Chapter 28: Power of Virtue Pt.2
The insect loomed over Damien, its remaining claws flexing as hatred blazed in its crimson eyes. One of its limbs lay severed on the sand, blue ichor still oozing from the ragged stump and hissing where it struck the scorching ground.
SHRACCCCK!
It let out a deafening, metallic roar, spraying spit and ichor in all directions.
Damien pushed himself upright, muscles coiling as he prepared to charge, but then the air shifted.
Behind the creature, a shadow fell. A silhouette wreathed in silver light and orange flames stepped into view, heat rippling outward.
"My firepower isn't enough to kill you outright," Joseph's voice rang out, cold and confident. "But this should hurt."
He stood there, streaked with blue gore, his silver armor dull and stained, hair plastered to his forehead with sweat and ichor. Flames gathered in his right hand, burning brighter and hotter, then he drove his palm into the creature's face.
The beast shrieked again, an ear-splitting, gut-wrenching sound as fire erupted in its eye sockets, charring its mandibles and searing through its armored skull. It collapsed to the sand, thrashing wildly, claws gouging deep trenches as it writhed in agony.
With a flash of golden light, Joseph summoned his sword, the blade gleaming like molten dawn. In one smooth motion, he stepped forward and thrust it into a crack in the creature's carapace, sinking the weapon deep into its chest.
The insect spasmed, then fell still.
Damien froze, his eyes narrowing.
Did this bastard just steal my kill?
Heat flared in his chest, hotter than the desert sun. Rage curled through him like smoke.
In his past life, killing was everything. He lived for it, thrived on it, loved the way it filled the air with silence and satisfaction. But here? In this cursed hell? He'd barely killed anything at all.
His teeth ground together. His fingers tightened on the hilt of his dagger before he let it dissolve into golden light with a bitter hiss.
Joseph crouched beside the smoking corpse, resting a blood-slicked hand on its shell. Without even looking at Damien, he spoke:
"You mind if I absorb it?"
Damien's jaw tightened. His lip split as he bit down hard, the sharp copper taste of blood filling his mouth.
"Go ahead," he muttered, voice low and dark.
His eyes followed Joseph's every move, already imagining the blade sliding between his ribs someday.
I'm adding you to the list.
However… the insect did not dissolve.
Seconds stretched into silence. Then a minute.
Joseph straightened slowly, frowning at the unmoving carcass at his feet. His sword's point lowered, scraping the sand.
"Just like the others," he muttered under his breath.
Damien's eyes narrowed, a chill crawling up his spine despite the desert heat. He glanced around the battlefield.
It was over, or so it seemed.
Blythe was already moving among the others, her hands glowing faintly as she worked. She swept over Jenna, James, the Monk, and even the three bland girls, sealing up their minor cuts and burns.
No one looked too badly injured, but the dunes around them…
The sand was littered with the corpses of insects. Eight of them, twisted, jagged, and still. The air stank of blood and rot, thick and metallic, clinging to the back of Damien's throat.
But none of the bodies dissolved.
Why aren't they disappearing?
The thought burned hotter with each passing second, and then Damien's eyes went wide as the terrible answer came to him.
"What if…"
A faint scritch caught his ear.
At Joseph's feet, the corpse twitched violently, jerking sideways on the sand. Joseph stumbled back a step, startled, his eyes flashing wide.
"What the hell's going on?!" he shouted, backing away.
Damien's stomach sank as a low grinding sound rose from the dunes around them.
One by one… the other eight corpses began to move.
They shuddered, legs twitched, mandibles scraped, then they slithered.
"They're not dead!" Blythe's voice cracked as she stumbled back, almost falling over Jenna, who screamed and scrambled away in terror.
The three unnamed girls pressed behind James and the towering Monk, eyes wide as saucers. James grimaced and stepped forward, shielding them despite the confusion.
Damien's fingers closed around his dagger as it flashed into being once more. The others summoned their weapons too — swords, daggers, spears — every blade catching the light in trembling hands.
Then came the sound.
A wet, crunching, grinding sound as the bodies dragged themselves across the sand toward each other.
Damien could only watch, his stomach churning, as they collided.
Carapaces cracked and split as they fused. Legs sank into torsos. Shells groaned and stretched, snapping apart only to knit back together, forming something bigger, darker, wrong.
Blue ichor sprayed and hissed against the hot sand as the horrific mass heaved itself upright, rising higher, and higher still.
The sound, the tearing, the snapping, the sickening pop of bone-like chitin fusing filled the air, loud enough to drown out the wind.
By the time it stopped, silence crashed over them like a wave.
What stood before them now was no longer just an insect.
Fifteen feet of nightmare — a hulking, misshapen behemoth of eight jagged claws and gleaming eyes, its breath steaming in the desert heat. Its shadow stretched wide across the dunes as its head tilted, scanning the frozen Hellbounds below with hate-filled eyes.
Damien swallowed hard, his pulse hammering in his ears.
"Well… that's new," he muttered under his breath, raising his dagger as the monstrous creature's claws flexed, ready to strike.
...
"It's too strong!" Joseph shouted, his voice hoarse, as another column of searing fire blasted from his palm, only to glance harmlessly off the towering insect's cracked, gleaming armor. Sparks and steam hissed where it struck, but the beast didn't even flinch.
From the opposite side, James hurled himself at it with a roar. His fist smashed against one of its eight monstrous limbs, but the impact barely made it buckle. Instead, he recoiled, stumbling back with a snarl.
"Our corruption ratio's too high!" James barked, shaking out his bruised knuckles.
Damien's lips pressed into a thin line. Other than the mimic, so far, everything they'd faced that skittered out of the desert had been manageable. One star at most.
This was something else entirely, something that belonged far deeper in hell.
The air itself vibrated with its presence, every step of the beast sending tremors through the dune, loose sand cascading down like water.
Joseph, James, the Grey Monk, and Damien moved almost as one now, lunging forward to meet it head-on. Their weapons gleamed, dagger, sword, bare fists, and spear — weaving through the scorching air as they zigzagged over the uneven sand.
The insect's claws came down hard, gouging the ground, whistling just inches from their skulls.
Damien ducked low, the wind of a strike whipping his hair back as he slipped between the monster's legs. Above him, the Grey Monk vaulted high, spear spinning in a silver arc. Joseph's flames licked the edges of its shell, while James charged again, fists hammering like pistons against the chitinous plates.
Behind them, the five girls scrambled to keep up, their movements clumsy but determined, swords and daggers flashing as they tried to offer what support they could.
Blythe shouted something Damien didn't catch, her white dress streaked with blue blood, and one of the nameless girls sent shimmering bubbles spiraling toward the beast, bursting harmlessly against its massive frame.
Jenna gripped her stolen mimic's katana tightly, her eyes fixed on the monster with a mix of fear and fury, waiting for her chance to strike.
Above them all, the beast let out a screech, a sound like metal tearing stone, and its claws rose again, casting a black shadow over the dunes as the fight reached its next, deadly rhythm.