Darkness and Hellfire

Chapter 57 Pile Them There In The Corner.

About a block away from the gate to leave Lenna asked a question. “Did you want to fight him?”

“Kinda, not really, I don’t know.” Isaac replied with a sigh. “I like fighting, I really do, and it made me want to fight him just for the rush of it. The real problem is that I know he is better than me with the sword so I’d end up using magic and at that point he’d probably just end up dying.”

“Most duels end in death. Not always on purpose.” Lenna told him.

“He doesn’t deserve to die just because I wanna fight.” Isaac said and sighed again. “I don’t take pleasure in killing, only fighting, but only really know how to kill.”

“I’m sorry.” Lenna replied.

“Huh?” Isaac asked. “Why?”

“You killed three people because of me. I should have told you to let me handle them.” She explained.

“No.” Isaac replied with stone in his voice. “They were different. They deserved it. I may not take pleasure in it but don’t confuse that with sorrow or pain. It’s more like complete apathy.”

“Most wouldn’t feel that way. Have you killed mortals in the past?” She asked.

He shook his head. “Not that I remember.”

—

Leaving was much easier than entering. The guards asked for their names and how long they thought that they would be away for. Afterwards they sent a messenger, probably to the duke, and then bid them a good hunt. All in all it was a perfectly neutral exchange. Just the way Lenna liked it. Quiet and nonviolent. She was tired of causing trouble, but most importantly to her, she didn’t want to put Isaac in any danger.

The two of them headed into the spider tunnels and stopped a few feet inside. “Let’s clear a small space a bit away from the entrance where nobody will stumble across.” Isaac told her.

“Alright.” Lenna acknowledged and went to work. They took one of the side tunnels and she torched any webbing in the way. The spiders were each about five feet across here. If there were no webs in the way Isaac would disappear, go up next to them, then chop down hard right behind their head. He did this to try to keep as many of the spiders’ valuable parts intact. He put the heads in his Inventory and Lenna would tie the body to her rope.

Half an hour and six spiders in Isaac stopped. “Think this is far enough?” He asked.

“For what?” Lenna responded.

“I wanna mess with the dragon skull again but I don’t want anybody to feel it.” He told her.

Lenna turned and looked behind them. She had been keeping track of their position fine so far. “Let’s head a bit deeper.” She replied.

After about ten more minutes and only one spider Lenna nodded to Isaac. “Here should be okay.” She told him.

“Alright.” Isaac replied and sat cross legged in the bend of the tunnel. “I don’t know how the spiders will react.” He told her.

Lenna smirked under her helmet and glanced sideways at Isaac. “I’ll take care of them.”

Isaac smiled in reply and pulled Kahtesh’s skull out of his shadow. It was just as he had left it. There were a few vertebrae attached and it was thicker than it had been when he first got it. He closed his eyes and poured mana into it. The skeleton drank it up. Isaac kept his eyes closed because he wanted to make sure to cut off his mana before he ran out and it was easier to sense if he wasn’t distracted by whatever was happening in front of him.

Lenna watched as Isaac’s dark mana regrew bone after bone. Once each vertebrae was finished it would start to grow bony plates that wrapped around to the where the front of the dragon’s throat would be. They would then get thicker and scale imprints would become visible. It was as if the bone was trying to become the dragon that it used to be but it couldn’t produce flesh. Once the neck finished Lenna heard the tapping of spider legs heading their way.

Lenna turned to face the spiders that were coming to investigate. She had only killed four by the time Isaac had almost bottomed out his mana pool and opened his eyes. What he saw was Kahtesh’s head down to his shoulders regrown in bone and held together by dark mana that seemed to work as cartilage. He looked up just as Lenna asked a question. “Out of mana or finished?” She asked while spitting a spider in two.

“Out of mana.” Isaac replied.

“We should move.” Lenna told him.

Isaac got to his feet and returned the growing skeleton to his shadowy closet. “Let’s head back. There is a limit to how many spiders we can bring back in one trip.”

“Understood.” Lenna replied and split another spider with her sword.

The trip out was a lot less combat intensive than the trip in. By the time they left the spider tunnels Isaac had to drag two spiders behind him and had eight heads in his Inventory. Lenna was dragging a train of another eleven corpses, some of them in halves, that were each tied to one long rope.

“I’m glad these are light enough for you to do that but I feel bad with only two of them.” Isaac told her as they continued their trek back to town.

“They only weigh fifteen pounds or so. Less without their blood.” She explained. The real problem was getting them out of the tunnels as they kept getting caught on the corners. Lenna had her end of the rope wrapped around her arm a few times and gripped in one hand as they walked. Isaac had his rope looped around his open hand and elbow to shorten it.

“Fair enough. You think they will let us just drag monster corpses through town?” Isaac asked.

Lenna shrugged. “We’ll find out soon.” She told him.

The short answer to Isaac’s question was a solid ‘kind of’. The guard actually had a small cart that could be used to bring monster corpses to the Guild Hall, sitting behind the wall to help keep the blood and guts from smearing across the streets. The only condition for using it was to bring it back. It reeked.

It only took a few minutes to load all the spider corpses onto the cart and Lenna moved to pull it. “Nope.” Isaac said, stopping her. “We each grab a side.”

“Why? I can get it myself.” Lenna told him.

Isaac grabbed the side of the cart and lifted it so the support was no longer resting on the ground. “I don’t feel like dragging it the whole way there myself but I’d also feel bad for making you do it. This way is both less work and doesn’t make me feel like a spoiled child.” Isaac explained.

Lenna just stared at him for a moment before shaking her head. “You confuse me.” She told him and grabbed the other side of the cart.

Isaac shrugged. “I confuse everyone. It’s part of the charm.” He said matter of fact.

The two of them stopped in front of the Guild Hall a few minutes later. “I’ll wait here.” Lenna told him.

Isaac nodded. “Just stand there menacingly and hopefully nobody will try anything.” He told her and headed inside.

Isaac walked in and asked Alice where he should leave the spider corpses. She told him that they should go down the alley next to the guild hall and that there was a place to unload them there. While that was happening Lenna did as she was told. A few people gave her curious looks but no one would go within fifteen feet of her once she shifted to look at them.

The pair pulled the cart around to the back where they saw a large pair of thick double doors. Alice opened it with a click and they felt unseen magic dissipate. “What kind was that?” Isaac asked Lenna, referring to the no longer present ward.

“Probably an alarm. Maybe a magic lock. Could be both.” She told him.

Alice looked at the cart. “You’ve been busy. Keep it up and maybe one day we can get rid of them all for good.”

“That might not be a good idea.” Lenna replied.

Isaac tilted his head. “Are they keeping something out?”

Lenna shrugged. “Everything is keeping something out.”

Isaac thought about it. It was the nature of everything to want to thrive and that usually entailed expansion. What she said made sense. “Fair enough.” He replied.

“Just pile them there in the corner.” Alice told them and gestured to an empty space off to the side.

Isaac covered his arms in shadows from his fingertips to his elbows. “Okay.” He replied. He and Lenna unloaded all the spiders and piled them in the corner. He then took each of the heads out of his Inventory and put them on top. “How much?” He asked Alice.

Alice was staring at him for a long moment before the question registered. “Uh, um, I’ll have to check over it all. You can wait in the hall and I’ll be over in a few minutes.” She replied.

“Sounds good.” He said and gestured for Lenna to follow. “Let’s return the cart.”