Tower of Avarice: A LitRPG story

Chapter 62 – Floor 7: Part 2

The sky was crimson.

It wasn’t a reflection of fire off the clouds or some trick of the light that made it seem reddish to Mathew’s eye; the sky was a bright red with an angry scarlet sun hanging overhead. There was a lack of clouds, nor was there a single living thing in sight.

Mathew’s boots made puffs of dust rise from the arid, dead ground as he exited the elevator. The air was dry, completely lacking in moisture. His skin prickled uncomfortably, and he could feel his lips become parched and chapped.

He stood on a rocky hill, the grey stone and earth barren and empty. But he wasn’t alone. Hundreds of people around him were looking at the strange new world they found themselves in. They wore a variety of clothing, informing Mathew of their disparate backgrounds and Disciplines.

A loud screech rang out, echoing off the hillside, and Mathew ducked slightly reflectively. A massive shadow obscured the sun. Sounding out once more, the creatures travelling far above them moved in a pack. With feathered wings, they looked like birds but monstrous and misshapen.

A deafening bang interrupted Mathew’s thoughts, and a streak of fire shot towards the creatures. Wheeling about, they scattered before dropping swiftly toward the horizon and out of sight of where the fire had come from.

In the distance, Mathew could see tens of thousands of people gathered on a flat plain below them. They had dug a large trench in front of them with a barrier of rocks behind it and were currently adding to their defences. They had tents and makeshift shelters, almost like it was a temporary community.

The ground began to shake, and the wind rose quickly, blowing dirt and grit into Mathew’s eyes and mouth. Distant shouting accompanied the rumble, and darkness began to creep toward the community of people from the far end of the field.

A horde of monsters was rushing toward the defending humans, their numbers appearing as a dark mass on the arid field. They were humanoid, their sky grey and sickly. Instead of hands, their limbs ended in long, bladelike appendages. They screamed in their madness, racing as quickly as they could toward the humans.

“Look out!” Someone shouted, and Mathew turned to see them pointing to their left. The flight of winged monsters had returned, swooping down low over the ground to pounce on those who had just left the protection of the elevators.

Mathew watched as a young woman was picked up in the claws of the demonic birds. Their feathered wings were mottled and rotten, their eyes crimson and hungry. Lifting the screaming young woman into the air, a group of the monsters tore into her.

“Run!” Another man yelled, and Mathew was pushed and shoved as the hundreds of people were desperate to escape the madness. A few of the more daring or calm amongst them began to fight back, hurling fire and other magics at the creatures, but the birds shrugged off the hottest flames.

One Blessing sent a cone of frost into the air, where it coated the wings of the monsters and sent them plummeting to the ground. A woman wielding a spear stabbed the creature, and Mathew could see the Aether released by the dead bird.

So strong was the Aether that it formed a visible, blue haze around it. Absorbing the Aether swiftly, the woman yelled in excitement and dashed toward another of the fallen creatures.

The hill around him was a scene of complete chaos. People were screaming, whether in pain and agony or delight and excitement. Mathew had no idea. Hundreds fought the demonic birds with magic or weapons, and it was all he could do to avoid the monsters' grasping claws and piercing beaks.

A feathered wing knocked Mathew off his feet as the creature dived on a nearby man. Mathew felt the Coward’s Brand on his chest burn with mana to ward off most of the blow, but the impact still forced him to roll and tumble down the uneven ground.

After finally stopping his tumble, Mathew climbed to his knees when a terrible screech sounded out right behind him. Another of the birds had focused its gaze on him, and it was only moments away from striking.

Snapping his fingers, Mathew conjured a towering pillar of flames, only for the bird to completely ignore it. Bursting through the fire, with not even a single of its feathers singed by the flames, its talons dug into his flesh painfully.

‘It’s immune to fire!’ Mathew thought as the Coward’s Brand was unable to protect him from the attack. A searing pain shot through his chest, and he felt himself begin to rise into the air. The bird, far larger than him, was picking him up to carry him away.

Looking around desperately for something to fight it off, Mathew saw a discarded axe on the ground a few feet away. Its owner was a mangled mess nearby, having been dropped from a great height by one of the monster birds.

Focusing his mind and mana, Mathew pushed the pain of the talons gripping him and flicked his finger toward the axe. ‘Catapult’ activated, and the axe flew toward him in a blur, colliding with the bird’s wing. It screeched loudly in pain. Its wing now hung uselessly, and it plummeted nearly ten feet to the ground.

Mathew landed on his feet and rolled to absorb the impact of the fall as the monstrous creature that had been gripping him crashed on the ground and began to squawk and cry out in pain. It attempted to pry the axe out of its wing to escape.

Not giving it a chance, Mathew ran forward and seized the axe in both hands. With all his enhanced strength, he ripped it free of its wing and repeatedly slammed it down on the bird’s head. By the third blow, he felt its skull collapse, and it fell lifeless.

A miasma of Aether rushed from the body, quickly surrounding him and was absorbed by his skin. The smell of spice reminded him of the Pit, the presence of Aether so strong that it overpowered his senses. Raising the axe, Mathew looked around for a moment.

The chaos of the attack was ongoing, both on the hill and the plains below. People were struggling and dying all around him, falling to talons and claws, or the humanoid creatures with blades for limbs. There was no safety, nowhere to run and hide. The only way to survive would be to band together and fight.

It seemed a number of his fellow ‘players’ understood that lesson. They were already running down the hill, fighting off the demonic and twisted birds as they did so.

Hefting the axe, Mathew ran with them. Occasionally, he would flick his finger, activating ‘Catapult’ to send a weapon, item or even rocks at the birds that tried to target him.

Several times, he was knocked down, and once, when he was nearing the bottom of the hill, a talon slashed him across the cheek. Even the Coward’s Brand was unable to protect him from the razor-sharp claws, and blood flowed down his face.

“Over here!” A young woman shouted from a circle of over twenty other people. They had managed to secure a small area, with several of their number firing arrows, crossbows and even rifles at the birds to keep them away. With a large rock that jutted from the side of the hill, it provided them some shelter.

Mathew skidded the last few feet, sliding on the ground as a bird pierced with arrows nearly struck him as it fell. Through a cloud of bluish Aether, he reached the group. Spinning around, he dropped the axe and sent it flying toward another bird that was about to attack them.

The axe bounced off the bird's thick feathers; the angle had been slightly off, and it tumbled to the ground. The bird had been knocked off course, and when Mathew sent the axe against it again, his aim was better.

Sprinting to the downed monster, he plucked the axe and returned to their encampment, where more and more players joined them. With their increase in numbers came more security, and finally, the birds were driven off.

Mathew leaned against the rock, panting at the physical exertion. Months at sea had softened him, if not physically then mentally. He had lost some of the edge that he had earned fighting the undead and goblins. He wasn’t ready to be on a battlefield, fighting against monsters for his life.

But things weren’t over yet. With the crimson sun overhead, they only had a minute's respite when the fighting on the plains began to spill over toward them. The strange creatures with blades for arms, howling for blood, flanked the defending humans.

Unfortunately, that put them directly into the path of Mathew and the other new arrivals. With their numbers swelling to hundreds, the circle of defenders readied themselves as these new monsters hurled themselves at the humans.

Mathew catapulted the axe against the creature, the swiftness of their movement hampered by the closeness of their ranks.

They were inhuman monsters; the fact that they had two legs and two arms was the only similarity between them and Mathew. With grey skin, horns protruding from skulls that lacked eyes, and teeth sharpened to points, they stabbed and slashed with their bladed limbs.

In minutes, the arid ground was wet with blood. Red from humans and black from whatever these creatures were.

Mathew spent the first few minutes on the Seventh Floor trying to stay alive.