"You have to take risks. We will only understand the miracle of life fully when we allow the unexpected to happen." - Paulo Coelho
"Nope," I quickly grabbed Josiah's arm and pulled him close to me. The hellspawns began to leap toward us, but I slammed Gabriel's shield to the ground, creating a yellow forcefield around us, pushing away all the hellspawns from us. The demoness stood up and proclaimed, "My name is Myra, demoness of the swarms. Under the Tiga agreement, I hereby exercise my right to act upon the intruders!" If you are wondering why she bothered proclaiming all of that, it is basically to ensure the angels do not intervene. Demons are surprisingly law-abiding creatures.
Myra then called upon even heavier rain on us, spawning larger hellspawns to overwhelm the force field. Normally, I would have just used the Orb of Light to blast the swarm away, but I am not sure if Josiah could tank that kind of damage. Josiah is crouching down, covering his ears, terrified. The force field is starting to crack and will not last long. I have to act fast.
"Josiah!" I called him. Josiah looked up at me.
"I need you to hold this shield for me while I write a sigil to get us out of here, okay?"
Josiah is visibly scared. "I need you to be brave for me. Please!"
Josiah hesitantly nodded. He slowly stood up and held the shield for me. I quickly crouched and began to write the sigil for teleportation on the ground. I was writing as fast as I could, but I noticed something odd. The force field was getting stronger. It was cracking before, but now it is repairing itself faster than the swarms could damage it. I briefly looked up and saw Josiah, powering up the shield with even more yellow energy. Not only that, I could finally see a spark of hope in his eyes. It was as if the angelic artifact was connecting with him. I took a glance at Myra, and she was visibly confused as well. "Who is that child?" she asked.
Her brief admiration then turned to twisted excitement. "Oh, hoh, this is going to be fun," as she raised her hand in the air. "I summoned thee; come forth, the Bull of Hell!"
Oh shit... "Are you serious?!" I yelled out to Myra as she began to laugh maniacally.
The ground began to rumble as the mountains began to crack. Cracks began to appear everywhere on the ground.
I quickly finished up the sigil and immediately activated it, summoning thousands of crows from it, but right before we teleported, the gigantic Bull of Hell ascended right underneath us, breaking through the ground, piercing the force field, and stabbing me with one of its horns. I quickly grabbed Josiah before he fell towards the bull and finally teleported both of us to the crows I had scattered early on. Josiah saw the giant hole in my body and panicly asked, "Are you okay?"
To which I responded, "Yep," as the hole was gone in a second. He looked, visibly weirded out by it. Yeah, it took a lot of people some time to get used to seeing my immortality at work.
"Where are we?" Josiah asked. "On the other side of the valley, the crows have searched the other areas, and only this area is left. We should quickly search for the cave and dip!"
But as I was saying that, the ground began to shake once more as I looked back and saw that the gigantic bull had fully emerged from the ground. The bull was so tall that it was overlooking the entire valley, and it saw us. It immediately went on a rampage, running towards us, destroying everything on its path.
"Change of plans! Josiah, take the shield with you and go look for the cave! I will kill the bull!" I yelled out.
"You are going to fight that thing?" Josiah asked in disbelief.
"We are not outrunning that thing! Go and let me know if you found the mushroom!" I said as I ran towards the bull.
"How?" Josiah yelled out.
"Just tell the crows!" I yelled from a distance.
Honestly, I am not sure if I can kill the bull. That thing is so terrifyingly powerful that even the gods feared it. During the war, hundreds of gods were defeated by this bull until my mentor, Bima, the god of strength, eventually killed the beast. This one is the weaker replacement for the said beast but still very powerful, nonetheless. Which is why it is insane that the demoness has the authority to call the beast out for something as trivial as this.
I pulled out a glass of mirror from my bag and crushed it to pieces. I then called my crows to me and handed them each a broken piece of the mirror. "Get me as close as you can to the head of the bull!" I told my crows. Hundreds of them began to move towards the head of the bull. Many, unfortunately, were picked off by the hellspawns. But I just need one of them to succeed. I pulled out my Orb of Light and prepared to activate it.
The bull is not slowing down at all and is about to reach me in less than a minute. I pulled out my binoculars to locate Myra. There she was, riding on top of the bull, seemingly enjoying the view. Perfect.
One of my crows finally reached the top of the bull's head and was immediately killed with a flick of a finger by Myra, dropping the broken mirror piece to the top of the bull's head. "Pathetic! "I think that is what she is saying based on her lips.
Oh... she still hasn't noticed. I pulled out my mirror blade and immediately moved to the broken mirror piece. I appeared directly on top of the bull's head, in front of Myra. Myra, caught off guard, quickly distanced herself from me, but it was no use. I activated the Orb of Light to discharge all of its stored power. I haven't used the Orb of Light to blow stuff up since facing the Drowned Ones, and I have been non-stop charging it in the desert. So one plus one equals a big kaboom. The Orb of Light engulfed half of the valley in pure bright light and decimated the entire environment. Josiah was far enough that he didn't get caught in the blast.
The bull was still alive but burned pretty badly and thus was fully incapacitated. Unfortunately, I don't think I can finish the job. The demoness... was half alive, I guess. The left half of her body was missing. Most of the hellspawns were obliterated.
I simply recreated myself. But in the blink of an eye, the demoness had regenerated most of her body and proceeded to control the blood around us to choke my neck.
"I know this isn't going to kill you, but it will very much incapacitate you, right?" she smiled.
"I heard that despite your immortality, you still feel exactly like a mortal. You feel hunger, thirst, all the pain of the wounds, and, of course, the lack of air." She was clearly enjoying this.
"What should I do with you now?" she approached me.
"Should I bind your soul to me? Make you my eternal slave?" She is right in front of me now.
"Aye, that sounds wonderful." She put her right hand on my chest and began chanting the soul-binding ritual.
I simply pulled out my Wind Tiger and decapitated the lady. She was completely off guard for the second time. She lost control over the blood, and I was released. Her body scrambled to retrieve her head, but I smashed it to pieces using Wind Tiger. Her body tried to fight me, but I quickly dismantled her entire torso with Wind Tiger. She was an incredible summoner, but not so much of a fighter. "After a thousand years, you get used to the pain."
"I found it!" Josiah said to one of my crows.
I drew a sigil under me and teleported once more to the crow.
There, I saw it, the lake with the golden mushrooms surrounding it. The mushrooms even look like a bunch of thumbs. I can't believe it. The mushroom fricking exists!
"Take as many as you can and put them in my bag," I said. Josiah and the crows began to plug out all the mushrooms. I also scrambled to take as many as possible. But I am well aware that the demonic reinforcements will arrive at any moment. After taking about half of all the mushrooms, we teleported to the checkpoint and presented the mushrooms to Graham. He quickly checked the mushrooms and confirmed that they are correct. Graham was very excited and urged us to hurry back to the fortress, but I simply teleported all of us back to the fortress. He was very much puzzled by what just happened, but he quickly moved on and got to work with the medicine for his lord. While he was doing all of that, we waited in the pantry. Josiah seemed hungry after all of that, and thus I decided to cook something for him.
"Do you think the lord will survive?" Josiah asked.
"I am sure he will. There has to be a good reason why Corvus even bothered to appear in Graham's dream."
"Corvus?"
"Ah yes, I haven't told you about him; he is... an ally, I suppose. He is the dark spirit that Graham told us before."
I looked over at Josiah, and I could see him thinking deeply.
"Try this." I gave him a spoonful of the soup I was making.
He hesitantly ate it and was rather surprised.
"What? What is it? Is it bad?" I asked.
The boy looked at me seriously and asked, "You can cook?"
Why... this boy! "Of course I can cook; what you have tasted just now is my sister's mushroom soup. All this mushroom talk made me hungry for a mushroom soup."
"You... you have a sister?" he asked.
"I had a sister; she is dead now, I am afraid. But her cooking lives on through me," I laughed.
Josiah, on the other hand, became very emotional. I sighed, "Look, kid. You and I have lost many loved ones. It is never going to get any easier. But we have a choice: either to live in sadness over their deaths or to rejoice in their legacy. You are your parents' legacy, and today, you have just helped us save a man. I am sure you are going to save even more lives in the future, and your parents will be very proud of you."
Josiah thought about it for a moment and simply nodded.
"Good, now eat the soup."
To be continued.