Chapter 9: Escape

  The street was dark, so Raiden flipped back on his mana light. In this area, only the library had some semblance of power. So far, his experience in the ruins had shown him that some areas were semi functional while others were completely dead.

  As Raiden raced down the street, he looked back at the library to see if the giant millipede had emerged. So far, it hadn’t. Taking advantage of the situation, Raiden ducked into an alleyway and continued his mad dash away from his enemy. He weaved through the streets, hoping to lose his pursuer in the maze of the dead city. During his escape, he had to vault over the occasional mound of rubble from a building that had collapsed, but he didn’t let it slow him down too much.

  Raiden had just turned the corner onto another street when he heard hisses and clicks. He held his hand over the light to dim it and listened intently. There was a group of millipedes ahead. Raiden had been astounded that he hadn’t come across any so far in his race through the city, but it seemed that his luck had run out.

  Continuing to hold his hand over the light so it wouldn’t spill out too much, he scanned the street for somewhere to hide. One of the buildings that was closest to him had a window that had been busted out in the front. He walked over to the windowsill, careful to avoid as much of the glass as possible, and vaulted over the lip.

  Inside, he could hear more of the creatures. These ones sounded like they were coming from a different direction. That meant there were at least two groups close by. He had to be careful. The building had smooth marble floors, and his footsteps were silent as he worked his way through the building.

  As he walked through the building, he came to a series of open doors that lined both sides of the hallway he was walking down. The doors were all open, and he gave a few of them a cursory glance before deciding to ignore the rest. After making it about halfway down the hallway, he heard a skittering sound behind him, followed by a wailing hiss. He spun around. A millipede came out from one of the doorways that he had just passed. More millipedes began to pour through.

  Raiden quickly charged toward them and hacked down at the first millipede, severing it into two pieces. He dodged back as another millipede lunged at him and skewered one through its midsection before slashing down at another millipede. His blade bit into its head and ended its life. One millipede jumped toward him, and he knocked it to the side with the flat of his blade and then stomped down onto its body, causing it to squirm until he pierced through its head with his sword. The last millipede dove for his legs, but he jumped to the side and rolled away in a semi-somersault. He quickly scrambled back to his feet and took down the millipede with a series of slashes.

  In the distance, there was more shrieking. He knew that this encounter had alerted the other millipedes to his presence. The shrieking grew louder, and Raiden dashed down the hallway to make it out of the building and get away from the scene of the disturbance.

  As he made it to the other side of the building, he found a pair of double doors that led out to the back. However, when he went up to the doors and activated the door tablets to get them to open, they didn’t respond. There were glass windows on both sides of the door, and Raiden looked around until he found an old chair, which he picked up and then threw through one of the windows. It shattered in a spray of broken shards of glass. He dashed out of the newly opened window and onto the street.

  There were more millipedes there already waiting for him, at least four that he could see. They were closing in on him fast. Raiden began to turn up the street, but the millipedes cut him off. He hacked at the first two and then caught a third millipede as it lunged for him in midair. He threw it to the ground and kicked it away. The last millipede was coiled to strike at him, but he thrust forward with his blade to skewer it. Quickly withdrawing his blade, he hacked down the last millipede that he had kicked away, not wanting it to continue following him and alert the others.

  The millipedes were fairly quick, and he didn’t want to take any chances. He had run a few dozen paces when the double doors of the building that he had just been in exploded outward. A deafening crack reverberated.

  “Human!”

  It was followed by a hiss of pure rage. As Raiden turned his head to see the form of the giant millipede looming there, it quickly spotted him. The hunt was on once again. Raiden didn’t have time to contemplate what had gone wrong in his escape. He trudged onward as he took the next street to get away from the giant insect.

  As Raiden was running, he noticed that he could finally see the edge of the cavern that he was in. He kept going straight without turning to get as much distance between himself and the giant millipede as possible. There were other smaller millipedes in the area, and he didn’t want to be caught unawares again. The street ahead of him seemed clear of the creatures. After running for a few blocks, he arrived at the edge of the giant cavern. He looked around for somewhere to turn. The road he was on ended a couple of dozen feet before the cavern wall. He could either go left or right.

  As he was about to do so, something caught his eye. He turned back to look at the cavern wall to see a hole that descended into the darkness below—another stairwell. He took the stairwell and descended.

  Raiden hadn’t stopped to check if the millipede was still behind him, but he was unsurprised when, after a minute, he heard the thunder of scuttling legs echoing down the stairwell from far above. He kept running. His legs and chest were burning, but he couldn’t stop. After about another minute, he made it to a new level of the dungeon. This area didn’t look much like a cavern at all, but a giant room with smooth walls and a ceiling. There were a few dozen buildings that occupied the space. At the very center was one much larger building.

  As Raiden ran, a few of the buildings came to light with flickering amber lights. It hadn’t been that way when he had entered the cavern, but his presence somehow seemed to have brought part of this area to life. Raiden was about to keep running past this section of the dungeon when the giant millipede finally made it to the bottom of the stairs. Raiden was almost at the large building now. The main doors that led into the building had what looked like a working door mechanism.

  Making a decision, he took his chances to try to open it. He slammed his hand onto the stone tablet, and immediately the doors receded and slid into the walls of the building.

  Raiden dashed inside and spun around to slam his hand on the door access once again to shut it. The lights in the building were off, but it seemed like the doors worked just fine. Inside the building, a stairwell led upward. There were hallways that headed left, right, and straight as well.

  He went straight and made it about a quarter of the way down the hallway when the doors reverberated with a loud thump. Raiden expected the giant millipede to have burst through, but when he looked back, the doors were still sealed. A giant thump reverberated once again. And then another and another. Somehow, the doors held. Raiden slowed to a stop and waited, watching the doors. The thumping continued for another dozen seconds and then finally stopped.

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  Raiden looked on, expecting it to come busting through a window at any moment, but it didn’t. That was when he realized that there were no windows in the building. The millipede didn’t seem to be able to open doors on its own, and the ones on this building seemed to be strong enough to keep it out. He could find another way out of the building, most likely. But then what? The giant millipede would just follow him again.

  Unsure of what to do, Raiden began to explore the building, looking for anything that he could use to fight the millipede. He hurried, not taking his time, as it was possible that the millipede might be able to find another way into the building. Raiden looked around the hallway and then picked a door at random and walked over to it. He placed his hand on the door access and opened it with ease. He stepped inside the room. It was full of all sorts of machinery and equipment. There was very little dust.

  Everything in the building seemed incredibly well preserved, much more than anything else that he had seen in the ruins of the dungeon so far. After looking at a number of the mysterious instruments and machines in the room, he decided to try another room. When he opened the door, he found a similar scene: a room full of lots of equipment that he had no idea what to do with.

  Raiden kept walking to another hallway that led off to a large glass paned room. surrounding it. Inside were the remnants of giant pieces of equipment. This must be a lab of some kind. Raiden was about to go inside the large room when he felt the building shake slightly. He heard a series of cracks from somewhere above him and then a loud bang, as if something had shattered.

  Raiden put away all his curiosity about what this lab was. The millipede was in the building. Raiden turned back to the main hallway that he had just come from. He had to think fast as he didn’t have time for anything other than a simple plan. He had no doubt that the millipede would find him soon. As he ran back to the main area of the hallway, he began opening the doors to the rooms and looking inside them for anything useful.

  When he opened one of the rooms, he noted that it had a connecting door to the adjacent room. He walked into the room and opened it. Sure enough, it led into the next room, which was also full of lab equipment. Then, an idea struck him. His mana had recovered just a little bit, so he thought he might be able to get off a few rounds. He stood back a couple of feet from the access tablet of the connecting door. Then he pulled his mana rifle from over his back and shouldered the weapon.

  He aimed at the door access and fired. The mana bullet caused the door access tablet to shatter into pieces. The door surged back into position, closing with great force. Raiden heard the many feet of millipede coming closer as it descended the floors of the building, likely on one of the staircases.

  He went back into the main hallway and began frantically opening the doors to the rooms to look for two rooms that were connected to one another. As he was doing so, a screech pierced his ears, and he looked over to see the dark horror scrambling on its many legs to get at him. It was in the hallway with him, closing in quickly.

  Raiden ran over to the next room and opened it. Seeing that there was a door that led to an adjacent room, he ducked inside. He walked over quickly to the connecting door and slammed his hand on the door access to open it. He darted through the door and into the other room. This room had a few rows of tables that were strewn with lab equipment. He began to knock them off onto the floor so he could have a clear shot at the door access panel.

  After clearing off a few of the tables by knocking everything to the ground, he turned around quickly and faced the connecting door. Just as he turned around, the millipede entered the other room. Raiden stilled his breathing as he lined up his shot. In one instant, the millipede was in the far room; in the next instant, it was surging towards the connecting door to get at him. It knocked the tables holding the remaining lab equipment up into the air as it collided with them. A spray of equipment was launched into the air. Raiden fired at the door access panel.

  A piece of equipment intercepted his shot as it was flying through the air. The millipede’s body continued to surge into the room. It knocked everything out of its path as it sought to crush him right between its jaws. Time seemed to slow for Raiden. The jaws of the millipede opened wide, and many legs wriggled in excitement as it sprang forward to attack him. Pieces of lab equipment were still flying through the air, but Raiden saw all of this through the corner of his vision. He kept his focus on the door access, lining up his shot as he prepared to fire. He waited just a fraction of a second longer until he knew his shot was clear. He fired two rounds.

  Zap. Zap.

  The first round hit a stray piece of equipment, but the second round struck true and obliterated the door access panel. The door slammed shut on the millipede, pinning a third of its body behind the door. The front half surged forward as its body stretched out. In a flash, two massive jaws came crashing together at Raiden’s head. The pincers snapped shut mere inches away from his face. Raiden fell backward as he dodged away, stumbling into the counter of lab equipment behind him. He was at the far wall of the room, and the millipede thrashed wildly to get at him, snapping its jaws as it wriggled and flailed.

  Raiden jumped up onto the counter to get away from the reach of the millipede. He knocked all the equipment onto the ground, trying to get away from the danger. The massive insect shrieked and hissed, and a violent mental energy struck his thoughts, causing him to falter.

  “Give me the amulet!!! Aaaaaah… you will die for this.”

  Raiden waved his hands in front of his head as if that would help, trying to push the voice out of his head. He made it to the far end of the room. The door to get out was still a few steps away. Broken sections of tables were strewn about the room, making it more difficult to reach the exit door. The giant millipede was flailing about, currently preoccupied with trying to free itself.

  He took a chance and dove from the counter to try to make it to the door. He only made it partway. He shoved debris away from him as he tried to make it to the door access panel. The movement caught the millipede’s attention, and it put aside its struggles to get free as it lashed out at Raiden.

  Despite all the debris in the room, he made it to the door, putting his hand on the door panel. He flooded the last dregs of his mana into it. The door opened, and Raiden dove through it, landing on his hands and knees, and then pushed off the ground as he lunged away from the door frame. The millipede’s head shot through the door frame along with a torrent of debris as it snapped viciously to get at Raiden. The millipede had reached its limit, however, and wasn’t able to move further.

  Raiden stood shakily on his feet as his mana light illuminated the face of the millipede. Raiden had been fortunate that the millipede was distracted with freeing itself. If it hadn’t been flailing in a rage and had stayed focused on him, there was a good chance that he would still be stuck in the room indefinitely or until it managed to free itself. The millipede had managed to get the majority of its body into the room before Raiden could close the door on it. He shuddered; if even a few more feet of the creature had made its way through, he’d be dead. The millipede continued thrashing and snapping its jaws at him, and it shrieked in frustration. Raiden didn’t stick around. He turned and ran down the hallway to get as far away from the millipede as he could.

  When he made it to the far end of the hallway, there was a door that led outside. His mana was so low that he couldn’t open the door. He stared back down the hallway at the millipede, still thrashing to get itself loose. It was currently using the door frame in the hallway as leverage so that it could pull itself free. Raiden shuddered at how intelligent this creature was. He waited there, unnerved, for a few more moments.

  Come on, come on, regenerate faster!

  When he finally had enough mana, he let it flow into the door access. The door slid open. He ran out of the building without looking back.

  As he was running, he saw yet another stairwell up ahead. He was getting incredibly tired of racing down stairs, but he knew that there was nothing for it. And so he descended the stairs to head deeper into the dungeon.