Drip-Fed

Dungeons were always places of danger, but it was a benevolent danger. The gods did not coddle their descendants. It would have been a crime on a cosmic scale to do so to an entire species – entire worlds – what an overprotective parent might do to the development of one offspring. Thus, dungeons were lethal, increasingly so with higher Levels, yet had that positive undercurrent. Every monster killed, every challenge beaten, was done under the idea that they believed in the ascension of those that had come after.

Such implicit faith was absent in the walls of a Dungeon hijacked by Parasytes.

The silence was oppressive. Where mana should have flowed, made the walls lightly thrum, there was only silence. Corpses were scattered all about. The monsters of the Dungeon had died in various stages of reduction. As the mechanisms to spawn and sustain monsters had shut down, they had simply wilted away. Their minds were not designed to cope with a change in their environment.

No flies touched the corpses; no plants buried their roots into them. They were simply left there, drying out, deer-like monsters with sharp teeth and clawed front legs. They were mounds of grizzly detail in a world disgustingly undetailed. The corridors that had gone through the earth and the underground forests contained in the chambers of the dungeon were all dominated by smooth surfaces.

The air was suffused with the odour of ‘tree’ and ‘dirt’. It was a pleasant smell to most people under most circumstances, but down there, in the stale air of the infested Dungeon, it was concentrated and reduced to an unnerving quintessence.

Apexus marched ahead, casually splattering the innards of another Shapeform with a sideways punch. The four-legged thing’s head, a bulbous thing at the top of a brown stalk, exploded from the raw physical force.

They had initially been concerned about the strength of Dungeon Shapeforms. That worry had been unfounded. What few had survived in the transitioning period between the Black Root’s manifestation in the mana supply of the dungeon had not been elevated. Indeed, they were even weaker than the animals outside. What power they had came from a mana they had been sapped of.

What remained was the labyrinth. Fortunately, the Dungeon was small. It once had been, as was common with those placed near the Stem, made for beginners.

“Hey there, slowpokes.” Reysha revealed herself out of stealth. “Found the Parasyte as the boss room.”

“Don’t you mean: in the boss room?” Aclysia asked, her correction tinged with worry.

“Nope.”

The redhead guided them down the path she had scouted. At the end lay the Black Stem.

Veins of void had consumed the walls of the Boss Room, covering it all in a mesh of fibres neither plant nor flesh nor fungus. What had been wood had been cracked open, the silver of Omniverse spilling like sap into a central pool, nourishing the complete darkness that was the first Black Root on the Leaf. It drew sustenance from the mana, spreading it as perverse branches into the soil above. It was neither the origin nor the end of the true Infestation on the Branch above, yet it served as an important middle point in that anti-life network.

A multitude of bodies were embedded in the walls. Most were respawns of the boss monster, a hybrid between stag and man, that had now been reduced to a ghoulish ornament. Tendrils squirmed in empty eye sockets as flesh was digested into nothingness. Some of the corpses in the wall, however, were people. Adventurers that had not known or not heeded the warnings that the Infestation had spread to this Leaf.

It was difficult to make out any details besides those islands of undigested matter. In the service of their task to make matter into nothing, Parasytes became physical enough that they reflected light, but it was strange and withheld. Though there was motion, though the petals of the toothed flowers shifted, the blackness was oppressive and the edges not always clear.

The Parasyte knew that they were there. The members of the Inevitable party felt it in a shifting of the world. An invisible eye was upon them. Yet, this greater Parasyte did not act. It was in a state of victory. It had no need to change anything. If the party continued to stand there, they would eventually fall with this wilting Leaf.

The party knew this as well. They hesitated only because of the danger they were about to head into. Before them was an opponent that was camouflaged by itself, with a heart that hurt to touch and that would give them no signs of pain. They would fight in complete silence against an eldritch abomination that would devour their souls if they failed. All that separated them from that risk was the threshold.

It was no surprise that few ever engaged in the risk they now took.

“I will attempt to break the Root,” Apexus shared the battle plan, eyes locked on the only truly black part of the room. Once that central pillar was undone, so was the greater Parasyte that had melded with it. “Cover me.”

With that simple strategy in their minds, the party charged into the room.

The greater Parasyte closed the way behind them with a mesh of its tendrils. The artificial light of the Dungeon dimmed, the trap sprung. Anticipating that move, Aclysia had already summoned an Ilumni orb, filling the chamber with a warm, golden radiance.

Apexus’ foot landed on the protruding arm bone of a dead boss monster. He had reckoned that it would be better to step upon what was physical than the layer of corruption. The incorrect assumption was to think of the two as different.

Tendrils of Parasyte-matter within the corpse coiled. No life was brought to the soulless carcass, no form of even minor undeath. No, like the Leaf itself, the corpse’s body had been hijacked completely, its nervous system filled with void and hijacked as a puppet for the undoing purpose.

The arm grasped Apexus. For the first time since absorbing the mana of the Omniverse, he felt a grasp that he could not easily escape. He tilted forwards, anchored mid-motion.

Korith’s hammer came down on the abomination’s arm, turning bones to splinters and dust. Apexus’s hands met the ground, but his foot was now free and he executed a nimble flip forward. His palms burned, the surface layer of skin starting to disappear where it met the void parasite.

The corpses all around the room emerged from their embedded state. Dried-up husks of people and boss monsters shambled forwards, each connected with a dark cord to the walls. The room itself came alive, thorned tendrils whipping down on the party as they attempted to advance. Everything, even the bones, moved in complete silence.

“DUCK!” Reysha shouted.

Apexus followed the command, Korith did not, Aclysia flew up instead. A wave of energy cut through the room, the Overplayed Spellslicer causing a rain of separated tendrils. More sprouted in their place, but that took time. Time that Apexus used to charge forwards.

Korith took a Treasure Leap, flying past her leader at a rapid speed, only for her body to serve as a living wall between herself and the abominable wendigo that had come for Apexus’ left flank. Impossibly, her body remained anchored midair while her plated forearm took the impact from the claw – Steadfast, improved by improvisation.

The parasitised monster went for another swing. Korith dropped, gravity once more applying to her. Striking swiftly, she reinforced the points of her claws and the scales of her hand. A swipe had her carve through the dried midriff of the monster, rush through the black blood replacing its organs and break through the spinal column. With it, she separated the controlling cord.

The puppeteered corpse collapsed. New void matter rushed towards it to knit the gaps and bring it back into the fight. Korith did not have the luxury to focus on it. She whirled around, her hammer coming for the torso of a dead adventurer. The soulless husk reached for the moving weapon, hands breaking as it successfully brought it to a standstill.

A lance of solar light ripped through the torso of the creature. Aclysia followed the one spell up with others. Each bolt was a prayer of vengeance. The angel fought with fury in her heart and calm on her face. Even as her fundamental nature screamed for the death of the Parasytes, her pride as a healer demanded she remain reserved. All the same, Bolt after Bolt of Sunlight scorched the masses of soulless puppets.

Her focus on clearing the way for Apexus left her back open. A tendril from above suddenly seized her neck. It only took a second of surprise for her storm of spells to stop. Thorns slammed into her back, tendrils tore off her wings, and she was yanked back to become one with the unholy walls.

A second wave of Ki sliced through the air. Aclysia fell, the ground beneath her opening up into a kind of mixture of marsh and maw. In panic, she sent mana to wings no longer there. No flight manifested.

Korith snatched her up midair. The duo sailed towards a trio of approaching corpses. A block of energy, summoned from Korith’s gauntlet, created a surface midair just large enough that they could catapult in the other direction.

That delivered them from the enemies, but it did not keep them safe. They crashed down. The magic in Korith’s armour kept it from dissolving into nothingness. Hair and skin that touched the ground wasn’t so lucky. A corpse hung above them, raising its foot. Once it stomped down on Korith, the Warrior took the blow by rolling over Aclysia. Twice it stomped down, the blonde gritting her teeth.

Before the third stomp, Apexus was there. The humanoid chimera had sacrificed part of his advance to turn around and kick the creature with all the force he could muster. The beginner’s armour folded like cardboard around the foot before the empowered corpse was flung across the room. It was caught by tendrils, black matter knitting it back together.

Two more enemies descended on Apexus. Trusting completely in his loves, Apexus hurled his fist at one, forcing it back. Reysha took care of the other, her Runeblade bisecting the creature with a swift slash.

They were fending well for themselves, but damage was accruing and the greater Parasyte had plenty of resources to spare. No words were needed for the strategy to be continued immediately. The Black Stem had to be destroyed and fast.

Apexus barrelled forwards. The alien mind of the Parasyte reacted predictably in at least one aspect: it wished to defend its core. Tendrils and corpses coalesced around the Monk.

Burning through Ki, he coated his entire body in Ironskin. His wings were seized and he surrendered them, letting them rip off at the joints without doubt. Finally, he had his hands on the Black Stem and pulled.

His touch set off a previously inactive aspect of the Root. No longer did it just facilitate, it began to draw in matter like its lesser kin. The defence mechanism filled the room with a high-pitched screech. Air was drawn into the Black Root. The unique pain, the flash-freezing of his skin, was more present than ever.

Reysha felt her ears pop as the pressure in the room suddenly and rapidly changed. She wasn’t quite sure what was happening, but she felt an instinctive dread towards it. All the same, her only contribution to the prevention of the coming vacuum was to keep the creatures off of Apexus’ back as he pulled and pulled. Bombardments of spells from Aclysia supported her.

The Black Root did not break – it bent.

It was the first time this had happened to Apexus. These metaphysical constructs usually shattered once their threshold was reached. The branch he held instead sank, its texture changing to a rubbery liquid.

Korith saw the scene unfold. Conviction for the Hoard and her party hammering in her heart, she charged through two enemies to the opposite side of the Black Root. She seized a low-hanging branch of the vile corruption. The chill that was unpleasant to Apexus was indescribable pain to her. Her nerve endings screamed as the thick skin of her palm was chilled and eliminated simultaneously until the void gnawed on the sinews and muscles beneath. Creatures grasped her to yank her away from the Black Stem. Using Steadfast, she anchored herself in position, trusting in the Armour of the Phoenix while claws dug into her skin.

The branches stretched. The pitch-black shape of a tree wobbled and extended like a distorted pond and fabric being pulled taut. It resisted and resisted, then it cracked.

Still, there was no sound. The greater Parasyte ended as quietly and alien as it had existed. The Black Stem tore apart. Silver energies of the Omniverse rushed upwards in a greater geyser than any that had come before. The pool beneath their feet suddenly turned into an explosive shockwave, sending all four adventurers and the variety of corpse puppets flying towards the walls.

The world was silver and white.

Then, the Inevitable party slumped to the ground. The force that had pressed them flat against the wall was gone. With it, the black of the Parasytes had been washed away. Left behind was only the reduced Dungeon and corpses.

They were thankful not to count themselves among them.