Chapter 88: The Grave of Dreams VII

  “I don’t think we will find anything else in this area.” Carlos said and kicked a pile of ruble. They had spent most of the day looking for more interesting buildings and besides another shelter (which they marked on their map) nothing had come up. “Do we go up again to use the “highway”. Or do we try and go down one of the smaller stairs to a deeper level?” Kou asked into the raid channel. A discussion followed that ended with the decision to go down another level. “We still have enough provisions to search for another day before we should go back. The “highway” level does not feel very safe, so let’s go down.” Rita summarized the conclusion for anybody who did not listen to the whole thing.

  They found one of the smaller staircases but it was broken. Half an hour of walking later, they found another small staircase but it was buried under a collapsed building and they decided to try their luck with the larger connections in the open space. The raid followed the, by now well known, patterns of hallways towards the open space in the middle of the construct. Once they reached the inside area they moved as fast as they could and five minutes later they descended one of the big staircases and entered a new level.

  The new area looked like a mix between residential and special purpose buildings. Overall it had the same spacious feeling as the posh area above, wide hallways, larger buildings and in general more ornaments. On the other hand, they found more and more areas completely collapsed and they started to suspect the further down they came the less of the structure was intact. Observing this Marcus said “It would make sense. Deeper down means more pressure from above means faster decay over time. It is possible that the lowest parts are completely collapsed by now.”

  They passed by a small plaza with a statue in the middle, it was surprisingly intact. It showed a man in a uniform and a large bladed weapon next to him “A hero of some kind, I would guess.” Kou said and made some pictures. “Do you think he was a class holder?” Marcus asked the people around him. “I would bet on it.” Alistair said and gave the forgotten hero a small salute. Marcus looked at the faceless statue and wondered if some time in the future aliens would walk the Earth and find a half broken statue of Kim. “In memory of our great hero. Defender of mankind, light of our hope.” He whispered to himself and regretted it. It was a depressing thought.

  They left the nameless hero behind and moved down the next major hallway. Marcus was still in thoughts as Janette suddenly stopped. He saw her body go stiff and his danger sense jumped to red alert. “RUN!” Janette shouted and started to run into the direction they had come from.

  Everybody started running and Janette shouted “It is behind us, a giant monster! We need space to fight!” As she shouted Marcus could hear loud noises from the other direction and it was not hard to imagine, that something massive was rushing down dark hallways.

  They made it back to the plaza and spread out. “What is it?” Rita wanted to know from Janette but she shook her head. Seconds later the thing burst out of the hallway, roaring and swinging massive weapons around it. The lights of the raid illuminated the giant thing, another modified monster.

  It was huge, at least six meter high and heavy too. What ever legs it might have had before, had been removed with some kind of metal frame and four massive claw like metal legs that stomped and carved their way through the broken environment. The body of the monster was covered in thick scales and armor plating and its two muscular arms had metal claws. Each claw held a massive glaive with over four meter length, it swung them around as if they were made out of cardboard, but each move made a terrifying sound in the air. The upper half of the monster’s head had been replaced with a metal dome, even the eyes were gone. Only the large reptile like jaws with deadly teeth were left.

  “How does it see?” Achara shouted running away from the monster. “Don’t know, don’t care. STAY AWAY from those blades!” Rita screamed. Heavy weapons together with metal fragments hammered into the beast while the melee combatants stayed back. Even Marcus was not sure he would survive even one swing of those glaives. The blades moved through the air like the reapers’ own scythe and Carlos dragged Rita out of the way just in the nick of time. The glaives left sparks, at the point Rita just stood. “We need to slow it down! Kou hinder it. Hammond we need Draculi. Alistair Blood Boil and if you can manage Blood Domination. Anything to slow it down.” Rita gave orders and seconds later the monster did act slower. We have a chance, Marcus realized. Our raid has a lot of good tools against a singular strong enemy like this, he thought. But we don’t have enough ranged firepower.

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  The machine guns, metal fragments and the occasional grenade did barely scratch the massive monster, and it was only a matter of time before somebody would get cut into pieces. Marcus ran around the monster and tried to approach it from the back but it near instantly turned and the glaive came his way, only to miss by centimeters. It was moving slower, but it was not enough! They needed an opening to get the melee fighter into battle, Marcus thought.

  In that moment the large monster growled and opened its maw wide “FIRE!” Marcus shouted more out of instinct than rational thought. Four people were in the danger area. Carlos moved away in blinding speed, Rita held on to a fragment and escaped, Kou floated away and Achara… was in the middle of it. Blinding light erupted from the maw and a flood bright burning plasma engulfed the area and Achara. For two seconds the ruins were illuminated by a miniature sun until the monster closed its maw again and darkness returned “ACHARA!” Kou screamed. Marcus could not see her, his eyes were still blinded by the bright light. “I’m fine. But that was so scary.” Her voice came over com and she showed up 30 meter from her previous position. “Don’t stand still!” Alistair reminded everybody.

  Marcus made a decision. “I have a plan to get rid of one of the weapons, but I will be out for some time after it.” He said over com and Janette cursed his name. “Hammond I need Bert and Kou you need to get me out of trouble afterwards.” Everybody followed along, “Keep on weakening it!” Marcus shouted and moved to the far left of the monster and waited for an opportunity. He need a downward swing. He watched the monster swing his deadly implement around and when it raised it again Marcus ran right into range.

  The monster’s head swung around in an instant and the heavy blade came rushing down. Marcus planted his feet, put Carapace to max and crossed his arms in the path of the glaive. The eon old metal crushed into him cutting through his arms, chopping both them off at his forearms. Slowed but not stopped, the edge bit into his shoulder cut his bones and sliced open his torso nearly down to his heart, where it stopped.

  The hit had been worse than Marcus had hoped but the feedback from Carapace moved through the ancient weapon and it tore apart and splintered into a thousand pieces. Marcus did not see it happening as he was falling over with his consciousness extinguished.

  When he opened his eyes again he was a lot farther away from the monster than before. Candis was next to him looking at him with a sad smile “I would heal you if there was still something left to heal.” Marcus blinked a few times and then got back on his feet “Marcus is back up again.” Candis informed everybody over com. Marcus watched the rest of the fight play out.

  The monster was immobile now, two of his legs had been cut off, most likely Grace’s work. The other glaive was on the ground too, the arm that held it before was only a stump. He watched as Rita created a circular saw blade (a ring of sharp edges) and slowly cut through the thick neck of the monster. It unleashed its devastating plasma attack once more but nobody stood in range. Eventually the head came off and fell to the ground with a fleshy sound. Cheering from many throats followed and then they all came running.

  Janette hugged Marcus and the rest of his clan followed suit. “You moron, that is not a plan, that is just you hoping not to get killed.” Kou ranted but he had a smile on his face. “It worked!” Marcus said. “It sure did, once one glaive was out of order it was easy enough to cut the legs and the other weapon alone was not that dangerous. Rita and Carlos took care of it. The rest you have seen.” Grace said. Rita stepped close to Marcus and took his hands into hers. She stared at them and at the massive rip in his chest armor. “How is that possible. I saw you lose both arms. And yet…” the rest of the Cromwell group inspected his body with awe.

  “I thought you had miscalculated when I saw the damage.” Alistair said. “To be able to come back from these wounds in such a short time. This is beyond broken.” Carlos said and laughed. They celebrated their victory with a large bottle of water and counted their level ups. Most, who were close to the kill, got four level ups, while Grace got three and the high leveler only got two. Marcus had been further away and got three, still.

  Rita was making pictures and scanned the corpse with the scouter to ensure the knowledge about the monster was not lost. “I doubt that thing is worth looting but at least we have avenged the other raid group.” Marcus said a bit later while he looked at the giant corpse. “IF that was the only one of those things.” Kou pointed out and Alistair agreed. “To be honest we got a bit lucky and this strategy does not seem to be very reliable in my eyes. It was a powerful monster indeed.”

  “I think we should go back.” Rita said to Alistair, who nodded after a few seconds. “You are right, we have pushed our luck and nearly payed for it. We have gained several great treasures and also a good amount of crests. We should make our way back home.” The old man said and the news was spread over com.

  After an hour of rest they made their way up to the surface, which took them half a day. Janette made jokes about Marcus’ arms and implicated they looked a bit shorter now. He let her have her fun, understanding this was her way of coping with him getting cut apart. Maybe there has been a better strategy, one less risky and less painful. But in the middle of battle, where every second one of your teammates could get killed, action was sometimes more important than the perfect plan. At least this was what Marcus told Janette.

  They met another group of Maken and small swarm of Hellbats attacked them on the way up but they were never in real danger. On the plus side it was enough EXP for Marcus to get another Crest together with Grace who had been working hard all the time. After several days, they returned to the surface, to the thick red dust, the heat and the harsh winds. Entering the bus after several days gone, felt like heaven and the drive back felt relaxing, as Janette was not allowed near the wheel. Once they would get to Earth a lot of work was waiting for them still, but for now Marcus leaned back in his chair and listened to his music.