The infinity dungeon 197

Chapter 197

The moment Michael saw what the Tree-Alfyr was doing, he immediately broke into a mad dash towards the old elf. Time did not stretch. There was no slow motion. Instead, it all happened in the blink of an eye.

Michael was still mid-air when he heard the click of the trigger being pulled. The next moment, he was within inches of the elf. He braced for impact, felt the frail body of the Tree-Alfyr, then the movement of magic from the very walls of the Seedship, and then something gave out beneath him. Gravity reasserted itself and he found himself on the ground in a heap, his limbs tangled with the Tree-Alfyr’s.

Then the magic reached him. It had been pulled from the very walls of the room, the Tree-Alfyr exerting his dominion over the Seedship. It smelled foul, much like the Corruption that was consuming the ship from the inside. 

Vines shot from the leaves in the floor and ceiling, from the wood of the walls and the table, from air itself. The deep green of foliage turned a brilliant emerald as the vines grew closer and closer.

Michael turned around, readying his magic to defend himself.

Behind him, the Tree-Alfyr had gotten up and was staring dumbly at Michael.

Click. Click.

The vines grew vicious thorns and pointed tips. There were at least six of them snaking around Michael, each as thick as an arm, their wood turning from green to brown and then creaking and splintering. All around, veins of Corruption spread through the room in a frenzy, reaching the summoned vines, turning their magic dark and foul.

The pointed tips morphed, becoming stingers dripping with poison, large droplets of it burning holes on the ground. The acid sizzled and filled the room with acrid smoke.

Click.

The Tree-Alfyr was still stunned, his left arm plunged into the Force Lance, his finger spasming and pulling the trigger with a clear sound of click, click, click.

Michael had readied a sort of scythe made of pure mana, the very best he could do given his low output and lack of real skills, and limited time. He swung it, aiming to intercept the vines, body rotating to switch from one target to the next, hoping the blade would cut because if it got stuck… then it would be over for him.

The blade did not slice. It did not get stuck either. Instead, it only met air as the vines abruptly stopped in mid-air.

Click. Click.

With a wave of his hand, the Tree-Alfyr recalled the vines. The room glowed one last time, the Corruption racing across the walls, liquefying an entire corner of the table, before the magic dimmed and the vines limply fell to the ground.

The Tree-Alfyr mirrored their motion, slumping to the floor like a puppet with its strings cut. The Force Lance tumbled, breaking free of the arm inserted into it, then rolled twice until it settled with the arm-hole facing Michael and its emitter side facing the door.

“I guess it does not matter anymore,” the old elf said. He sounded ancient, his voice reflecting the age his body showed.

Other elves were rushing through and pouring into the room, surrounding the two but stopping several feet away in an uneven ring. Patches of Corruption, once again moving at its usual slow pace, had infested the room and melted holes in the floor. Below, two elves were sharing a bed in a cramped room before their roof melted and they scrambled away, leaving their meager belongings behind.

One of the elves that had entered the room finally moved, advancing towards the Tree-Alfyr, avoiding the corrupted ground. He said nothing, just putting a hand on the old elf’s shoulder and standing as still as a metal rod.

The old elf’s eyes were unfocused, looking past Michael and into the distance beyond the leafy wall.

“What does not matter anymore?” asked Michael.

The old elf shrugged then nodded towards the weapon even as his eyes darted to the corruption in the walls. Then he laughed. “All I needed, it seems, was a catalyst. I am sorry it had to be you.”

“What the fuck were you trying to do?” asked Michael as he quickly got up, overcoming his shock and letting adrenaline fuel his movements. He picked the weapon up and pointed it at the Tree-Alfyr, conscious of the irony of the gesture. If he were to shoot it, then the weapon would actually work.

“I was saving us…” the Tree-Alfyr said, eyes staring at something only he could see. “Saving us all…”

The elves around them shuffled, save for the one still keeping his hand on the Tree-Alfyr’s shoulder.

“What are you talking about? You were about to kill us all! This,” Michael waved the Force Lance up and down, “is a weapon capable of tearing a hole through this ship like paper. Did you think it was something else?”

“The only thing I didn’t know,” said the Tree-Alfyr, his gaze now boring holes through Michael. “Was that the weapon would refuse to work when not wielded by you, human. But in the end, it was not needed.”

Michael met the intense gaze with anger of his own. “You knew what it was and still wanted to shoot it?”

The Tree-Alfyr got up, spat on the ground, and then slapped away the elf still trying to give him moral support. “Yes! Don’t you understand?” he screamed, tearing his hair and clothes and madly pointing at the other elves, then at the room and the whole ship itself. “This is an abomination. Heresy. Madness. That weapon… I wanted to finally do what I have never had the fucking BALLS to do. Isn’t it how you humans used to say? Grow a pair and do it? And it would have worked, and we would have finally been free.”

Silence befell the room.

“This ship is an abomination?” asked Michael.

“This ship, these fucking…” he gulped a lungful of air, “albino elves. EDEN! Eden was never our world! Our world was harmony, Eden is heresy! A…” he wheezed, struggling to breathe enough air to speak, and his face contorted as if he was about to swallow something sour. “A terraformed world. Terraformed by humans! The pinnacle of the hubris of a race that destroyed itself before it could even set foot into the stars. Eden! A world filled with machines, machines that still to this day tend to it like a garden. Machines doing a better job than we, twisted and reduced to… to this,” he looked at the elves around him, “could ever do.”

His gaze softened, and he looked at the corruption. “Even though the weapon did not work as intended, it still achieved its purpose. I am at peace.”

With each word he said, the elves recoiled as if slapped. But even in their state, they did not act. They simply stood, many of them with tears in their eyes, but their gaze was on the Tree-Alfyr, and while it lacked the reverence it once had, it still betrayed a childlike dependence on the old elf.

They all thought they were nothing without him. Except, as Michael boiled with rage, some of their gazes turned to him.

“To hell with your stupid ramblings,” he said.

More elves looked at him. He suddenly felt their gazes on him, like a physical weight. He felt their hopes for a future they couldn’t even begin to imagine, their dreams, their fears and their sacrifice.

“They are the truth,” the Tree-Alfyr said.

“You would doom your whole race to die just because you no longer feel like fighting?”

The old elf sighed. All around, Corruption sped up again as the Tree-Alfyr withered, his face growing older by the minute. “I already have. And they… They are no elves,” he muttered weakly. His voice was a wheeze, his breathing labored. “And you, human, are no messiah.”

More heads turned to look at Michael. He met their expectant gazes, feeling as though he could feel their desires and hopes. They were many: the formless yearning for freedom and the blue sky, the dreams of a race of people who had never seen either.

“I am not a messiah,” Michael whispered. Then his voice grew bolder, the flame of rage fueled by the sorry sight around him. “But I will do what you were too weak to do.”

The Tree-Alfyr gathered magic, more than ever before. The whole room glowed, Corruption spreading in a frenzy, melting the walls and beyond them the whole ship trembled and wobbled, solid matter turning liquid and foul, unable to function.

Then Michael heard a voice. A whisper, nothing more.