Chapter 161: Captain
It would seem that the enemies had died a painful death, and now I could relax and collect trophies, waiting for Simon's return, but I had put off summoning the elder elemental until the last moment for a reason, fearing his reaction to the summoning site and the demonic energy spilling around him. In short, he didn't like it. He really, really didn't like it. Otherwise, it is difficult to explain why after getting rid of the main obstacle, as if wound up time after time began to attack the altar stone, bringing down on it all his power. But the latter didn't just stand there... Or rather, it did, but that didn't stop it from snapping back, spewing dark energy prominences into space.
In fact, at first it even seemed that the elemental was about to gain the upper hand, as it took material form, beginning to resemble a huge seven-meter long genie, whose "tail" flowed mist across the floor of the gloomy temple, gradually displacing the demonic mana. At the same time, thousands of blue air blades were digging into the monolithic stone, trying to overcome the passive defense, but the true owner of the altar did not want to lose the link with the real world, so he let his toy fully utilize the accumulated reserves, and soon joined as an operator. The dark mana spilled around him began to flow quickly to the tower, increasing the already powerful defense and forcing the elder elemental to retreat under a continuous bombardment of concentrated energy clots. They couldn't be called spells in their entirety, as they were just a huge amount of compressed mana backed by will and command: "destroy!".
Because of the abundance of mystical manifestations and the unreal concentration of energies alien to the world, the metrics of space began to malfunction. Here and there, dark gaps appeared in the air from the collision of two elements, only to dissipate in a brief flash of dark light. The whole room was moving, columns and statues of angels were bending, trying to turn into incomprehensible art-objects with deep meaning and minimal artistic value, and flat surfaces were rippling, as if from rubble thrown into the water. But, unlike the water surface, when such waves were superimposed on the marble surface, sharp peaks sharply grew, capable of easily piercing a slow-moving reasonable person.
And in this dangerous place, there was only one island of calm. The space stabilization seals, designed to catch the Hound, were doing their job. Luckily, the whole team had managed to run inside the dome, and at the same time to take with them my beauty, and bonus the detective's body, including the second severed arm, kindly brought by Susie. There's no demons in this world, and I'm talking about the Hound, if anything, though Tom's body is also of great research interest.
No matter how skeptical I am, it's fucking conditional immortality, the main thing is to take care of your head, because it contains the main binding construct. Really, I don't like the idea of being soaked in not the most pleasant energy. It's one thing to occasionally use dark artifacts or exploit some unlucky demon, and quite another to operate such forces personally. And, given my natural-spatial coloring, it wouldn't be the most pleasant thing to do, and Abby would be sure to say no. But I'm not ready to refuse close communication with the incredibly seductive green-skinned cutie, who fills my reserve to the brim every time, developing it by leaps and bounds.
At a certain point, there was a fragile parity between the Beast projection and the elder elemental, and it clearly did not suit both creatures. The raising of the stakes came suddenly. First the djinn disintegrated into a multitude of air currents, and if it weren't for the increased concentration of elemental mana with a light blue coloring and the loud howls of wind from the appearance of even more blades, most of which took an intangible form to attack on all fronts, I would have thought that he lost the battle, and then a stream of black bubbling mass, very much like the Hundred Hungry Mouths, rushed from the altar. But there were more than a hundred of them, for in a few seconds the entire floor was covered with dark, translucent pseudo-flesh with moving outgrowths, and only a small area beneath the dome was free of this abomination.
After the transition to the new level, the battle outside did not even think of subsiding. On the contrary, it was rapidly gaining momentum, and already the spatial barrier began to be covered with small cracks, even though no one was directly affecting it. In fact, the battle was still taking place near the altar stone, and we could only hear its pitiful echoes, otherwise the seals would have lasted about ten seconds at most.
"Hmmm..." the head in Harley's hands gingerly looked at the thin long crack right in the center of the dome, behind which a deadly battle between two monsters was unfolding. - It was an honor to fight you.
"Oh, please don't use pathetic words. We'll get through this," I waved the detective away with my own severed hand, healing the damage quickly. But this can't last much longer, and soon I'll collapse from exhaustion.
Mana in the source is at zero, there is only life energy left, which is unlikely to be enough for anything meaningful, given the shitty control, but we have allies full of strength, who do not use their energy practically, and blood magic.
The plan matured instantly and immediately began to materialize. Runic converter here and here, here to stick a cluster to redistribute the incoming mana and stabilize the structure of the barrier, just in case to add protection from physical damage, here to draw two collecting circles and a fuse, because the hell knows how much can give the same Gaius or Susie. Even though the meatball looks like a Japanese schoolgirl's dream, but the power in it is clearly not less than in the defeated demon, just using it a little clumsy.
The fun memories bring a rush of euphoria while boosting my concentration, but I need more! The blood trickles down my fingers, and as if alive, it takes on the desired form. The bloody writing is surprisingly good at holding mana, even compared to the diamond dust magic gel, and considering that it contains the user's aura and can resist external influence to a certain extent, it's quite remarkable. The smile doesn't leave the pale face, making the allies nervous. Or is it because of what's going on behind the barrier? The two Powers collide with each other, generating violet discharges, coruscating space itself. Even the exit from the temple has long since disappeared, drowned in the darkness of another flash.
A sudden creative impulse pulled me with a head, all the accumulated knowledge of magic gained incredible clarity, the formulas of interaction runes as if they appeared in front of my eyes, allowing me to create. Do not follow some template, but to create their own! And it was simply delightful! Damn, now I understand the former owner of this body, for whom the same creativity was to get Puffy Mouse. All those clever traps, multi-step plans, and a life that resembles walking a tightrope over a precipice while juggling chainsaws.
Soon the seals were finally working. My companions took their places in the center of the structure, rebuilding the dome and allowing me to finally admire what was happening outside.
I'm not sure, but at some point, both entities began to devour each other stupidly, taking a generous bite out of the enemy's energy body and regenerating to do it all over again. If the Beast were to distract himself even a little bit to eliminate an unfortunate obstacle in the face of a motley crew of heroes, we would immediately die, but he couldn't! The proverbial balance. The beast doesn't belong to this world and can only use a small channel in the form of its own altar, while the elemental, though weaker, has been living in this dimension for a long time and can use its full power.
Our makeshift raft was tossed around like a shell in an ocean of elements. Crazy? Yes! Scary? You bet! Fun? Definitely!
"All hands on deck, land cuttlefish! We'll survive this storm if I'm not Captain Joker! Bwa-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! - I was shouting nonsense, shouting over the storm of power from which only a thin film of translucent barrier separated us.
I even had a parrot on my shoulder in the form of Kirk's screaming head, which Harley had kindly lent me. The girl herself was also radiant, drowning in my embrace. Her multicolored eyes shone with delight, or maybe because of the presence of another charming beauty who decided to join the fun and see everything from the front rows.
Honestly, I had no idea how long the confrontation between the two powerful entities lasted, as all my attention was evenly divided between patching up the dome and casting additional defense in the form of a modified walk, which was created outside the barrier by maximally stretched aura. It was something like a renewable anti-shock shield, only the enemy projectiles were single bursts of aggressive energy, which occasionally reached us, threatening to destroy the stable space, but the additional defense made them detonate earlier.
At one point I just realized that I was less and less required to search for the scum flying at us and to create protection on its way, pulling out of the faithful companion of mana, then the barrier stopped constantly rippling, restraining the distorted waves reaching us, and then the kaleidoscope of colors began to fade rapidly, until we saw the interior of the once beautiful Dark Cathedral. Or what was left of it...
The floor, transformed during the battle into a forest of sharpened peaks, and the twisted columns that looked like diseased trees, were immediately noticeable. The rest of the flat surfaces had also undergone metamorphosis, acquiring unusual geometries that made one feel a little queasy. Only three places remained normal: the sealed-off dome, the arch with the demonic portal at the far end of the temple, and the elevation where the sacrificial altar used to be. Only now, the large stone had been neatly chopped in two, as if it had collided with a giant blade.
The next object to be scrutinized was the winner of the epic battle, the elder elemental. I didn't even realize it was him at first, because instead of a huge translucent humanoid figure resembling a genie, a faceless two-meter tall creature whose flesh consisted of thick black smoke was staring right at us. And what was going on in the energy spectrum... Mm-hmm. If not for the presence of a very distinctive mana coloration, I would have been willing to bet Kirk's head that someone like Mammon appeared before us.
A dark elemental... No, a dark air spirit appeared before us...
To think that the inhabitant of the amulet took and literally devoured the projection of a powerful Archidemon, and not only devoured it, he internalized it, dramatically jumping in strength!
I also didn't like the way he was looking at us. His dark blue aura swirled, making it hard to understand his intentions, but my intuition told me that nothing good could come of it.
The air shook slightly, and the dark entity stood at the edge of the fortified barrier. The seals shimmered dangerously, holding back the power of the alien, and he hadn't even attacked us, he'd just hit us a little too hard.
His head felt as if it were squeezed by a heated hoop, and a powerful bass rang in his consciousness, causing persistent associations with the storm:
"More... Want... Let go..."
Fine, he liked eating demons, and my allies fell into that category. His thoughts, though sparse, made it clear exactly what he wanted.
"They're friends and you can't eat them. No nibbling either. If you want, you can take a tour of the labyrinth and the mansion on the surface. There are probably still surviving devils and summoned creatures there," I replied, hoping he understood human speech, since my attempt to convey images could hardly be called thought-speech, even though I'd read a chapter or two about it while I was dealing with the illusions.
At the same time, my mind was actively looking for a way out of the situation. The dome contains my mana, so an attack on it would be considered an attack on the summoner. Giovanni Zatara was no fool, so he'd planned for the deportation of the elemental that had fallen off the slicer, but the mere presence of such a powerful creature made the weave fray at the seams, despite the constant nourishment from Susie and her son.
Technically, you could threaten me with a contract, which is woven into the structure of the amulet. But the problem is that the serious consequences will be only if they try to attack me or if I try to enslave the summoned creature, and so the contract is rather mild and does not carry any particular danger for either party. Besides, intelligent spirits are quite adequate creatures... If they don't eat several tons of demonic pseudo-flesh beforehand. This is where anyone's mind starts to go on vacation.
"Whoa," Simon's surprised voice suddenly sounded from the archway. - What happened here?
The dark spirit behind the barrier turned its head sharply, staring at the new protagonist.
"Run, Simon! Run!"
It's not hard to predict exactly what's about to happen, given the dark creature's new gastronomic cravings and the chimera's mana coloration, which is not under the amulet bearer's protection.
In an attempt to do something, I managed to extend my aura almost two and a half meters on reflexes alone, even though the record before was only one and a half, and to place a small disk at its end, perpendicular to the floor. An ordinary person would have been cut by such a construction, but the former elemental didn't even notice this pathetic attempt.
"Prey," the alien thought echoed in his head, causing an unbearable urge to scratch his brain.
A moment, and the creature is already a meter away from the surprised guy. The hand from wrist to forearm becomes a huge drill of a thousand concentrated wind blades, ready to grind the enemy into a bloody mess.
"Stop!" came a shout accompanied by a new blow to the mind, reminiscent of a slap in the face.
Spirit froze with his hand raised to strike.
"Do you want to devour me? Why? - The boy spoke soothingly, clearly reinforcing his speech with thought images.
The negotiation didn't take long. It didn't take twenty seconds for the amulet dweller's hand to return to its former form, and he stopped resembling a compressed spring, even allowing himself to be touched.
"No, I shouldn't be consumed after all. Oh, and maybe you want to go to the hell dimension? Just go through this archway," Simon gestured at the demonic portal behind him. And the strange thing was, even though it was still obscured by the black fog, I didn't feel threatened by it, and the fog was less dense. - There was a whole huge world behind it, populated by creatures with the same energy.
The dark creature turned its head in my direction.
"Give up... Home... Leave..."
A pain shot through my temples. I had to use the mental now, because it wasn't good to lose half the packets of information on the way. Good thing I was getting the gist of it.
"Catch."
I turned off some of the runes and tossed the amulet outside the dome. It flew a meter away before it was gently picked up by the air currents to be delivered to its new and old owner. The spirit immediately hid the stone inside his body, placing it instead of his heart, and walked silently toward the archway.
As the figure crossed the boundary between worlds, Simon exhaled tiredly and immediately sank to the floor, leaning against the remains of the altar.
It was no use holding the barrier, so I immediately broke the loop and rushed to my buddy. It was amazing, but now the efficiency of my moves had increased by almost an order of magnitude, allowing me to skip over the peaks with only a drop of reserve. And the density of glyphs seemed to have increased a bit too, with the same mana expenditure. And not so long ago I was resenting the heroes of the senens who, instead of developing in a smart and unhurried way, get into all sorts of trouble to improve their skills and kick Glavgad. I hate to admit it, but today I acted pretty much the same way. Yes, I tried to consider all options, including calling in the cavalry in the form of a green-skinned cutie, but in the end I missed finding a full-fledged altar and a strong demonic cult right under my nose, although I should have been wary when Simon told me that we had to fight at least three hundred devils. At the same time, of all the comic book heroes, Bats is practically the only one who acts like a "normal" superhero. He has charted his own path of development, traveled it, and then set out to do good and bring justice. Eh, where I could find so much time for self-development, so that in such situations I could rely a little less on blind luck and create fate with my own hands.
* https://youtu.be/zXQ9gfJHiOA
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