The Nexus Knight [Chps 6-7]

More fun times in the death games!

—Chapter 6—

—The Catacomb Maze—

Sen turned to Kellan, a slight frown on his face. “Well? You go first.”

Before Kellan could head over to the door, Mavis reached into her jacket and withdrew a Desert Eagle, a semi-automatic pistol. Kellan was familiar with their design, though he wondered where Mavis had gotten it.

“Didn’t you have a rifle?” he asked.

Mavis nodded once. “Yeah, but some crazy shit happened during the second game. I had to fight someone, and I lost it down a vent.” She motioned to the door. “You want me to go first? I have shoes.”

With a smirk, Kellan shook his head. “By the way, you should know what I found out during the second game. It’s about Team 42.”

“Sen told me.” Mavis held her handgun close. “Team 42 is working with aliens to kill primordial dragons so they can invade other dimensions. Right? And they’re going to use the super-powered magic of Zenith to do it?”

“That’s right.” Kellan glanced over at Sen, and then back to Mavis, the light in the room irritating his eyes. He closed one and said, “We should talk about it at some point.”

There was only one other person that Kellan trusted in the Nexus Games, and that was Mavis. She had come from his dimension, and they had started this journey together. Kellan wanted to ensure they were on the same page with what was needed to be done.

Team 42 could not be allowed to win the games.

Kellan had come to that decision when he had seen glimpses of the aliens—the Flestiss Dominion. He needed to discuss it with Mavis, to make sure she knew the horrors, and that he could rely on her to help with this self-imposed mission.

No team would emerge successful unless all the members were on the same page and working toward the same goals.

“Does Xiang know?” Kellan asked, glancing down at Sen.

The child crossed his arms. “I told them both at the same time, thank you very much. My sister said she suspected they were up to no good when they registered with one of the flestiss on their team.” Then he pointed to the door. “Now we need to go!”

With a huff, Kellan walked over to the door. The cold metal handle practically burned his palm. He held his rifle close before shoving the door open and stepping into the maze.

His right forearm burned, and Kellan glanced down at his skin to see a new number emerge.

It read…

07:59

Their remaining time.

The speaker in the room shook again as it spoke. “Whenever you’re ready to leave Catacomb Maze, enter your designated room before your time runs out. You will be returned to the AVU Palace, along with all your prizes. If you fail to return to your room with remaining time on the clock, you will die. Thank you and enjoy!”

Fantastic.

Kellan glanced around at the maze. A long hallway stretched before him, one of stone bricks, and decorated with cobwebs and dust. A chill ran down Kellan’s spine when he spotted one of the tiny spiders. He didn’t have arachnophobia, but the Nexus Games had given him a whole new healthy respect for avoiding spiders.

“The Kuji aren’t in the maze, right?” Kellan asked.

Sen, who remained in the safety of the room, shook his head. “Of course not. Stragglers aren’t allowed to join, remember? Get your head in the game.” He shooed Kellan to the hall with a wave of both his hands. “Check for traps.”

Kellan returned his attention to the hall. They were underground, obviously—all catacombs were—but he didn’t understand how a straight hallway could be considered a maze. With a slow step, where he kept his attention on his surroundings, Kellan walked forward.

The metal door behind them was etched with the number 101. Obviously, it was their escape room. They’d have to remember where it was in order to return to the palace.

Sen crept out of the room and followed a good ten feet behind, his hands clenched together in front of chest. Mavis walked behind him, her weapon up and ready. She, too, remained vigilant, checking behind them occasionally, even if there was no place for an enemy to come from.

They had left an empty room, into an empty hall.

Kellan’s bright hane was their only source of light, and it illuminated their path for a few feet. They continued at a steady pace, the stone bricks uneven and rough, as though the walls and floor had been assembled by amateur architects.

Two minutes of walking, and Kellan hadn’t seen a single door or turn. They just walked forward, at a steady pace, never encountering anything but the spiders on their webs. Then Kellan’s right forearm burned. He gritted teeth and glanced down.

07:47

“Our time went down?” Mavis said, staring at her own arm. “Why?”

“Someone triggered a trap,” Kellan muttered, thinking back to Bitso’s explanation of the game. “The time goes down whenever that happens.”

“Seriously?”

Kellan nodded, and as the sting of the numbers slowly faded, he was struck with another burning sensation on his right arm. When he glanced down a second time, he was shocked to find the numbers had changed.

07:37

“Another person triggered a trap?” Kellan balked. “What’re these delta-bravos doing?”

“Delta-bravos?” Sen asked, frowning. “Is that some sort of bizarre insult from your world?”

“It’s code for D-B, which means douchebag.” Mavis glared at the number on her arm.

“Seems needlessly complicated for insulting someone.”

“This maze seems needlessly complicated for killing people,” Kellan sarcastically muttered. “I’m just sticking to the Nexus theme.”

“Keep walking! We’re running out of time!”

Sen’s shouts echoed throughout the hallway. Kellan took in a deep breath, asking for whatever gods were listening to grant him the patience needed to find his way through a death maze. He moved forward at a quicker pace, trying to find something that indicated it was a door or another pathway.

He didn’t see anything.

The hall seemingly went on forever. In one direction. No turns. No escape.

There weren’t any enemies, thankfully. No monster yami, or traps with buzzsaws, or bizarre imps out to kill people.

Kellan’s arm burned a third time. The numbers had decreased again, more than just the normal passage of time.

07:25

“We lose ten minutes every time?” Kellan shook his head and tried to think of how often it would occur. How many people were in the maze?

Mavis touched the stone brick walls, running her fingers through some of the cobwebs. “How are they triggering traps? We haven’t found anything yet. We can’t even add to the incompetence.”

“There must be illusions over the walls,” Sen said. He walked over and felt the hall walls, never sullying his hands by rubbing the dust or webs. “If we all work together, we’re bound to find something.”

Kellan was familiar with illusions. Xiang had created them repetitively in the last game. That didn’t help much, however. All he learned about illusions was that he couldn’t see through them or detect them. Well, he also learned they weren’t tangible. They only seemed tangible.

Which gave Kellan an idea.

“How do we see through illusions?” Mavis asked, her volume increasing with her obvious frustration.

Sen stopped his searching. “Mind magic and soul magic have abilities to see through invisibility and deception.”

“You’re the soul mage,” Kellan stated. Then he waved his hand around the maze. “See the way.”

“Y-Yes, well, I’m too low rank. You see, you must be equal rank or higher to see through such abilities. Whoever made the maze—likely the Arbiter himself—is high rank. Perhaps A, S or M. Which is, unfortunately, outside my capability to handle.”

“Then why did you even bring any of that up, ya piece of toast?”

Sen’s face reddened, then his ears. He pursed his lips, his eyebrows knitting downward into a glare. “How dare you. I’m using our valuable time to instruct you on the rules of the Nexus, so that you can use your two functioning brain cells to hopefully live through the rest of the games and this is how you repay me? Insults?”

Sen’s shouting was legendary. It filled the hallway, echoing off the walls.

But that was exactly what Kellan wanted.

Ignoring all of Sen’s yelling, Kellan moved forward. He closed his eyes, listening to shouts.

“You’re leaving? Disgraceful!”

“Kellan!” Mavis added, her own voice echoing down the halls.

As Kellan ran down the straight hall, he paid careful attention to the sounds. A few feet forward, and he heard it—the sounds echoing in a different direction. Off to his right. Kellan, without opening his eyes, turned to face the faint sounds disappearing down another tunnel.

When he opened his eyes, Kellan saw a stone brick wall, just as he thought he would.

“You will return or else!” Sen shouted, his tone harsher than before.

Kellan tensed. When he turned to face Sen, he fought the urge to end this once and for all.

With gritted teeth, Kellan said, “I found the illusions.”

Sen opened his mouth, as though ready for another tirade, but Mavis grabbed his Power Rangers sweatshirt and twisted her fist, practically yanking Sen off his feet. “Stop. No more threats. We’re in the middle of an operation. We don’t need this.”

Sen huffed and then sharply turned his head to the side. “All right, all right.” He dismissively waved his hand, and then tugged his way out of Mavis’s grip. “But next time, articulate your plans, lest you risk angering me.”

Kellan balled his free hand into a fist several times, willing himself not to succumb to rage. A feeling of bloodlust and revenge emanated from his rifle, of all places. He glanced down at the black metal, occasionally forgetting that the weapon was semi-sentient. Did it want to kill Sen?

In a perfect world, Kellan sarcastically thought.

“Yes…” a haunting voice filled Kellan’s mind. “In a perfect world…”

He flinched, surprised by the dark voice, wondering if it actually came from his rifle.

Sen sucked in air through his teeth and grabbed at his shoulder. He whinnied as he hit the ground on his knees, his eyes scrunched closed. Mavis touched his back, her brow furrowed in confusion.

“Sen? What’s wrong?”

He shoved the sleeve of his Power Rangers sweatshirt up past his elbow. With deep breaths, he touched at his arm, his child-fingers sliding down to his wrist. A bulge writhed around, something snake-like under his skin.

The Queen Tyranny Worm.

“Jesus,” Mavis said as she leapt away, her eyes wide.

Kellan held the glowing cigarette up a bit higher, staring at the wriggling worm moving around Sen’s arm. “Maybe next time you’ll use protection,” he quipped.

“Enough of your pathetic jokes,” Sen hissed, his voice strained. He gripped his arm, closing his fingers around the wiggling worm, and the disgusting creature eventually calmed down. “This wouldn’t have happened if it weren’t for you. Whenever I… think about them… the queen gets agitated. She hates I haven’t used her children…”

“Yeah, it’s my fault you puppet people. Airtight logic.”

Mavis walked over to his side. In a low whisper, she said, “Kellan, please. I think Sen can be reasonable. He fixed my leg, remember? Let’s just… try not to antagonize each other. Not here. In the middle of a death game.”

Kellan exhaled. “He’s testing my patience.”

“I understand. Let’s just try to solve this civilly.”

Kellan wanted to point out that Mavis had just yanked the kid around by his sweatshirt but opted not to say anything. Mavis had leapt to his side when it seemed Sen might try start something. She just didn’t want Kellan to act in the same manner as the child.

“Fine. I’ll try.”

Mavis returned to Sen’s side. “Are you okay?”

With a huff, Sen shoved the sleeve of his sweatshirt down. “I can control it.”

A hint of hesitation laced Sen’s child-like voice. Kellan recognized it, and he wondered if he should be worried. But Mavis was right. Now wasn’t the time to deal with the problem. Their time was quickly dwindling away.

Mavis glanced at the wall. “Kellan, you said you discovered the illusions?”

Still disturbed by the rifle, and the argument with Sen over the worms, Kellan ran a shaky hand down his face. They had a new way forward. He shouldn’t waste it.

“That’s right.” Kellan walked over to the wall—the place where he had heard the echoes. “This is it. But…”

He knew if he touched the wall, the illusions would mess with his mind. Sure enough, when Kellan lifted his hand, his knuckles grazed the rough bricks. It felt real, even though he knew it wasn’t. He would act as though he were touching something physical, which would prevent him from just walking through.

“How do we get through now that we know it’s an illusion?” Kellan asked.

Sen swallowed and then managed to get back to his feet. He pushed his sleeve down to his wrist. “Just run through. Or have somebody shove you through. The illusions will stop you if you’re hesitant and unsure, but if you’re confident or merely thrown into one by accident, the illusions will crumble.”

There was a long moment of silence. Then Kellan’s right arm burned yet again.

The numbers…

07:10

They only had little over seven hours remaining, despite the fact they had only been in the maze for a handful of minutes. At this rate, we’re just going to die in the maze, Kellan thought.

“Should we head back?” Mavis asked.

Sen waved his arms. “No! People are just being brazen because this is the beginning of the maze. We haven’t even gathered any arcana. We need to keep going. Come. Shove me into the wall. Let’s continue.”

“This seems risky,” Kellan muttered.

Was the Chime worth it?

“We can’t return to my sister empty handed.” Sen clenched his jaw and said nothing else.

Kellan hesitated. Then he glanced back at the wall. They still had plenty of time…

“All right. Let’s go. But quickly.”

—Chapter 7—

—Coffins—

Kellan, with force and confidence, walked forward into the wall. He basically threw himself through it, the illusion incapable of offering any resistance. He stumbled into a new hallway, this one with a four-way intersection a few hundred feet from his location.

And holes in the walls. Holes filled with coffins.

Kellan stopped and glanced around, taking in as much information as possible. Twenty coffins from here to the four-way intersection. He glanced at the coffins, his rifle at the ready. They didn’t have names—neither on the coffins or engraved into the bricks of the stone shelves.

But there were words.

Percentages.

Kellan stepped close to the first coffin, his eyes narrowed. Burned onto the redwood, were the words:

Arcana 80%

Trap 19%

Other 1%

For a long moment, Kellan just stared. Was the coffin… randomized? Was that the percentage the likelihood of the contents? The majority percentage indicated arcana. If he opened the coffin, was that the most likely contents?

Sen and Mavis stumbled into the hallway a moment later. It seemed as though Mavis had thrown Sen forward and then charged forward herself. The two almost tripped over each other as they entered the coffin-lined hallway. In an attempt to stop himself from falling, Sen grabbed hold of Mavis’s upper leg.

With the speed of a reflexive action, Mavis smacked Sen off and then stumbled into the nearest wall. “Watch it,” she hissed.

Sen hit the ground, unable to steady himself in time. Then he rubbed at his face as he got to feet. “I assure you, I that wasn’t a tasteless attempt at human contact.” He brushed himself off with a huff. “For your information, my child-like body comes with child-likelimitations. Such as the inability to be intimate.”

“You can’t get it up?” Kellan snorted and half-laughed. “This is the first time I’ve legitimately felt bad for you.”

The cold breeze of the coffin-filled hall slowly wafted by. A chill ran down Kellan’s spine. He glanced back, trying to keep his attention on everything around.

“For your information,” Sen said matter-of-factly, “men are capable of erections as soon as they’re born. However, the ability to consummate a relationship isn’t possible until the testis swells during the early stages of puberty. And since my body has—”

“Stop,” Kellan interjected. He pinched the bridge of his nose. “I can’t believe we’re having this conversation.”

“Really?” Mavis smirked. “I thought men always wanted to talk about their junk?”

He returned the smirk. “Speaking of junk, I’ve already gone through puberty, and everything works just fine for me.”

With a blush, Mavis nodded once. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

Sen sighed loud enough for his voice to carry down the hall. “Yes, rub it in. The shame of my situation doesn’t hurt enough.”

The thought that Sen had somehow lost that much of his physical capability did bother Kellan. He glanced over to the child-like man and half-shrugged. “Sorry. I’ll keep the jokes to a minimum.”

“I’m so fortunate.” Sen crossed his arms.

Then Kellan motioned to the nearest coffin. “I think these contain arcana. Mavis, why don’t you open it?”

She walked to the nearest coffin and frowned. Then she grazed her fingertips over the words etched into the wood. “Percentages?”

As if to answer the question, the timer on Kellan right arm burned. He glanced down and stared at the remaining time.

06:58

Goddammit, he thought. All the other teams are triggering traps constantly. When Kellan glanced back at the coffin, he took note of the nineteen percent associated with the trap. How many coffins were the others opening?

Kellan turned his attention to the other coffins in the hallway. If he opened all twenty, he would, most likely, trigger four traps, which would subtract forty minutes from the overall time. But if they were going to acquire arcana… They had to open a few coffins, at the very least.

“Are you sure?” Mavis asked. She grabbed the side of the coffin’s lid. “What if it’s a trap?”

Kellan hefted his rifle. “If it’s a yami, I’ll handle it. If it’s poison darts or something similar, we have two healers, right?” He motioned to himself, and then Sen.

Before Mavis opened the coffin, she stared for a long moment. Then she inhaled and closed her eyes. Her exposed skin shimmered for a second. Pebble-like formations appeared across her skin, hardening like armor. They shifted with the pale tone of her complexion, becoming nearly invisible. Kellan still noticed the scale-like texture across Mavis’s body, but it was subtle.

“I have this ability,” she muttered. “Magma magic apparently lets me create natural armor.”

Her statement reminded Kellan of his own armor. He touched the back of his neck and slid his fingers down his spine until he grazed a small object injected straight into his skin. While he was still wearing a T-shirt and sweatpants, the armor he had discovered had bee connected straight into body.

The armor had once been cursed, but not anymore…

Magical Item [Armor]—Shadow of a Dying Star

Uniform armor worn by the stealth gunners of the Flestiss Dominion. Sturdy and reliable, this piece of armor attaches to the mage’s spine and requires a mana to activate. Once activated, the armor covers the mage completely and grants +2 “living shadow shell” armor defense, and +2 armor rating. The mage can deactivate the armor at will.

The armor rating reduced damage off the top, and the living shell was some sort of shadowy health source beyond his own. Kellan would’ve surely died in the last game if he hadn’t been wearing his armor.

“Ready?” Mavis asked, drawing him back to the present.

“Do it, soldier,” Kellan said, readjusting his focus to the coffin.

She shoved, and then grunted, and finally—with considerable effort—managed to push the coffin lid off and reveal the contents. The inside glowed with a sinister red, the hue enough to briefly lit up the hall. Kellan’ glowing hane stick almost didn’t compare.

But the red glow faded just as quickly as it had appeared.

Mavis held her breath for a long moment. Then she glanced down to Sen. “Was that a good sign or a bad one?”

“Look in the coffin,” he said with a wave of his hand. “Since you weren’t attacked by anything, I would say it was good.”

Kellan didn’t typically associate redwith good, but this was Nexus.

After a hesitant moment, Mavis leaned forward and stared at the contents of the coffin. Kellan moved forward as well, curious as to what was inside. He leapt back as soon as he caught a brief glimpse of the corpse inside.

The dead body was half-preserved. The skin was wan and sunken, the eyes nothing more than pools of jelly, and the clothes stiff with dried fluids. Hairs were thin and everywhere, and the scratches on the inside of the wooden prison told Kellan the man had been alive before the coffin was stuck into the Catacomb Maze.

Kellan hadn’t gotten many more details. He had turned away too quickly to really know who the man was.

“There’s arcana in here,” Mavis muttered. She had to push the corpse to the side—her face twisted in a grimace the entire time—but she managed to gather up a single glowing red crystal.

She held it up for a brief second.

Arcana…

It sparkled with inner power, crimson and mystic.

But then it melted into the palm of Mavis’s hand. She shook out her arm and then wiped her hands onto her jeans. “That was disgusting.” She waved around her nose. “And that corpse reeks.”

“Most bodies decompose into a set of gases,” Sen said, holding up a finger. “Cadaverine and putrescine smell like rot, whereas the gas, skatole, often smells of feces.”

“I don’t think that knowledge is gonna help us in this situation,” Kellan muttered. He glanced over at the next coffin. “We’re only getting one arcana from these? Some of the magical abilities we can obtain require a lot more. In order for me to rank my magic, I need at least ten. I only have five, currently. At this rate, we’ll trigger several traps before we’ll gather enough.”

“That’s because this is the early portion of the maze.” Sen pointed to the four-way intersection. “This is a risk versus reward challenge round. That means the more we risk, the greater the gains. The center of the maze has the ultimate prize, and all the coffins around it will likely have plenty of arcana.”

Both Mavis and Sen turned their attention to Kellan. He glanced back at them before turning his attention to the four-way intersection. They had to go deeper? The time was the biggest factor. He couldn’t account for what everyone else was doing. Would they continue to trigger traps until they all died?

No. The other competitors had already lived through two games themselves. That meant they were clever enough to make it through some of the Arbiter’s tricks. They were probably just taking risks because their time was so high.

Once the time was lower…

Would they stop risking themselves?

Or perhaps the other competitors would leave the maze before the time became an issue.

“Let’s go deeper,” Kellan said. “Forget these coffins. One arcana isn’t enough incentive to trigger traps and decrease our time. Let’s head straight for the center, and on the way out, we’ll check these death boxes.”

“Sounds like a plan,” Mavis said. She readied her handgun and motioned for Kellan to take point. “I’ll cover the rear.”

He nodded in acknowledgement.

As a group, they ran to the four-way intersection. The whole catacomb was just as Kellan imagined it would be. The dark halls, stone archways, and many coffins were the things of nightmares. Instead of running down a random hallway, Kellan stopped in the middle of the intersection and glanced around.

“What’re you waiting for?” Sen asked. “We don’t have a map. Any pathway is as good as the next!”

“Shh.”

Kellan rummaged around in his backpack. He pulled out a stick of hane and then threw it to the floor. He stomped on the black cigarette and smeared the contents on the stone floor.

“What’re you doing?” Mavis asked.

Kellan motioned to the hall they came from. “I’ve marked it. Now we know how to get back.”

Her eyes went wide for a moment. “Oh. That’s a good idea.”

“Now can we go?” Sen asked.

Kellan held a hand up, silencing his teammate. He glanced down each hallway, trying to decide which path to take. Some paths had spiderwebs… and others did not. Had someone been through here already?

Then Kellan turned his attention to the coffins on the holes in the wall. Some of them had been opened on the route with no spiderwebs. People had been down that way. But should we follow them? Kellan narrowed his eyes. Or should we take our own way?

This wasn’t a PvP game, which meant the players weren’t allowed to fight each other. If Kellan ran into others, they wouldn’t be struggling for their lives, but that didn’t mean strange things couldn’t happen. Kellan had his key taken from him in the first game…

We should avoid everyone else if we can.

Kellan pointed down a hall that hadn’t been traveled. “This way.”

He jogged forward, keeping his attention focused on the way ahead. Sen and Mavis followed without saying a word, agreeing through their actions. The stomp of Mavis’s shoes were the loudest sounds they made as they hurried into the dark and gloomy hall.

The spiderwebs grew more numerous as they went. Kellan had to wave his arm to clear them away, the gentle tickle of their presence more of an irritation than anything else. When Kellan stopped to glance at the coffins, he was surprised by the numbers. One coffin read:

Arcana 60%

Trap 39%

Other 1%

The percentage for the traps went up?

Mavis stared at the coffin as well. “What is other?” She pointed to the last category.

“I’m sure that’s for magical items or other useful objects,” Sen stated. “Sometimes the Arbiter likes to put in random gifts for the participants in the Nexus Games.”

“Will these coffins have more than one arcana?” Kellan asked. “Why else would the percentage shift so drastically like that?”

Sen had to stand on his tiptoes to even look at the percentages etched into the coffin. “That would be my guess.” He stood back on his feet and crossed his arms. “I say we test this theory. The other teams have already stolen time—it wouldn’t hurt if we did it once.”

Kellan motioned to the coffin. Mavis stepped close, tucked her handgun away, and then grabbed the edge of the coffin.

“Ready?” she asked.

Kellan lifted his weapon. “Let’s see.”

After another grunt, and some effort, Mavis shoved the lid of the coffin off. But instead of crimson light and a corpse, Mavis stared down at a dark hole that seemingly led into the ground, like a hole that just went straight down.

Before they could discuss what they had found, Kellan’s right arm burned. The numbers changed.

06:43

And then a scream echoed up from the hole in the coffin. It wasn’t a cry for help, but a wail that chilled Kellan’s blood. Mavis flinched away and drew her gun.

A mass of hands—human hands—like a centipede had been stitched into existence out of human corpses, jutted out of the coffin and scrambled around. The fleshy centipede screamed again as it dragged most of its body out of the coffin and slinked into the hall, its movements fast enough to rival a viper.

“Kill it!” Sen commanded. “And don’t let it touch you!”