The Demonic Games (Disgardium Book #7): LitRPG Series, Dan Sugralinov [the read aloud family TXT] 📗

and more excited… I darted downwards, activating maximum Flight speed. The chains pulled taut like strings, rang out, but held. More than that, the Companions, still hissing, began to pull me back up toward them. I didn’t have enough strength to pull away from the three level 50 bosses.

“There he is!” came an echoing cry from above.

“We found Scyth!”

“Gotcha, bitch!”

Turning my body over to look upward, I saw six mages heading down toward me. It looked like they’d reached level 10 and leveled up Levitation to full-fledged flight! Nether. Now I had nowhere to hide! The mages’ hands lit up and crackled with elemental spells: fire, lightning, ice, something else…

“Come h-e-e-e-r-r-r-e!” the Companions groaned in unison, redoubling their efforts.

My ribs were broken and my spine was split by a harpoon, but thanks to the game mechanics, the damage didn’t count.

With a whine and a whistle, a fireball and a huge icicle shot toward me. A charge of forked lightning crackled. I activated Stoneskin. It didn’t save me from the harmful magic; the first wave of spells slashed into my health, bringing it down into the red.

The mage who cast the lightning spell shouted victoriously, stretched a hand out toward me, fired an orb crackling with energy. My heart stopped. This was the end, clear as day… Clarity! The ball lightning froze. Its fingers of energy, one of which had almost reached me, stopped, and I flew to the side as far as my chains allowed.

Time sped back up. The lightning passed me by and exploded, cutting into the wall. Drooling and somersaulting in the air, I managed to catch a moment when enemies were within my visibility, and activated Ghastly Howl. The spell from Crusher the wolf overcame the paralysis debuff, twisting my mouth and making me howl piercingly! The fear that overtook the mages interrupted their casts of a second wave of spells and broke Levitation!

The mages fell down to the gates in terror, screaming piteously, then jumped up and ran inside.

“Y-o-o-o-u-u-u! Mmoo-o-orrtals!”

“Mi-i-ine!”

“Oo-ou-urrrsss!”

“Foo-oo-ood!”

The harpoons burst out of me and returned to their owners. The Companions forgot all about me as soon as the six mortal morsels ran screaming into their lair.

My pathetic 3% health demanded only one thing — to get out of there right now! But what then? The mages would revive and come back! I had to act.

Flying up, I went back to floor 50 and approached the threshold of the gates. That’s when I laid eyes on the Companions. Three ashen humanoid figures floated in ragged gowns floated above the ground, with goat skulls instead of heads and nightmarish mouths that a dull green light. They were twice the height of any titan. The Companions held green lanterns hanging from chains in their left hands, harpoons in their right. Their lamps swung, casting light in predatory flashes that tore away layers of flesh like the scorching light of an atom bomb.

The Companions were torturing the poor mages like I’d been tortured by the Living Sieve in the Nether. The effect of Ghastly Howl had already ended, but they had no chance to escape. They were bound in the same chains that had been preventing me from flying away only a few moments ago.

The mages’ bones were already beginning to shine through, blood fountaining from a multitude of torn capillaries. I finally managed to make out their names: Karlesh, Mario, Shade, Ducknose, Cardinal and Pilgrim. Karlesh’s eyes had fallen out and the pink of his brain shone through his open skull.

The next thing I did was highly cynical. I was cold-blooded enough to cast Spirit Shackles at the bosses’ feet, and to borrow Ducknose’s class to level up Imitation. Right after that, I flew down a hundred floors to recover my health in peace.

Imitation level increased: +1. Current level: 2.

Twenty minutes later, I came back. The gates were wide open, the Companions melding into the shadows, only the two lanterns jaggedly lighting the entrance. Nothing remained of the mages but blackened puddles of blood. The levitating adventurers had apparently agreed to start their first day by hunting me. By their logic, they risked nothing — Scyth was still at level one, languishing at the bottom of the Pitfall, defenseless, weak. Unfortunately for them, even the paralyzed Herald had a couple of tricks up his sleeve.

After reviving not in the graveyard, but in the nightmarish spot where they died, the mages were stunned and hesitated. Each had lost a level, and no doubt they all wanted to quickly make up for lost time, but it wasn’t to be.

The Companions, hissing gleefully about mortals and food and arguing as to who it belonged to, materialized from the shadows and pulled the mages in with their harpoons. I was feeling sick as it was without watching that again, so I just copied the class and level of Pilgrim, one of the mages, refreshed Spirit Shackles and took off upwards. I flew the same way as before, still limp and Trixie-like, as if an invisible hand was lifting up a cloth voodoo doll.

On floor 29 I intercepted another group on its way to ‘deal with Scyth.’ This raid of over thirty contestants was led by Yermak the Paladin.

I took his class and level and improved my skill:

Imitation level increased: +1. Current level: 3.

Now I could copy equipment too. I celebrated this by triumphantly blowing several bubbles of drool from my mouth, then hid in the shadows over the edge, deciding to listen in on the players. Afraid of accidentally falling off, they were pressed against the wall and didn’t see me.

“We have to hurry!” Yermak’s voice echoed. “Those mages can only float, they don’t have full control yet. So we might have enough time.”

Does he mean my mages? I thought. They have no control at all right now.

“I remember once