The Eye of the Bedlam Bride — Chapter no 66

[ 66 ]

YOU ARE IN THE PRESENCE OF A DEITY. THE SCAVENGER’S Daughter’s eyes remain open. She fills with even more power.

Temporary effect from Ysalte: All potions you quaff or physically handle outside your inventory will turn to vinegar. They will return to a more powerful version of themselves upon her banishment.

I barely registered the notification as the music, which was strangely slow and symphonic, rose in volume. We all backed into the stairwell chamber as the corpse of Sister Ines dissolved and turned into that of the level-250 goddess.

Goddess of Hopelessness and Insanity Ysalte. Level 250.

This goddess is sponsored by Pontifex Shine of the Nebular Balance.

Warning: This sponsor is not currently inhabiting the shell of this deity. She will speak and react as per her regular nature. Considering who this is, that’s some bad fucking news for you guys.

Warning: This is a deity. She is invulnerable on this floor.

This goddess has been temporarily summoned to this location due to a special boss battle event and will return to the Ascendency upon completion of the event.

The earliest citizens of Larracos always worshipped Ysalte, which is fitting. She hasn’t always been considered the Goddess of Hopelessness and Insanity. First it was of the Dirt. Then it was of Tears. It’s a recent thing that they started calling her something else. The Downward Spiral.

The Vinegar Bitch.

Her downfall mirrors that of the citizens of Larracos, who have embraced the deity in all her forms.

That’s what happens when everything you know is upended, and everything is taken from you. First they vilify you. Then they separate

you. Then they blame you for what they’re doing to you. Then they hunt you. It’s the step after that which is important.

The one where they start to fear you.

Ysalte has a special place in her heart for the outcasts, for those whose minds are being devoured by the world around them. She takes no new worshippers, beyond the citizens of Larracos. But she is known to be a great patron of the arts and is one of the few deities who will sponsor a bard or a performer. She asks nothing in return, though occasionally her gifts are more than what they seem, and some may even carry a curse.

The story of this goddess, like that of many of her kind, is long and a little sad. At this point, how it began isn’t nearly as important as how it will end. She is half-sister and niece to her former lover, Taranis.

Threatened with the Nothing by Apito, she fled to Sheol. She has since returned to the Halls of Ascendency, where she is feared and reviled by all.

She is not considered someone who wishes to lead, which makes her a dangerous and cunning contender for the Ascendent throne.

The deity appeared in the form of a regular sized, young-faced, female dwarf carrying a pickaxe, which was not what I was expecting from someone with such a name. She smiled upon us, almost gently. She wore a helmet with a candle atop it, but the candle sparked, like that of a dynamite stick, reminding me of the goblin bomb bards. Her face occasionally flickered, like a bad television screen. And in those moments of static, her mouth turned to that of a scream, though no such sound came out.

She turned her attention to Louis, who still held the knife in his hand. He stupidly dropped it to the floor and held up his hands like it was a stick up.

“You killed my bard,” she said to him. Her voice was soft, sweet, musical. She did not have the Scottish lilt of most of the dwarves we’d met so far. This was more French than anything. As she spoke, she clinked her pickaxe gently against the floor. Cracks started to form. A memory ghost walked out of one of the apartments and strolled past, oblivious.

“She was asleep, and you killed her. Her mind is finally at ease, which is a blessing, but I was not done with her yet, and for that you must suffer.”

Samantha appeared, floating between Ysalte and Louis, who’d backed all the way to the wall of the stairwell. Her voice was filled with fake cheer.

“Ysalte! Honey! We haven’t seen each other in so long! How are you?

What’s new? I must invite you to my bachelorette party. How’s the child?”

Samantha: LOUIS YOU GOTTA RUN BECAUSE THIS BITCH IS GONNA MELT YOUR BEAUTIFUL ASS INTO BUBBLING AND STICKY OATMEAL.

“Ysalte!” came the cry from above. “Release me!”

“Psamathe, is that you?” Ysalte asked, ignoring the demon above us.

“You dare show yourself to me after what you did?”

Carl: Louis, do what she says. Get the fuck out of here. Run.

The music remained unchanged, but it was starting to get punctuated by a distant chug-chug of a distorted guitar. Wide-eyed Louis started to slowly descend down the stairs, his hands still up.

“Uh, what did I do?” Samantha asked, suddenly defensive. “Wait, are you still mad about the thing with the reverse hedgehog? Because that was like a really long time ago. And everyone else at the party thought it was funny.

Well, except the hedgehog I guess. And you, apparently. But it’s not my fault if you can’t take a joke about how ugly your child is.”

The goddess roared and swung her pickaxe directly at Samantha’s face.

Even a pickaxe swung by a god was not enough to injure the sex doll’s head. It bounced right off her like she’d tried to pierce an impenetrable kick ball. The look on the goddess’s face was one of utter surprise as she started to fly backward, feet up in the air.

At that moment, everything froze. I froze. Samantha froze. The Vinegar Bitch froze, floating off the ground.

The ceiling at the end of the hall collapsed, and the coils of the Madre de Aguas snake slurped into the hall from above, suddenly and violently. It was like it had tipped off the main roof and landed above us.

Ysalte’s pickaxe was stopped in midair, in the process of flying from the goddess’s hands. Behind her, the snake continued to cascade into the hallway, despite being wider than the hall itself. Concrete and metal vaporized as the city boss slammed into the floor. The ceiling over our heads collapsed, but fell to the sides, as if it was being peeled like a banana, miraculously not hitting anybody. After just a few seconds, the ceiling above us was just gone. The walls all around us also fell away, revealing multiple memory ghosts in their apartments without walls, going about their lives.

Everything but the floor beneath our feet was suddenly gone, almost like we’d been transferred to the roof.

Elle: Holy hell, what’s going on up there?

We were now outside, yet we remained frozen. The swirl of demon birds

and bats continued to spin, now all around us. The gout of flame was gone.

My heart sank at the sight of it.

The collapsing snake had temporarily stopped on our floor-turned-roof, coming to a halt right behind the frozen goddess. The city boss had multiple notifications over its massive head, including Enslaved. It paused before its distant tail started slipping over the far edge, sliding away like an anchor chain, yanking the whole snake off the side. The demon hissed as it was pulled away.

I caught movement just above the snake, rapidly catching up. It was the little automaton I’d set up atop the stairs, also falling, shining like a shooting star. The small robot, which should have been destroyed along with the rest of the top floor, spun through the air as it “miraculously” landed atop the falling snake.

Oh, come on. I thought as the whole thing blinked and reappeared in a quick teleportation.

Ysalte had been summoned while we were in a regular hallway, and because of that, she entered this world as a regular-sized dwarf. When Amayon dropped the shell of the snake, he was exposed to the open air.

As a result, he took on a much larger size than that of the dwarf.

The whole world stuttered as if we were in a car crash. It was the sound of the demon’s four feet slamming to the ground far below.

The full-power version of Amayon stood to his full height, feet on the street, standing before the building with the lopped-off top, facing us. nd We stood upon the 32floor-turned-roof of the building, and we were about equal with the chest of the demon who now glared down at us.

His body appeared to be that of a centaur-like quadruped, but I couldn’t see the legs from our position. His humanoid chest rose above our platform, cleaving through the round of birds and bats, which moved back to let him within.

From the waist up, he had a similar appearance to that of the Pleasure demons, but his red skin bubbled like it was made of lava with black, swirling patches. He looked similar to Emberus in that way, though his head was that of a massive, demonic deer-like creature with four, steaming horns.

Two that rose straight up, piercing the clouds, and two that curved downward like tusks. His mouth was beaked at the very end, almost dinosaur like. He roared, and the interior of his beak was nothing but teeth and fire.

The Enslaved marker remained over his head.

Fuck.

He had not been freed from Ysalte’s grip by the teleportation. We’d only managed to make him more powerful.

The moment he finished his scream, he too, froze, leaving everyone in the area motionless as the heavy metal chugga-chugga took over the symphonic music and rose in volume. Imani, from way down on the first floor of the building, sent a panicked message.

Imani: Oh shit, we’ve been frozen also. We’ve been added to the battle!

For a moment, nothing changed, as if the AI was trying to figure out what to do next.

The timer blinked and whiffed out. A new timer appeared. It was at ten minutes.

Quest Complete. Where the Sidewalk Ends.

Please wait…

New Quest. The Missing Piece.

This is a hybrid world quest. All crawlers who are dumb enough to still be stuck on the eighth floor have been added to this quest.

Every remaining crawler within the region of Cuba has been designated as host of this quest.

This quest contains two parts. Part one is called “The Big O.”

Only those in the Cuba region may participate in part one. If they are successful, part two will initiate and will include everyone else. In the meantime, this upcoming battle will air on all screens throughout the dungeon for those outside the Cuba region.

The demon Amayon, prince of Sheol, is stuck in this world, banished here by one of his three brothers.

Ysalte, his former girlfriend and mother of his child, has also stepped into the realm, and she has seized control of the demon, just as he once seized her when she tried to flee their relationship.

He wants to go home.

She wants to keep him under her control and bring him with her to the Ascendency, where he will act as her retainer until the Ascendency battles are complete. While all the other gods have been waking up long- forgotten deities to assist them, the Vinegar Bitch knows having a prince of hell at her side will help ensure her claim to the throne.

She will return to the realm in ten minutes. If Amayon remains fully under her control when that timer is complete, they will both teleport away to the Ascendency.

If that happens, everyone without keys is dead. There will be no more chances.

In order to break free from Ysalte’s grip, Amayon must begin the casting of his spell to return home. In order to do that, he must be strong enough to cast it. How will he be given strength? Maybe you should ask him.

If he has broken free from her control by the time the timer runs out, then she will leave, and he will remain and will eventually travel home.

The stronger he is by the time the timer runs out, the bigger the spell will have to be. If he is at full power, that spell will cover the entire world, and everyone within it will have hope to make it to the next floor.

Oh, and one last thing.

This is the eighth floor after all.

Clank, clank, clank, clank.

Four cards appeared in front of the still-frozen, still-flying-backwards dwarf. Each one slammed into place like the blow of a hammer.

“What the hell. Really?” I asked. “Fucking really?”

Clank, clank, clank, clank.

Four more appeared in front of the giant demon. Each of these cards was the size of a garage door.

Amayon has a short deck with six totems. He will play each totem as they appear. He won’t even begin to attempt to flee until all his totems are dead. As for Ysalte? She is armed with a slightly enhanced version of the deck of the late Sister Ines. You can’t kill the god, so you have to hold out.

The world unfroze, and the goddess continued to fly back. She hit the ground and skid. She pulled herself to her feet about 100 feet away and tried to cast a spell at us, but nothing happened. She growled in frustration before her eyes finally focused on the cards floating before her.

Let the final card battle begin.