Page 16 of Pain Run Rampant

The stone door is triple as tall as Invictis. Plain, nothing inscribed on the stone. I tell Frederick, “The empresses knew. They passed the knowledge down with their memories. If they would’ve told anyone… it would’ve been a risk.”

“And yet, somehow, agents from another kingdom still discovered them,” Frederick says. “I do wonder how people from another kingdom knew while us Laconians were kept in the dark. Such a thing doesn’t seem possible, does it?”

“It is weird,” I agree, but unless we raise the freaking dead, there’s no way to ask the assholes who unleashed Invictis twenty years ago. I gesture for Invictis to open the door. “Be a doll and get the door for us, buddy.”

The growl Invictis lets out when I say that is record-setting. I can practically feel him seething as he stalks toward the door with a hard frown on his face. What might be difficult for Frederick and me is an easy job for him, even though he’s beinga little bitch about it. He pushes open the door, and inside, we see a long, dark hall continuing into the depths of the mountain.

“Can you light up the path for us, too?” I ask with a smile, taking way too much enjoyment out of pissing him off.

Hey, it ain’t like I can light up the way. It’s him or me, and right now it’s gotta be him.

Invictis groans again, but he does as he’s told. He lifts a single finger, and simultaneously magical balls of yellow light appear on either side of the hall, lighting the entryway section by section.

“Ah, that’s handy,” Frederick states, earning himself a hard glare from Invictis.

“Let’s do this thing.” I push past the guys and walk into the labyrinth. I thought, back when Invictis was Rune, that I took shelter in one of these one night, but it had to be some other old ruin.

This place feels different. It feels ancient, eerie, like it doesn’t want anyone inside it.

Like it’s alive.

Frederick and Invictis are behind me as we traverse deeper into the labyrinth. We’re about fifty feet in when the sound of the outside door closing on its own echoes in the stale air, and I nearly jump out of my skin.

This place… I don’t like it. I don’t like it at all.

Tiny balls of golden light hover like torches all the way down the hall. The hall must be half a mile or more; it’s the longest goddamned hall I’ve ever seen. At the end of the hall, we reach a door similar to the one that separates this place from the outside world—however, this one is different in that it has words etched into its stone face.

Words and an image.

“To those who must enter, a trial you must face,” Frederick whispers. “It’s in ancient Laconian. I’m fairly certain that’s what it says.”

As he speaks, I can’t look away from the image below the words. Time has made the etching not as sharp, but even so, I can tell it looks like a damned monster. Fuck me. Are we going to have to fight that thing in order to get to the depths of the labyrinth? Just my luck.

“Interesting. It seems to be some kind of guardian meant to keep most people out,” Frederick explains. “It didn’t work twenty years ago, though. Perhaps they defeated the guardian and we’ll find nothing but a skeleton.” The hope in his tone is cute but pointless; if it’s a magical guardian, there’s no way it’s dead.

There’s only one way to find out. We came all this way, so we’re going in.

I go for the doors, using all of my body to push them open. Look at me, practically running headfirst into danger even though I don’t have any magic to speak of right now. If the guardian is still around…

One thing at a time.

It’s a strange thing, walking out of a narrow hall and stepping into what’s basically an underground colosseum. As Invictis and Frederick step inside behind me, Invictis lights up the arena with his magic, more golden balls of light floating around the circular area. Bigger than a football stadium, built underneath a mountain; I can’t imagine the power creating something like this took. The first high empress really was the OG.

Nothing but dirt so fine it’s like sand on the ground, the stone walls of the mountain surrounding us on all sides and above our heads. We see nothing; no skeletons, no great beast. It’s a large, empty space.

“Well, it seems we are in luck.” No sooner does Frederick say that that the ground starts to tremble beneath our feet. When I glare at Frederick, wordlessly thanking him for jinxing us, he gives me a sheepish look and a nervous laugh. “I’ll, uh, stay back and let you two handle it.” He does pull out his dagger though, just in case.

Invictis and I step forward. The ground shifts, and suddenly something long and slithery erupts from the ground, letting out an otherworldly shriek that makes my ears want to bleed. It pulls itself up, from the dirt, and stretches its body to its full length.

Holy shit. It’s fucking huge.

A snake mixed with a lion. That’s the best way I can describe it. It has a lion’s head, a lion’s strong legs and claws, but the long, thin body of a snake. From head to tail, it’s got to be at least two or three hundred feet long, and when it stands tall, it must be fifty or more feet taller than me.

And, add onto that, it’s made of magic. Its form is ethereal, like it’s not truly here, not a solid creature. Its body shimmers in and out of existence, and yet when it growls and snarls, the sound is so very real.

It might be made out of magic, but I don’t doubt it can pack a punch. A thing like that can easily kill a dozen or more normal soldiers. For the ones who unleashed Invictis twenty years ago, they must’ve thrown everything they had at this magical creature to get past it.

“Holy shit,” I whisper, and right when the words leave my mouth, the magical beast launches itself at Invictis and me. Invictis flashes away, reappearing a good twenty feet to the left, but my reflexes aren’t as good now that I don’t have any magic behind them. I narrowly avoid its first attack by jumping backward, but it’s not far enough.

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