Chapter 11: Isn’t That Interesting?

Ever since the first howl of whatever abyssal beast that had been, there had been silence. Fortunately, the maze was ready. Stone walls rose around them, standing tall and jagged, blocking the light of the sun and sending long shadows crawling on the floors. The knight who had shaped the earth using his Memory had done a great job. He’d created narrow corridors, tight choke points, and plenty of dead ends. It wasn’t pretty, but it didn’t need to be. It just needed to work. Noah stood just inside the entrance of the maze, flexing his fingers. He could still feel the buzz of energy inside him. The coiled potential of his mana pool humming like a small lake held in his chest. His body felt weightless and heavy all at once. Powerful, yes, but restrained. Like a bow that had been pulled taut, ready to release the arrow. Sir Enzo paced behind the front lines, checking formations. "Maintain your positions. If they break one wall, fall back to the next. Don’t get surrounded." Cillian stood on top of a high outcropping of stone that overlooked the maze, his sword of light in his hands. Arlo sat beside him, dangling his legs off the edge, humming a tune as if they weren’t about to be swarmed by monsters. He was the only one who looked truly relaxed. He grinned like a man who was out for a picnic. "They’re coming." Noah muttered. He didn’t need to say it. Everyone could feel it. The very air was starting to shift, charged with something dark and violent. It felt like someone had added a tint of hatred to the very air and it circulated through them as they breathed deeply, steadying themselves for the fight. Even the sky above them grew a bit darker, the light from the sun growing a bit dimmer. The ground began to tremble. Not the kind of rumble that Noah had previously created nor from an earthquake. This one was as if someone was sending pulses through it designed to weaken the maze. The mist that had been in the gorge before Noah wiped out the Thresher was returning, rolling in fast and pressing against the maze like waves hitting a shoreline. Just as the beasts couldn’t see them behind the walls, they too couldn’t see the beasts behind the mists. Noah narrowed his eyes. The demon was indeed intelligent. Then, the howls came. They were all high pitched, guttural, and primal. And they awakened the fire inside Noah. He wanted to crush them to nothing. "Positions!" Sir Enzo roared. The knights raised their shields, and arrows were notched. They all activated their Memories, waiting for the inevitable tide of monsters. Noah stood tall, waiting. Waiting to dish out death. The beasts emerged from the mist like living nightmares. Massive, wolf-like things with blackened spines, three eyed hulking brutes with tusks too large for their mouths, and serpentine creatures that slithered along the tops of the walls. All of them wreathed in the mist, and all of them, snarling or hissing with hunger. They charged. The maze held. For the first few minutes, it was chaos, but organized chaos. The beasts funneled into the corridors, and the knights struck hard. Noah leapt into the fray, grabbing one of the tusked brutes by the throat and slamming it into a wall with enough force to crack the stone. The wall buckled. "Don’t destroy the walls!" Enzo yelled from where he fought. "Let them advance through the maze!" He kept fighting, his only acknowledgment of the yell was to tear the throat out of one of the wolf-like beasts as it lunged at him. The group of knights slowly retreated down the wide corridors of the maze as they fought and while it burned the part of him that was a dragon to do so, he retreated with them, fighting as he went. For him, this wasn’t a battle of strength. It was a battle of wits. If he were alone, he would be long dead. So, he had to fight with the group or risk being surrounded. He snapped a snake out of the air, tearing it to shreds and painting the floor and walls with blood. He was at the head of the group, killing as he baited more beasts into the corridor, retreating step by step, drawing them into a line. "Now!" Enzo yelled and Noah punched the wall. The stone exploded outward, before the upper part of it collapsed inwards, controlled by the knight that had created the maze. With a loud crash, the stone crushed the beasts beneath it to paste. "Next phase!" Enzo yelled again as the beasts began to pour through the broken walls. The knights retreated deeper into the maze, but Noah moved slower, standing his ground. He kept picking up chunks of the destroyed wall, hurling it at the attacking beasts and pulping their skulls. Arlo whooped from above as he danced at the top of the maze, fending off the flying beasts with ease. "Now you’re thinking like a dragon!" Noah kept fighting, but the more he fought, the more wrong it felt. He slowed as he caught his breath. The beasts were... gone. He frowned, straining his ears. It was as if the mist was whispering. He could hear things moving, but not attacking. Then, all of a sudden, a large section of the maze exploded. The beasts surged in through the new hole, taking the knights by surprise. One of the knights suddenly screamed as one of the serpent like beasts dropped from above, crushing him. Another knight rushed to help, only to be dragged away by two more wolf creatures that came out of nowhere. The beasts raged through the maze, navigating it, circling and flanking them. Noah watched with narrowed eyes as they moved away from him, not coming down his part of the maze. Enzo bellowed orders. The lines were breaking. Beasts were coming from behind, some climbing over the walls of the maze. With a snarl, Noah sprinted through the maze, intercepting a pack of smaller beasts that had broken through the side. He slammed one into the ground, kicked another into a wall, then spun and ducked under the claws of the third. They were adapting to him too. From above, Cillian raised his sword, and a beam of light burst from it, slicing clean through the mist and taking down a dozen beasts in a single pass. His aim was perfect, and the light of the attack lit up the entire gorge for a moment. But still, they kept coming. "Cillian!" Noah shouted, leaping over a wall to join the high ground. "They’re not attacking randomly. They’re coordinated." Cillian nodded grimly. "I see it." "The demon’s guiding them." Arlo whistled as he strolled over. "Good thing we’ve got overwhelming strength on our side. "Watch and learn, Noah." With a grin, he stretched his hand and snapped a finger. The whole maze began to reverse in time. The walls that had been destroyed and broken began fixing themselves, plugging the holes the beasts had made and the places that had been destroyed. "Go forth and destroy." He grinned. "With pleasure." Noah mirrored his grin and dropped back into the maze. He tore through the maze, killing every beast he laid eyes on. But it still didn’t stop the tide. More knights fell, their screams echoing off the walls. Noah turned a corner and skidded to a stop. One of the wolf beasts stood in his path, but it didn’t attack. It tilted its head, watching him. Then it turned and ran. Noah followed. He moved faster than before, using the walls as springboards as he chased the monster through the maze. It moved faster than he did, always just out of reach as it led him through the maze. Finally, he turned a corner and froze. The mist parted. Standing there, on the far side of the clearing, was a figure. Human. Or at least, it looked human. Tall. Slender. Dressed like a rich noble. Its face was pale and flawless. Eyes black as the Abyss. It stood calmly with hands behind its back. Noah felt a chill crawl up his spine. This being wasn’t like the beasts. It was thoughtful. Intelligent. Deadly. And the dragon within him roared in challenge, standing his ground. The figure looked at him, tilting its head slightly. "Interesting." The voice was smooth, unhurried, and curious. It didn’t yell. It didn’t snarl. It simply... observed. And then the figure vanished. The mist closed in again. Noah stood there, breath caught in his throat, energy surging through every cell in his body. That hadn’t been a beast. That was something else. Something worse. A demon.