Silver Rose

Chapter XXXIII - As Pure as Fresh Snow

Lilly yelped as she was hurled back into a wall. She coughed, trying to regain her bearing. She just barely dodged out of the way of a massive column of rock, which obliterated the wall behind her.

"Gehärtete Verteidigung!" she yelled, increasing her defensive abilities just in time to withstand an incoming monster, which struck her hard enough to knock her back, but with the Earth Rune spell active, her aura barely received a scratch.

She returned fire with a Wind Rune, sending out bolts of lightning to char the three monsters that had come to finish her off. The massive ogre was still in the distance, preparing to hurl another projectile at her.

She fled back into the prison to try and put some distance between herself and that enormous monster. She gasped as the entrance was reduced to rubble by the boulder the ogre had thrown at her. She listened as its heavy footsteps came closer and closer, but it stopped just outside.

Okay, she thought. Now to check this place out. The heck was that thing anyway? I've never seen anything so big before.

She hurried through the dungeon, Myrtenaster ready to rock and roll. A Shield Rune orbited her, ready to protect her against any threats. It would only withstand a few hits before dissipating, but it was better than nothing. She also held a small Fire Rune in her left palm, ready for offense at a moment's notice. In this miniaturized state, it wouldn't have much power, but it took only a split second to expand it to a full sized rune and deploy whatever attack she needed.

She stopped as another group of those twisted creatures rounded a corner to face her. She had come to call these monsters "Corrupted," naming them after the fact that they tended to represent the distortion of humanity's darkest fears and desires. She had faced countless Corrupted since she began exploring this alternate reality, each creature symbolizing some kind of repressed emotion. With this family, whose other world represented a dungeon of torture, each of the Corrupted reflected the constant state of fear and maltreatment of the victims and the anger and hatred of the father, who constantly abused them in the real world.

The most violent of the creatures were clearly a representation of the aggression and cruelty borne by the father and, perhaps in a strange way, the mother and children as well. There were also variations of the Corrupted which were passive, choosing to flee from Lilly instead of engaging her. There were many instances of them, but the moment she would try and pacify their fears, they would turn on her and she would be forced to defend herself.

She only needed to figure out a way to get to the core of all this. Only then would she be able to free them. But she was beginning to run out of strength for the day. She had been in this place for more than three hours now, probably coming up on four. She would have checked her scroll for the time, but electronics didn't always function in this other world. Sometimes it would, but during the most inopportune moments, they would cease.

"So," she said aloud to the Corrupted standing before her. "Are you here to fight me?"

The three creatures screeched at her before dashing forward. She didn't hesitate to maximize the power of the Fire Rune in her left hand, projecting it outward for a fiery attack, which consumed all three and reduced them to ash.

Lilly took a deep breath before letting it out slowly. She planned to investigate this place a little bit more before returning to her world. She needed to at least make some progress today. That endless wasteland had given birth to this prison merely by her walking forward for a few miles. Surely something would show itself if she would just check these decrepit halls.

The torches around her went out simultaneously, prompting her to call upon the power of her runes. She summoned a Fire Rune, forming a fireball to follow her around and serve as a lantern. If only she had as much control over this power in the real world as in here, the battle against Ivory and her team would have been easy. It was no matter, though. Lilly understood that this was where she truly belonged. Winning tournaments meant nothing to her if she couldn't do something as simple as save a family from their corrupted alternate reality.