Somewhere in time
The Black Tower loomed before them, jutting out of a rocky outcropping like a cancerous growth on the land. There was nothing but leagues and leagues of barren, empty, nothing as far the eye could see, save the Tower. They had no food and very little water.
Will we die here? the Hero wondered. Four they were now, forty five had ridden from Tar Guldrim, with provisions and remounts for their spent horses. They passed through many perils, and forty one died bravely, all to bring her to this singular point.
The summoned Hero leaned on her sword, trying to force her raw lungs to inhale enough of the Demon Land's stale putrid air to give her the strength to go on.
They came here by a secret way, a forgotten pass in the eastern mountains, thought to be unguarded. Even as they stole into the Demon Land a great host mustered in the south: the dwarves of the deep places, the elves in their crystal towered cities, and an array of no less than nine princes of men with all their muster, the last alliance of the Free Peoples. The host would menace the Demon Queen's borders and hope to draw her eye while the Hero's party would make a last desperate attempt to slay the great monster herself and bring peace to the land.
Things started going wrong almost immediately. Their horses died and they had to distribute what provisions they could amongst themselves and carry it all on their backs, abandoning everything else. The patrols in the mountains were not as light as expected, and thrice they were ambushed, taking losses each time. Poor Sir Guldrim himself took a poison arrow and they had to put him out of his misery, all the antidotes had to be abandoned with their dead horses in favor of food and water.
They had no news of how the war fared in the south, but seeing as this land was empty, the Hero supposed the Demon Queen's numberless slave legions had marched to meet the host of the last alliance. Would the Demon Queen still be here? Or would she have gone south to lead her armies in person? She hadn't bothered for some time. The Free Peoples were losing. Every year her realm expanded. Soon, all would fall under the shadow.
Gulping her share of the last of the clean water, the Hero's thoughts turned to the past. She was not from this world. Once, she was an ordinary girl who loved anime and manga, especially the stories where a normal person went to a new world and had adventures.
Some adventure, she thought darkly. One moment she was blinded by the headlights of a Rainforest delivery truck, and the next she was in a castle. They put a sword in her hand, trained her, pampered her, made her feel special, and sent her out into the world to solve their problems.
Her years as the Hero had not been easy, but she'd slain many demons, and forged bonds with more wonderful people than a loner like her could have ever imagined, almost all dead now.
All that remained to her were Rickard the Ranger, a stout and world-weary archer of the Green Marches, Vigdis Shimmerstone, a powerful mage and an older sister figure, and Darthaniel.
Darthaniel was a priest of the elven gooddes Elbereth Evervirgin, and had lain his healing hands on her more times they she cared to admit, but fewer than her fantasies. Darthaniel served a virgin goddess, and would lose his powers if he ever laid with a woman, but they had what would have been called an "emotional relationship" back on Earth. The Hero could tell Darthaniel anything, and looking at his kind, impossibly beautiful elven face would always comfort her when her heart was dark and hope seemed far away. One night, camping in the Demon Land, they made a promise to one another. If their quest succeeded and the Demon Queen was slain, Darthaniel would retire from the priesthood and they would marry, assuming they both still lived.
That promise drove her on even now.
"Suppose we just walk up to the front door and ring the bell?" Rickard thought out loud.
They might've laughed at his jape if they weren't now completely out of water.
"I don't see any guards," Vigdis observed, holding up a hand and passing it through the air, "or detect any magical defenses of any kind. Is she truly so confident, or perhaps arrogant to not bother defending her own home?"
"Maybe she's not home," Rickard said hopefully.
"Then our quest is vain," Darthaniel pointed out. "Victory or defeat, today is the last day."
They fell silent at that. This really was the end.
They all looked at her. She was the Hero after all. Only she could slay the Demon Queen, or so the prophecy said.
Drawing her sword, she lead them toward the Dark Tower, but once they got closer they realized there was no door.
"Smooth black stone, closely laid, very fine work actually," Rickard said, running his hand along the wall admiringly. She thought she recalled something about Rickard's father being a mason back in the Green Marches.
"Can you use a spell to get us inside, Vigdis?" the Hero asked.
The kindly dwarf woman hummed in thought. "The wall is quite thick, and black stone is resistant to magic. I'm not sure any spell of mine could blast an entry large enough for us."
The Tower rumbled. Her party leapt back in alarm, taking a defensive formation. The Hero sensed rather than heard a figure land lightly behind them.
"Beggars scratching at my door, is that the way of it?" purred a sonorous voice that was deep for a woman.
They turned immediately. The Demon Queen was there, no guards, no armies, just her.
Beautiful and terrible she was, as tall as a tall man, with skin the color of freshly shed bled, and wings that were webbed and rubbery as a bat's tucked behind her.
Of course her tower doesn't need a door on the ground level. The demon queen can fly! The Hero should've remembered.
"Is this the best the "Free Peoples" can send against me? Soon enough, all shall be free to serve me. I come from a victory in the south. It was kind of you to marshal your forces in one place so I could destroy them all at once!" she said cruelly.
No! She's lying!
Rickard knocked an arrow and shot it right at the Demon Queen's eye quick as a flash, while Vigis began gathering energy in her hands, muttering a long and complicated incantation. Meanwhile, Darthaniel prepared his strongest ward.
The Demon Queen surged forward with flap of her wings and a rush of hot air, batting Rickard's arrow out of the sky with one hand and driving the clawed fingers of the other right through his chest. She threw Rickard's body at Vigdis, and they both crumpled with the violent impact. The monster was right in front of her and-
"No!"
Darthaniel threw up his ward to protect her and the Demon Queen's attack rebounded with a shock wave. The elf was not spared, though. His broken body was flung backwards, making a dent in the Dark Tower.
The Hero stood there frozen. Her last three friends fell in an instant. How could anyone think she was a match for the Demon Queen?
"Ah, so this is the Hero I've heard so much about. What kind of hero let's her party get wiped out without even swinging her sword? It takes more to make a hero than an urchin such as you," she gloated.
Rickard...
Vigdis...
Darthaniel!
The Hero clenched her sword and it blazed with holy light. With a cry of vengeance and hatred she charged the Demon Queen.
The monster smiled and drew a sword of shadow.
They clashed! The shock of the impact rippled down her arm, but her grip held. Taking a firm stance she assailed her unholy foe.
"Ah, so you do know something of swordplay," the Demon Queen complimented. "It's been a while since I've had such fine exercise! Perhaps I'll tarry with you a while longer. Our play is a fine diversion after dealing with those upstarts to the south."
With fury the Hero struck, but the Demon Queen kept taunting her, speaking casually as they exchanged blows. As the battle wore on, she felt her strength ebbing; her sword grew heavy, and she thought she saw boredom in the eyes of the Demon.
A blow she never saw coming struck her face and her legs collapsed beneath her.
"That will suffice, I think," said the Demon Queen casually. "I've taken your measure, and while you are stout for a mortal, you will never be a match for me."
The Demon Queen sounded almost kind, like she was consoling her.
"It was a fair attempt, but now it's time to punish trespassers to my realm and have done with this whole affair." She looked at the ruin of poor Rickard and Vigdis. "These have already been punished adequately it seems."
But wait, Darthaniel was still breathing! The Hero could see it and and the Demon Queen could see that she saw it.
"This one protected you from a killing blow, don't you think you owe it to him to witness your comrade's final moments? I'll give him a quick death for his courage, never fear."
She strode forward casually a raised her sword of shadow.
Something snapped within the Hero. A reserve of power that was her love of Darthaniel launched her like a rocket and she drove the sword of light right through the Demon Queen's heart!
The Demon Queen gasped, and looked at her with eyes that held not pain but surprise and utter disbelief at being felled thus. The Hero dropped her sword, now no longer glowing, and the Demon Queen's corpse fell with it.
Forgetting her exhaustion, the Hero rushed to Darthaniel's side.
"Darthaniel, it's over, we did it!" she embraced him, cradling his head.
Darthaniel smiled at her, but it didn't look like how she expected. The smile looked almost sad.
"What's wrong, Darth? I've seen you heal yourself from worse damage than this."
"Your quest is over, Hero, it's time to go home."
She sensed something off in the way he said 'home'. "Home to your family's crystal tower, right? So we can get married!"
She thought mentioning that would cheer him up but Darthaniel looked even sadder.
Darthaniel exhaled softly. "No, beloved, this is not your world. It's time to go back."
No. No. No! "What do you mean 'go back'? What about our promise? Didn't that mean anything to you?" the Hero asked hysterically.
"I told you what you needed to hear to fulfill your destiny." He cupped her cheek with his long-fingered elven hand. "I'm sorry, Alice. SOUL SEND!"
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Present Day
She was Alice again, but not the first Alice, the Alice that had been mangled under the tires of the delivery truck, but a new Alice with a new life.
The Hero was now Alice Glass, college student, president of the fencing club, and part time waiter at Rattinger's Pizzeria.
She spent a year grieving for her old life, for Rickard and Vigdis and all the others, even for Darthaniel who betrayed her at the end.
Her life became a monotonous routine, going to class, going to work, going to fencing practice (thankfully her sword training in the other other world had some degree of carryover so people weren't too suspicious). There were no adventures, no parties, and no Demon Queens.
She thought this was the same Earth she had come from the first time. It was all just like she remembered, like she never left, until one day she served a party of three at the Ratt.
The party consisted of a chubby woman and a fancily dressed couple that behaved in the most nauseatingly lovey-dovey manner she had ever seen. The woman was strikingly beautiful, and the man, well, could charitably be called average, but that wasn't the main thing she noticed.
It was the smell of ozone and and a feeling of unreality, an out-of-placeness that could be only one thing: magic!
This couple had a magical bond, a deep one. Was this her Earth after all? Or perhaps an alternate one with magic?
Wherever she was, Alice knew that the couple was the key to getting answers.