Forty Seven
Umbra and Marin, The Lava Fields
The towering coliseum of the Demon Lord of rage, Iblis was on the horizon long before Umbra & Marin arrived in chains, dragged behind the squadron of Molten Core bandits.
A large castle door led below the arena, Umbra's anxiety grew with each rattling step down the massive stairwell.
Marin noticed bloodied handprints, claw marks and torn nails on the stone walls either side.
Where are they taking us? Umbra projected his question into Marin's mind.
She had been practicing maleficae thought-intrusion magic, guided by Umbra during their passionate night alone in the low slope inn.
I'm not sure, this looks dangerous. Should we try to break the restraints and escape?
Umbra check his shackles, magic dampening runes were etched into them. Escaping them with magic would be impossible.
Umbra shook his head. These are the best equipped bandits I have ever seen.
The stairs led into a chamber resembling a beast pen. Cages were stacked everywhere, filled with dangerous beasts and starved prisoners. An ashen rhino snarled at them as they were dragged past its cage.
A fair-sized wyvern huffed as they passed. Its jaws were clamped shut & its claws bound, leaving it helpless.
Umbra gagged as he passed a caged pack of massive Amorok wolves eating a dead prisoner hungrily.
"Here are your new neighbors. Be friendly now," a snarky goblin beast handler remarked, cracked its whip at Marin & Umbra as they passed.
The troop forced the two heroes into a cage.
Umbra growled in frustration as he saw the cage was designed to be magic proof just like the shackles.
Shoved roughly by a sneering troll beast handler, Marin tripped into Umbra's shackled arms.
Umbra noticed several gears lining the chamber roof and gaps between the tiles. Pulley systems were attached to the cages to hoist them upwards.
"We are below the arena," a tired ogre in the next cage explained. He reached through the bars to offer his hand, Marin reluctantly shook it.
"Nice to meet you," she looked at the ogre's body tattoos and loincloth. "You're a clan warrior, aren't you?"
The bruised and beaten ogre nodded his bald head, revealing his jaw tusks had been sawn off.
"I am Temperfist, chieftain of The Stone Heart Ogres." he sighed in defeat.
"Not that the title means anything anymore. That demon bastard fed my people to a borer worm months ago." he tightened his fist, eagerly wanting to choke the life out of Iblis, but he was now just a tool of entertainment.
Marin glanced over to see a dead slayer in another cage being eaten by a Mire Beast. Iblis had captured beasts from all across Turbulus it seemed.
"What does he want from us?" Umbra inquired.
"Simple. He wants us to kill each other," Temperfist growled. "I've already been forced to kill my brother in the arena."
"Will you kill us, ogre?" Umbra inquired, his face tensed in anger.
Temperfist grunted. "One of us will die a warrior's death."
"Look lively, scum!" the jailer pounded his hammer on the cages.
"You two!" he pointed at Umbra and Marin. "You go first." he cranked the handle next their cage as it raised towards the stone ceiling as it parted way for them.
They were raised into a mighty sandy arena betwixt two granite columns into the open air of a roofless carved stone stadium.
A troll beast handler strolled up to them to remove their chains before scampering off.
A goblin armorer handed the two hero's wooden swords.
Umbra snatched the sword and promptly stabbed through the goblin's neck. "Thanks, I guess," he remarked as he twisted the sword to kill the runt.
Applause rang out through the coliseum.
Marin glanced around, countless seated goblins, trolls, satyrs, lesser demons and more applauded loudly, cheering at the bloodshed.
A massive Demon Lord with magma-veined skin roared from his private overlook. "Attention, slaves. Now put on a good show & a glorious death!" Demon Lord Iblis announced to begin the first round.
Another platform was rising from the pens below, their first challengers- a crazed cluster of starved dworgs darted towards them the second they were able.
Marin & Umbra stood back-to-back as the brainless beasts surrounded them, snapping and snarling at each other, frothing at the mouth.
Umbra pointed to the biggest one, making a mocking gesture. The enraged beast lunged towards Umbra, cleanly beheaded by the battle-hardened maleficus.
Marin with a sweeping gesture let loose a wave of sharpened ice, skewering most of the dworgs.
The few remaining leapt over the icy barrier and lunged at Marin.
Umbra launched a bolt of blue fire, immolating two of them outright. Their blackened, sizzling remains collapsed in a heap.
Marin dodged the final beast, cleaving it across the spine and finishing it with a stab to the heart.
Iblis watched with satisfaction far above & grinned devilishly as the audience erupted with applause.
"Round Two!" the restless Demon Lord boomed.
Stepping away from the lifeless dworgs, Marin & Umbra regrouped by one of the columns. Two platforms rose from below.
One was a massive frost mammoth, delirious from the heat & the other a putrid Flesh Golem oozing from its shabby stitch craft.
The frost mammoth charged at them shaking the sandy ground as it tried to trample them.
The two heroes dove out of the way, casting bolts of sorcery at the hulking beast's legs.
The half-starved and heat-stricken mammoth didn't require much to topple it as Umbra hurled his sword into the beast's sunken eyes.
Marin ran at it, using its tusk as a stepping stone launched herself like an arrow, skewering the other eye with her wooden sword.
Her sword broke off in the defeated mammoth and it collapsed to the floor, shaking the whole arena with its weight.
Umbra called his cracked wooden sword to his hand, while Marin returned with only a shattered stump of a sword.
The pulsating and crudely-stitched amalgamation of assorted flesh and sinew trudged forward, it's misshapen bones cracking as it moved.
The singular bulging eye on its shoulder was fixed on Umbra. It roared, horribly spewing bile.
Umbra unleashed a rush of shadowy tendrils that wrapped around the fiend enveloping it. With a snap of his wrist the shadowy blanket got tighter around the monster.
But the monster unleashed its strength in a burst that shattered its shadowy bindings. Sharpened bones emerged from its gruesome arms.
"Be careful, those look dangerous!" Marin called over as she channeled a spell of healing, clear sparkling mana danced through her fingers while she concentrated on rejuvenating Umbra.
Umbra lunged at the beast augmenting his wooden sword with shadowy magic. With an upwards slice, severed one of the flesh golem's arms.
It wriggled limply on the ground before melting into corrosive ooze.
The beast flung its boney shards at Umbra missing him entirely. Umbra, with a blast of fire launched an explosive volley into the severed wound of the monster. With an eruption of sinew and gore the fire detonated in a blue explosion.
"We did it!" Umbra exclaimed. He brushed stray dangling refuse off his shoulder.
He turned to Marin, his smile gone.
A large shard of bone had pierced Marin's chest protruding from behind. An ever-widening crimson puddle was forming below her.
Umbra raced over to his fallen friend trying to support her head.
But she hung lifeless, Umbra couldn't feel her heartbeat either.
Applause erupted from the crowd, as the minions of Demon Lord Iblis reveled in the death.
"Another pitiful human slain. How long will you last, Maleficus?" Iblis bellowed, leaning forward on his perch.
"You hide behind your monsters. If you had any balls, you would fight me yourself, coward!" Umbra bellowed.
The stunned silence of the audience allowed 'coward' to echo around the coliseum.
The spectators in tense silence stared up at Iblis.
Umbra's eyes wandered over the crowd, the reptilian gaze of Belphagor fell upon him. The demon projected a clock ticking noise into Umbra's mind.
Umbra knew he wouldn't be walking out of the coliseum alive, but he had a last gambit.
"I will end you!"
Iblis fumed, his breath expelled cinders that danced over his ram's horns.
With an enraged roar the Demon Lord leapt from the dizzying height above, landing like a meteor onto the arena floor.
The columns cracked and toppled, stirring up the sands.
Through gritted fangs the Demon Lord issued his will. "Nobody calls me a coward!" Here in my grand coliseum among my adoring fans, I will rip you apart!" he raised his arms to the joyous applause of the fiendish audience.
Umbra didn't back down, marching up to the snarling demon he simply smirked.
Iblis dragged a foot on the ground. He charged like a crazed bull at his prey with the force of a crashing boulder.
Despite his injuries and fatigue, along with the oppressing heat, Umbra was able to sidestep the demon lord.
Amping up his mockery, Umbra crossed his arms and yawned.
Iblis was furious now, he leapt and his foe landing with his cloven hooves onto Umbra, but once again he missed.