Azaria 2 -25

Good Morning!

Chapter 25: Heading Down Main Street

Azaria

Using the same method that I used to launch Lance unto the enemy island, I launched my parents up. My mother had taken the time to completely clean her armor and the golden glow coming from it was almost unbearable. The glow drowned out all the other light in the area even if they were mostly fires.

We all waited with baited breathes until the first explosion signaled that they had started. As we discussed beforehand, we waited for a solid minute before the boats started heading up. Neo, Thomas, Starburst, and I flew into the air ahead of them and shot off to help establish the beachhead. I didn’t doubt my parents’ prowess, but not helping them was just idiocy.

As we came around the edge of the other city island, a building that had to be at least six stories tall fell over the edge entirely engulfed in flames. The bottom appeared completely melted and hadn’t been able to support the weight of the rest of the building. I sent a warning to Ophelia and her girls to watch for the flaming debris and continued moving up.

When we reached about a hundred feet from the other island, my dungeon field ended. I could feel my total Aether supply become far more strained. I paused to check myself to make sure it wasn’t suicide to leave my field completely. After a few seconds, I decided it was safe enough. While I couldn’t use all my Aether at once, I still had access to the full pool, only as if through a straw. The bigger spells would just be much more rarer going forward.

Starburst and Neo were the first over the edge of the wall. Neo vanished as he flew into a building, while Starburst held his hands out toward a building and a few dozen streams of energy crashed into the strutucre completely tearing it to pieces. I hung back while the two of them went to town and check on my parents. After a bit of looking, I found them a bit further into the city, my father turning the streets and buildings near him into a sea of flames while my mother offered the prefect defense.

Even as half a dozen demons erected barriers in front of them, the flames just washed over or around the magic. Screams and yells of pain that quickly died down usually followed. The two of them proceeded without much of a pause.

“Those two are almost as bad as Neo,” Thomas whispered. I couldn’t help but nod in reply.

The sound of buzzing drew my attention. A swarm of bugs ascended the air with the boats in the middle of the swarm. A few of the minotuars were on board as well. It was a surreal sight, seeing the half bull, half man creatures surrounded by groups of pink armored women and lizardmen. Our control of the boats was limited resulting in most of them crash landing on the island to unload the troops.

The rest of the monsters from the cores were staying back and protecting the borders of the city island. We couldn’t be sure that even with us attacking, they might not try to launch an attack to hit us in the back. Especially if they find out that some of us were cores.

With the situation stabilizing on the beachhead, I floated further into the air to get a good look of the city. In the distance, I could make out a large force heading our way from a large tower that rose into the air and seemed to touch the storm cloud that covered the island. If my count was accurate, the incoming force outnumbered us three to one. Everyone was really going to have to pull their weight.

Explosions rang out as more buildings were targets of spells. I wasn’t sure what Neo was doing, but whenever he emerged from a building it soon started to collapse until it was nothing more than a pile of rubble with presumably a bunch of dead demons inside. The entire side of the city was soon on fire from the flames my father was throwing around liberally.

I concentrated on the doll that was with Lance, but there was something interfering with the link and I couldn’t connect with it. Lance must be inside the field of another dungeon or have the doll in her storage. Either way, I would have to hope that she was okay. There wasn’t much in the way of helping that I could do for her this time if she was captured… again.

“So much for that. We’re going to have to rely on brute force,” I said out loud with a sigh.

“I’m sure your friend is fine,” Thomas said. “Let’s deal with the problem at hand.”

“As you say,” I replied, and we flew into the city over our forces.

~~~

“The wall is in sight, but resistance is increasing as we get closer. They have some sort of gargoyle, magic user hybrid coming out of their walled section of the city,” Starburst said. The battle continued to rage on. My minions, technically being toys, weren’t tired, but the other monsters and the Powered that had joined the attack force were starting to wear down. They’d been fighting for a solid twenty minutes now after all.

The gate was in sight, not even two hundred feet from us, but the ground was covered in demons that were blocking our path. For every one that died, two took their place. To be brutally honest, we were stuck in a stalemate. While I debated what to do, a building inside the wall suddenly shuddered before it came down in a huge cloud of dust that even managed to get over the thirty-foot wall.

I took the chance to leap into the air and play my violin to create a magic tornado that tore through the enemy. Bodies were flung left and right, with some landing in the middle of our forces. I doubted it would kill many of them, but it would give our people the chance they needed to cover some ground.

Meanwhile, the island continued to shudder from whatever was happening on the other side of the wall. I didn’t have an proof, but I was confident that Lance was the cause. She had a tendency to be loud and destructive when backed into a corner. Either way, we took advantage of it and were soon directly under the wall. Neo didn’t need to be asked, he phased through the structure and brought it down in an equally large cloud of dust to the collapsed building.

Charging through the gap expecting to find another large force, we were met with a scene of carnage. Bodies that were in pieces laid strewn all over the place with pools of darker liquid than the rain gathering under the few piles of bodies. The scene was straight out of a horror movie, and it was hard to believe that only one person had been responsible for all of this.

“There! I can sense the presence that commands this island,” Thomas said pointing at the bottom of the large building. I wanted to make a snide comment about stating the obvious, but a large Aether sensation coming from the top of the tower distracted me. The next moment there was a large discharge of lightning that rapidly struck into our people.

The human Powered and the lizardmen fell to the ground twitching horribly with blood leaking from their faces. Twenty- One’s bugs had it even worst off. They exploded in horrifying blasts of green ichor. I worried about mine, but they looked around with interested expression, or rather Ophelia did since the foot soldiers had helmets on.

Even my parents were hit by the spell. My mother was kneeling with her shield covering my father, but they were down. I quickly ordered some of the soldiers to protect them while I started to pull the energy into my violin. For the first time there was almost too much energy and the instrument started to heat up as the strings began to glow.

Worried that it might do irreversible damage to me or the people laying prone on the ground, I quickly created a funnel and sent the energy back up into the clouds to cancel out the spell. There was a minor boom as the two spells impacted each other. The clouds above the city split and reveal the sky for the first time since we came to this dimension.

Horrified was the lower end of the spectrum. Tears in the blackened sky with what looked like eldritch monsters reaching through appeared to held back by the storm. One of the tendrils appeared to be aware of the opening in the cloud and shot for it, but as the storm closed it was repelled. Even with the storm back over the city, I could still feel the pressure from the creature. Looks like there was more to this world than we first thought.

“What in god’s holy name was that?” I gasped out grabbing my chest.

“I’m not sure, but I’d rather not stay in this world much longer,” Thomas said wringing his hands. I didn’t judge him for being scared. I was terrified myself.

A hand grabbed my shoulder almost painfully. I glanced to my side and found Starburst with a dreadful expression but also one of recognition. He knew what that thing was. “What is it?” I asked finally.

Starburst took a steadying breath then released my shoulder. “Goulderlia. A nightmare that they… we used to set upon worlds that have failed to convert. I’m amazed they found a way to hold him back. He… It is quite capable when it comes to destroying planets.”

I shook my head to clear the lingering terror and turned back to the stunned people. Only a few people were recovering, while most of the monsters were already back on their feet. “Leave the lizardmen here to protect the Powered that are still knocked out. We need to get to the tower before they do that again,” I said quickly and then ordered Ophelia to head for the tower with her soldiers.

“I agree with the child,” Neo said heading after them. “This place is much more dangerous then we first thought.” I couldn’t be sure since his voice sounded just as cold as ever, but I thought I sensed fear from even him. I guess he wasn’t immune to the terror that almost seemed to emanate from those tendrils.

I shook my head and flew after him. I cast a quick glance back to my parents that were still recovering from the electrical attack. My father appeared unconscious while my mother was back up on her feet. I was sure she could manage to protect him and the others while we dealt with the core.

The rest of the street to the tower wasn’t too challenging. The magical attack appeared to have been a self-defense method once most of the demon forces on the surface had been defeated. Ophelia’s women were tearing anything that stood in their way. With more room to work, they could more freely use their weapons. The chainsaw swords were devastating at close range and could easily cut through most of the enemy troops that remained.

“There’s the entrance!” Thomas shouted and I nodded having seen it at the same time. The Aether pulsing from the entrance was dense. This would be the strongest enemy that I’ve ever encountered. At least I had several people that were among the strongest in the city.

The grinding of bricks drew my attention as a figure fell from higher up the tower. We braced ourselves, but when they got closer, I was able to make out that it was Lance. Though, it was hard to tell with how much blood she was covered in. She crashed to the ground in front of us and breathed so heavily that steam was escaping her mouth and nostrils.

“Lance?” I asked worried that something might have happened to her.

Her eyes locked on me before she roared loud enough to cause the air to ripple. I didn’t fail to notice that there were pieces of flesh in between her shark like teeth. With a loud cracking and popping sound, some of her armor and exoskeleton retracked and soon she had a womanlier figure, even if parts of her were still covered in plates of scale and chitin.

With a few more cracks and pops of her neck, she stood up straight. “That was fun.”

“Glad to hear it. Are you alright?” Her skin, or rather hide had noticeable bruising and cuts. None of them were bleeding, but it still made quite the sight.

She waved my concern off. “I’m fine. Can’t say that for the demons in the area though.”

“I see. Are you up to some more fighting?” I asked. It wouldn’t be fair of me to push her much more if she was reaching her limit. I had already forced her to be a distraction for the landing forces.

“I’m more than okay. I want to slaughter more,” she replied. Her eyes flashed a noticeable red on the edges while her hands twitched. It quickly receded, but that didn’t help make me feel good about taking her along with us. However, I was sure that only Neo would be able to stop her without too much of a fight, so it was best to just bring her with us.

“Very well then. Let’s head see if we can speak with whoever is in charge,” I said finally.

“We have two paths that we can take. The core is actually down. Not sure how we reach the bottom floor, but that’s the goal. If we head up, we can speak with the avatar,” Lance added as she checked her wounds over.

“Likely a trick floor. You’re the expert on those,” Thomas said with a head bob in my direction. “Even if we defeat the avatar, it will mean little in the grand scheme. If she has enough Aether, she’ll be able to fight us a hundred times.”

“My thoughts exactly. We need to head for the core.” I concentrated and pulled as much Aether as I could into my Avatar body. It was possible that the Queen had a skill like my Total Domain that might completely cut me off from my pool. When I felt like I was filled to the brim, I sent a quick message to Zaria to watch everything for me. With a deep breath, I slapped my cheeks to stook myself. “Alright. Let’s go.”