Chapter 400 - Guildmaster

Note :

Chapter 400 ! And almost the end of the book ! Wooo ! Damn, it's been a long road getting there, hasn't it ?

I hope you'll enjoy the chapter !

Chapter 400

Red Sands Desert, Aurorean Empire

Dungeon Factory, Logistics Tunnel

Starvak threw the golem into the rest of the squad, and roared as he pounced onto the tangled mess of limbs and metal.

It was short work after that.

He stood up, and tilted his head.

There was something different about the air now.

He gazed at the end of the tunnel...and saw the minefield.

Oh.

The dungeon core was funneling him into the public parts of the dungeon.

Very well then.

He walked through the minefield...and nothing happened.

He came to a halt, and looked at the mines.

They weren't damaged. They were purposefully turned off.

He stepped out of the tunnel, and into the open space of the second floor.

And only silence greeted him. No golems, no nothing.

"Do I have to make you come and fight me, Crystal?" Asked the guildmaster.

"No. That won't be necessary."

He turned around, and watched as a woman jumped off from the water temple, and landed lithely in front of the moat.

There was no need to ask who she was. She had appeared in public often enough at this point.

"Hello, Crystal. It's good to see you. It has been a while."

"It has Starvak. I see you've never stopped being an amoral monster."

The dwarf twitched.

"What I do, I'm doing for the world."

"I'm sure those who burned it to ashes said the same."

He raised an eyebrow. There was feeling in her words.

"Are we just going to stand here, trading barbs? Or are you simply buying time for your golems to get into position?"

"No need for that."

"Oh? You struck me as a commander though. Someone hiding behind legions of disposable minions."

"Legions of minions are expensive. Cheaper to kill you myself. Besides which, I have better things to spend them on than detritus like you."

"Kill me with one of your ambassadors? I think not."

He was trying to find where she'd hidden the real threat. That was why he only realized she was moving when she activated her spell as her fist connected with his face, and threw him through five buildings and half the damned floor.

He stood up, his 'flesh' made right again by the time he was back on his feet, and he growled angrily, wrapping himself in magic and lifting into the air.

There was no way she would have been able to throw a spell like that. Hit him? Sure. Throw him like that effortlessly, and without incanting? Hell no.

There had been no activation flare from an artifact either. This was the work from a mage.

Someone was helping her. Someone with far greater magical knowledge than she ever could have.

Her advisor, then. That was the trick. The maids were probably lurking in ambush too.

"You wish to fight for real? Very well then. But you'll do it on your own." He retrieved a neutralizer from one of his pouches, and turned it on. It wasn't potent, it would only incapacitate the vampires, but it worked in a wide area.

The device beeped, and sizzled.

He stared silently at it. The neutralizer...failed?

"Did you seriously think I wouldn't have countermeasures?" Crystal tilted her head, walking down the street, looking up at him.

He squinted at her. How would she-

Emilia's mother. The duchess of the Western Marches.

If she was ready to murder an entire town of innocents to fuel a blood ritual, then breaking a few rules to protect her daughter was nothing.

"So, you have an avatar?"

"Always did." The dungeon core came to a halt, and an alarm bell finally rang in the guildmaster's mind.

Something was seriously wrong here. For one, some of the background sounds had changed. The battle outside, maybe?

No. It was something here.

"Always is unlikely. But I admire your wit." He landed. "For what little it matters, I'm sorry. I shouldn't have allowed...all this."

"All this?"

"This mess. I could have stopped it."

To his surprise, she nodded.

"Yes. You could have. Throwing the guild headfirst into this mess would have at least been one hell of a wrench in the gears. Whether it would have been big enough to stop it altogether..."

"What do you mean?"

She chuckled.

"What do you think? Did you seriously believe all this was...random? Everything's just been the slightest bit too convenient, hasn't it?"

His eyes widened. She was lying, trying to keep him off balance.

But...

So many things were starting to seem doubtful.

Why would the UDC, so psychotically defensive of its own members, leave her flapping in the winds?

"I see you're starting to think." Said the dungeon core, and he gritted his teeth.

"I have. But it's too late for words now."

She looked at the neutralizer he was holding.

"Yes. Indeed."

Her gaze met his again, and he took a step back.

Because he didn't see a young dungeon core in them anymore.

He saw death incarnate.

And he felt an echo. An echo of death. Of screams, uncountable. Of...fire. Unending, unquenchable fire.

He suddenly realized that he had no idea what the hell was in front of him.

Because whatever this thing was, it couldn't be Crystal.

It was older. Scarred.

And animated by a blazing inferno that he couldn't fathom.

"The time for words is long past." She dashed for him.

He dodged the spell she threw. Splinters of energy flew where he had been a second ago. Silver Shot. A deadly spell, meant to kill vampires and other abominations imbued with magic. And not something she ever should have had access to.

He opened up the distance. Trying to get a feel for her attacks. She fought like a paladin. Get close, unleash devastating spells. An excellent style, left wanting only be the massive expenditure of mana necessary for both when in a high level fight.

Problem was, she was a damned dungeon core. Her pool of mana was unlimited. Presumably, so was Emilia's, who was casting the spells. Meanwhile, his was his lifeblood. Every spell he used, every time he enhanced his movements and flew, quite literally hurt him.

Any long fight would favor her. Attrition was his worst enemy.

It startled him that he started thinking of her like she was another archon. Or at least at that level of personal power.

But given the assistance she was getting, she might be. The daughter of the blood witch of Hartown was not someone to be underestimated.

He was preparing to dodge her next move, when she instead gestured at the ceiling.

He dove forward, as an entire section collapsed, obliterating the entire area he had been in. In big areas of effect by mages, often the only place safe was to be right next to them.

And realized too late that she hadn't cast any spells. The gesture was theatrical. Someone, somewhere, had been watching for it to trigger magitech bombs, making it look like a spell.

Which meant that her mind was free to cast the actual magic.

He braced, raising a ward for the attack he was walking into.

And his eyes widened in horror as he felt the teleport spell. This close to him? Impossible! He had activated his own anti-teleportation wards. No point getting there if she could just kick him out again. It was why he'd been surprised by the other teleport, but it had been distant enough.

To punch through his protection, it must have been unfathomably...powerful...

His thought process failed as he saw the golden spear appear in her hands.

There was no way to dodge in time. Not fully.

He twisted his body, as the spearhead touched his ward...and it instantly collapsed, like a popped soap bubble.

He turned what would have been a direct hit to the torso into a glancing strike on his shoulder, and he screamed as he leaped back, using his flight. Energy, mana and essence both, streamed from the wound like if someone had bled a star.

His wound closed. But far slower than it should have, and he stared at Crystal.

She shouldn't have had that weapon. Not still. The guild giving it to Sunrise for the kill had already been a massive gamble.

There was no way the Custodians would have let her keep one of their own weapons.

She smiled at him...

And dove forward.

He barely got out of the way. She could fly. Problematical, but he could deal with it, and-

She executed an impossible turn around, and he realized with a start that she wasn't flying. She was floating and falling. He knew it was possible, but so very few tried this technique, due to how disorientating it was.

He swore as he tried to parry, only to find one of his axes heavy damaged, and given another minor wounds. DAMN IT! That spearhead could punch through anything he had.

He hit the ground, and raised the earth, intercepting her next leap, giving him breathing room.

Except the rock immediately parted, and he narrowly avoided the next thrust.

Right. He was fighting a vampire mage and a dungeon core. He wasn't going to be able to beat her nor buy time with magic. In arcana, he was outmatched, period.

She attacked him, and he countered, finding with a start that it worked, deflecting the spearhead. There was a brief, but violent clash before they separated again, and he took a step back.

Crystal wasn't fighting like an experienced warrior. All of her parries and thrusts...they felt like they were coming out of a combat manual. She didn't have the experience an actual combatant would have.

But she behaved like she knew the spells she was casting. Knew exactly how to work with them.

Emilia isn't here. She isn't doing this. He realized. This is her. Just her.

That meant she had the same limitations as a Paladin. He growled, and began his assault.

The spear gave him a severe handicap. And the magic wasn't helping.

But he was a centuries old adventurers. His bag of trick was endless.

And he needed to regain the initiative.

He charged her, and she started to change gravity to back away, trying to use her spear's greater reach and bombarding him with spells.

He closed in, ignoring most of the magic, deflecting it with wards or simply tanking the hits, in favor of getting to grips with her. Magic could compensate for a lot, but not technique, and she knew it.

In less than a couple of minutes, the floor was thoroughly wrecked. Buildings toppled, pillars collapsed as she started blowing more and more charges to try and force him back, at one point almost burying them both under the rubble.

But he kept close to her. Through the strange, hellism power beams, the silver bullets and the unending avalanche of spells and explosions, he kept close, working her down.

He took hits. Painful, painful hits from that spear. Only glancing blows, but each made it feel like he was being ripped apart. And in a way, he was.

But she was having it worse. Her avatar was a mana construct. It was resilient, and in many ways, very close to an archon. Some even said it was the archon equivalent of a dungeon core.

But it wasn't invulnerable, and it couldn't recover like he did.

She summoned a wall of energy, separating them after one of their clashes, and stumbled as she landed next to the moat. Particles of light floated around her, coming from every little wound, and he drew a new axe, tossing the old, half destroyed one to the side.

Two minutes, and he was almost out of his spare weapons, accumulated over a lifetime.

"You're good. You're very good." Said the dungeon core.

"If you thought that spear could bridge the gap between us, you were being very foolish."

"Oh no. That?" She raised the spear. "It was just to grab your attention. And keep it there."

"Keep it?" He looked around. "And yet, I see no ambush here. None of your golems."

"Oh, they're in the adjacent rooms. Not to rush in and fight you, but keep you here."

That gave him pause. She could be lying, but...

Everything she'd said seemed to have been truthful so far.

He stepped forward, towards her...

And came to a dead halt, as he was finally able to see into the moat.

It wasn't water.

It was blood.

And it finally dawned on him what the change in background noise he'd noticed had been.

It was when the moat was drained of water, and instead filled with the viscous, vital fluid.

He looked up at her.

And she smiled.

He rushed towards her, but even more walls of energy materialized around her. Not magic, but technological. Shields, wrapping her in shining barriers.

His axe made short work of them. But short wasn't instantaneous.

And she wasn't incanting. She was mindcasting blood magic, the most complicated, deadly spells in existence.

He got through the shields, and leapt for her.

And instead of jumping away...she came to meet him, tossing the spear aside, blood pooling around her hands and mouth, forming claws and fangs.

One of his axes hit her armor head on, and almost cut her in half. The other embedded itself into her collarbone.

And she got her claws and fangs into him.

Starvak, guildmaster of the adventurers guild, thief of NLR cores, and honored Archon of the Tlaven Path, died screaming as the dungeon core devoured him whole, his essence drained by her spell.