“Yeah, it’s like Youlang’s reward was tailor-made for this exact situation…” Quetzal noted, looking at me. “But I don’t think it’s all of us they want to stop from winning. It’s one person in particular.”
“That’s right,” I said. “My participation in the Games is a pain in Snowstorm’s ass. You’ll find out why soon.”
“Never mind,” Meister sighed. “I never dreamed of getting this far in the Games anyway. Thank you, Scyth!”
“Thanks from all of us!” the crafters shouted over the noise of shots and the roar of demons from outside.
Destiny caught my eyes, nodded. No matter how the day turned out, I had fulfilled my obligations to her — she was in the final leaderboard. The silver ranger would hold up her end of the bargain after the Games.
In the meantime, all the ranged fighters hid behind mobile barricades erected by Joker. The engineer turned out to be a true master of fortifications.
The next wave of mobs rolled onto the floor, these higher in level than the ones I threw back. They charged into Despot, and my ally barely withstood against their mass by driving his halberd arms into the floor behind him. An endless cannonade of shots rang out from the sniper and hunter. Destiny’s arrows whistled.
Quetzal, stabbing his sword mercilessly into an open space between Despot and the wall, turned around and said quickly:
“We need to find a narrow passageway inside the instance.”
“I’ll fly around and look,” I said.
“No. You’re needed here! If any small ones get through, everyone will die.”
“I’ll take care of it,” Destiny volunteered, firing off a Volley of arrows that left a blue trail. “The floor is clear, I shouldn’t run into any problems. Rangers have a big movement speed bonus.
“All of you go then,” I said. “Despot and I will hold them back. If you find a good position, speak up in chat and we’ll come to you.”
“Hold on here,” Destiny whispered, kissing me on the cheek.
“We only have to hold for a little under six hours! Go!”
My allies disappeared down the tunnel. For me and Despot, the fight had only just begun…
I spent a quarter of an hour careering back and forth in the cave before the entrance, intercepting demons that got through in my quickened state. In that time, my knowledge of the types of demons that existed expanded by a dozen species. Helpfully for me, the first ones to reach us were weak (and for me, that was any beneath level one hundred), and the strong demons were too large to fit through the gaps left by Despot’s frame. They couldn’t touch my comrade, so they tried constantly to convince him to open the way to the mortals for them.
A sweet-voiced demongirl boss, level 78 Virgo, appeared before Despot and spoke to me. Her seduction aura didn’t work on my ally, but me… I ran toward her, trying to move Despot aside. I saw the most beautiful woman in the world: a waterfall of chestnut hair, cherry lips, naked firm breasts, curved hips. If the pinnacle of creation existed, she was it. A thought knocked from outside my consciousness, trying to tell me it wasn’t normal that she had eight legs that looked more crustacean than human, but the demoness emitted a dizzying aroma. I would have sold my soul for the right to touch her.
“Wake up!” Despot pushed me hard with a halberd and I flew back several yards. “Get out of here, ally! None can withstand her charms!”
The haze lifted and Virgo howled in anger and disappointment. I moved back, just in case. The demon woman couldn’t get inside, but her smaller progeny could — the cave filled with forty or so spiders, all different sizes and all with women’s torsos. Before they ran through the dungeon in search of my allies, I used Clarity and brought them all down. With each death, Virgo howled beyond the threshold of the gates.
We found a good spot, Quetzal wrote in a message. A narrow tunnel leading to a wide dead end. We see your marker on the minimap, so you must see ours too. Come to us with your pet.
“Follow me, Despot,” I commanded the demon, then flew off toward our people.
I wasn’t worried about my ally — not with his talent of always catching up. Quetzal got in touch just in time — right after my command, I heard a deafening crash like a celestial hammer striking the anvil of hell. With a loud crack, Despot’s body crashed into the wall opposite the gates.
“What the hell?!” I asked aloud, turning round. When I saw what it was, I flew away at full speed without looking back.
Even Behemoth in his most terrible incarnation looked like a cute puppy in comparison to the boss of floor 594, Multifacet. He seemed to consist of a pair of massive leathery wings with a formless mass of monstrous faces between them.
I flew on, trying to forget the sight. Despot kept up, mentally commenting:
“Multifacet can adopt the form of his enemy, gaining all their strength! You can’t let him get within nine paces, or else…”
Winding through the corridors, we reached a spacious cave with several passageways leading off it. Destiny appeared in the furthest and narrowest:
“Over here!”
I flew in and saw a sixty-foot-long straight tunnel, around nine feet across and twelve high. Despot had crawled after me through passageways like this in his labyrinth, although those might have been a touch wider. Stopping halfway in, I turned. Despot had completely covered up the entrance from the other side of the tunnel with his body. Almost — his angular frame still left small gaps here and there.
“Hold on, ally,” I said, trying
