Chapter 404: Real Terror
Laz stood up on his feet once again, but he could feel the ache in his body. Whatever they black beams of energy were, they packed quite a punch. Still though, Laz was somewhat confused about what was happening. Sure, getting hit hurt, like being hit in the chest with a baseball bat. But considering this was a true, genuine god, it should have hurt a whole lot more.
’Hell, it should have killed me... but it didn’t...’ Laz looked at the still laughing face in front of him and started walking towards him once again.
"YOU DON’T LEARN," Tezcatlipoca again said, with the black beam firing from his eye. This time though, Laz was ready. He dodged to the side quickly to avoid the blast.
"HOW DARE YOU!" Another blast came and again Laz leapt out of the way, avoid the strike. More and more blasts shot out and Laz avoided them all.
During the last few, the ground rumbled as more of Tezcatlipoca’s neck was revealed.
’He’s still trying to free himself,’ Laz thought and ran forward, dodging left and right as the blasts kept coming. Just a step away, Laz slashed Sever at Tezcatlipoca’s cheek, but the blade failed to cut. Rolling out of the way, Laz again slashes Sever, this time infusing it with his energy and activating the purple edge of the blade. This time, a small cut was made where the blade made contact with the skin. It wasn’t deep, just an inch or two since Laz was focused more on trying to cut the skin than leaving a deep gash.
’YES... NO FUCK,’ Laz said to himself, watching the gash heal over and disappear as Laz watched on.
"YOU THINK YOU CAN HURT ME? Tezcatlipoca yelled and then laughed.
Laz swung again and again, but still the cuts healed faster than he could make them.
Just as Laz was about to try adding the black flame to his attack, a chill went down his spine and he jumped back with all his strength.
Where Laz had been standing a giant snake like tongue smashed the ground. Following it to it’s source, Tezcatlipoca smiled and drew it back into his mouth.
"TOO FAST. HA HA HA. I SHALL HAVE TO TRY HARDER TO EAT YOU."
While the black beams looked strong, they were slightly weak, at least to someone like him with a strong body. But when he considered the deep gash in the ground, Laz knew that being hit by the that tongue would have cause even him a few broken bones. To top it all off, Laz had the impression that it would have wrapped around him like a boa constrictor and dragged him into the huge mouth.
Just as Laz was standing there wondering what else he could try, he felt something grab on to his leg and looked down.
"WHAT THE FUCK?" Laz called out, unwillingly.
There, right beneath him was a skeletal hand, sticking up from the ground and grabbing on to his shin. Kicking out, Laz felt his leg move like lightning as the bone arm was dislodged and sent flying in the distance.
’I forgot how much stronger my body was now. Fuck, I haven’t even had the chance to get used to my new strength and this fucker shows up,’ Laz grumbled while thinking about how best to proceed. Just that momentary lapse of initiative was enough time for dozens, if not hundreds of other bone hands to emerge from the ground, all around the giant head.
"HE HE HE HE," Tezcatlipoca laughed.
As Laz looked on, the hands then pulled up the bodies they had been attached to, dragging hundreds of skeletons from the ground.
"Sure, Skeletons. Why not? Got any zombies down there? Maybe a few fucking ghosts and ghouls or something?" Laz called out as the eyeless heads turned to look his way.
"You’d think I’d learn to keep my mouth shut sometimes, but no...." The skeletons charged at Laz, wielding rusted swords and knives. Shreds of dirty cloth hung from their lifeless bodies as they made their way forth, intent on killing Laz. Their speed wasn’t fast, but it wasn’t slow either. Laz could easily out run them if he tried, but knew that doing so would just put him farther away from Tezcatlipoca.
Laz just braced for the wave as the ground shook yet again. Looking over, Laz noticed that Tezcatlipoca’s collar bone was now visible from the ground, spanning a distance of almost fifty feet.
Laz didn’t fear the skeletons, having experienced their strength from the one arm before, he knew he could take them out easily, breaking apart their bodies with one swing of Sever. The issue was doing so would take an immense amount of time and energy, something he couldn’t waste if he wanted to somehow try to fight Tezcatlipoca. Every moment he delayed was another moment where Tezcatlipoca was pulling himself free.
Just as Laz was about to throw caution to the wind, a large vine, the thickness of his thigh, came out of the ground and swung around bashing away all of the bony white enemies in a circle in front of Laz. Next came several figures who flew forward and engaged the skeleton army. One was clearly a female with a normal human body but massive arms and the head of an elephant complete with tusks and long nose. Next to the elephant woman was another clearly female body with massive fur covered arms and a bear’s head, ramming through even more skeletons. Surrounding those two were a dozen others, all partially transformed into some of the largest animals on the planet, smashing the bones away allowing Laz to escape being surrounded.
"GO. QUICKLY. WE WILL TAKE CARE OF THE SMALL FRY MOBS," Joan yelled as she whipped her head around and decapitate several skeletons by swinging her massive trunk.
"YOU ALL NEED TO LEAVE, QUICKLY. IF HE GETS OUT OF THE GROUND, THERE IS NO WAY I CAN STOP HIM..." Laz called back worried.
This time, the bear answered back instead of Joan.
"THIS IS THE HOME OF OUR ORDER. IF WE WON’T EVEN DEFEND IT, HOW CAN WE CALL OURSELVES WITCHES?" Gia called back, clapping her massive paws together and smashing in the skull of the skeleton in front of her.
Laz was stunned but then remembered he had never seen Joan or Gia or basically anyone else in their battle forms before, except for Celes. Looking around, Laz noticed that many other women had joined the battle as well, using either sheer strength or their own abilities to decimate the skeleton army.
Laz wanted to call out something more, to send the women away, but he knew they wouldn’t listen.
And he knew they were right. This was their home so it was their right and duty to defend it. Hadn’t he been teaching them how to fight, just because of something like this? Well, not this. This wasn’t something he had ever considered.
"Stop with the internal monologue. You should have known we wouldn’t leave," came the voice from behind him. Laz turned to see Celes standing there, her body a blend of nothingness and night. She had clearly been sneaking around the battlefield, taking out targets as she saw them.
"Didn’t you leave?" Laz asked, surprised to see Celes.
"Funny thing that. I needed to leave to protect everyone, right?" Celes asked with a strange look on her face.
"Well, yes?" Laz had the feeling he was walking into a trap.
"Exactly. So how was I suppose to go when everyone decided to stay here, hmm?" Celes grinned before adding.
"Oh, don’t worry though. We made Renee leave... well... we tied her up and threw her into the back of a pickup and had the youngest drive her away while protecting her at the same time."
Laz shook his head, unsure of what to say. Was that suppose to make it ok or something?
"Never mind that. We are about to break through, then it’s all you baby," Celes pointed out, showing that at the onslaught of the dozens of girls of the order, the skeleton were almost all destroyed and a path had been cleared to the head.
Laz didn’t waste time, heading to the path to get back to the head. He wasn’t going to hold anything back this time and go all out, even if he risked injuring himself in the process.
That was the plan, before another skeletal hand reached up from the ground and grabbed him again, just like the last time. This time though, the bony hand was covered in rusted steel plates, inter woven with the bones as though they had been lashed to them.
Unlike the last time, this hold wasn’t easily broken.
"Fuck."
"Get down!!!"
"Stay in groups and watch each other’s backs," Celes called out, propping everyone to move around and team up.
Laz finally freed himself by using sever to cut the bone through the wrist. All around him, these armored figures were crawling out of the dirt and charging at the first person they saw. Unlike the skeletons who only had a few weapons among them, each one of these skeletons were armed with weapons and armor. Not only that, some of them had an oppressive feeling to them. If you looked at them long enough, you could see a red smoke coming off their bodies.
When one such creature swung it’s man sized hammer, Joan blocked it with her massive, elephant like arms but was still sent flying back until she crashed with another girl not pay attention. Several other members were also hit or blindsided by the new opponents who were still clearly skeletons, but much stronger than the ones before.
Again, the ground rumbled as some of Tezcatlipoca’s chest became visible.
"WE ARE RUNNING OUT OF TIME," Celes called out, killing another one of the undead skeletons with a well placed fist through it’s back.
"I KNOW. I KNOW." Laz stuck down the armored skeleton in his way as he prepared to again charge the head.
"WHAT’S THE RUSH? WE ARE JUST GETTING STARTED!" Tezcatlipoca said and laughed again.
Shades began emerging from the ground, the bodies nothing but blackness in the still pre-dawn field. Most looked two dimensional, their bodies flat like a piece of paper. But there were also several that looked fully like a human, only without faces.
Gia tried swinging one of her massive bear paws at a flat one near her, only for the paw to pass through the body and remain unharmed. The flat creature then turned to look at Gia and started growling. It then jumped to attack Gia, it’s nail like fingers heading straight for her neck.
