Page 154 of Death is My Ride or Die

Ahrimad turned sharply away from Malphas and faced me, massive fangs filling a mouth that belonged to a distorted, evil creature of death.

“Lights out, bitch.”

Power surged up my forearm like liquid fire, white light seeping through my knuckles and consuming my entire hand. I hurled my fist toward the portal, a scream tearing free from my throat as I fired everything I had into the rippling surface. The portal trembled violently against my chaos, glowing a blinding white until it finally detonated with a sonic boom, cracking the mirror with a mighty force.

The portal spewed out energy in violent gusts. A windstorm unlike any other hurled around the room, nearly knocking me off the stage as its vortex of fury swept across the mausoleum.

“YourBook of the Deadisn’t salvageable!” Malphas shouted as his braids tossed to the side from the wind. “While you were busy with your obsession with destroying my son, I hid your precious tome and replaced it with a red herring. Do what you want with my soul. Without that book, you’re done. There is no corpse in this room or anywhere else in the universe that will withstand your vexatious soul.”

Ahrimad’s expression hardened, his head trembling with rage, and a cruel smile turned up the corners of his bloodied mouth. His arm rose, his fingers flexing as the scythe appeared in his hand. Designs appeared along the staff, rippling symbols, as Ahrimad’s otherworldly eyes pulsed with light. “You are all sentenced to death.”

Death’s chest heaved fast; his eyes went wide. Shadows pulsed from his frame and slid over the ground, consuming his space. His whole body shuddered uncontrollably as he visibly tried to keep something at bay.

And he lost.

Shadow expelled from Death’s skin like inky tendrils in the air, blotting out the light in shapeless terrors. They coiled around the high-level demons beside him like vipers. The demons’ screams suffocated as the darkness crawled down their throats. Death yanked one of his chained arms inward, pulling the demon toward him, ripping its throat out with his fangs and slicing the rest of its thick neck away with a vicious swipe of his talons. His feet kicked up off the ground as he punted the headless corpse away. He launched back into the air in a blur, his chain wrapping around the other demon’s neck as he took him down and strangled him to death.

Wind hurled around Ahrimad like a twister, cocooning the original Grim Reaper, imprisoning him in thick magic. Ace moved fast and threw out his hand, and the hurling energy spiraled out of control in blacks and reds. Ahrimad was imprisoned in a blustery mass of pure chaos that Ace kept together with his two hands.

“How long will that hold?” Malphas demanded.

The warlock’s back foot slid across the ground until he replanted himself. “Not long enough!”

The remaining high-level demons suddenly snapped into focus. Their snarls turned on us.

One of the demons materialized in front of Malphas. It lunged for him and took a swipe with its deadly paws, but Malphas evaporated like a mirage. The creature staggered back in confusion, gripping Malphas’s shirt in its meaty hand.

Malphas rematerialized behind the monster, furious. “That was my favorite silk shirt.” His hand shot out, blackness expelling from his eyes. The creature gripped its own skin with razor-sharp claws and began tearing at the scaly flesh covering its face, howls unleashing from its throat.

A monstrous howl thundered through the room. A grin lined Death’s mouth, like a lunatic wanting in on the grisly war. His mismatched green eyes glowed against the dusky hue of his skin. His jaw flexed, veins engorging in his angular face. Fangs lengthened into knives, filling his mouth in a nightmarish image as his jaw unhinged and an animalistic roar ripped free from his throat.

“That can’t be good,” I muttered.

Ace had seized the opportunity in the chaos to attack the demon guarding him. Swirls of violet magic permeated the air as the creature burst into flame on Ace’s command. Another creature gripped Ace by the throat and lifted him off the ground.

“I hate my liiiiiife!”I sprinted at full speed, pushing off the stage as I leapt and slammed my fist forward into the monster’s face, the force of my punch taking the creature down to the floor.

Quickly sitting up on top of the wriggling monster, I realized two things. One, my supercool outfit that Romeo had given me was definitely fire-retardant. And two, my fist was currently embedded in the monster’s face, and I couldn’t get my fingers out of his brain.

“Ew, ew,ew! Rewind, rewind!”

Two hands gripped my shoulders from behind and tore me and my hand away from the monster. Malphas. He brought his sword—my sword—down into the creature’s skull, killing it. Another demon came at him, and he executed it in an effortless whirl of silver.

“The containment spell won’t hold Ahrimad for much longer,” Ace said, limping heavily to stand beside me. He turned his head to Malphas with an accusing look. “Where is theBook of the Dead?”

“I tossed the damned thing into the portal.”

Ace’s eyes widened. “You’reserious? I don’t buy for one moment that you would throw one of the most powerful artifacts in the world carelessly into a portal!”

“Believe it, wizard,” Malphas grinned. “Want it for yourself, do you? By all means, go for a dive and fetch it in the Unknown.”

Ace growled out something nasty in a foreign language and lifted his hand up to his ear with a readied command, magic uncurling into his palm, but I grabbed his forearm.

Suddenly, two more demons manifested around us. Malphas took on one by himself, and Ace and I took on the other. Light sparked from my fist as I connected with the demon’s hand coming down, my other fist uppercutting as I slammed it into its gut. Ace finished it off with an incantation, and I pivoted around to face Malphas.

“What’d you do to the reapers?” I demanded.

“All you have to know is they’re alive, and they’ll recover.”

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