Purgatory: The Devil's Game

by M. A. Carlson

  I added a quick, “This time.”

  “Any time,” Asher corrected. “Now, let’s keep going. Oh, and be wary of any traps. If this is a maze, it’s not just secret passages you need to keep an eye out for.”

  I wish he’d said that a few second sooner. I stepped on something and heard a click. Directly ahead of me a small fireball was cutting through the air and headed directly towards me. I barely got my shield up in time to take some of the damage. Unfortunately, the ball hit my shield and exploded in a wash of flames. Cooking me ever so slightly. Unfortunately, it managed to kill Asher. How fire killed a fireball, I’ll never know.

  After recalling Asher, I tried not to laugh as the little guy glared at me. I may have deserved it when I asked, ‘how does a fireball die to another fireball?’

  I was a bit more careful after that. I tried to keep an eye on the floor, watching for any more pressure plates, uneven stone, or discolored stones. That seemed to work pretty well.

  At the end of the hall, I came to a T-intersection. I checked down both sides. On my left the hall continued for about ten feet then turn left. On the right, the hall also continued about ten feet, but turned to the right. “Left, or right?” I asked.

  “Left,” Asher answered. “When in doubt, always go left.”

  “Why always left?” I asked.

  Asher quirked an eyebrow like I just asked a stupid question. “Weren’t you a gamer in life? Don’t you know you always go left in a maze dungeon? It’s the only way to not get lost.”

  I would have pointed out dead ends and changing mazes but decided to leave it alone.

  I took the left path, trying to pay attention to the floor while also keeping an eye ahead of me for any of the demons.

  At the end of the hall, I peeked around and saw another succubus waiting for me. It was maybe ten or twenty feet down the hall. Rushing it might not work as well this time. It also carried a whip in one hand. I couldn’t remember if the other succubus had been armed.

  “Just one,” I whispered to Asher. “I’m going to try to rush it like I did the last one.”

  Asher glared. “That is just stupid. You surprised the last one. This one will have plenty of time to see you coming. Better to try to ambush it here. Shoot it once then duck back behind the corner. It should come running.”

  That was a better plan. I equipped my recurve bow and drew back an arrow. Smirking, I popped out into the open in plain view and released the arrow. It hit solidly into her leg. “Hey, you come here often?” With that, she came running . . . limping at me. I ducked around the corner just in time to hear something crack the air. Her whip apparently had a lot longer reach than I thought it would. Still, I called out my mace. She came around the corner and my mace clotheslined her hard. Her body going limp before it even hit the ground. I smashed the mace down one more time and she liquified.

  “Will they all be this easy?” I asked as I collected the crystals and her whip.

  Asher twisted left then right. “These are all lesser succubae. It won’t be too long before you come across something more dangerous.”

  Accepting Asher’s warning I moved down the new hallway, mindful once again of the floor. The end of the hall was another T-intersection. I tried to get an angle to see down the left path and got a hiss of anger from the succubus that had been waiting in ambush. I barely ducked in time as her whip cut through the air and the stone, showering me with pebbles and dust.

  I coughed and rolled to the other side of the hallway, thinking it would force her to come to me. I didn’t count on their being a second succubus down the right-side path.

  I barely got my shield up in time to absorb the blow. I might have grinned a little when I saw the whip catch fire and quickly zoom up the length back to the owner of the weapon. I could only watch for a second as the succubus dropped the whip and tried to stamp out the fire before the first succubus turned the corner. Given I was down on the ground, I swung with a quick strike, popping her in the knee, which I now noted looked more like a goat’s leg. Either way, I hit the knee and it buckled the wrong direction with a loud pop, snap sound. She howled in agony as she fell in front of me. I moved quickly to hold her down with a knee and raised my shield to block the other succubus, who apparently gave up on her whip as a lost cause.

  The succubus’ nails ran down my shield with an almost nails-on-chalkboard like sound. That was until the demon started screaming and flailing about with her arm on fire.

  “We need to talk about your burning armor when this is over,” I said, bringing my mace down on the succubus I had pinned, smashing it into the back of her head and neck where I was greeted with another loud snapping, crunching sound and the demon beneath me went completely still. Taking her as either paralyzed or dead, I turned my attention back to the one with a now smoldering arm.

  “Are you saying you don’t like it?” Asher asked.

  I didn’t immediately respond. Despite having a charred arm, the succubus was rather agile. Dodging blows with relative ease. Then she made a mistake. She attacked with the other arm which was promptly blocked by my shield. With that arm on fire and her attention now focused on the burning limb, it was easy to plant the mace into her stomach, driving all the air out of her lungs. She collapsed to the floor, unable to catch her breath or put out the flames. I killed her quickly after that. I finally replied to Asher, “I like the flames just fine, but don’t you think they are a little overpowered?”

  Asher frowned at me. “Lesser Succubae. What part of that do you not understand? Of course, they are going to burn easily when confronted with holy flames. Against stronger demons it will be little more than a mild irritant. But mild irritant or not, any additional damage you deal to a demon will help you make them dead just that much faster. So, stop you’re whining and get back to work.”

  Sometimes Asher really lacked in the ‘witty banter’ area.

  I checked down both halls just to make sure there weren’t more succubae waiting for me. There was nothing I could see. The left hallway stopped at a dead end about five feet in. The other hall went on for ten or fifteen feet before turning back to the right.

  I was about to go to the right when Asher stopped me. “Where do you think you’re going?”

  “Down the hall that isn’t a dead end,” I answered quickly.

  Asher sighed disappointedly. “Fine, if you don’t want to look for a hidden room down the dead end, that’s up to you.”

  I stopped mid step and turned it into an about-face. “Right, hidden treasures and all that, right.”

  The far wall of the dead end revealed nothing as did the wall on my left. But the wall on the right had an oddly colored brick that depressed with the application of a little strength. The dead end slid down revealing a bedroom . . . with three succubae . . . staring at me intently.

  I quickly ran, ignoring the pain that lanced through my back as a whip managed to strike hard. Thankfully, I heard a hiss of pain and crackling fire behind me. Hopefully at least one of them will be slowed down. I ducked around the corner and waited, listening to the sound of hoofs clattering off the stone floor. As the first one came around the corner, my mace swung out. For the second time that day, I clotheslined a succubus, her lower body continuing forward as her upper body suddenly stopped. Then one of the succubae slightly trampled over the one I just clotheslined, then tripped and face planted. I brought the mace down on the back of her skull and got another repeat of earlier. Her dead weight was now pinning down one of her sisters, who was trying to dislodge the dead weight and get at me with her claws at the same time.

  The third one finally came around the corner and just like the first, came to a sudden stop with my mace buried in her chest. After that, it was just clean up and looting. I was happy for the crystals and what looked like clay. Clay that Asher helpfully informed me was succubus skin. I put it in my inventory but was not happy about it.

  Finally, I went back to inspect the room. The only thing in it was the bed . . . whic
h was useless to me. Feeling annoyed, both by the fight and the lack of reward, I flopped down on the bed only to hear a loud screech of pain and the smell of smoke wafting around me.

  I sprang from the bed and turned to see the bed was on fire, though the flames were quickly dissipating. The bed started standing up . . . with a large red welt shaped roughly like me. The bed transformed into a familiar form, a sloth demon, though it was by far the largest one I’d ever seen.

  “Sloth demon lord, run!” Asher warned.

  I tried to run for the door, but it was gone. I was trapped. “Can’t run. Any weaknesses?”

  Asher was quick to answer. “Try to get behind it.”

  That might have been impossible. The demon was massive, bigger than the bed it previously portrayed. It had long arms that could easily reach from one end of the room to the other. It had short stocky legs that held up its very wide, very ugly frame that still had a welt shaped like me.

  I didn’t think I could go under it, and going around was unlikely, not with those long arms, and going over . . . well, I didn’t think I could jump that high. I was so busy looking for a way to get behind it, I almost missed the spike tipped arm shooting toward me.

  I raised my shield and angled it, trying to get the arm to shoot past me. And it worked. Sort of. Still, it gave me what I wanted. The arm caught fire and flailed. I swung my mace from below, striking the arm and sending it toward the ceiling. A move that created the opening I was looking for. I ran right past the demon and into its blind spot.

  Once I was behind the monster, I laid into it. Hitting it once, twice, then ducking and raising my shield as the other arm swung around and hammered into me. It lit on fire for its trouble, but it still hurt me, knocking off a good amount of my HP. That was about the time I saw a large yellow eye open up on what I thought was the demon’s backside.

  I laughed nervously then dove to the side as both arms, one of them still smoking slightly, slammed down on where I’d been standing. I turned my dive into a roll coming back up on to my feet and running for the edge of the beast but the arm on that side wasn’t having it. It attacked. I tried my angling trick with my shield again but failed to actually block the attack. It was a feint. The arm suddenly pulled back as the other arm shot across the body, stabbing into my side, the armor there thankfully holding it back from cutting me in half. Once again, it still hurt.

  The arm burned and jerked away. The other arm tried to slam down on me from above. I got my shield up into place just in time to catch the brunt of the hit. It still dropped me to a knee trying to hold back the power behind the attack.

  I was surprised when the arm tried to hold me down, despite burning the entire time it stayed in contact with me. That was until I saw the other arm looking to attack me again. I needed to think quick. But the only plan I came up with was a stupid plan. I let the arm push me down, slamming me on to my back, knocking the wind out of me. But my stupid, crazy plan worked. The arm that intended on impaling me, instead impaled the other arm, piercing all the way through it.

  The beast howled, finally revealing a large gaping maw near the bottom of its body. Ignoring that I couldn’t draw in a full breath, I scrambled to get back to my feet and once there, I stumbled, hacking and coughing past the demon. Finally getting behind it again. I coughed and hacked a few more times before I finally drew in a breath. I looked up at the monster and struck. Just once, then an eye opened, and I groaned.

  “I hate you so much,” I complained, readying my shield for another attack. The previously impaled arm swung around, but more like a whip than a spike of death. I was actually able to bat it aside fairly easily. I chased after the arm, swinging with a quick strike. Two quick strikes then I needed to dodge the other arm. Another quick strike. I was out to destroy that arm. Then I could focus on the other one.

  Twenty hits later that arm finally ‘died’, tearing free at the source and oozing black blood. Unfortunately, I was just about gassed. I spend far too much energy trying to ‘kill’ the arm.

  “Attack from its wounded side,” Asher called out. “If you can. Strike the wound.”

  I smiled as I saw what Asher was going for. I stepped to the things back and glanced at where the eye was before. It was closed. I smiled and struck hard into that side of its body. The thing roared in pain and the eye opened to glare at me. I gave it a little salute as I calmly stepped back to the other side where the eye was closed. I hit again, then for good measure I hit right next to the bleeding wound where the ‘dead’ arm had fallen off. The eye went wide after that hit and the beast started going a little crazy. Its free arm flailed about uncontrollably so I hit it in the same spot again.

  The beast screamed in pain. It was high pitched, high enough I was sure glass would have broken if there had been any present. Then everything went quiet on me despite seeing the arm still flailing about. Apparently, the scream was so loud and high pitched, it burst my ear drums. Which also explained why the room had started to spin.

  I tried to steady myself, grabbing ahold of the demon’s flesh with the hand that also held my shield. I started sloppily laying into the demon. Trying to hit the wound regularly, but regularly missing my target. I had too many misses just once and got stabbed through the leg for it. Of course, that was right before I finally hit my target. The boss didn’t like that. He tore the spike free from my leg, taking a large chunk of flesh with it. I was temporarily stunned by the blood that came gushing out of the wound. Another part of my brain warned me that if I didn’t it kill faster, I was going to bleed out.

  I attacked with a new fervor, aiming for the wound but taking any hit I could get. It was sloppy and messy, and I think I got stabbed a few more times along the way. My HP bar showing I was at 15/340 was a little concerning. There was a pop and suddenly my hearing was restored.

  “Stop, you’re killing yourself,” Asher screamed.

  I looked at him, confused. “What? Hey, I can hear.”

  Asher ignored me and snapped out orders, “Quickly, take a healing potion and for the love of God, stop swinging, it’s dead already. You’re just killing yourself. Your EP is already zeroed out and you’re burning HP to keep going.”

  I looked down at the demon I was still holding onto for support. It was indeed slumped over, dead. I slumped down. All my energy was gone. It took a few seconds longer for my regeneration to tick just to have enough energy to open my inventory and pull out one of the healing potions and drink it down. My HP jumped to 134/340.

  Asher seemed to deflate a little at that. “Oh, thank God! That was too close.”

  I nodded in agreement. That was far too close. “I think it’s time I put the chausses back on. My speed increased after my boosts from Ramy.”

  Asher bobbed his agreement.

  I watched with relief as the former bed melted into goo, leaving behind a large pile of crystals and a . . . bed of all things. It was the size of a matchbox, but it was still a bed. I picked it up and showed it to Asher. “What is this thing?”

  “A bed,” Asher said, sounding far more excited about it. “You put it in your bunkroom, and it will replace your cot with an actual bed. And this bed will most likely come with some kind of resting bonus for sleeping a full night on it.”

  I smiled. Bed sounded really good right about now.

  “Put it away, finish healing up and let’s keep going. Maybe we’ll find another room like that,” Asher said excited.

  “Weren’t you the one that told me we should leave if we ever got something good like this?” I asked.

  Asher stiffened. “Right. You’re absolutely right. We’ll leave and place that in your bunkroom. Then we’ll come back and resume our exploration.”

  I sighed. I kind of just wanted to use my new bed and get some rest. Apparently, I would need to wait a while.

  Chapter 25 – Curse or Blessing

  Remember those two points I said would be easy to gain? I was wrong. My maze, changed every time I went in. The paths were different. The
traps were different. The only thing that remained the same were the succubae. Well, them and the loot.

  After that first successful hidden room, Asher and I were flying high. We were unstoppable . . . until we weren’t. The very next time in, the ground fell out from under my feet, and I died. The time after that, the wall opened behind me and three succubae emerged, this while I was already engaged in combat with two others. Five on one when I was surrounded did not end well for me, even if I managed to kill four of them along the way. It seemed every time I went in, there was a new trap just waiting to see me dead and more often, than not, that was exactly what they did. Killed indiscriminately.

  “Finally,” I said, collapsing into my bed. The only good thing to come out of Purgatory in after a week. The 5% experience bonus from a good night of sleep was great. Or it was until I died, then the bonus disappeared. I’d died a lot in just one week. It was not pleasant. Still, I finally had enough experience to gain that second point I needed to learn another Soul proficiency.

  Name: Victor Goodspeed

  Highest Floor Cleared: 2

  Experience Earned: 92,101

  Hierarchy: 4th

  Rank: 12th

  Title: Sinner

  HP: 340/340

  EP: 170/170

  SE: 100/100

  Body

  Experience to Next Point: 302,101

  Unused Points: 0

  Strength:

  17

  Reflex:

  17

  Constitution:

  34

  Recovery:

  20

  Soul

  Experience to Next Point: 79,557

  Unused Points: 14