NOVEL NEXT Chapter 49: The Eldritch
12 Hours Until Reset
I'm in a crouch, rifle up. I swing open the door slowly and creep into the hospital floor. I quickly scan left and right. We're at a T intersection, halls left, right and center, the broom closet at my back. Jose already took one step out to get a better look at the floor.
The sides of the halls look like hospital rooms, doors currently closed. The floors are white tile, the ceiling looks like tan plasterboard and the lighting is low, using mostly track lights. Kinda like an airplane at night. Dim lighting, to use the RPG term. Enough light to shoot someone in the face at 50 feet, but not enough light to make out their emotions as you do.
“Good adventurers always go left,” I say into my comm. I head to the left. Even in a crouch my speed is double that of anyone else, and I reach the first hospital room door. I reach for the handle. Jose comes up behind me and has the hall covered. I push the lever-style handle in and the door silently cracks open.
Even through this small sliver I can see blood. The floor is covered in red blood. I hear a mechanical beeping and a machine whirring, just like you'd expect to find in a hospital room. I open the door more and see a bed. The bed sheets are soaked red. I look at the occupant and have to hold myself back from retching.
The human occupant, Afghani based on his complexion, has had an arm removed and replaced with an octopus-like tentacle. I resist the urge to just close the door and run away. I push into the room and he hears me.
We make eye contact. He is so, so scared. He's hooked up to a breathing apparatus with a tube in his mouth. He can't talk, but once he realizes I'm some sort of soldier he starts crying and shaking his head. The sobbing forces me to rush to his side and I hold my finger up in the universal shush motion. God, his right arm was replaced with a giant claw. No arm, no elbow, just a long hooked bone.
Fuck this place.
He's still shaking his head, frightened out of his mind. I know very little Pashto, but I say, “friend, help.” That seems to pull him away from the edge of madness just long enough for him to motion with his eyes to his right.
The room's barely lit far corner moves, and what I thought was a chair slithers towards me. “Fuck you,” I say coldly, and cast Yellow Beam at the dweller in the dark. The bright yellow burst lights up the room for just a second, long enough to see that the monster is four legged, has five scrawny human arms on top of a dog-like body, and has way too many fucking eyes. The beam hits one of the arms- no, it actually blocked with that arm. Then it leaps at me, arms first.
I punch it as it flies towards me, sending the creature into the ceiling. Jose bursts in. It falls, taking plasterboard and electrical wiring with it. The lights go out and I cast Yellow Ray and aim my flashlight hand at where it... Used to be. Shit.
I hear muffled screams and turn to see the monster on top of the hostage. From this angle I can see that its mouth is on the bottom of its body, and circular like a lamprey. It bites down on the man and blood sprays, but unfortunately for it, Jose Amarillo is in the room. He fires two shots which knock the thing on its side, then he fires three more shots into the open mouth. It's arms flail around for just a second before the monster slumps to the side and falls off the hostage.
I look at the man and prepare to use one of my healing techniques but he's clearly already gone. That's... That's two human rib cages I've seen today. Fuuuuuck.
“Fucking weird monster,” Jose says. Going over to kick it. I take a look as he kicks it again to make it drop loot.
Nine Limb Creeper. Tier 4. Takes reduced damage from pretty much everything except Psychic attacks. Did you know that this thing can't actually survive? A Nine Limb Creeper's organs won't support its own body for long. It dies every 20 or so hours only to have another terminal lifeform replace it. Fun!
Possible Loot: existential dread, misery, fake nails, tooth bracelet.
Jebus H. Christopher that's fucked. The monster fades from Jose's third kick and drops a bucket full of coins and a packet of fake nails.
Press-On Pressure-Point Pointed Nails. Increases the damage you do to pressure points when using certain unarmed techniques. Particularly the ones where you poke people.
Mercy bursts into the room as Jose and I are scooping up handfuls of coins as a bloody mess of a man is still on the bed beside us. I see her look of shock and quickly say, “not our blood! We're fine!”
She takes another look at the mangled human corpse and then turns to leave the room. Quins comes in. “What's eating her, eh? Oh, and what ate him?”
A few minutes later we open another hospital room and find another monstrous human experiment. This one has his ribcage on the outside. Or maybe it's an extra ribcage. I'm not currently interested in finding out which. We sweep the room this time and I find another Creeper keeping watch. The only truly offensive Psychic power I have is Psi Punch. A glowing purple fist slams into the Creeper and caves in its... Face? Body? Whatever, point is I Psi Punch it twice to kill it.
I try to heal the victim and that seems to alleviate enough pain to let the poor man talk. Alicia does our translation again.
“The short ones are like dogs. They keep watch. The fish men only move us around. The tall ones are smart. They talk to us in our brains.”
“I think he means telepathy,” I say.
Alicia rolls her eyes, “sure but there's no word for that directly in Pashto so I'm giving you what he says.”
“They took us and brought us down here. The tallest one is their leader. It is a monster. Not human, but smart. Please, find my brother, he was brought here too.”
“How many are there?” I ask.
“The tall ones, not many, I think. The short ones, they come back, they always come back. I killed one. It came back, stopped me from escaping. The fish men, maybe lots, maybe one. I don't know.”
I look again at his... Condition. “I don't know if it's okay for you to try to escape or not. I don't know if you'll survive.”
“I don't care. I don't want to die on this bed.”
We help him up. His movements are stiff, like his joints can barely bend. I don't know if he'll even be able to get up the ladder to the previous floor. We show him the way and he begins a slow, awkward climb up the ladder.
I turn to my team as we stand back at the T intersection. “We need to clear these rooms, and find anyone else who can be saved.” I can hear Alicia's argument already, so I preempt it. “We have five floors to go, including this one. And 12 hours. We can do 2 hours here. Besides,” I look Mercy in the eyes. “We're supposed to be the good guys.”
Something in the air changes, and it's not my courage surging through the hall. No, something cold wafts through the hospital hall. Something distinctly evil.
Guns are raised. Down the center hall a tall, skinny figure in a long black outfit raises a skinny hand towards us and- BANG! Gets popped in the head by a goddamn US Army Ranger. Jose's shot is the first, but not the last as Alicia opens fire with a handgun and I follow up with rifle fire. Out of the corner of my eye I see Quins draw his bow and face to our right. He uses some technique on his arrow then fires, the arrow exploding on impact with... Something.
“Creepers comin!” he says and I hear doors up and down all three halls open up. I look left and see two more tall monsters down that hall. Their hands are already raised and creating some sort of purple translucent barrier as they advance. I glance back at the central tall boy and see he's got a barrier now too.
Elder Thing Version 83. Tier 4. Did you read Mountains Of Madness? This is one of those aliens. Except evolved. After 82 previous attempts, this is the most human. It only has 3 arms instead of 5. Progress! Also it has psionic powers that will WRECK you.
Possible Loot: Ancient texts, surgery tools.
Creepers burst out of the open doors, 23 of them all at once. We're opening fire but the tough little bastards are hard to kill. I need more. I can deliver more.
Nine wakizashis fan out around us and then fly, three in each direction. I press my body against the wall to give myself as much peripheral vision as possible. I focus center and let my sub-minds take over the left and right halls. Blades slam into creeper bodies with 81 Strength. At 81 it's twice the strength of the world's strongest a few months back. The blades don't slice through the monsters so much as push into them, driving them back as the solid little creepers can't be killed so easily. On the right my sub-mind has decided to chop off their scrawny arms and that seems to work, so I and my other sub-mind follow suit. Soon the halls are slick with gross, acrid-smelling yellow blood.
The Elder Things must be just in range for their psionic attacks because Alicia, Jose and Mercy all drop to their knees and clutch their heads. I can see blood flowing from Mercy's ears. Shit, shit, shit! I get desperate and take a chance. I cast Rot Touch through my wakizashis and they drip with a black sludge.
The list of magic spells in my brain is organized like so:
Fire, Electric, Earth, Wind, Water, Ice, Light, Dark, Toxic, Psychic.
Since after light and dark, toxic and psychic are listed together, as a sort of pair, I have to guess that they're linked, or opposites, or... Something. I ram the rot tipped blades into the psychic shields of the Elder Things and they crack. The barriers don't shatter, but the black-green rot spreads out along the cracks, eating away at the barriers. I don't know if this effect will let me through in time so I just push with my blades and punch holes big enough for them to slip into.
My blades, on the other sides of the barriers, go to work and slice away at the Things. I crouch down and place a hand on both Alicia and Mercy, casting Healing Palm to try and keep them alive. Jose, buddy, just hold on!
The barriers go down as the Things try to parry and block my blades. Quins takes about five seconds to make some sort of big ass arrow and lets it fly into the pair of Elders on the left. THOOOM! The following explosion is massive and blasts the Things and several creepers apart, sending the others in that hall sprawling. The heat and shockwave from the blast hits us and I shout, “too close, Quins!”
“Yeah I did shoot those twins!” he deafly says back while firing an arrow into a nearby creeper.
With two psychics gone, Jose and Alicia return to the fray. I send all my blades to pound the last Elder Thing version whatever and cut it to ribbons. The rest of the team pumps hundreds of rounds of ammo into the nine-limb creepers, but before too long the fight comes to a close and we emerge both alive and victorious.
I go over to inspect the Elder Thing I killed. It's not wearing clothes, the black outfit is actually some sort of flesh. So it's not wearing a dress, instead it's a cone of flesh that ends at the bottom with about a thousand 1-inch orange tentacles that must glide it along the floor. It's “head” is white but I'm not sure it actually contains any important organs because the whole thing looks like a damn cut up vegetable. No blood, no organs. “I think these are psychic eggplants,” I say to no one in particular.
“Their dogs are flesh and blood though,” Quins says, slicing one of the creepers open. “Fecking skin about an inch thick and tough as shoe leather. Inside is... Jelly? I think it's yellow stinking jelly.”
I hear Alicia ask Quins why he's cutting open the corpse. “Because, my dear, knowledge is power. If I can find a wee little weak spot, I can just shoot that instead of, oh, 12 arrows to random bits.”
As he continues to cut, I hear coins drop to the floor and Quins say, “bollocks.” His current sample gone, he moves to his next victim.
I've recovered some more Ki, and go to heal Jose. I know him, and I know he's hurt worse than he's letting on. I give him some Healing Palm for a minute to get him back up.
Mercy is standing by the ladder back in the broom closet. She's contemplating just leaving. Hey, wait, is this what having above average Wisdom is like? Knowing how people feel? Shit, that's not bad!
Anyways Mercy isn't scared, I can tell she's just... “Done with all this?” I ask while healing Jose. She just nods. “I get it. But you're awesome now, so can I still rely on you, at least until we leave the dungeon?”
“I'm not awesome.” She says it looking down and away.
“You are,” says Jose, wincing in pain.
I follow up with, “yeah, that psychic attack was the first thing to actually threaten you in this whole dungeon.”
“You need to learn how to aim with that gatling gun though.” Jose is referring to Mercy's AF-04 Spiral Vulcan mini-minigun. She can throw a lot of bullets at once but her aim is really shit.
“I know this has been a tough one for you,” I say, finished with Jose's heal. “But we also did a lot of good with the previous prisoners. And... You helped me get past the first part. So I think...”
“What, that I'm some crybaby non-soldier, who can't keep her shit together?”
I take both her hands in mine. “No, I think that you're really amazing, and I'm so glad you're with me.” She finally looks me in the eyes and I get lost there. I had more to say. Just can't think of it while staring at the most beautiful face in the world.
I have to turn away, force myself not to pull her close and kiss her deeply, right here surrounded by monster goo. Not the right time.
“But this part is going to be particularly rough,” I say. “Checking these rooms...” I turn to the group as a whole. “Is not for the squeamish. Anyone who wants to stand guard is welcome to.”
Quins gives a quick, but lengthy reply. “Oh right, I'm straight out, on guard duty, sir, if it pleases ya.”
Mercy just nods and I take Jose and Alicia down the hall to check each room, one by one.
The fucked up shit I see in those rooms will haunt me until I die. There were horrible, horrible things done to these men. Amputations, implantations and, in one case, disgusting attempts at dentistry. All in all we only find seven more men alive and... Fit for travel. We guide them to the ladder, and we support the weakest man as he climbs with just one arm and no legs.
Jose is halfway up the ladder with Bashir when another chill wind blows through the hospital, this time coming from the double doors at the end of the hall. All three paths, left, right and center, converge at that point, which is clearly a boss battle door. So we left it the fuck alone.
The door shakes. “Prepare for battle!” I shout, and wakizashis fly in front of me as we take cover in hospital rooms and around corners.
The doors burst open and another Elder Thing glides through, though this one is clearly floating off the ground. Instead of black, its exterior is solid white. Swirling around it are dozens of various medical implements; scalpels, saws, pincers. I thrust forward with my own telekinetic weapons and they clash with the boss's. Metal scrapes against metal. My weapons are far better than his, but this isn't a battle of blades, it's a fight about telekinetic skill. And he's winning.
Jose, Alicia, Mercy and Quins all open fire but their attacks are blocked with perfect deflections by the flying implements. He's blocking Mercy's gatling gun fire with a large bed pan, and the bullets are collecting in the dish. Quins said he's out of explosive arrows for now, so all he's got is regular ones. Somehow he manages to bounce an arrow off a bone saw and it barely sticks in the monster's head. The monster seems unperturbed. Jose's electro bolt shot arcs down the room only to make contact with an energy shield that shimmers into life just in time. Shit, this thing is tough.
Elder Thing, version 84, Doctor edition. Tier 5. A mastermind who conducts experiments on humans in an attempt to further its own species's development. Has immense psychic powers.
Possible Loot: Surgery equipment.
Huh. These loot descriptions seem to be getting more and more vague.
I see a couple of bone saws fly past me and hear Quins curse, followed by Jose grunting. I turn to see them bloodied but still in the fight. Mercy flies forward and grabs the two saws and simply crushes them in her mecha-armored hands.
My nine wakizashis clash with scalpels. I can feel this thing's overwhelming strength with each blow. The tiny scalpels manage to push back each of my blades when they make contact. I switch three wakizashis to magic and try to get through the energy shield. Flamethrowers start up but I immediately find scalpels pushing my wakizashis down, making the flames hit the ground.
One of my sub-minds digests that move. Deflection means he doesn't want to just have his barrier eat the flames. Or maybe it's simpler than that. Maybe he just wouldn't be able to see through them. He'd be fighting blind. That's something I can work with. But he doesn't have eyes. Does he operate in sound? No, he'd hear through the fire. Heat. He sees through heat!
Sapping Cold
Call forth a cloud of chilling air around you that slowly erodes enemy strength and life. Also known as “Brr, It's Cold Out Here.”
Area: 5 foot radius
Cost: 1 Arcana Point per second
Proficiency: 0%
The air around each of my blades chills. The overlapping zones of cold begin to fog up, and seeing that I can stack the effect, I bring all nine blades together to create a 10 foot cube of arctic air. The telekinetic medical implements in the cube actually drop to the ground and the others pull back. To thermal vision everything in the cube and past it must be a nearly solid blue (or black? Whatever color cold is.) All of a sudden my team's bullets start making it through and we land our first real hits against the monster. It lets out a shriek like scraping metal and a purple energy shield rises in front of it.
I've seen that trick before, and try a new counter to it.
Noxious Dart
A small, pen sized projectile flies unerringly into a target to deliver a harmful and crippling poison.
Range: 50 feet
Cost: 40 Arcana Points
Proficiency: 0%
A thin, three-inch long green cone fires from my index finger and flies at a speed not much faster than a regular run. It flies up and along the ceiling, then slips into an air vent and I lose track of it. Jose lets loose a massive bolt into the shield. The shield flickers once, but then recovers. Then I see the dart, a thin line of green energy trailing behind it. The little projectile has snuck around, popped out of another air duct on the other side of the energy shield and, without fanfare, sticks into the doctor. The dart fades and nothing happens. My team keeps firing as I maintain the freezing cold area. Then green energy arcs across the doctor's skin like lightning. Its arms flail wildly and the shield drops.
My team lets loose with everything they've got and lead and lightning fly down the corridor into the creature. I dash forward too, and pull my blades, still emitting cold, into a circle around my right arm. I slam into the monster with the circle of swords like a clothesline punch, dashing past it and taking a whole square foot of its side along with me. The white vegetable flesh slides off my blade tips, and I see the doctor bend over at the waist where I cut it apart. Its three arms still flail so I fire my blades like bullets, sending them tip first into the creature. My blades bury themselves up to the hilt and frost spreads across the doctor. I clench my fist and my wakizashis all fly back to me, rending frozen vegetable as they go, turning the boss monster into half a smoothie.
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Conversation Log 0106
Hyperion: I wanted to ask about cultivation.
Spear Saint: regular or Xianxia?
Hyperion: Xianxia.
Saturn's 2nd Ring: Absolutely not. It's meaningless nonsense. Shonen Jump battle manga make more sense!
Skull Master Flash: But my core spins faster now, and I can thread my qi down into it better than anyone else can!
Hyperion: Is that sarcasm or are you really cultivating right now?
Skull Master Flash: Sarcasm, sir!
Spear Saint: The fact that we have to ask shows how far we've come.
Hyperion: You're sure there's no way to implement cultivation?
Saturn's 2nd Ring: Oh, there is, it would just deeply destabilize the entire system. People wouldn't fight anymore, they'd just meditate and then be strong enough to blow up buildings after a few years. The XP system at least makes it so people risk something before gaining something.
Spear Saint: I wouldn't mind magic treasure pills to make you stronger though.
Saturn's 2nd Ring: Some should drop in our personal dungeons. I made sure useful items would drop for us in abundance.
Skull Master Flash: My spiral tempest core thanks you!