Chapter 6: We Break the Labyrinth

Chapter 5

Of all the things I have done in my life, charging a man who apperantly just stole the power of an Immortal and who can command the remains of one of the greatest army of monsters I have ever heard of was not one of the brightest I have ever done. But I ran forward, and my friends didn’t think about it for a second, but sprang into action. At this point the monsters, who had numbered in the hundreds, were now down to about 15. Which, of course, meant the fifteen meanest, nastiest, monsters they had.

Joy.

At my battle cry they jumped down to protect the man who would be their leader. The first was a draceane who carried what looked to be a crossbow with a clip of arrows on the bottom. Since she was paying attention to me, she didn’t see the burning arrow from Anna that went through her head and lodged itself into the kneecap of the second contender, a Hyperborean Giant who was showing cracks where the arrow had lodged itself. Sean took the opportunity to use that as a stepping stone to run up the giants arm, which apparently made for a perfect step ladder, dragging Whiplink through the giant as he ran. When he reached the top he jumped off the head of the giant, and struck out at three of the birds. Two died with quick slashes to their stomachs, but the third deflected the attack with its beak. Sean landed in the stands with his sword through a draceane.

Anna removed a couple of draceane from the party with well placed arrows, leaving eight monsters. A laistragonian was fighting a pit scorpion I hadn’t seen earlier and crushed it, but was too late to stop its stinger from piercing its arm. The Giant just stared in shock as it dissolved. Six left.

A harpie, a hellhound and a dog seal looking thing rushed me. I swung Glacius in its bladed shield form to slash the harpie from the air, it laughed at me until it realized that there was, in fact, a blade on the bottom of the shield that sliced through its belly. The dog seal jumped at me while the hellhound rushed in low. I brought my shield in low to cover my body and raised my sword so the jumping monster impaled itself, then I backhanded the hellhound, sending it flying with a long gash going from its shoulder to its chin. It growled at me crouching low and looking for an opening. We circled each other watching to see who would make the first move, when I noticed movement behind me. The Emperor fellow had risen to his feet and drew a gladius.

As I was distracted the hellhound started to jump, but was promptly crushed by Sean, who was riding a second flesh eating giant to the ground, running up its torso with his sword dragging through flesh and armor as if it was nothing. He jumped off the shoulder and landed near Anna, who was holding off the last monster. This monster was something made from ancient tales of horror. It was like the earthborn, but not. I would have called it an automaton, but there was no metal inside, just pure rock. Then I was occupied blocking attacks from the emperor dude.

He was quick, slashing and jabbing with his attacks, weaving and jumping to avoid my retaliations.

“Foolish child, I was trained by the best Rome had to offer. I grew up with the Legions!” He cried out as he feinted to my left. It was a mistake a lot of my opponents made. They thought that because I had a shield on that arm most of the time that it could not move fast. They thought that the shield was heavy and weighed me down. I let them think that. If my weapons were so heavy, would I keep them in my bracers?

His sword came close and I sprang into action knocking it so he was unable to bring it to defend himself and sliced across his chest, then dancing back. He looked down in shock at the cut, then dirt seeped out, and closed the wound. There was still a scar, but otherwise no indication I had mortally wounded him. His face turned red with rage.

“I am Calligula, Emperor of Rome. I am a God. You dare injure me?” He screamed out. He was about to attack me when our little fight was interrupted. The giant rock monster ran in from the side, Sean and Anna following it. It charged Calligula who swiped his sword at it contemptuously and cut a giant gash up its body. The whole building shuddered, and parts of it fell away. Calligula took a step forward, meaning to finish me off, when the floor fell out beneath him. The open space he fell into was dark, swirling smoke, that lead to what looked like...farmland?

“Mark!” Anna screamed at me. “We got to go, which way?” I realized she was right. During the fight Growlz had been circling us, but he landed on a finger of the stone construct and looked like he was talking to it. After a moment the constructs arm fell off and Growlz was flapping his wings in agitation. It reached down, grabbed its arm, and using the extra length, pressed a hand to the doorway. It glowed blue for a moment, then opened to a desert.

This way, Growlz told me. When he landed on my shoulder again he appeared to be wearing a little top hat.

“Where did you get that?” I asked him. No time, move, friend Labyrinth cannot hold itself together much longer, Growlz replied. I figured that was a good point, and we ran out into the desert.

Chapter 7