Chapter 160 The Dungeon Graveyard Pt. 6
We exited the tent and there was Stoney standing there at the mouth of the cave and he was staring in our direction. He was huge! His dragon form dwarved mine, his legs were gigantic as they were solid and built like gigantic rock formations. Imagine a moving island but of nothing but solid stone and rock but with green jutting crystals of emerald like they grew over centuries to form a solid armor over his entire body except the mouth, nose, and eyes.
"Holy shit! He was not that big when I just went inside!" Kitsoma said as she gasped and stepped back with astonishment.
"Yea he grew like that after smiling and glowing a bright green... Do dragons normally have the ability to grow bigger like that Vexsus?" Mara asked as she looked over at me with a serious stare.
"How the hell should I know? I know basically nothing about my own species. I am the worst to ask about this kind of thing! But either way we need to be prepared because it looks like he is headed this way!" I pointed and suddenly an earthquake rocked the ground below our feet as Stoney took a single step in our direction as a loud booming voice echoed across the battlefield.
"HAHAHA LITTLE VEXSUS, WHY DON'T YOU SHOW ME YOUR DRAGON FORM NOW AND WE CAN HAVE A REAL BATTLE? DRAGON VERSUS DRAGON? LIZARIA TOLD US THAT YOU RESISTED HER ADVANCES AND THAT WAS YOUR LAST CHANCE COUSIN! NOW WE WILL DESTROY ALL THAT YOU LOVE AND BRING FORTH OUR MASTER! HAHAHAHA"
I had to press my hands against my ears just from the bass of his voice alone vibrating the air itself and hurting my eardrums. I saw everyone else doing it aswell so I quickly cast a magic circle to try and drown out the noise. It worked but only partially as now a constant ringing was heard and nothing else.
I saw as Kitsoma and Mara were speaking or rather their mouths were moving but I couldn't hear them. I held up my hand to hush them as I added a healing rune to the circle that repaired our bodies and that took away the ringing.
"That's better thank you baby." Mara said as she sighed.
"You ears are bleeding honey. Did you get effected worse than us?" Kitsoma said but I saw as her ears were aswell. I looked and it seemed that almost every one that should have some kind of supernatural or super sense of hearing had been effected and I was wondering if that had been the plan? Were they trying to limit our senses now or was this just a fluke by mere chance?
"I have to go out there and atleast stall for time... You all stay here and figure out a way to weaken him in any way shape or form. If you can cut open a wound than try and throw some poison in there. I don't care and use any means to take him down. He is taken over by a Mindflayer and by the way he is talking... I'm guessing his mind is fully corrupted and we will not be able to save him." I took a step forward but Hannah stopped me by holding onto my arm, I looked down at her with a smile.
"Dad? Are you going to come back?" She asked in a almost hushed tone that threatened to break and it threatened to break me aswell as my heart almost made me stop everything to make sure I stayed by her side this time. I knew that I needed to continue making the choices a Leader would do and hope that I could be the Father she needed afterwards... I gave her a hug and lifter her up.
"I will always come back to you baby girl. You hated me but I still came to see you didn't I? It's because of how much I love you that I will always find my way back to you and will always do what it takes to make sure you see the light of another day.... I won't fail you ever again even if this body is the sacrifice I have to make I will find a new one and come back."
I put her down and wiped her tears with while smiling. I turned and left before she could see the tears falling from my eyes. "I really am too damn soft..." I muttered before I sniffed and put on a serious face and as I got out into an open area I fully transformed once again. But this time I did something different. I knew that my normal size wasn't going to be enough to fight or even a scratch on his armor. So I focused and while transforming I pulled in as much mana as I could and willed my body to continue growing past what I was used to. I reached my normal size and for a minute I stopped growing but I felt as something told me that I could keep going but I just had to push against that wall just a bit harder, I pulled in more mana and infused it throughout my body with more force. I did that for a few minutes and finally like a snap something like a torrent or a floodgate opened and I felt a woosh as my body shot up in height and I started to feel heavier.
I felt a huge surge of pain all over as more bones started to break and a couple spots on both sides of my rib cage on either side burst open like someone had slashed open a huge gash before two arms emerged the same size as my other ones. My body lengthened and a smaller set of wings erupted in a splash of blood from lower down my back. I was now a mix between what a western bulky winged dragon would look like and a lanky eastern dragon would look like. My body was still that purple color with the liquid metal armor covering my entire body but now the tips of my claws and even my wings were lined in what looked like gold and purple trimed tips that were sharp and deadly. I felt a new rush of power like never before as I jumped through the air and felt as the wind embraced me like I was some long lost lover that had just come back from overseas.
"AHA LOOKS LIKE YOU FIGURED IT OUT VEXSUS! YES GOOD! NOW COME AND FIGHT ME!" Stoney roared before starting to lope faster and causing more earthquakes. I quickly shook my head free from the eauphoria of power that this new form brought and rushed towards Stoney and quickly cast a circle at the opening of my mouth as I concentrated my skill Breath of the Sun and shot it out and once it collided with the circle it was like sunlight hit a prism as multiple beams of light flashed out in multiples. Except these beams were more or less directed in Stoneys direction. Some hit him and some hit the army of skeletons and zombies near him and turning them to nothing but dust. The parts of him that the beams hit were melted from the high tempatures of the beams but soon a glow would appear and the liquid would slurp back up and reform the armor like nothing ever happened.
"Hahaha good work cousin. You found the weakness of my armor. But I have found a skill that can cover that weakness." He said but he talked normally so I quickly whipped my head around to look at the others and sure enough they were all on the ground writhing in pain as blood was pouring from their ears. Dammit, he fooled me into thinking his voice in this form was natural but instead he was using a skill this whole time.... does he have an embryo aswell?
I quickly cast a magic circle over them to heal them again but as soon as it was up I got smacked out of the air and sent rolling through the earth like a meteor yet again. This time though the pain was nothing more than a mosquito bite but somehow the force behind it did not lesson an ounce? That was odd. Something had strengthened me to endure the power behind stoneys attackes but yet he could still send me flying like I was a.... well like I was a fly.
I rose up quickly because a felt a presence and as I opened my eyes a saw a giant rocky foot almost closing down on top of me. I raced out from under it and latched onto his leg. I didn't have any idea of what I could do against this armor but I started to draw in mana and started etching runes directly into it. I basically just made it to wear his armor was constantly pumping poison mist into his body and drawing out his stamina.. That was all the only runes that would stay enchanted without exploding in my face after a few minutes of multiple attempts and multiple times of having to dodge his tail from trying to slam into me while he also was casting spikes to try and impale me.
Thankfully I was able to fly away after that and just started peppering his face with spatial bullets to piss him off and soon I saw as a wave of Darkness swept across his legs while destroying a good amount of the army around him. I knew it was the group finally acting and I saw as Kitsoma, Mara and Lula were in the lead along with Vannessa as they had a dark aura around them that increased their speed and also repelled any attacks from nearby monster that had been lucky enough to survive the wave. They got close to Stoneys leg and started attacking at once with excitement and in a frenzy. I smiled as I increased the amount of bullets I shot out and even started to shoot out spatial cannons after every ten bullets. I'm sure if an anime fan was watching it would've looked like some kind of godzilla fight but to me I was just looking at a huge ALMOST indestructible Gator. I could see as the damage from the poison was starting to build up and that adding with the stamina drain and what little damage my wives were doing, He was starting to stumble around. I saw his knees shaking as they struggled to keep up his weight.
I flew down quickly and without a thought picked up the girls and dropped them off at the camp. I saw Necro and waved him over as I quickly morphed back into my normal form. I couldn't exactly hold a normal conversation when my dragon voice was like blasting out power with every syllable now could I?
"Is there a way to save him? What if he has been implanted or had his mind corrupted.. anyway whatsoever?" I asked but Necro just shook his head before speaking.
"An embryo is one thing since an uncorrupted mind is needed for a successful implantation. But if he was seen as unfit to be implanted and only turned into a slave then his mind is not his anymore and he as we once knew him will no longer be there.... I'm sorry Vexsus."
"Dammit!! That fucking Mindflayer! Not like I'm strong enough anyways to kill it but still gods dammit... Fine but this sucks. Just be ready when I finish him off ok. I will need you to protect me while I devour him."
"Ok no proble.... Wait WHAT!?" Necro shouted at me with wide eyes. Lula oooh'd at me and came skipping at me and tugging at my arm with a sweet smile and even a bad attempt at bedroom eyes.
"Vexsus, my darling. If you share that delicious looking meal with me I'll let you do whatever you want with my body." She leaned up and whispered that as I leaned down and whispered back as both of our lips were just barely almost touching and her breath started to quicken.
"Your can't fool me you glutton. Your mine anyways, but yes, can have some." I kissed her and laughed as she huffed but smiled nonetheless as I rosed back up and stared at the still wide eyed Necro. "What?"
"What? What? You just said you were going to devour your cousin! Does that mean anything to you anymore? I mean comeon I know it's been awhile but you have to still have some kind of humanity left inside you right?" He asked but I just shrugged.
"I left most of that behind me. I only care about what I care about, If it's family than I care about that. If it's food that I care about food. If it's an enemy than mmmm oh baby I care about my enemy.... Well anyways only if they mess with my family do they get that special treatment. But I mean just look at that guy. He is huge and full of meat and gems to delicious looking to pass up. If you want them I can have some of my people save some of the body parts for you like the scales and bones and some of the emerald that is growing but the rest we are eating ok? That will make my family grow stronger and that is what is more important... By the way baby girl? Since you are part dragon now, well more specifically you carry MY dragon blood. You should have a partial power to eat and grow stronger just like your siblings.... I didn't think about any of this until just now but my mind is random and I barely know what will pop out an any given moment.... But since your siblings gained my hunger from my Gluttony than I'm guessing that maybe you gained something aswell whenever you transformed?"
Hannah nodded shocked and Necro started to laugh outrageously. "HOLY SHIT!!!! That's why she was having my cooks make so much food so often! Everytime we would eat she was mowing down like ten-twenty plates stacked with meat and veggies and afterwards she was throwing back cakes like they were going out of date. She never packed a pound and I was just wondering where the hell she got it from but now it makes sense HAHAHA! OWWW HONEY STOP I STILL LOVE YOU PLEASE I'M SORRY!" Necro started shouting as Hannah started hitting him with a pillow that she came up to me and calmly asked for all of a sudden. I didn't think anything of it at the moment but I was to busy listening to Necro to pay attention until she started smacking him with it.
I leaned over to Lula and whispered. "If I would've known that, I would've gave her the pillow I used back when me and mara first got together hehe." Lula just looked at me with a gross look before smacking my arm.
"Eww, but that would pretty funny. But can we go eat now?"
I nodded and took her by the hand as I willed my wings to emerged. They did and alongside them came the smaller set that appeared just below them that emerged from just above my hips. I liked the aesthetic of having multiple wing sets and took off towards the dying Stoney. I tossed Lula up in the air as transformed and my armor quickly made a room for her to land on as I zoomed towards Stoney and landed on his back. I started infusing mana into my claws, well I guess now that I had 4 arms I had to quadrupal the amount of mana infusion but afterwards I started to dig a hole into his armor hoping to get to his actual flesh. I was getting hungry and I didn't want to wait till he died to start eating.
His armor was sturdy enough that my claws kept breaking but I just powered through and thanks to my regen powers they healed back in just a few seconds and back to work I went. After some time I finally saw what looked like greyish skin. I got Lula down and I morphed back into my regular form before we both jumped down the hole I made. The hole come to find out was actually about a good 20 seconds worth of air time for a humanoid.... So by the time we landed Lula was screaming her head on while her arms were latched around my neck and suffocating me.
"Lula.... Stop...PLease! I can't.... Breathe!" I choked out before finally dropping her on her ass and gasping for air and choking.
"You should have warned me about this before we jumped you asshole! I would have prepared myself better dammit!" She yelled before she pinched her nose and looked around in disgust. "What in the fuck is that god awful smell?" She asked in a nasally tone.
I looked around as my brain finally registered the smell she was talking about. It smelled rotten down here, I could smell it coming up from the skin itself. I knelt down and touched the skin, it pushed in and made a squelching sound like a overripe fruit full of liquid.
"Well this can't be good? Did I just make a huge poison bomb? Or was he already like this but his scales covered it up? I didn't think the poison would make something this bad but than again I didn't exactly experiment before doing it. I think we are going to have to take a rain check on the meal babe, let's go!" I ran and snatched Lula up and jumped up to fly back out the hole. The flesh from my jump squelched again and caved in from the pressure and I looked down to see nothing but a dark, black hole filled with something wriggling in the darkness.
"Welp... Again, don't like that... Better get out of here before whatever the fuck those things are come out." I said as I turned back around to focus on flying as fast as possible but it was taken away by the sounds of Lula gagging and finally hurling from my arms and behind us like some kind of sick airplane messenger.
After she finished she stayed silent until we landed and she left to go lay down while I filled in the rest as we watched Stoney finally fall down causing a huge earthquake but stop moving for the final time. Necro moved forward while wringing his hands.
"It's about to be a hell of a lot worse if he was filled with what I think he was... Those things eat away at the flesh and absorb the power of those that they eat before bursting forth and rampaging across the land finding a home to cocoon and morph into their adult forms. Think flesh eating beetles but for magical insects Vex." He said as he turned around and looked at me. My face paled and my skin started to crawl as I couldn't help but imagine those things wiggling under my skin. I shuddered a little in disgust.
"So what do we do? Do they have a weakness?"
"Did Stoney have a weakness?"
"Thats gonna be a problem then, are they going to be covered in emerald scale armor aswell or are they going to be covered in chitin insect stuff? Idk how this insect works so I'm just taking pot shots."
"They will most likely be maggot looking.. The powerful ones that we will have to take out first will be the ones that take after the host that they have eaten the most of. If you see any with armor that looks like Stoney then target those first. then take out the others after. If any of those escape then it'll be damn near impossible to find them if they find a place to hide since they can burrow pretty deep and have a unique hiding skill that is damn near impossible to track." Necro turned around just at that moment as Stoney's body bulged slightly for a moment. It was only slightly and only for a second but then it happened again and again.
"It's happening... Get ready."