Chapter Twenty-Four
"We can't hold,"
shouted Zobens, the first orc I had made.
"He's spotted us. FOR LORD LEO!"
"FOR LORD LEO!"
the others roared in my mind.
I ran through the labyrinth in a full suit of armor summoned by Metalcoat. Static Aura crackled about my body, Revitalize suffused me with greater energy, Strength of Mountain gave me immense strength, and Granite Flesh made my flesh as hard as stone. I had every buff I thought I could use.
Then the next round of dying began.
Orka died first. I felt her vanishing.
"Fuck!" I snarled, racing through the labyrinth as fast as I could. The others were right behind me.
Snezhinka perished. The yuki-onna snuffed out by this monster that had invaded my dungeon. How could this be the work of
one
man? Moroz, Dzelzs, and Briesmoni died. He was cutting through my orcs and yuki-onna.
"KILL HIM!"
Zobens shouted.
"NO FEAR! FOR LORD LEO!"
"No," I groaned as Belyy and Sukkub died.
That left only Zobens in the fight. The rest of the orcs and all the yuki-onna were dead. My forces were getting so horribly reduced. I burst through the lightning trap room, racing past the ruined pillars towards the door that had been cut down.
"I hurt him!"
Zobens cried out in my mind, such joy in her voice.
And then she died.
I roared my fury. I would murder this thing. I would kill it. Extinguish it. Whatever it was, it would not survive the day. I had come too far, learned too much, to let it end. I would not let my family perish. We were surviving today.
* * / *
Lana Fulmine fretted.
Leo was in the dungeon, but the attacker was almost to the Flooded Bridge Room. He would have to swim into the waters, raise the bridge, and turn it. All the quetzalcoatl, mermaids, and hippocampi would be there.
He would have to enter their element.
Please, please, stop him,
She prayed. She didn't know to who. Lana couldn't remember the last time she had been in church. Not since she was a kid.
Lana Fulmine didn't want Leo to get anywhere near this monster. The more monster girls he killed, the more it scared her that Leo would perish if he faced the monster. The other deaths didn't matter. Even if Lana herself died, that would be a price worth paying to stop this creature.
She could come back to life.