The Eye of the Bedlam Bride — Chapter no 70

[ 70 ]

I HAD ANTICIPATED THIS, AND I GRABBED ONTO SAMANTHA’S PIGTAILS once again as we slipped away. She screamed as we plummeted, but she angled herself back toward the building, almost like we were zip-lining, and we glided toward the hopping up-and-down form of Donut, who had Lazarus th thsummoned next to her on a metal beam. She was on maybe the 25or 26 floor, right above a group of intact floors.

Lazarus had a large, RPG out and was about to blast it into the chest of the demon, but I yelled at him to stop.

I let go of the sex doll head, and I stumbled onto the burning-hot metal beam.

“Carl!” Donut shouted. She was on her feet, jumping up and down on the metal. Mongo was one floor below, roaring at a group of approaching demon crabs. I could see him and others through the multiple holes in the floor.

“Everybody is below, trying to get to Imani and Tran!” She paused. “Carl, what happened to all your hair!”

Behind me, the demon turned his back on us. His pig-like body turned and brushed against the building, causing it to shake even more. He’s done with us, I realized. He would leave us alone as long as we left him alone. He wouldn’t stop the possessed demons from attacking us, but at least we didn’t —hopefully—have to worry about him striking us down. He just wanted to go home.

The birds and bats continued to swirl around him, thicker than ever. They were still arriving from all over. Most of them seemed to ignore us, too. They only attacked if we got close.

Amayon raised both of his hands into the air, and he shouted something into the sky in a language I did not understand. Lazarus also screamed something and lifted his RPG again. He was trembling with rage at the sight

of the massive demon.

“Leave Amayon alone,” I shouted. “We need him to cast his spell! And don’t fire that thing here. You’re going to collapse the building!”

“The building is already collapsing,” he complained. “Why summon me if you’re not going to let me blow stuff up? I swear, you’re all pansies.”

“Donut, Carl, come!” came a shout from below. I looked between my feet to see Li Na and Li Jun struggling with a group of demons one level below.

That level still mostly had a floor. Sort of. Mongo was already there, perched atop a turned-over bed in a wrecked apartment while the memory ghost of a kid was eating something at a kitchen table. As I watched, a demon seal lunged at Mongo, but the dinosaur jumped up to our level, and the seal broke through the floor. It continued to fall, but the hole he made revealed another mostly-intact floor below that. Louis stood there on that next floor down, looking up at us.

“We’re coming!” I called. Donut jumped to my shoulder. She still had her card deck summoned. I aimed toward a girder and jumped, landing upon it as Li Na and Li Jun both jumped down one more level to be near Louis. I quickly followed, landing between Louis, Katia, and Dong Quixote.

“Imani and Tran are two levels below,” Katia said, “but the whole area is swarming. If we can get to them, then we can get the hell out of here!”

“No!” Dong shouted. I turned to see a group of crabs swarm up through a hole in the wall. One grasped onto the arm of Author Steve Rowland, and a portal opened up. The troll was sucked into hell, screaming. The elderly stripper shouted and rushed at the remaining crab and clobbered him with his nickel sock. The crab went flying off the edge and plummeted into the fire below.

Lazarus shouted something and another crab appeared, coming through a wall. It grabbed onto him, and they also disappeared. Splitter or not, getting pulled into hell was a good way to completely eliminate a card. I jumped back and prepared to kick, but both Lazarus and the crab were now gone.

Totem Eliminated.

“We need to go down one more floor!” I shouted.

“Carl, why hasn’t the quest updated yet?” Katia called as we prepared to jump.

“I think we’re waiting for the cloud to spread over the whole world,” I shouted back. I kicked a charging crab and felt it shatter under me.

Below, I could see Bautista, Britney, and Elle ripping up pieces of rubble

to gain access to the next floor down. Bautista had changed shape, turning from the tiger to a large, four-armed creature, similar to the AI guy who ran the training room. I knew he had a ring that allowed him to do this, but this was the first time I’d seen it in action. Tran and Imani were apparently trapped in a pocket. Elle had two totems summoned helping with the job. One was another sasquatch thing, and the second was a massive bear/hippo thing called a Gumberoo.

“We need more hands!” Elle called. “Come help!”

“The exterior of the entire building is covered with demon crabs,” someone called. It was another human. Another Li Na totem. “We need to hold them back while you work!” The voice cried out and died.

“I’m out of cards!” Li Na shouted.

Imani: They’re in here with us! I’m holding them off the best I can!

Elle: Do you have cards left? Do you have a Flee card?

Imani: I won’t leave Tran. And I don’t trust my last totems.

Tran was in Katia’s squad. She’d have to use a Flee card for him to get away, but she didn’t carry them in her deck. She was out of cards now, anyway.

“I have a few Phase Through Walls potions!” I called, jumping down to land amongst everybody else. “I can get through, give them the potions, and we can keep going down!”

“Won’t work. If you do it, you’ll drop like a rock,” Elle called. “You can’t control it. Maybe I can drink it and try to float, but if Tran and I are both phased, I won’t be able to hold him. He’ll get splattered for sure. Let’s dig first!”

“Donut,” I said. “What about your Hole?”

“It’s not in my hand!” she said. We’d added the Hole spell to her staff totem in hopes of using it to cut either an enemy totem or deckmaster in half.

“What do you have?”

“Alpha Carl is back in my hand. Shi Maria. My golden combo card. And the Lamp snare. I can’t discard for a bit. I already discarded Jola. He’s too big for this place! I don’t have any Flee cards in my deck, either!”

“Okay,” I said, looking around, thinking fast. We had demons coming up from both sides. Everybody was engaged, fighting them off while Elle and the others were desperately digging through the rubble. “We need you to get rid of your deck. You still have Puddle Jump available, right? We gotta get everybody out of here.” She still had Skedaddle, too, but that escape spell

would likely dump us into a pile of Sheol fire. “Discard when you can, especially the snares, but in the meantime summon Shi Maria and Alpha Carl and use the Golden Combo to combine them. That’ll get that combo card out of your hand, too. Do it fast. We don’t have time to deal with either of their usual bullshit anyway, especially Shi Maria. Maybe temporarily combining them will help. Have the combo version hold off the demons while I help to dig. Discard or play everything you can until you get your staff totem!”

Donut tossed Alpha Carl back out and then Shi Maria, shuffling the spider off toward the edge where there was no ceiling. Hopefully she would fit. Both of their entrance procedures started.

I punched another crab before it could grab unto me, and a notification popped up.

The Scavenger’s Daughter has been fed. Unleash her wrath.

I looked at the bar in my interface, and it crackled with black energy.

I needed to unleash it, but I didn’t dare do it while up here.

Alpha Carl appeared. Just behind him, Shi Maria also emerged, too tall for the hallway. Metal bent and snapped as she materialized. Most of her bulbous body hung outside the building, but her long, horrible legs spread out, snaking into the hall. Donut tossed out the Golden Combo card.

Alpha Carl looked at me and was about to say something when his face exploded. Shi Maria had shoved a leg right through the back of his head. He exploded all over me, showering me with gore.

“Carl!” Donut shouted in panic. “It says…”

The intended target of the Golden Combo has been incapacitated.

Proceeding to the next available minion target.

That’s you.

You have been combined with Shi Maria.