Chapter 52: Hershey

"Gwynne! Try to distract it or disarm it!" Rueben shouted while dodging the incoming spear once again.

Gwynne, on the other hand, was running straight towards the gate and screamed, "HOW THE HELL DO I DISARM THAT SHIT!?! IT LOOKS LIKE A FUCKING HEDGEGOG WITH WEAPONS!!"

The knight looked back and saw Gwynne near the gate, it dashed towards Gwynne with a halberd in its hand. Gwynne gritted her teeth and shot the knight but the knight wasn't phased by it.

"Rueben!" Gwynne desperately yelled as she rolled down to dodge the halberd coming towards her horizontally.

Swip! Swip! Swip!

Rueben grabbed its head and stabbed it in the neck three times.

The knight bellowed out in anger and gave Rueben a punch in the face, breaking his jaw in the process. He fell down to the ground with a loud thud, shivering.

"Gak!" Rueben shook as his body refused to move.

Gwynne saw all that and ran towards Rueben while the knight once again dashed towards.

Once the knight and Gwynne was near each other, she immediately took out a dagger and the two exchanged blows and blows. Gwynne mostly blocked its punches with the dagger and counter attacked.

Then her feet was stepped on and her whole body stiffened, giving the knight a chance to punch her in the face, then two more on her stomach.

It then followed by grabbed her head and smashing it to the ground.

The knight stood up before feeling one of the weapons stuck on its body gets out, it turned its head around to look before a spear stabbed through its jaw.

Rueben then punched its frontmost part of its helmet and dug deep in its face.

The knight swiftly grabbed him by the neck and threw him down, breaking his bones in the process. Rueben coughed up blood as his nose bled from hitting his face on the floor.

Gwynne then grabbed a sword from its body and slashed, one of its arms fell, it reacted by kicking Gywnne on the stomach before stomping on her back.

Then it grabbed its arm and placed it towards the wound, before the arm became whole once more.

"Fuck it." She muttered underneath her breath and took out a small cube like object before stashing it inside the gaps of the armor that the weapons made.

Then she rolled forward and grabbed Rueben by his hair and ran.

The knight suddenly felt its stomach turn warm before it exploded into pieces, creating a giant hole on its stomach.

The knight fell down and touched its nonexistent stomach, then the flesh on its stomach suddenly squirmed and worms like flesh moved to mend the wound.

Rueben caught hold of this and grabbed Gwynne as he healed, "We better stash more of those exploding thingy inside it."

Gwynne nodded her head, then she looked through her bag before a blank expression on her face appeared. Rueben turned to look at her then his eyes also turned blank.

"You... Lost all of it?"

Gwynne then turned towards the knight, and a very obvious pouch beside it, her face scrunched up and nodded her head very slowly.

The knight turned to look at them, then grabbed the pouch.

This immediately got the two to stand up and grab a rock before throwing it towards the knight to which it responded by throwing the cube towards them.

They intended to stop the knight from throwing the thing by distracting it, but the knight ignored their blatant distraction and even retaliated by throwing the cube towards their direction.

"How the hell does it know how to activate the cube?!" Gwynne ran immediately after she saw the cube on the knight's hand.

The knight first studied the cube, then pressed some button before it threw the damn thing towards them.

Rueben, on the other hand, caught the cube and tried throwing it back but found that the thing was stuck on his palm. He looked at it blankly, then took out an Ichor Siphon and stabbed his leg before the cube blew up and erased his whole right arm and part of his torso in the process.

Then he healed quite immediately after.

Gwynne shot another arrow at its hand, rendering it unable to hold the cube in the process. The thing stared at the arrow, before it broke it into two and grabbed another cube.

But Rueben was faster, he swiftly came to its side and stabbed a dagger on its face before he grabbed the pouch and threw it towards Gwynne. He then grabbed the spear stuck on its jaw and pulled.

"Guff!!!" Then his mouth bled out, Rueben coughed out so much blood that he fell down and got dizzy.

The knight stabbed its hand through his stomach, then dug around before taking out his guts, once that was done, Rueben fell and got dizzy.

The knight softly stomped his stomach, making him cough out more blood.

Gwynne swiftly dashed towards the thing pushed it down, but it didn't budge a single inch, the being grabbed one of the swords on its body, and pulled. Then it stabbed Gwynne and held her high up in the air.

Then the knight smacked Gwynne down to the ground, beside Rueben, and the two shivered.

The knight then went to their side and raised the sword up high, then slashed down with all its might.

Rueben, who drank his own blood, already healed and kicked Gwynne away.

"Bang!" Gwynne yelled with a smile on her face as the knight felt his whole body turn warm and it exploded into bits.

Smoke filled the air as dust soon settled.

Rueben grabbed one of the weapons that got blow off and threw it towards the Knight to which it responded by grabbing it and stabbing it to the ground.

The knight's body was blown off, large chunks of its body was gone but the two of them could clearly see that it was healing.

Gwnne gritted her teeth and tossed a few more bombs, the cubes stuck to the knight then exploded once more.

She felt that it wasn't enough and ran to its side. She saw most of its body was charred black with only its torso and head left, then she chucked more cube inside and ran.

The cube exploded and ashes filled the air.

Rueben as slowly healing as the two of them calmed down.

"What kind of thing was that guy? He wouldn't die even though i threw so many bombs into its body!" Gwynne sat down beside Rueben, ignoring the bloody mess that they were wearing and placed her head on his shoulder.

Rueben ignored her and focused on healing himself.

"A knight that had hundreds of weapons stabbed through its body. It shouldn't be a person." She spoke while wiping the blood off her face.

"It should be a monster. To think we would find a monster guarding this gate with its whole life, that was stressful as hell."

"But its dead now, we should move forward after we take a short break." Rueben said and opened his eyes, looking towards the gate.

Gwynne nodded her head and lied down on his lap. "Let me rest a little."

"You can also rest forever you know? Want to try it?"

A voice sounded out behind them, Rueben swiftly grabbed his dagger and threw it towards the voice.

But the dagger suddenly stopped, then turned around and stabbed him in the head. Gwynne already stabbed an Ichor Siphon on his leg and pulled out the dagger from his head, then the healing began.

"To think you managed to escape that hole. Did the beast inside spat you out because you were so disgusting to eat? Or did you kill it?" A little girl slowly materialised as ink fell down from the ceiling above.

White hair, white eyes, white lips, and a blood red aristocratic dress paired with inky black stain.

"No matter. I can just kill you once more." She smiled and snapped her fingers.

[Life's Illusion]

A sphere appeared and expanded, encompassing the two of them as well as the little girl inside.

"Welcome back to my domain, Hunter." Hershey smiled chillingly.

***

A speck of dust and a burning flame.

Two insignificant ants now stand before me. I have met and even fought the other one.

The Hunter looked at me with no expression on his face but judging from the light glinting in his eyes, he must be quite angry at me. How pathetic.

I looked over to the woman, a woman. She has an aura of countless beasts within her, yet i see no soul. Is she a puppet? No, its not that she do not have a soul, rather, its that her soul is weak, so fickle like a candle on its last legs.

But i feel terrifying obsession hidden deep within, maybe she does not realize this obsession or has not discovered it yet. Where did she come from? Why have i not seen her before?

The Hunter grabbed a knife from the woman and swiftly dashed towards me. I harrumphed and softly twisted my wrist. The Hunter stabbed through the air before rolling to the side and grabbed somethinf in the air and threw it towards the air.

The woman also started flailing and running around with a dagger and stabbed the air.

I stared at them for a moment, then sat down as a chair materialised infront of me. I continued my train of thought.

The beast that grew inside the hole suddenly disappeared, its last aura was within an island near a beach. The Hunter's aura were also all over the place, even his disgusting blood was there.

With prior investigation, i managed to track him down to here, at the "Gate".

It was probably due to the woman that this Hunter managed to get this far. Should i kill him now?

....

....

....

No.

"Killing you will only make you effectively immortal. If it was through the beast below, you might truly die but if i or any of the beings inside this labyrinth were to kill you, you would become one of us."

It was truly an annoying thing. But no matter, i just have to lock him up and starve him to death.

"Faesher—"

The ground rumbled, the air turned ice cold.

Rueben turned to look and saw a large door. He stared at the door, just as he stepped his foot forward, blood suddenly sipped through the blank space below the door, then—

The world turned on itself.

Then it inverted. Then mashed together before Rueben was down on the ground with skulls placed infront of him.

"—Traumata."

-Forever Trauma-

Gwynne looked at the countless knives in front of her. Each was very familiar. Each was something that she had used.

"Savious—"

Then bodies appeared infront of her, the circled around her. Sitting in chairs, their heads dropped low and they were unflinching, not moving a single inch.

Each bodies were extremely familiar to her as well.

"W-W-What.." Her eyes shook.

Her face turned pale as she fell down on the ground, her knees turned weak, her body shook as if she was on a frozen lake.

Blood dripped down from her head as it showered around the whole place. Dying the entire area slowly with read.

"No.... No! Noo!!" Gwynne cried out as voices yelled in her ears.

"Please, please, please, please, please—" She kneeled down and clasped both of her hands together.

"—Amemoria."

-Saved Memory-

"I shall let you go through your traumas and painful memories, over and over and over and over and over again."

She smiled and sat down.