Heart And Soul

Before I can even start thinking about my next move, I sense movement to my left and right, simultaneously. This time, I'm not nearly fast enough, and two massive hands clasp me tightly.

My arms are pinned tightly against my sides. The monster lifts me off the ground. I try to twist around, but my chest is held fast, and I can feel my breathing being restricted.

I cough and gasp for air.

I must have dropped the mana store when it threw me. Well, I guess it served its purpose. There's no doubt that the beast's whole attention is focused on me. I feel a coldness descending, and twist my neck to look above me.

Two gaping, black sockets glare back at me. A skeletal grin frozen across its skull, I'm lifted up towards the skull of the greater monster. There's no brain or eyes inside the skull, so what is it doing?

"Oh," I realize, with a chilling sensation down my spine.

It's going to eat me, isn't it?

Elizabeth really needs to hurry up.

With a creaking and scraping sound, like that of an old iron door, the monster's jaw begins to open. A vomit-inducing scent rolls over me and I stare into its mouth. The monster has no clear throat to lead to a stomach. So what happens to the bodies it eats?

They lie, stacked in piles, slowly rotting away within its skull.

With the exception of some fresh corpses close to the front, all the decomposed bodies are completely lacking in mana. Not even the slightest bit is left. This monster is truly mana-powered in every sense of the word.

The pungent smell of death covers me. As I get closer to its open jaw, I notice that the bodies are not chopped in half or even crushed. They haven't been chewed on. They've been disintegrated, somehow.

Out of the bottom of my eye, I spot that familiar blue glow.

The monster is still fixed on me, moving me toward its open mouth. My mana must be outweighing hers, like I had hoped, and with no eyes to see, it's left practically blind. She sure took her sweet time.

The glow of Elizabeth's sword lights up the night like a beacon. She shoots for the monster's stomach, leaving a long streak of light behind her, like a comet.

Now close enough to see whites of the carcasses' eyes, I spot something. There, at the very back of its throat, is a thin, fleshy pipe. A disgusting, vomit-green liquid is dripping from the pipe, onto the corpses below. This must be its stomach acid. For it to be able to completely disintegrate human bodies like this, it must be incredibly strong. Even more so than the stuff found inside humans.

The monster lets out a roar of pain as Elizabeth plunges her sword into its belly, exactly where I specified. I see the sword dim and Elizabeth switch out the AM-store for another, slicing open the creature. Covered in blood, I see her climb inside.

The greater monster nearly drops me in pain. Letting go with one of its hands, but keeping me tightly gripped with the other, it slams its fist against its own body. Unable to see from my leaking mana covering everything in the area, it's hitting everything it can in its frantic attempts to destroy the attacker.

Elizabeth must have been able to find something vital because, with harsh groans of agony, the monster begins to fall backwards.

The beast topples, its grip on me loosening. With some effort, I manage to pull myself out of its grasp with my unbroken arm. The gigantic body falls across the city, turning buildings and streets to dust. The whole planet seems to vibrate under us.

Massive amounts of blood gush from the cut on its stomach, covering the streets of Rosewood. The once beautiful city is now covered in the guts of the greater monster.

Continuing its loud roaring sounds, it punches again and again and again. I hear a crunch which tells me that it has broken one of its own ribs. It lets out an agonized howl. Yet, with one last effort, it raises all four of its massive fists, and crashes them into its own enormous body.

It's as good as committing suicide.

A series of highly uncomfortable noises come from the creature, as its four large fists let down their full might onto its own body. The creature whimpers. Frightening though it is, its reliance on mana became its downfall.

The arms stop their frantic movements, and there's a sound much like a heaving breath, as the monster finally goes limp.

I guess this technically means that Elizabeth killed the monster. That's fine. She can deal with the attention instead of me.

Speaking of, where is she?

I leap onto the monster's corpse and climb towards the large cut in its belly.

"Elizabeth?" I call.

Pulling open the wound, blood spills from it, covering up to my ankles. The rancid smell of gore forces me to cover my nose and mouth in disgust. Squeezing myself through the wound, I look up in the direction of the monster's condensed mana, slowly seeping out of its body.

"Elizabeth?!"

Massive, broken ribs line the outer rim of the corpse. Large chunks of a splintered rib are penetrating a gross sack situated just beneath the skull. A green liquid is spilling out of it, slowly disintegrating globs of flesh within the dead body.

There, unconscious, is Elizabeth. She looks bruised and severely battered. A massive rib is holding down her leg and her body is covered in the splattered guts of the beast.

Worse yet, that green liquid - the greater monster's stomach acid - is visible along the lining of her armor.