Chapter 41: Chapter 41

Jalel’s jaw had dropped when he saw what she held. It only took him a second before his face twisted in a strange mix of desperation and greed, rage, and hate, and their newfound acquaintance pulled out his dagger. He dropped his bag without even thinking while simultaneously lunging forward toward Athela and pulled out some sort of white potion.

Riven’s eyes narrowed, and it was as if time stopped as she stood unaware of the impending attack.

“Athela, move!”

In an instant, Riven had rammed his foot into Jalel’s chest—expelling the air from the man with an abrupt wheeze and sending the man off course. The potion that Jalel had been about to throw smashed against the ground, blinding everyone momentarily with a loud pop of sound like a flash-bang. Riven cursed and blindly slammed his staff into Jalel’s chest, managing to hit him straight on. The man grunted, scrambling back across the ground, trying to get to the weapon that’d loudly clattered against the stone.

It took about ten seconds for everyone to recover. Riven blinked rapidly to clear his head, Athela screeched irritatedly while trying to rub her eyes, and the man on the ground groaned and coughed.

Athela was confused and disoriented by the blast, but she began to laugh at Riven’s display of violence when the light cleared, and she slipped the stone back into Riven’s pocket. “I would have been fine, Riven. This man is far too weak to kill me, and even if I died—I’d come back. Though I do appreciate the sentiment…you didn’t address me by my royal title! Address me as Princess, you peasant slave!”

“I was worried about the stone!” Riven snarled and angrily kicked the downed man in the gut while he ignored the crazy arachnid demon nearby. He’d certainly felt that this guy was…off. Jalel had seemed desperate, untrustworthy, and all-around shady since the first conversation Riven had with him—but to see the miracle stone and go on the offensive to attain it…

Jalel had just sentenced himself to death. Why would he have been so utterly stupid? Was he truly that desperate to obtain something of value for his debts? Jalel knew he was weaker than Riven and Athela were, but he’d acted so brazenly Riven simply couldn’t understand. Had he really expected to snatch it and run? Or had he been planning to stab Riven first on the way to the spider?

“That stone belongs to me!” Jalel half screamed and half gasped, short of breath after the kick and clutching at his stomach. He was half-mad with envy as he picked himself up and narrowly rolled to dodge a close-range flurry of spinning red blades that crashed into the wall behind him, eyes growing wide before howling his rage and swinging in an arc to take Riven’s head.

Two thin tendrils of crimson from the leeching totems slammed into the man, catching him in the chest and neck and causing him to scream and miss his swing. The threads of red magic pulsed, drawing out his life force by the second as Jalel began to writhe about.

Though Riven himself was somewhat of a novice at fighting in hand-to-hand combat, the spider was not. In a blur of legs and fangs, the Blood Weaver slammed into Jalel with a screech as she sank her teeth into his arm wielding the dagger. Necrotic venom began to slide into his veins as Jalel gave a high-pitched wail, reeling back as Athela kicked off while simultaneously latching onto him with her blood webbing and spinning in an arc around the man’s body to trip him.

The next moments were a blur of motion as Athela whipped back and forth, managing to wrap her webbing around Jalel numerous times before he was restrained enough that she could just roll him repeatedly with her legs as her spinnerets went nuts. Before long, only Jalel’s strained face remained open to the air as his entire body was wrapped up in a red cocoon.

“You fucked up,” Riven hissed at the horrified man with a malevolent sneer as Athela finally finished her wrapping job and hopped off proudly.

“May I eat him now, Master? May I?”

Jalel caught his breath with a panicked expression while still being pressed up against the bloodied wall, groaning in discomfort as Riven’s arm shoved his face into the stone.

“I didn’t mean anything by it… I swear by all the gods. I reacted on instinct—”

“Instinct?” Riven asked mockingly, picking up the knife Jalel had dropped and pressing the blade farther into the man’s neck to draw a slight amount of blood. “Instinct to grab it from her without warning and attack us? Fucking liar.”

Riven drew Jalel’s head back and abruptly slammed it into the wall again with a violent thud—leaving a trail of Jalel’s blood after releasing his pressing hold. “Now that I know I can’t trust you, it’s lights out, buddy. Any last words?”

“No!” Jalel interrupted after a quick yelp of pain with a desperate, wide-eyed shake of his head. “I do not want it! I was going to destroy it!”

Riven remained unimpressed, tightening his grip on the back of Jalel’s hair, and he glanced up at Athela, who sat watching silently by. “You just said the stone was yours, but let’s pretend you’re telling me the truth. Why would you destroy it?”

“It is evil!” Jalel inhaled sharply as the freezing venom started climbing up his neck, glancing over at the glowing orb cupped between Athela’s arachnid paws. “You have read the description, yes? Innocent souls have been sacrificed to wield its power! Demonic energy is a taint upon the land—you and your kind will all burn in the hells forever for your sacrilege! You will rot with them if you don’t forsake the Unholy pillar!”

Jalel managed to spit at Riven with a look of contempt, his facade entirely gone now. Instead, a look of malice and hatred that Riven felt was rather misplaced overlapped every aspect of the other man’s features.

A loud thud sounded from above them, and the wall shuddered slightly, bringing Riven’s attention away from Jalel. Small rocks and pieces of debris began falling from above, and Riven took a couple steps back to get out of the way with Athela scrambling to the side. Then there was a loud and eerie screech from above them in the mist.

The three of them remained perfectly still, and Riven could feel his heart beating ever faster.

“Untie me!” Jalel hissed as he began to frantically struggle within his bindings. “Please! Please, I did not think before I acted; just let me go and I’ll let you take everything I’ve collected while here!”

The strange cry came again, this time still up above—from the other side of the alley…with the soft flapping of wings accompanying it.

“SHRREEEEEEE!”

The scream was a mixture of both bird and man as a winged, semihumanoid creature dropped down from the sky to land in the path behind them. Taloned claws were present at the end of its stork-like feet, with wings where its arms should have been. Otherwise the torso, abdomen, and head were all more or less human. Thick plumes of brown feathers covered the head just above the eyes, spreading along its neck and along the rest of the body with a strange grace to it. Long, carnivorous teeth spread out in a grin as it eyed them hungrily from catlike yellow eyes, and its abdominal muscles contracted repeatedly while grunting in a crude and beast-like chuckle.

[Juvenile Harpy, Level 3]

Another one, similar to the first but displaying a prominent set of breasts to signify its gender as female, dropped down on the other side toward the statue. The tips of this one’s feathers ended in silver edging, and as it spread its wings, it took a long step toward them with those insanely long legs. Talons grasped at the air hesitantly, as if it didn’t know whether or not to strike yet, and it let off a cunning smile while thinking about its next meal.

[Juvenile Harpy, Level 4]

Then they moved into action.

“SHIT!” Riven swore loudly and backpedaled frantically, narrowly avoiding a swift jab from the male harpy as it struck out with its left foot. The talons came within an inch of his face like the strike of a mantis as it hissed at him.

He hit the wall, rolled onto his side, and fumbled for better footing before blocking another strike with his staff. “GET FUCKED, YOU OVERSIZED CHICKEN!”

A blast of black netting erupted in front of him and swallowed the creature, burying its Unholy needles into the harpy as it lurched back and screeched in panic while frantically flapping and tearing away from the magic. He activated the Blessing of the Crow, and his body reacted with a noticeable boost in speed as red sparks trickled along his skin—and he ducked a counterstrike before slamming his staff into the outstretched thigh of the harpy for a solid hit.

A multitude of crimson discs blasted into the harpy’s chest a second later as he conjured Bloody Razors, and the creature screamed in fury to fall back and tend its gushing wounds while a third harpy charged in. It dived in fast from above, bowling Riven over and causing him to drop the staff as he stutter-stepped. He rolled over twice and gripped at the knife he’d picked up—starting to charge up a Blood Lance along his right side and slashing at the new harpy’s wing when it blew up a dust cloud to blind him.

Coughing and removing himself from the debris, he briefly caught sight of Athela as she battled two more female harpies with silver coloring. The arachnid was fast…remarkably fast, and was dancing in between them or up the sides of the walls while spraying shards of sharpened bloody webbing akin to magically infused needles. She hissed and spun, dodging a taloned strike and wrapping the extended leg up with more webbing to yank and pull the harpy off balance before launching herself at the harpy’s throat and digging into it with her fangs while the other harpy was knocked back with ribboning crimson lights as Riven’s unfinished totems fired to latch onto new targets.

Another nearby screech brought him back to his own battle when his current combatant was joined by the harpy he’d injured earlier. Crimson razor discs still stuck out of his enemy’s chest and acidic burn marks from where the snare had caught it showed easily. It charged him with bloodlust. Talons, wings, and sharpened teeth were used in conjunction as the harpy used its slightly larger size to try and bully him, and he was doing everything he could to dodge when its leg shot straight toward him like a snake’s strike.

*RIP*

He cried out as the harpy’s talons dug into his back. The monster’s talons clawed at him three times with quick, consecutive motions that left deep bloody cuts through his robes and along his ribs.

“Riven!” Athela cried out, forcing herself to disengage from the two females to let them turn their attention on the totems, which were continually leeching life with little red threads as Jalel screamed, thrashed, and sobbed in his cocoon. He was being eviscerated by a fifth harpy that’d dropped from above to eat him alive. The creature was gorging itself on his innards, and he lay helpless within Athela’s webbing, but the arachnid didn’t even spare him a glance as she rushed past to help her master.

Riven landed on the ground and rolled, his enhanced speed allowing him to dodge a second strike and unleash his charged Blood Lance right into the second harpy that’d lunged his way. The right wing was completely torn off at the shoulder in a spray of bone, feathers, and muscle—sending the new harpy backward into a spinning crash against the far wall as debris from the structure tumbled onto it after the lance had made contact.

But even while Riven conjured another four Bloody Razors, his spell missed due to the frantic casting. The infuriated, injured male he’d originally hit tore into Riven’s back again—only withdrawing with a hiss when Riven slammed his dagger desperately into the stork-like leg of the striking creature to leave a good-sized gash.

The harpy flapped its wings and raised into the air after that and prepared to dive when strings of red webbing latched themselves up onto its wings from below and yanked down hard—slamming the harpy into the stone ground with a squawk. Sharp fangs sank into its side to inject necrotic venom, the spider hissing ravenously while Athela clung to its body. Black areas of rot quickly began to spread, and the harpy screeched and clawed at Athela, panicking as the side of its chest began decaying until it managed to get ahold of one of Athela’s legs with its teeth.

Chomping down hard and ripping the spider off its chest, the male harpy flung the spider into the females that were coming over from destroying Riven’s totems and feeding on Jalel.

Riven’s scream of rage caught their attention as two more snares flew toward the harpies, one capturing the damaged male to take it down and the other snare just falling short of the females after having miscalculated the distance. “DAMN IT!”

Athela spun in the air, locked onto the wall with another strand of webbing in a legendary display of agility and pulled herself just out of reach of the females’ talons as they struck. Yanking herself up the webbing and onto the wall, Athela whirled. The arachnid then began firing more shards of condensed needles from her webbing, burying the projectiles into their flesh while scurrying across the side of the wall as the two infuriated females launched themselves airborne to give chase.

Riven scrambled for his staff, pain searing across his back with the effort while he slammed the gnarled end of the wood into the struggling harpy caught in his snare like a club. He struck again, and again, and again—sending blood splattering across the pavement as he huffed and heaved. When he finished it off and the harpy finally lay still, he looked up to see Jalel’s dead eyes staring at him with mouth agape in horror. One of the harpies even continued to feed on the guts of the corpse. Another dead male, the one that Riven had hit with his Blood Lance, lay buried in rubble with one of its wings torn off and lying nearby. Athela was keeping the two female harpies occupied as she danced along the walls overhead and managed to catch one in a quickly constructed web while hopping across the short distance between walls of the alley, and Riven had decided to try his luck by taking out the monster feeding on Jalel’s remnants by charging up another Blood Lance when he felt claws slam into his back again. The strike also seemed to draw mana from his body, almost like a leech would blood—and he felt physically depleted in an instant.

He screamed and was flung forward onto his face, feeling his muscles literally being torn out of his back as parts of him went numb while others lit up like they were on fire. He gasped and hit the ground, managing to turn and see a much larger harpy standing over him that’d flown in from above. This one, though still a juvenile male by the system’s standards, was more muscular and a good two feet taller than the others with feathers dipped in orange at their ends.

[Juvenile Harpy, Level 7]

[You are experiencing Amplified Bleeding. This is a damage-over-time effect.]

The monster sneered down at him, drawing up the piece of his back it’d torn out with one taloned foot and chomping down to chew and swallow it seconds later. Then it let out a loud, screeching hiss. “SHHHHRRRRREEEEEEEE!”

Riven’s head spun, his quivering hands tried to keep his grip on the staff so he could bring it around to protect himself, but he quickly realized he didn’t have the mana to cast a snare. How was that possible? The earth beside him jolted when yet another silver female harpy landed beside Riven with a hiss, and his heart sank.

The hissing female came in closer, baring its teeth as it kicked the staff out of his hand to bounce against the ground a couple yards off. Riven’s breathing was labored, but he spat blood at the creature in an act of defiance. “Fuck you, you bastard chickens!”

He was going to die here.

Riven closed his eyes and grunted in agony when he felt another chunk of his back get torn out by large, hooked talons—squinting them shut to mentally deny the pain and trying to hold back the tears that wanted to come. In some ways, death would be welcome…it’d stop the agony, at least. But it was still a hard pill to swallow, knowing that he’d wanted to do so much more and had spent so little time doing things he enjoyed in life.

“Sorry, Allie…”

His most treasured memories flashed before his eyes as he realized that these were probably the last moments of his life. The time when Riven had gone with his little sister to the mall and she’d bought him caramel apples with what little money she’d earned as a waitress that day. The time they’d gone to see the animals at the zoo, and how he’d let her feed the brightly colored fish after picking up some quarters they’d found by chance. Spending long nights walking through Chester’s Grove when they were at their worst, a park in the city with a swing set he’d push her up high in.

Then the memory of when their mother vanished finally came…how Riven had spent days looking for her and how he’d filed numerous police reports only to come up empty-handed. His mother had been Riven’s world, and suddenly that world had shattered. The final memory of visiting Chester’s Grove to swing on that rusty swing set one more time before visiting the tree at their favorite spot with Allie… Their mother had always taken care of them since their father had disappeared. How was he expected to go on after losing both his parents? But he couldn’t just give up; he had to get out of here and look after Allie. His sister needed him.

He hadn’t believed in an afterlife, but he hoped he’d been wrong now with the system in place and the things he’d learned after integration. He wanted there to be a heaven, because if there was…maybe death wouldn’t be that bad. Maybe he’d get to see his mom and dad again after all…because if that was true…then this would all have been worth it. He’d not been able to make the life for himself that he’d wanted, but at least he’d met Athela. It just turned out that this strange new world had unexpectedly decided to treat him unfairly…and he’d simply not been cut out for it. Not that it was any different from his old life.n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om

Simply put, life just wasn’t fair—and that was a pill he had finally decided to swallow.

A warm sensation in his pocket began to grow as he accepted the finality of it all, and he lifted his eyelids just enough to see the larger orange harpy raise his taloned leg overhead with a malicious grin unbefitting of a nonhuman creature. It just looked…wrong, out of place, and warped. Riven just barely had enough time and willpower to glance down at his pants, where the warmth was beginning to spread, and in that moment—the world went black.