The House at the End of the Street

Chapter Nineteen: The Underworld

We stood in shock, trying to understand how the strongest building in Ocean Springs had fallen. The one place we needed was gone.
"So, it's over?" Mae asked.
"I think so," Jhett said, worried.
I sat down and looked around. Then, I saw a book stuck inside of a building. It was an old book and had spider webs on the front.
"What the hell?" I said, bending over and grabbing the book.
I opened the book to page 107 and read the first sentence. It said: "The only way to kill Salvullaz is Ruby's Knife."
"Guys!" I yelled.
Mae, Kaycie, Conner and Jhett came over and looked at the book. They were in just as much shock as me. I flipped to the table of contents and found what chapter Ruby's Knife was. It was found in chapter Thirty.
"Ruby's Knife is located deep in the depths of hell. It is guarded by the worst of the worst demons. You'd be lucky to get into hell more or less getting Ruby's Knife," I said, reading the first couple sentences of chapter Thirty.
"If you do want to try and get Ruby's Knife, then you'll need to find an entrance to hell," Mae said, stopping.
"We know an entrance. The House at the End of the Street," Conner said, excited.
"So, we're going to just drop the 'find the radio and call for help' idea?" Jhett asked.
"If we can't call for help, then we need to kill Salvullaz before it kills us. If we can kill Salvullaz, we will be safe from him," I replied.
With that, we were off to find Ruby's Knife which was one of the easier ways to kill Salvullaz. If it didn't work, then we were screwed. We started walking back to the road and to the house that once caused us all harm in one way or another. I grabbed a bag from an old store and put the book inside.
"Stop..." I said, freezing in place.
We had only walked about two minutes before I noticed something. We stood in silence for five seconds before someone started coming out of the forest right next to us.
"Good job, Zack. You've survived this far, so you can survive it again... can't you?" A voice said.
A person came walking out of the forest. It was Matt, the kid who went missing first and Salvullaz possessed him. Matt looked the same as he did when we first had an interaction with him.
"It's been a while, hasn't it," Matt said, walking in front of us.
"Why are you here?" I asked, shocked that it'd been so long since we've seen him.
"To see how your journey has been. To see if you're enjoying yourself," Matt said, smiling.
"Get the hell out of here before I beat you ass," I said, trying to seem tough, but I knew I wasn't.
"Oh no! I'm so scared! I need to call in three other people to help!" Matt said sarcastically, laughing.
Matt snapped his fingers and Madison, Tristan, and Thomas came from the same place that Matt had come from. They walked forwards and stood right next to Matt in a line.
"I thought you said you didn't need three other people," I pointed out.
"Shut up," Matt said.
We stood in silence for a few seconds.
"Well, this seems familiar," Thomas said.
"Dude, this had never happened before," Matt turned around and whispered to Thomas, embarrassed.
"You're an idiot," Madison said, looking down.
"Whatever," Matt said, turning back around to face us.
"C'mon, Matt. I thought you were stronger than this," I said, pulling out my machete.
I motioned for all five of us to run on my count. Matt stood there, not understanding what those motions meant.
"Now!" I yelled, the group and I running towards Matt, Thomas, Tristan and Madison.
Thomas came running at us too, but I kicked him over and stabbed him in the gut. I took out my sword from his gut and ran towards Matt. I lifted my weapon, but Matt pulled out a machete of his own and blocked the blow to his head.
"Did you think it'd be that easy?" Matt said, kicking me backwards onto my back.
"Damn it!" I yelled from the pain, but I stood up and continued to fight.
I lifted up my weapon and brought it down, but Matt blocked it. I kicked Matt, but he didn't flinch. I constantly tried to hit Matt, but every time, he found a way to block it. Then, I got the upper hand and ducked from one of his blows and stabbed him in the gut. But, the machete went super deep and you could probably see it from the other side.
"Damn!" Matt yelled, falling to the ground.
I walked over to Matt, lifted my sword into the air, and brought it down, but when I looked to see if he was dead, he was gone. Matt disappeared into thin air. I turned around and saw that Thomas, Tristan, and Madison were also gone.
"Well, even if we do get Ruby's Knife, we still have to deal with Thomas, Tristan, and Madison," Kaycie pointed out.
"Point made. At least our biggest threat will be gone at that point," I reassured.
"Let's get outta here before something else tries to kill us," Mae said, grabbing some rope from a building's fire escape.
After about five minutes of walking out of downtown Ocean Springs, we made it to the house. Along the way, Mae grabbed some extra rope for us to be able to come back up to the surface if any broke.
"Alright, so we just need to get Ruby's Knife and then we leave. Where does it say it was again?" I asked.
"It's located in Salvullaz's palace. The dungeous to be specific," Jhett replied.
"Alright. Remember, do not get killed. If anyone dies, I will not be happy," I said, turning back around to the front door.
It was nerve racking, seeing the place where your friends died almost six months ago. It was terrifying.
"I'm not ready for this," Conner said, nervous.
"You can't be ready for this," Mae replied.
We kicked in the door and started for the hellhole. Once we got there, we all tied the rope around our waist. I was first, then Jhett, then Conner, then Mae, then Kaycie.
"Alright, tie the rope to that, Kaycie," I said, pointing to a metal stick that was built into the house.
"Done," Kaycie said.
"Alright, so we'll need to scale the wall or we'll be in a free fall until we hit the bottom, so just follow my lead," I said.
The temperature outside was cold, but it was a nice cold. The temperature in hell was a figurative boiling heat, but it was still super hot.
"Are we almost down?" Conner asked.
"Just about. Just hold on for a little bit longer," I replied, scaling the wall down.
We kept going down for a few more minutes, but we eventually made it to the bottom of hell without any incident. We untied ourselves and left the rope there so we could climb back up. We had landed in a little passageway that led outwards to the main part of hell.
We all walked out of the passage and were stunned by what we saw. Kaycie and Mae froze while Jhett, Conner, and I had to close our eyes due to the intensity of hell's image.
"Oh my god..." Kayice said, looking out to hell.
It was a crazy sight. There was only one color: red. The water was red, the endless walls were red, and every demon was red. There were spirits during labour, probably for the rest of eternity. Demons watched over the spirits to make sure they were doing everything they commanded.
"Let's get to the palace," Jhett whispered.
"Let's go left first to see if there is anything on that side," I whispered back.
Everyone nodded their heads in agreement and we started on the left side of hell. There was little brush around the left side, so we were able to hide pretty decently back there.
"Stay low. We can't get caught," I said, stating the obvious.
We crawled for about ten minutes before we made it out and into a small cavern in the ground. It was only about two feet deep, but it was just big enough that all five of us could fit.
It was just in the right spot so we could easily hide in there until the demons weren't looking so we could make it to the palace before any of the demons found out.
"Keep going forwards," I said, staying behind everyone.
"Duck!" Jhett whispered yelled to the group.
We pushed up against the side of the cavern and I could see the shadow of the demon looming over us. I held my breath and closed my eyes, hoping for it to disappear. Then, it did and we all signed in relief and went on. We started over a small path that went over the cavern.
"Kaycie!" I said, pulling on her leg to stop her from crossing over the path.
A demon was walking past and I didn't want her to get caught.
"Thanks," Kaycie said, continuing on.
We kept going on until we hit the palace.
"Well, this is convenient," Kaycie said, happy.
We stood up and ran behind the palace. At that moment, something started rattling from behind the bushes.
"Who's there?" I asked, feeling like an idiot aftwards.
The bushes stopped and a person jumped out and stood in front of us. The person had a metal helmet on their head. They had a metal bat and looked kinda like someone I knew.
"Zack... is that you?" The person asked.
"How do you know my name?" I replied.
The person removed their helmet and I was shocked to see who it was.
"Is it... really you?" Jhett said, stunned.
"Hey guys," He said.
It was Jack. He was alive.