Shadowcroft Academy Year 2 - Chapter Forty-Nine

Logan and Tet padded into the cavern-turned-circus zoo, with that mad organ music played by the Marko puppet doing its best to drive them insane.

For a second, Logan thought about creating a digestion pit, but there was no time. Instead, he summoned six of his waddlers, all fierce-faced and ready to die for the cause. This time, Logan conjured six Sunflower Pods, basketball sized yellowish balloons, filled with hyper-flammable gas. Strings made from fungal growths dangled from the pods. Each of the waddler’s grabbed a Sunflower Pod and started across the hay covering the zoo cave’s floor. They looked like lumpy elementary school students carrying brightly colored balloons at a state fair.

Four of the waddlers went for the cages. Two more trotted toward the organ, which pumped mad music into the air like toxic smog. The acoustics were terrible—which was the whole point.

The waddlers near the cages swung their Sunflower Pods into the bars. The balloons popped on impact and a mushroom cloud of oranges and yellows billowed out, followed by a wave of choking green fog that would poison anything that survived the initial explosions. Cage doors snapped open all across the room, and the plaster animals let out defiant roars, but the fire soon consumed them, and not just them, but the straw in their cages and on the floor.

The Marko puppet, dancing at the end of the strings, turned and his face exploded into purple tentacles that latched onto the waddlers. The two waddlers let out twin screams of, “The roof, the roof, the roof is on fire!”

They slammed their bobbing Sunflower Pods into the Marko puppet. The strings ignited and the tentacles jutting from his face went up like dry tinder. The rest of the unsettling puppet was quickly consumed along with the organ. It was like it was raining napalm. Before long, the entire cave was an unquenchable inferno, all that straw burning with the fury of a thousand suns. The organ—big, and mostly made of old wood—burned like a yule log.

Logan hadn’t really thought the plan through. He hated fire, and Tet wasn’t thrilled about it either, but it was damned effective against the plaster critters as well.

<So, Tet, I don’t want to wait until the flames die down. Any thoughts?>

<Of course!> The feline sandmaster thrust both hands out, palms up. Grit Wind screamed through the cavern, creating a swirling vortex that tunneled through the flames. True, the extra oxygen made the existing fires burn hotter, but it also provided them a corridor to run down. They passed by the massive organ until they reached the other side, where the temperature plummeted.

Racing through the last corridor, they were ready for traps, but there weren’t any. They headed onto a landing at the top of a long staircase, cut into an icy cliff. Two dozen snow-covered mannequins blocked their way forward, call carrying silver shields and Fulgur enhanced weapons. It would be quite a fight to descend the twisting staircase. Luckily, they didn’t need to.

<Grab hold, Tet!> Logan yelled as he leapt from the ledge. The feline sandmaster slipped her arms around his shoulders and together they took to the air, floating past the frost-covered mannequins, carried away by the arctic breeze. A few of the plaster dummies came alive and hurled snowballs, none even came close.

As they neared the bottom, Tet dropped down onto the cold stone floor, landing in a crouch. Logan touched down a second later, sword drawn and ready to fight. Ahead was another big circus sign: Welcome to the Sorrow Circus’s Sorrowful Feast and All-You-Can-Die Buffet! Enjoy your last meal!

“Come on!” Logan hollered, charging beneath an arch and into the inner sanctum. “Chadrigoth doesn’t have long!”

The Winterdark’s inner sanctum had changed dramatically since the last time Logan had seen it. There were still ascending ledges, carved into the stone, but Logan’s mushrooms had withered and turned into a fungal sludge that dripped off the various levels. Steve had added a central table that followed the ledges up. Each platform had an assortment of dummies, all frozen on their chairs, regarding plates piled high with food. The setup was very reminiscent of what Marko had created during their final the year before.

This feast had a porcelain channel of melted cheese running down from table to table, descending from the very top, where the fountain bubbled out the cheesy stream, to the very bottom, where the cheese collected in an enormous silver basin.

Next to the porcelain channel on the tables were tortilla chips, jalapenos, sausage sticks, and pre-made tacos you could dip into the river of gooey yellow. However, the circus food motif was still present because Marko took his dungeon design class very seriously. Theme was everything to Marko and he committed completely. There were bowls of buttered popcorn, trays of funnel cakes, all kinds of hot dogs, hamburgers, and slices of greasy state fair pizza. Logan had to admit the display was impressive.

On the top ledge was a grand ball table, set for royalty. This was where Inga’s influence had manifested. Logan spotted a dizzying array of plates, bowls, knives, forks, and spoons. In the center of the table was the cheese fountain, which fed the river of slow-moving milk product.

Inga, Treacle, and Marko sat at the table. Not moving a muscle.

That table also acted as the last barrier to the dungeon’s pedestal, where the four gems floated and danced—Steve’s proto-gem connecting the other three gems with shadowy tendrils.

Steve’s voice filled the room. “Well, fungus, aren’t you full of surprises. Ow! That whip hurts! And who does this guy think he is? Indiana Jones or a Balrog? You can’t be both! I’m afraid you’ve worn out your welcome, Logan. Its high past time that you leave. Marko, please see our guests out—and do it with extreme prejudice.”

Marko leapt to his feet and dropped onto the next table down. His body swayed, hands waving, hooves kicking through funnel cakes and donuts as he performed Nataraja’s Wretched Rhythm.

Logan immediately looked away, but he couldn’t help but scream, “Marko! Do what you want with me but take it easy on the funnel cakes!”

Tet was also smart enough to drop her gaze from the mesmerizing dance. “Logan, you need to get up there! Trust me and trigger your Pneumacity!”

“Got it!” he shouted, filling his body with a rush of air.

Tet took care of the rest. She made a complicated series of hand motions and conjured a hot wind that sent him floating skyward. Mannequins strained for him, white hands grasping for his oversized feet, but he was always just out of reach.

The dummies weren’t the only threats, though. Turned out, one of the pizza wasn’t a pizza at all, but a mimic. Purple tentacles, stained with marinara sauce, uncoiled from a mess of the cheese and pepperoni, trying to pull Logan from the air. He tucked his knees up against his chest just in time, and waved to at the mimic as he bobbed right on by. The table was also covered in Tsuki ants—they’d been invisible, but they weren’t any longer. A swarm of them scurried across the food, beelining—or maybe ant-lining—for Tet.

She ignored them, focusing on Logan. Her hands shook as the conjured wind howled even louder, lifting Logan higher and higher, up over Marko’s head. Finally clear of the assortment of obstacles, Logan dropped onto the cold stone of the dais. Treacle and Inga were both waiting for him, their eyes a solid black. Positioned around them were more circus posters, all decorated with cartoonish versions of Steve, wearing a diabolical grin and a black top hat.

Logan then noticed Melvin’s cherry turnovers sitting on little desert dishes. That was a low blow, reminding them of Melvin.

Logan landed just to the right of the grand banquet table. He immediately summoned Mariah Carey and two other waddlers along with a pair of Kurrybooboos. He instantly seeded them with Corpsebomb spores—if they went down, they would take someone else out with them.

Treacle pushed back form the table and armored up. His huge hammer whirled out from his wrist, filling his hand. He stood between Logan and the pedestal.

With a sweep of her wings, the mothmancer rose from the table and called forth her chrysalis swords. She landed on the stones next to the minotaur and immediately dropped into a fighting stance, both swords raised. She still wore Melvin’s fedora—it looked so good on her!

Marko had stopped dancing, but he’d spun around his hooves, accidentally kicking a plate of hot dogs onto the floor. He had the Luden Lute out and was ready to strum more of those eerie chords that summoned eldritch horrors. Three on one were bad odds. Worse, that was also the moment when Logan felt the Psuche Powder power up and leave him. In the blink of an eye, his Rank dropped back down to eight and he lost not only his Sunflower Pods and Corpsebombs, but most of his remaining Apothos.

It was the worst possible moment to lose so much of his power. The story of his life.