolate cake?” She looked around the vast cavern as though she expected the fictitious dessert she had spoken of to appear before her.

  “There was no cake,” I said as I bent over Annalíse and tried to bring her around. “It was an illusion. Please see if you can wake Rana.”

  “Huh?” Carmedy said confusedly as she walked toward the sleeping fox woman. “What do you mean?”

  “The goddess who lives here uses illusions on those that come to her dungeon.” I nodded to the female deity on the floor as I pulled a very confused Annalíse to a sitting position. The tall warrior rubbed at her eyes sleepily and blinked at her surroundings in confusion.

  “Did you say illusions?” Annalíse asked as she tried to steady herself enough to stand.

  “Yes.” I nodded. “Do you remember the pink mist?” Annalíse bit her lip as she tried to recall.

  “I-I’m not sure,” she said slowly. Her face was troubled. “I remember standing here with you all and hearing a voice. Then the next thing I knew, I was on a battlefield filled with warring soldiers. I had no idea what happened to you all. I was going to try to find you but… I was in command of one of the warring sides, and I--”

  “It’s alright, Annalíse.” I held up my hand. “You don’t have to explain and don’t chide yourself. We were all under the goddess’s spell. I believe that we each saw what we desired the most in this world.”

  “Boy, I’ll say!” Carmedy called out as she gave Rana a hard slap on her rear.

  “Yow!” the fox woman shrieked as her blue eyes flew open. “What in the world do you think you’re doing?” Rana hissed as she rubbed at her bottom.

  “Good morning, sunshine!” Carmedy opened her arms and grinned at the red-headed woman. Rana swatted the cat’s arms away as she wobbly rose to her feet. “I was just trying to help.” Carmedy shrugged. “You slap a baby’s bottom when they’re born, and I thought it might work on you.”

  “Yeah, well, you think you could have, I don’t know, tried a gentler approach?” Rana moaned.

  “I guess.” Carmedy tilted her head to the side. “But that would have taken too long. Anyway, guess what? An illusion goddess took over our brains!”

  “What?” Rana scrunched her nose. “Is this another one of your crazy stories?”

  “No.” Carmedy folded her arms over her chest. “Master said so, ask him.” The cat nodded in my direction. Rana looked over at me as I helped Morrigan to her feet.

  “It’s true,” I said as I held onto the elf’s arm as she steadied herself. The dark-eyed woman shook her head in an effort to clear away the dreamy haze that had taken over her mind, and she gazed around the room suspiciously. Even her ravens had
fallen victim to the goddess’s dream-inducing fog and lay motionless on the damp ground. Morrigan pulled away from me and bent over her slumbering pets to whisper something to each of them.

  “See? Told ya,” Carmedy said as she playfully poked Rana’s shoulder. The fox-eared woman rolled her eyes in response.

  “Okay.” Rana sighed as she placed her paws on her hips. “So, an illusion goddess took over our brains. Yeah, that sounds even crazier the second ti- wait, who’s that?” She jerked a thumb toward the dozing goddess. “Mind explaining what’s going on here, Mr. Demon?”

  “I just told you--” Carmedy began.

  “Yeah yeah.” Rana waved her paw dismissively. “But I’d like a slightly less crazy explanation than a brain-stealing goddess.”

  “She didn’t steal them. She--”

  “Shh,” Annalíse hushed the green-eyed cat. “Please, tell us what happened,” the freckled human requested hurriedly.

  “As I said before, this dungeon is home to an illusion goddess.” I gestured to the woman who had taken Isolda’s form. My minions glanced at the sleeping woman before they returned their gaze to me. “You may not remember,” I went on, “but as we spoke with her, a mist began to form around us.”

  “I don’t remember any mist.” Rana raised an eyebrow.

  “Neither do I,” Morrigan said nonchalantly.

  “Well, the goddess used this mist to trap us each individually in an illusion,” I continued. “I assume that when you all awoke, there was no trace of the others in our party, and you were in your ideal paradise? Is that correct?” Realization began to flood to each of the women’s faces, and they slowly nodded.

  “Yeah, that’s right,” Carmedy said. “In my dream, I was on an island where everything was made of candy and dessert. The flowers, the trees, even the rocks tasted yummy. And I had my hospital… it was so wonderful,” the cat purred at the recollection. “I even came up with this cure for a rare disease. The cure was a type of chocolate cake! It was unbelievable.” She clasped her hands and sighed dreamily.

  “It sounds unbelievable alright,” Rana said under her breath.

  “As I thought,” I said as I held back a chuckle. “We were each in a dream that was tailored toward us. After speaking with the goddess, it seems that typically her victims are so entranced by the illusion, they never wake up. They stay here for the rest of their days, and without food or water, they waste away.”

  “So, there are other people in here, but they’re all…” Carmedy interrupted her own words with a gulp.

  “Yes.” I nodded. “I sense no presences but our own.” Carmedy’s jade eyes widened, and her furry black ears drooped sadly.

  “Hold on just a second!” Rana raised her hands in the air. “You’re saying you had a little chat with this dream goddess?

  “Illusion goddess,” I corrected, “but yes, that’s right.”

  “And we were all caught in these illusions?” Rana raised an eyebrow suspiciously.

  “Yes.” I nodded. Where was she going with these questions?

  “Well, if you were in an illusion too, how exactly did you manage to get out of it?” Rana narrowed her eyes. The other women looked at me curiously and waited silently for my response.

  “I am far more powerful than the deity who attempted to deceive us. I am not so easily duped by such shoddy illusions.”

  Rana’s lips tightened as I spoke, and her tail twitched in annoyance.

  “The fantasy was… ill-crafted,” I said slowly. I wasn’t sure if Carmedy had told the others about Isolda. Even if she had, I had no desire to delve into the dream plagued with inaccuracies that I had experienced. “In the very unlikely event that I didn’t realize what was happening, the many mistakes that the goddess made would have given it away.” I shrugged.

  “Mistakes?” Rana squinted her eyes at me. “What mistakes?”

  “The goddess tried to recreate something that was familiar to me,” I said simply. “Certain events transpired that revealed that the re-creation was highly inaccurate.” The fox waited for me to elaborate, but I offered no further explanation. I was growing tired of her questions, and I had indulged her long enough.

  “In any case, I too have used illusions on those who visited my dungeon,” I said as I ignored Rana’s glare. “Do you recall the one-eyed snakes?”

  “How could we forget?” Carmedy shuddered. I gave the cat an apologetic smile.

  “My strength combined with my experience with illusions rendered the goddess’s tactics useless against me.”

  “Did you… um, you know?” Carmedy winced at her own implication.

  “No.” I shook my head. “I did not kill her. I simply turned the mist that she used on us against her. Now she’s trapped in her own fantasies.” I frowned at the goddess as she giggled in her sleep.

  “So that’s what she looks like, huh?” Carmedy walked toward the female deity and peered down at her curiously.

  “No,” I said as I turned toward the mouth of the tunnel from which we had come. “That isn’t her true form. That body doesn’t belong to her,” I whispered. I fought to keep my anguish at bay. Even though the Isolda in my dream hadn’t been real, my feelings had been stirred when I had first laid eyes on her. Now those feelings were returning.

  “Well, she’s really pretty anyway,” Carmedy said from behind me, but I didn’t answer her. I walked into the tunnel, and its darkness swallowed me whole. I heard the women’s footsteps hasten to join me, but I didn’t turn to them.

  “Hey, you are walking toward the exit,” the fox-woman called after me. “What about the treasure?”

  “We can leave now,” I said. “I will summon creatures to haul the treasure out of the dungeon. I do not wish to spend another moment here.”

  “What’s the matter with him?” I heard Rana whisper behind me.

  “Maybe he didn’t want to wake up from his dream, but he did because he had to save us,” Carmedy said softly.

  “He didn’t have to save us.” Rana snorted. “I would have figured it out and stopped her.”

  “Oh? Is that so?” Annalíse said in disbelief. “And how would you have done that?”

  “Well, I… I would have… I don’t know, but I would have figured something out,” Rana stammered.

  “I have reason to doubt this,” Morrigan said unfeelingly. “To my knowledge, you possess no magical abilities. Am I correct in assuming this?”

  “Yes but--”

  “Your defensive tactics rely solely on hand to hand combat,” Morrigan interrupted the fox. “How would such methods have worked on an illusion goddess?” I didn’t have to look at Rana to know that she was probably seething at the elf.

  “Once again, thank you ever so much for your astute observations,” Rana grumbled.

  “I accept your gratitude,” the pale elf said unsympathetically. “I have made mental notes of your other shortcomings as well. If you would care to hear my thoughts on them--”

  “No Morrigan, let’s save the Rana bashing for another day if you don’t mind,” the fox-tailed woman groaned.

  “As you wish,” the white-haired elf said calmly. “But I must advise that it would be best to discuss this matter sooner rather than later. I believe that it is imperative that one be aware of one’s own weaknesses and--”

  “Um, Morrigan? I think you better stop,” Carmedy whispered. “Rana’s face is turning red.”

  A smile slowly crept across my face as the women spoke. It was ironic that Morrigan felt that she had a right to analyze her companion’s skill level. Her limited dark magic would have proven as ineffective as Rana’s efforts. I was certain that the tattooed elf had no experience whatsoever in the art of crafting illusions. In fact, none of the women would have stood a chance had I not been there.

  “Hey, Rana, what was your dream like?” I heard Carmedy say. “I bet you were swimming in piles of money.” The cat giggled.

  “Yeah, something like that.” Rana chuckled.

  “Who else wa
s in your dream?” Carmedy asked the fox woman. Rana was quiet for a moment.

  “There was no one else.” Rana laughed, though it sounded somewhat forced. “Just me and my gold. That’s more than enough to make me happy.”

  “Sounds kind of lonely though,” Carmedy said to her fox companion. “There were lots of people in my dream. My parents, my brothers, and people from my village. You three and Master, too! I love sweets and all, but it wouldn’t have been a perfect dream without my family and friends. Didn’t it bother you to be all by yourself?”

  “Of course not,” Rana said. She tried to sound nonchalant, but I sensed a twinge of sadness in her voice. “We were all in perfect dreams remember? So that means I was happy.” Rana was becoming more and more of a mystery. Once again, I felt as though she was hiding something.

  I could sympathize with the fox woman’s reluctance to share the specifics of the fantasy world that she had experienced. Perhaps, like me, she had encountered someone from her past that was no longer in the land of the living. Even so, it didn’t explain her sensitivity over talk of the sacred objects. I wasn’t yet sure how all the pieces fit together, but I knew that Rana was concealing something.

  Something was causing her distress, and clearly, she felt that it was serious enough for her to lie about it. In the short time that I had known her, I could already tell that she was a straightforward individual. While she was a thief, I believed that that was as far as her dishonesty extended. I didn’t get the impression that lying was inherently a part of her character. Was Rana in some sort of trouble? Was she afraid of something or someone?

  As I exited the tunnel, I was met with glorious daylight, and my body was warmed by the sun’s rays. I took a deep breath of the clean air, happy to no longer be inhaling the foolish goddess’s sickly sweet mist. As the women filed out of the dark passageway, I briefly glanced at Rana. She wouldn’t be able to keep her secrets from me forever. Some way or another, I would find out. She was, after all, my minion.