Azaria The Doll Dungeon 12

Chapter 12: Murderer and Monster!

I checked patreon and saw that this was set for tonight. Sorry for the delay. 

Lance

A few hours ago

“Son of a bitch!” I shouted as I came to violently. My head throbbed like someone took a baseball bat to it. Pushing myself up, I took stock of the situation. Thankfully, I was alive. The female goblins seemed to have barely moved. I did notice that I had a coarse animal skin covering me.

I looked around but didn’t see anything to indicate which goblin might have been responsible. I rubbed my head and turned to the pile of materials hoping it was still there. I breathed a sigh of relief when I saw that it was. The smell had definitely gotten worse but when I used my harvest skill, everything was still the same color as when I first carved it out.

I didn’t want to risk it vanishing, so I quickly stored it in my storage. I got a sense that it was almost full when I finished collecting everything. Looking around, I noticed that more than a few of the female goblins were staring at me.

“I don’t know what will happen when I leave, but if you want me to end your suffering I will.”

Nearly all of the goblins fell to the ground. I couldn’t take back my offer, so I only nodded and moved to the closest goblin. It was hard to tell given her goblin features, but to me it looked like she had a thankful smile. I nodded again and brought my cleaver down quick and smooth. Her head went flying, the smile permanently etched.

That was how the next five minutes went. All the goblins wore a sad and thankful smile as I decapitated them. It was probably the most hollowing thing I’d ever done, or hopefully will ever do. I didn’t use Harvest as no matter what gains I might get out of it, I felt these creatures deserved better.

There were only two goblins left when I finished the gruesome task. They looked at me with indifference. Why they didn’t want to end their suffering, I’d probably never know. That was just how life worked at times. Since my task was done, I moved over to the throne.

Most times, dungeons will reward those that defeat their last boss. I was hoping for something good, but considering this dungeon hadn’t been dived much, didn’t get my hopes up too high. Looking around, I finally found a chest under the throne.

There was a lock that looked more like a wooden block attached to it, but I was easily able to break it with my cleaver. I almost laughed when a solid bar of gold was presented perfectly centered in the chest. I carefully lifted it out worried that it might be trapped but nothing happened.

When the bar fully left the surface of the chest, I managed to notice the bottom board rose just barely. My interested peaked, I reached inside and stuck my nail in the side between the floor board and the side board. With barely any effort, it popped out. In a velvet sheet, there was a vial of green liquid.

“Son of a!” I nearly shouted. This was a power vial. You could think of it like a skill scroll from a video game. If I were to drink it, I would get whatever power was stored inside. They literally sold for millions outside. I gulped then quickly stored it in my storage, infinitely grateful that I had acquired that skill.

I was about to turn away when I spotted something glittering in the corner of the chest. Reaching carefully, I grabbed it. Looking it over, I found it was a amulet of some type. I couldn’t see anything that told me what it did and when I tried to view it like an item, much like my cleaver, nothing came up.

I went ahead and pocketed it. It wouldn’t be the first time regular jewelry was found in a dungeon. They were usually made from good material and worth quite a bit. The interesting fact was that dungeons on different continents have shown jewelry of similar make. Theories abound about the dungeons coming from another civilization. Not that anything had been proved yet.

In the back of the room, the teleport matrix glowed softly. I’d ended up spending almost an entire week in the dungeon. Surely that should have been enough time for the search for me to have spread a bit further than the area. Stepping on the matrix, I felt my body compress then blinked to find myself in the entrance area before the cave. 

I heard the sounds of weapons being drawn behind me causing me to spin around. A party of seven looked to be in the process of gearing up to dive the dungeon. I was surprised for a moment but relax. At least, I did.

“A monster!”

“What’s it doing out of the dungeon!?”

“A rogue. We need to kill it before it becomes too powerful!”

The party harshly whispered between themselves, but my keen hearing allowed me to catch it all. I quickly threw my hands up in the, ‘I don’t mean any harm’ pose. “Wait, wait! I’m human!”

“Don’t think you can fool us! We’re the first divers in here for over a three months!”

I ground my teeth which made a much more menacing sound then I meant it to. “I swear I’m a human. I snuck in due to some issues I had above ground,” I pleaded but I could see it was falling on deaf ears. This is just my luck that there would be a party going in just as I was leaving.

I took a step forward hoping to let the light from the broken overhead lamp to show I was human. My intentions did not go as planned. I had momentarily forgotten I’d been in the dungeon for nearly a week, had been covered in blood and other liquids several times and my body had literally changed due to my harvest skill.

“SHIT! Do you think it’s a boss that escaped its floor!?” one of the party members shouted.

“I don’t know and don’t care! We need to kill it!” shouted the person in the center of the party. I could only assume he was the leader. 

I was going to take another step forward when an arrow sank into my shoulder tossing to me the side. Black and red flared into my vision and I lost it. With a growl, I ripped out the arrow and charged across the room. Another arrow sailed at me, but I snapped my jaw to the side and bit it in half. I subconsciously used Harvest as I always did. I grinned as they all lit up. 

A man moved in front of the party to block my path. I whipped my cleaver off my belt then bodily slammed into he shield. Bringing my arm around, I twisted my hand and the cleaver opened as it collided with the top of the shield. The blade shot up and over the shield tearing a large gash into the man’s neck.

Brute forcing my way past the man by pushing the man back into the party. He’d lost his strength as he tried to stop the bleeding. A blade of wind or some other transparent force sliced into my arm. I turned in the direction it came and bared my teeth. Kicking off the shield, I crossed the distance with the woman in less than a second.

Idly I thought what I did next couldn’t be possible but I was able to do it. I opened my jaw and bit a massive chunk out of the woman’s throat. I jerked my head around with the body still clamped in teeth and blocked a strike from a man that was swinging a massive bastard sword at me. The man finished the woman after as he completely sliced her body in half, the blade getting caught on a bone.

I thrust my hand around and impaled my claws and most of my hand in the chest of the man. He was only wearing leather and I was able to penetrate it. Pulling my hand free, I looked to the rest of the party. I could feel steam leaving my mouth as I growled at them. 

“This is your own fault,” I said my voice having taken a menacing tone.

The four remaining party members backed away, but I’d gotten between them and the exit to the dungeon. Their only escape from we would be to flee deeper into the dungeon. ‘Not that I would let them do that,’ I thought with a grin coming over me.

“Fuck! He took three of us out in seconds!”

“We don’t have any choice!”

“Dominate!” I shouted and an almost visible aura slammed into them. I watched as one of the party members’ knees buckled and they soiled themselves. Not letting them recoup, I shot at them. Another shield bearer was in my way. Without hesitation, I impacted the shield bringing my cleaver down at an angle.

I was able to cleave through the shield with surprising ease. With the obstacle gone, I brought my claws down and removed the man’s face. He screamed as he fell to the ground. A small man behind him fired a dart from a small crossbow that pierced my thigh. Kicking the shield guy out of the way, I jumped at the man and ripped his throat out.

All that left were two woman, one that had soiled herself and the other that looked close to doing the same. They gripped each other tightly and had their eyes firmly shut. I finished the shield guy off, by sinking my hand into his chest. 

Even in my trance-like state, I was barely able to stop myself from charging the two women. They didn’t attack me, and there was still a part of me that didn’t want to kill them. I stalked forward and placed a hand on each of the woman’s shoulders.

“Tell anyone you saw me, and I’ll hunt you and your families down,” I said right next to their ears while slowly letting my claws sink into their flesh. The one that had already soiled herself broke and fainted. The other one followed suit. Looking around I found a bundle of rope and tied them. They would be able to break free after a few hours of struggling. After that, my last strands of self-control slipped. 

I came out of my trance a few minutes later and looked around. I jerked back after I realized that I’d harvested the party member parts as I did the goblins. I quickly looked over and saw the two women looking at me as if I was a monster, which I guess I was to them. I needed to take some time to process this.

No matter how it happened, I murdered these people. My knuckles turned white as I made a fist. I shook my head and turned from the murder scene. I would live with what I’d done, somehow.