What was not to love?
She lifted herself off him as she became full, and his come spilled out over her inner thighs. Once it had stopped geysering out of him, she slid off of his body and looked down at the puddle of fluids left behind from their lovemaking. “What sick creeps made this game?” Shaking her head, she put her clothes on. “I don’t know who made more fucking mess. You or me.”
Chapter Twenty
Fallen Azinore
Three hours after leaving the temple, they crept along the carved stone aqueduct, the tops of buildings rising above the sides of the giant half-pipe. In the distance, lit by a violet phosphorescent light from giant vines hanging down from the dark shrouded cavern roof, was a vast domed structure with a huge spire rising out of its center.
Zack kept his endless torch low to the ground to reduce the spread of the light. Already, they’d heard noises rising from the city below them. Strange chattering sounds, a hiss and twice now, the thud of heavy feet.
Holly had warned them that the hive of Deep Ones had infected this city and that many of its long dead inhabitants still roamed its streets, their bodies under the control of the insectoid creatures ruled by the Karzel. So far, Zack and the three women’s presence seemed to have gone unnoticed.
He doubted that would last.
They were far from the safety of the lift leading up to the Bottomless Well, far from anyone that could help them.
And his disease timer ticked down, one hour at a time, heading toward his death.
Missy took his hand, her eyes searching his. He nodded to show her he was alright.
The four of them had resolved themselves to not speak until they had reached the maintenance tower at the end of the aqueduct near the dome. To be detected by the Deep Ones, would almost certainly be a death sentence.
Soon they reached a broken part of the aqueduct. Zack leapt over the six-foot gap first, his armor jingling as he landed. They waited a tense thirty seconds, before deciding nothing had heard him. Missy made the jump, then Holly.
Anita peered down and then up at Zack. He could not see her face, but he assumed she might be afraid of heights. It had taken her twice as long as everyone else to scale the ladder inside the maintenance tower that had led them into the aqueduct.
But the orc woman had said little to any of them since her and Zack went at it the night before. If anything, she seemed worryingly subdued.
Had they made a mistake sleeping with one another? He’d enjoyed the hell out of it, and felt more connected to her than ever before. He reckoned she had enjoyed it too, but real world women were a difficult lot to understand at times.
She made the jump, her armor clanking loudly as she landed. Zack hid the torch and held his breath, Missy taking his hand again, her body shaking as she pressed it against him.
A mewling noise sounded from somewhere below. They heard feet padding across pavement and what might have been claws scraping along the side of a building.
Then nothing.
Zack slowly took in a breath, then cautiously moved on. Their pace was slow as they strained their ears to listen for more sounds.
Damn, he hated this. Horror had never been something he’d enjoyed. After all, when your real life was one of unending horror, why would you want to experience it in game?
The Forgotten Sump, the place where the tomb of the Soul Eater had been located, was a bright and bubbly kindergarten compared to this place.
At some stage, he would need to come back down to the Deep to face the Karzel from the Bethod Hole Jeweler Guild quest chain from Lower Underworld. Maybe he would pass on that quest. No way was he coming down to this place again!
It took them another hour to reach the maintenance tower near the giant dome at the center of the city. Here, they would have to descend to street level and find an entrance leading into the domed structure.
Zack climbed out of the aqueduct and up to the metal catwalk. Helping the other three up, they made their way into the tower. Before they climbed down the ladder, Zack peered over the railing to the base of the tower.
The place appeared empty and the door leading in from outside was shut.
He went down the ladder, then after double checking nothing was about, lifted the torch to better illuminate the stone structure.
Holly descended next and gave him a brave smile as she came to stand next to him. “We made it,” she whispered.
“We’re not there yet.”
Missy gracefully slid down the sides of the ladder, landing without so much as a sound. Anita ended up unequipping her armor and came down in her small clothes, never once looking down. Only when she was safe on the ground did he see her finally relax.
Piece by piece, her armor appeared on her body as she reequipped it. Then she nodded her head. “Now what?”
They gathered close together so they could speak as silently as possible. “We put out the torch,” Holly said. “At least until we are inside the dome.”
Zack would extinguish the flame once they were ready to leave. There should be enough phosphorescent light out there to be able to see.
“Once we are out on the street, we need to search for a minor entrance to the dome. The place used to be the Senate building and Imperial library. It contains all manner of ancient tomes and sacred items. The minor entrances are where the servants used to enter.”
She grinned at Zack. “I guess I can tell you what you are after now. Somewhere inside the library, there should be a plant growing inside a glass container.”
“A plant?” His heart sank. “This place fell a long time ago. If there is a plant, won’t it be long dead?”
“Malghana doesn’t think so.”
“That’s not very reassuring.”
Holly shrugged. “The plant is called Mistletoe and Malghana said it can be found in one of the rooms in the Upper Library.”
“Mistletoe.” Zack glanced at Anita. The orc rolled her eyes and looked away.
Zack wanted to beat his head against a wall. Fucking hell. I came all this way to be trolled by the stupid developers.
Missy grabbed his arm, harder than he was accustomed to. “Trust in the game.”
“What?”
She made a sharp intake of breath, then let go of him and hefted her guitar and held it like nothing had just happened.
No one else seemed to have noticed what had happened. Holly was busy talking about a book she had been sent to find for Malghana and Anita had her back turned, seemingly disinterested in the whole thing.
Had the resistance just sent him a message through Missy? Telling him not to worry as this was a game world and it was completely logical for a living bit of mistletoe to be found in a place like this?
“Are you listening to me?” Holly hissed.
Zack turned back to her. “Sure. Shall we get moving?”
They hid in an abandoned building across from the side entrance to the limestone dome. The area was well lit from the purple glowing vines growing along the sides of the building.
But they were not alone. Shuffling through the streets were mummified people, covered in webs, their eyes empty holes peering out between the white gossamer threads.
While the infected people were long dead, the creatures inside them continued to control their bodies, the webbing clearly acting to preserve the ancient flesh.
What sicko came up with this? Zack thought bitterly as twenty of the infected moved about on the street outside.
They had been trapped in the building for the better part of an hour. Nothing had detected them on their short journey from the tower, the streets empty, the place deathly silent. Then they had neared the dome’s minor entrance and suddenly a group of infected had emerged from a side street and started in their direction.
They had only just managed to get to cover.
But why were the Deep Ones still outside? If they had detected Zack and the others, why hadn’t they attacked?
What if they didn’t go away?
&n
bsp; Zack ground his teeth as he listened to the feet shuffling out on the street. He and the three women sat propped up against the inner wall of the building, right below the broken window.
The enemy was too close for Zack to speak to the others and make plans and the light inside the building was too dim to effectively use hand signals.
All he could do was charge out there and hope the others would follow or wait the enemy out.
After what had happened at the mine at Bethod Hole, he decided waiting would be the best course of action. Magic and weapons had little effect against the infected, which likely meant the way to kill them was yet to be revealed to him.
It almost seemed like Malghana had sent them all knowingly to their deaths… She out of anyone would know of a way to kill the infected. Why hadn’t she shared it?
To his immense relief, the infected shuffled off down the street. They waited for several minutes, then Zack stood and cautiously peered through the window.
The street was empty. The way to the entrance was clear.
Chapter Twenty-One
The Infected
Missy gently shut the door behind them. Zack and Anita quickly threw the bolts across, locking them inside the domed building.
Now nothing could follow them from outside.
They had made it across the street undetected but just as they were about to enter the door, more infected appeared down the street. Zack had no idea if they had been seen, but he reckoned it best they didn’t find out.
After lighting his Endless Torch, Zack led the way down the empty stone corridor, Holly at his side. “There should be a servants flight of stairs up ahead on the right. We climb three levels, then we should be able to find an entrance to the balcony overlooking the senate floor. There should be an exit on the other side that will take us to the upper library.”
Zack was glad the apprentice had studied the maps of the place, at not only was it huge but every thirty feet along the corridor, passages led off to their left or right, many with dozens of doors along their walls.
The servant passages were a complex maze and had been designed to allow the servants access to all parts of the senate building without getting under the feet of the rich and powerful.
Or he assumed that’s why the developers made it that way. It could also be to add to the difficulty for the players sent inside the senate building for a quest.
After a few minutes, they reached the stone stairs. Zack glanced back at Missy and Anita. Both women held themselves stiff, Missy ready to play her music, Anita holding her sword.
Zack tried not to think of where they were. So far, their luck had held out. Maybe they would be able to get what they had come for, escape the city and never have to face the Deep Ones.
Or maybe not.
Holly had started to ascend the stairs when the sound of heavy footfalls echoed from above them. Zack grabbed Holly and dragged her back, then started toward one of the nearby doors, holding the torch close to himself to reduce the spread of light.
Anita got there first and opened it. Thankfully, the hinges weren’t rusted and made no noise as the door opened. The four of them hurried inside the pitch black room and shut themselves in.
Zack kept the torch hidden, just in case the light could be seen through the crack under the door. As he listened for the footsteps coming down the stairs, he scanned the room.
They seemed to be in a servants sleeping quarters. Simple metal beds were placed along either wall and beyond them, another door led from the room.
Zack touched Holly on the shoulder to get her attention, then pointed at the other door. Her brow furrowed, then she grinned. “I think there is another corridor out there with another set of stairs leading up.”
She started creeping across the room. Zack waved the other two women after her and then walked backwards behind them, facing the door they had entered, just in case the thing coming down the stairs decided to enter the room.
Holly listened at the other door, then motioned to Anita to get ready. Zack never took his eyes off the entry where they had come in for more than a second. He could no longer hear the footsteps but reckoned whatever was making them had to be close to the bottom of the stairs.
Zack heard the women open the door and glanced over his shoulder at them. Anita was peering outside. She opened the door wider, then stepped out into the hallway.
Suddenly, the door on the other end of the room flew opened. A webbed beast of a figure stumbled into the room. Twice as big as a human and three times as wide, the figure had to be an infected Greater Goblin or some other creature like a troll.
Zack tossed Anita the torch, then shield raised, backed after them as they left the room. The webbed creature made no noise as it hobbled after them. Two pinpricks of red shone out from the webbed covering over the infected’s mouth.
A chill ran through Zack. They looked like small eyes, peering out from the host creature’s mouth.
The creature let out a horrifying moan, then started barreling toward Zack. He raced out the door and pulled it shut, a moment before the creature slammed into it. “Find those stairs,” he cried, holding the door shut as the infected creature tried to pull it open.
Holly raced down the corridor to their left. Zack waited for Anita and Missy to follow, before he let the door go and hurried after them.
Seconds later, the creature was in the corridor with them, its moan echoing around them.
Dozens of shirking cries sounded in the distance. A door flew open somewhere, and feet thundered on stone somewhere down one of the side corridors running from the one they raced along.
They arrived at a set of stairs and the three women waited for Zack to catch up. He got to them, then took the lead. Anita followed from behind, the two lightly armored women staying at the center.
Several levels later, Holly said, “This is the right level.” She sped toward a set of double doors.
The infected were coming up the stairs behind them. It sounded like there were dozens of them back there, crying out to one another in the darkness.
Unlike Zack and the others, their eyes were clearly accustomed to not having light around.
Zack got to the doors. There was no time to be cautious, so he threw them open and raced out, shield raised.
A human-sized infected stood not far in front of him. Racing forward, he charged the creature, slamming it in the chest with Shield Slam. It stumbled back. His blow hadn’t done any damage, just like he expected it wouldn’t, but it had forced it against the railing overlooking the senate floor.
“Anita, help me.” Zack bashed the infected in the face twice, trying to stun it long enough for him to be able to pick it up and toss it over the edge.
The orc woman got to him and brought her two handed sword down in the center of the infected’s skull. Her blade bounced away with a hollow thud.
“You can’t kill them.” Zack dropped his sword and grabbed the creature’s webbed legs, grimacing as the sticky fiber clung to his gauntlets.
Anita must have understood what he was trying to do. She grabbed the creature from the other side, just as it began to thrash about, then they both hurled it over the railing.
By the time they heard it crash to the ground, Zack had already grabbed his sword and was racing along the balcony toward the far end of the giant room. The same purple vines that had grown outside ran down the domed roof above them, shining a violet light over them.
The women were beside him, all puffing and panting. Zack risked a glance down at the senate floor and swore under his breath.
Everything was covered in dense webbing, much like the lair of a giant spider. Cocooned bodies hung from overhead railings, others were merely dark specks poking out of the blanket of web.
Then something huge moved at the center of the web. Not a spider, but a creature seemingly made of black fog, tinged with the violet phosphorescent light. The thing had no form, it simply was.
Even though it had no discernible eye
s, Zack knew the thing saw him. Could it be the Karzel? Had Malghana lied about everything?
They got to the giant wooden doors and Anita kicked them open, one falling off its hinges and crashing to the ground. Racing inside, they found themselves on a narrow bridge overlooking a giant park below.
Infected moved among the empty garden beds, hundreds of them, their webbed bodies bathed in violet light. A whole fucking army!
“Shit.” Anita started along the marble bridge, peering over the railing at the teeming masses below.
The infected knew they were there. Hundreds of webbed faces peered up at them, some human, others monsters of varying size. All had an evil red light shining from their mouths.
Zack followed the women along the bridge, eyes scanning everywhere. Figures moved beyond the broken door behind them. The infected were close on their heels.
The bridge was narrow and the only quick way off it would be leaping over the side to a certain death. If any infected were in front of them, they’d be trapped.
There didn’t seem to be an immediate way for the infected below them to ascend to their level, but there were doors leading from every side of the park, including the end they were heading to.
Was there a way to reach the upper library from the lower? There had to be. So why weren’t the infected below all heading the same direction they were?
Unless…
They got to the end of the bridge and Zack once again took the lead. Their pursuers were nearly halfway across the bridge.
With Anita’s help, Zack opened the double set of doors leading into the upper library. Making sure nothing moved in front of him, Zack headed in, the women right behind him.
All four of them slammed the doors shut. Holly pounded her fist down on a button beside the door and a moment later, a loud click filled the air.
The doors were locked. Seconds later, they heard thuds and bestial screams from outside.
Raid Slayer 2 Page 12
