The Rise Of Evil Chapter 16
By Citadel
Janus looked at the smoldering bones of Dalton. His skull grin smiled at him. Dalton's bones were charred black, the shadow flames completely staining them. Janus's lip curled up in a sneer that would've sent the greatest heroes running in fright. A sudden realization came over him that he was the last Zealian alive. Alive. The word haunted him. The old skeletons in the closet reminded him of his fallen homeland, and his deceased family. he thought it ironic that he, having lead such a dark life, wielded shadow powers. He turned from Dalton and looked at Robo in sorrow. The old thing had given its last bit of life in a selfless manner so Janus could live. He felt guilt over what Robo had done. He felt like Robo should've lived, not him. He shook his head with frustration and sank to his knees.
Janus sat on his knees for a few minutes before he looked at the gargoyle. The hideous beast head the crystal that he needed. Janus stood. His robotic parts were damaged from the onslaught of Dalton. Even Robo's cure beam was of minimal help. His cybernetic arm was barely able to move. He attempted to rotate it around, but it wouldn't move higher than his shoulder.
"Useless," he muttered. "Completely useless." He looked at it. Robo's lasting reminder. He looked at how well it was put on. He wondered how well he could take it off. The arm was useless to him now, it would only slow him. Janus created a black orb around his fist. He held his arm out as far as he could. A thin beam of shadow evenly sliced off most of the arm, near the shoulder. His leg still operated well, he could walk on it at least.
Janus limped his way over to the blue crystal. It was translucent and very bright. It glowed a sky blue. He could see his reflection on all of the faces of the thing. Janus held out his arm and touched the blue crystal.
"Yow!" he exclaimed. It was icy cold to the touch. He flicked his wrist and sent a thin stream of fire into the crystal. the fire danced and encompassed it. He released the magic and saw no scratch. Janus backed a few steps away and gathered his shadow energies. He paused for a moment and reflected on his shadow energies. They'd been odd lately. He'd had some exteme powers that he'd never been able to use before. They made his Dark Matter look like a simple candle-lighting spell. Janus dismissed the thought and hurled a Dark Bomb into the crystal. It exploded and covered the crystal and most of the gargoyle with a shroud of night. It disipated and left the crystal still standing there. "What the?" Nothing had so much as a scratch on the entire thing.
"You shouldn't do that. If that were to crack--" Janus spun on his heels and was facing a man with black clothes and a blood red belt.
"And who are you?"
"I am Cameron Delecroix," he said with a smirk.
Janus grinned. "You mean Anoctium." Cameron's eyes went wide for a moment.
"Heh heh, guess you found out. Who told you?"
"Old friend. Maybe you'll have the pleasure of meeting him. But maybe I'll just kill you first. You'll find I won't fall as fast as Marle." Cameron silently chuckled and motioned for him to come. Janus floated into the air and pulled every shield imaginable around himself. They were tightly interlinked. Nothing, not even Lavos himself could penetrate the shields. His shadow energies flowed around him, pulsing with the beat of his heart. Janus's eyes lost their color and radiated black. They were darker than night. He pulled an orb of shadows around himself. Janus concentrated his powers into a tiny orb, the shadow leaked out of it. He pumped more and more power into it. Beams of black jutted out of it, to much power was in it. The shadows around Janus vanished and the black sphere rocketed at Cameron. It exploded as soon as it touched its target. The room fell into darkness, thunder blasted and it hurt Janus's ears. Purple lightning shot around the blackness. Janus could see the white outline of Cameron. He saw the human body sometimes change into something else. Something that put a horrible fright into him. Soon the white outline was alternating between human and beast. "What is that?" Janus asked himself over the roar of the thunder. Suddenly the blackness was sucked from the room. The lightning was pulled from its path. The spell was being sucked away like a black hole. Janus glided to the ground and saw the old room emerging from the blackness. He looked at where Cameron stood. Cameron was sucking the spell in through his mouth. Once he finished inhaling it he smiled.
"Nice try." Janus gaped at what he saw. Cameron had not even a hair out of place. "That was a decent spell, immature, but decent." Cameron further critiqued Janus's effort. "I like the shadow base to it, but it lacked the necesary element: Holy. If you'd added some of that, it might've hurt me. Furthermore, it was far too widespread to hurt one man, it should've been focused into me."
"How did you--"
"Don't even try to comprehend. I'm way to strong for you." Janus didn't like having his strongest spells criticized, so he floated above Cameron and pulled more shadow energies together. Magic was flowing through him freely, he'd never felt such a huge amount of magic coarsing through his body at any time before.
"Dark Bomb!" Janus's fist glowed black and a dark sphere was shot like a cannon at Cameron. Cameron held up his hand and the shadow ball fell apart in mid-air and became nothing more than mist. Janus gathered more energies.
"Don't even try." Cameron pointed his right hand at Janus. A loud explosion resonated in the room, Janus had to cover his ears. Green and multi-colored shields fell apart all around Janus. Cameron's arm seemed to contort itself, rippling like water. It suddenly rushed out and grabbed Janus by the neck before he could even utter a sound. The huge arm frightened Janus. The six foot man had a ten foot arm, Janus was in a death grip. He struggled to free himself, but to no avail. "I don't have much time to fool around, so I'll make this brief." Cameron's hand turned into a wax and began to flow over Janus, covering him in flesh colored wax. The end of his arm looked like a huge sack of sand on the end of a long pole. the sack of sand fell to the ground with a thud and a groan from within. With a bright flash Cameron and his arm disappeared into mist.
***
Frog and Lucca entered a huge room after the long hall. It had an altar that was grander than the Cathedral itself in Guardia. On top of the altar was a very tall head. It was almost humanooid in appearance, but seemed animal like. The eyes drooped sadly, and the lips curled down in a frown. The tall head had a crystal in its forehead. It was red and glowed dully.
Frog had never in his life wished that he had a sword more than at that moment. He had the worst feeling that something bad was about to happen in the room.
"Frog, do you know what that is?" Lucca asked.
"Haven't the slightest. You?"
"Nope. But I think it's one of the things we need to destroy. Be careful, there may be traps." Lucca and Frog cautiously jogged to the base of the altar. It seemed safe enough, no boobytraps. Frog examined the stairs, Lucca looked at the walls. Everything was ordinary.
"Methinks it's safe." Frog took a step onto the altar. Soon as his webbed foot touched the stair a red glow covered the entire room. "What is that?"
"I don't know, but whatever it is it isn't good." Frog retreated a few steps and looked around the room.
Suddenly a loud thud startled them. They turned to see the passageway blocked off.
"Great," Lucca muttered.
They looked at the altar in frustration for a moment. They didn't know how to get on the thing. The red light was getting brighter. the room began to get hotter under the intense light.
"I hope they aren't trying to maketh frog legs," Frog joked. Lucca shook her head and chuckled. They looked back to the altar and saw the air twist and swirl, like the air right over a fire, wavy and distorted. Looking at it gave Lucca a headache. A dark shape bega to appear out of thin air. It was towering, easily ten feet tall. It was cone-like. Two massive shapes sprouted out from its sides. It was breathing heavily. they could hear itsw raspy lungs filled with mucus and fluid. the dark shape began to gain color. The dark swirls and lines soon came together. the blackness was replaced by gold and silver armor. The skin beneath it was a hideous purple. The skin was covered with neon green warts.
"What is that? A golem?" Lucca asked.
"No," it corrected in a deep and gurgling voice, "the golem king." The hideous mouth grinned, rows of sharp and massive teeth scared Frog and Lucca.
"Remember how it mimicketh your attacks!" Frog reminded. Lucca nodded and got ready for battle. She charged her powers and shot a flare. The fireball raced through the air and smacked into his breastplate. It exploded in an array of flames that danced around him. They encompassed his body and burned him badly. The flames extinguished themselves and left neasy burn marks all over the gruesome golem.
"Heh, heh," it chortled. It's eyes flashed a bright red and it opened its cavern like mouth. A tremendous colllum of fire shot out of his mouth and raced at Lucca. She jumped out of the way and landed on her shoulder. She rolled on the ground in an effort to avoid the other flames that branched off the blast.
Frog was preparing a water attack to offset the fire. He was too late, however, and the thing shot out a very strong fire attack. Frog released his tidal wave anyway. A huge wave of water formed behind Frog. The golem turned in his direction and was ready to sih out more of the fire onto Frog. The golem took in a big breath and prepared to fire. A huge collumn of fire erupted from the golem mouth. The tidal wave washed around Frog, protecting him from the scorching flames. The wave smacked into the golem and sent it spawling to the ground. The water steamed and hissed off the golem. The eyes changed from bright red to a sea blue.
"Run!" Frog yelled. Lucca was back up on her feet. She was ready to move at the slightest hint of an attack. Her mind was racing. She had no idea how they'd counter any of the thing's attacks. They had no weapons, and it would simply use their magic against them.
.