Horror and dread-Sa

"Sophia get out of there!"

I heard Touji's voice, but it was too late to react. A huge pain struck me as I was sent flying by a sudden attack, crashing against the cave walls in the process. My back hurts like hell and I feel like that hit may have fractured a bone or two.

The sound of metal crashing against something just as hard prompted me to raise my head. The monster who struck me appeared in my field of vision as I did so, with its head bleeding from a blow from Haruto's mace. 

The monster's black scales, stained with blood from who knows what kind of creature, covered the entirety of its elongated body. From the sides of it, multiple scythe-like appendages partially covered in scales and insect carapaces protruded like centipede legs despite the monster itself resembling a snake

The head of the giant snake was devoid of normal eyes, instead having a single black gem-like eye in the middle of the head that shone ominously. The beast's mandibles and teeth were abnormal too, instead of having two fangs this thing has multiple rows of hook-like teeth. While the upper mandible looked normal the lower one split into two, each side had two long fangs looking upwards along with the rows of teeth. All of this is weird, but it wasn't bad when compared to the most horrible aspect of the creature.

Mrrrfff!-Crkkk!-Crkkk!-Nnnghhh!-Snapp!

Multiple nauseous sounds were coming from the snake's stomach. Muffled screams of pain and crushing bones along with the wet sound produced by the snake innards twisting and constricting around whatever prey it caught inside it. The idea of being swallowed and consumed alive is disturbing.

Cuts and dents are all over the snake, along with some missing legs, courtesy of Nayuta and Haruto onslaught that has been going on for a while now. Im not sure how much time has passed since that thing started to attack us, but is more resilient than both the mutant on the first floor and the knight on the second floor. 

"Scheiße, just die already!"

I threw my axe at the monster's head, aiming for its eye. The axe spun in the air while cutting the air, barely grazing the surface of the snake-only eye as it quickly retracted its head when it heard my scream, and is now looking at me with hatred...Scheiße.

"I need to move-!"

The snake launched itself towards me with its mouth wide open and as I tried to move away, a sudden pain ran through my back. Momentarily stunned by the pain I wasn't able to react and before I noticed, the snake maw was about to close on me...Im gonna get eaten alive!

I closed my eyes expecting to feel those hook-like teeth pierce my skin, but instead, I felt something grabbing me from my back and legs before lifting me up. When I opened my eyes I saw Nayuta holding me in her arms, right before jumping away from the snake charge. The wall I was leaning against was practically destroyed by the blow causing part of the ceiling to collapse on top of the monster, but it was undeterred.

"Are you okay?"

Ah, I can feel myself melting under Nayuta's worried eyes, she is just so beautiful no matter what. Ah! I have no snap out of it, that thing isn't dead yet.

"Y-yes, I can still fight"

Although my knees are shaking a bit, im not seriously injured. My back still hurts a little but I still managed to stand up without a hitch, I tried to reach for the axe that would normally be in the sheat in my hip, but I quickly realized that I had just thrown it at the snake, and I missed too...ugh.

Before I even had time to rummage through my pockets or go to my bag, which I had thrown in a far corner of the cave when that thing appeared, for some weapon, Nayuta unsheathed her short sword and pushed it into my hands. It looked sharper than when she first got it, so she must have done some maintenance on it.

"Is sturdy, so is good for defense, although I haven't used it much..."

She grabbed the hilt of the remaining sword on her hip before unsheathing slowly, the dim crimson glow emitted by the sword along with the smell of blood that came from the blade made an eerie ambiance around her. The crimson light reflected in her eyes, which were of a very similar color, making them look like a pair of captivating yet dangerous red flames. It was a sight that i normally could only see through movies and novels.

I heard her grit her teeth in anger before jumping towards the snake, who had already shaken off the rocks that had fallen upon it. The second I blinked a centipede leg was cut off, the next second lots of scales were broken and a bleeding wound appeared on the snake's side, covering Nayuta in blood.

The snake howled in pain, an unthinkable sound for a reptile, and quickly charged towards her. She jumped back but the snake never stopped its charge, instead of trying to bite her it just rammed into her like a ram, crashing against a wall. The sound of broken bones was immediately followed by a horrendous cry.

A fountain of blood erupted from the creature's eye as the crimson sword was stabbed into it. The body of the monster suddenly started trashing around wildly and aggressively. I saw Haruto being hit and blown away by the monster's body as well as Touji jumping out of the way.

Seconds later I saw Nayuta being thrown upwards by the snake, almost hitting the ceiling, but instead of that happening she somehow turned upside down mid-air and quicked the ceiling, launching herself against the snake and cutting deep into its flesh before rolling on the ground, she had an empty healing vial in her mouth, she had probably used to heal her broken bones and counter attack. Not long after Haruto dashed from where he was blown away and swung his mace at the monster's head, breaking a fang and multiple smaller teeth in the process, as well as stunning it for a moment.

He jumped back and a few moments later the monster turned around. Its eye was mostly destroyed, but apparently, it could still see us, although probably vaguely. I've heard that snakes can sense heat like those visors I've seen in movies, so maybe is a mix of heat vision and whatever remains of its normal vision.

The snake was about to charge again, its mouth wide open in an attempt to swallow Haruto whole, however moments before it could reach him a sound similar to that of glass breaking echoed through the cave and an eye bigger than the snake's head, which was already bigger than any of us, appeared in front of it.

The eye that peeked through what looked like a cut in space prompted the snake to stop mid-charge, staring at the unexpected phenomenon cautiously, almost as if it felt fear towards the strange anomaly in front of it. I gripped the handle of the short sword tightly before running toward the snake, I jumped before stabbing the sword into the side of the head, between the scales and close to where I guess the brain is. Before the snake could shake me away Haruto jumped above the eye and struck the snake once more.

I retreated quickly as the snake started moving quickly, trying to hit us with either its large body or multiple legs. A scythe-like centipede leg would have cutt my head off if it wasn't because I managed to block it with the short sword in time. While I and Haruto were having trouble with the legs, I saw multiple legs being cut by both Nayuta and Touji, although more were cut off by the former than the latter.

The wounds inflicted by the crimson sword wouldn't stop bleeding, and the strikes from Harutos mace were bone-breaking injuries. Both of these had an obvious tool on the snake. 

The snake suddenly coiled around itself before shooting its head towards me like a bullet towards me, however, it wasn't precisely accurate so I was able to dodge it, stabbing the short sword into the creature's mouth in the process. As it turned around to try to bite me again, I dashed towards it right as it charged towards me, stepping aside before its teeth delved into my skin and grabbed the sword, making a great effort to stand my ground. As a result, the sword ended up slashing through the snake's head and into the body because of its own reckless attack, a huge cut almost splitting the snake in two. But it wasn't dead yet.

The snake was still alive, although barely, its movement became sluggish and the cries of pain became more frequent, as we kept on attacking it, the bleeding became too much and it fell with a horrible death cry, its huge body made the cave tremble. it even raised a cloud of dust as a result. As soon as it fell I drank a healing vial, thankfully the vials appear to be more durable than normal glass so they don't break that easily as long as they're not hit directly so they're safe in my pockets, I don't understand the logic behind it though.

"Is everyone okay!?"

Nayuta's worried voice reached my ears, but thankfully her worries were unnecessary. Although they weren't as efficient when it came to heavy blows like the snake charges, the coats and leather vests were perfect protection against slashes, that's why the scythe-like centipede legs didn't manage to leave even a scratch on us.

As we all gathered around the monster's corpse, Touji used his sword to rip off a pair of legs and grabbed some broken scales from the floor. They were tougher than the wolf coat and leather vest, the only weapon that could reliably inflict damage in the snake's body was Nayuta's crimson sword, meanwhile, my axe and Touji swords needed considerable strength applied to them, and using the monster strength and charges against it to force the blades through or aiming for the gaps between each scale. Even then most of the scales didn't break entirely, they were scattered around with some cracks so they were still useless, but they weren't completely destroyed.

Maybe realizing something, Nayuta approached the corpse and stabbed it in the gap between a pair of scales, which were each about the size of my palm, and used the sword to force one of them out. Upon seeing this Touji's eyes opened wide and quickly started doing the same, although with much more effort needed. Before long there was a pile of black scales that reached my knees in front of me.

"What is this for?"

Haruto and I asked at the same question at the same time, but only I was looked at by Touji with that expression that clearly spelled "idiot". Ugh, how I hate his guts!

"If we add them to the vests, we could make armor of similar durability to the one Haruto is using. maybe higher"

I took one of the scales as soon as I heard his words and tried to crush it with my hands. I already expected to fail but since I was able to crush rock and punch through wood before I thought that I could at least bend it, but I couldn't even do that. Actually, my hand hurts now, Scheiße!

"We can't take more than this, the scales are quite heavy and neither of us has much space in our bags left...actually im quite surprised they haven't broken yet with all we have gone through"

Per Touji's instructions, we all split the scales between each of our bags, even though it was a small amount it made my bag feel twice as heavy as before. Once we finished they started walking deeper into the cave while I...was distracted playing with one of the scales

"With this thing dead, I guess we should start looking for the ga-"

Before Nayuta could finish her sentence, a horrible and cold feeling ran down my spine. I tried to move, but my legs were shaking and refused to obey me while sweat poured down my forehead. I could feel my entire body tensing up and I felt goosebumps rise all over my skin, my breath caught in my lungs at the sudden feeling of a horrible presence staring at us from right behind me. 

The others were in the same state as I was, maybe Nayuta seemed a little less shocked, but she too, couldn't move at all. It was fear as I have never felt before... I-I'm gonna die. If I don't move, if I don't run away right now, im definitely gonna die, but is as if im frozen in time.

"I ~FOUND~YOU~"

A voice came from behind my back. A distorted voice as if someone spoke through a broken radio, mixed with a sickening laughter in between each word. I felt as if bugs were creeping under my skin just from hearing that voice, and the horrified faces of Haruto and Touji as they looked behind me only worsened that feeling. I was scared beyond belief, but something, I don't know what encouraged me to look behind.

The being I saw once my neck turned slightly to the left was probably the most horrifying thing I have ever seen. A tall and slender body of barely 5 meters, featuring grey skin that looked anything but alive, the creature's arms were as long as its body was tall, almost dragging on the floor. The monster's body was riddled with gaping mouths, slowly opening and closing at irregular intervals. A long and swaying neck which somewhat reminded me of the snake monster we had just killed connected the body to the head, long and dry brown hair covered the head while the creature's left hand was hiding the face, but I could see an eye through a gap in the fingers. It was flickering between brown and bright red.

"COME~BACK~FOR~ME~"

Each word was pronounced by a different mouth, but the voice was exactly the same. I didn't understand the meaning behind those words, but the feeling of bugs creeping under my skin only worsened with each word spoken by the monster.

The monster raised its right arm, its hand curled into a fist. Even though I knew it was trying to crush me, that I was going to die if that fist connected...I couldn't move, my legs were still shaking, and...a warm feeling was spreading through my crotch. Im scared.

I closed my eyes as soon as I saw the fist started moving towards me, but the blow never came. Instead, I feel a hot liquid falling over me. I opened my eyes only to see the monster's arm bleeding profusely and some of its fingers missing. The monster's head turned towards the left, where a new mysterious creature stood with blood-soaked fingers on its mouth.

The monster appeared to be some kind of malnourished cat, but the size of a large dog or a wolf. Its fur was snow white while the eyes were bright red, blood was leaking from them like tears. The most disturbing fact about the feline was the presence of "human features" below the skin and fur. A hand was present over the face of the cat, its shape making a grotesque picture of the feline head, a human face with a suffering expression was noticeable on the monster's left side with a single eye sticking out of the fur. On the opposite side, a noticeable human heart was beating beneath the feline skin. It was as if the white monster had become a wicked prison for some poor devil.

"GOD~GOD...~BLOOD~?"

As it uttered those words the feline, who already seemed to be in deep rage, was infuriated even more. The humanoid monster seemed confused at the sudden appearance of the cat, and also somewhat frustrated maybe?

Although the feline was a creature of horror, the monstrous "man" gave me a feeling of dread that I can't describe. Both monsters stared daggers at each other before they disappeared a second later, cracks formed all over the cave floor and walls as they did so. A loud explosion-like sound echoed through the cave at the same time the monsters reappeared, the man was missing his right hand and was covered in slashes and blood, meanwhile, the feline was riddled with holes, and the human face that was attached to it was being munched by one of the humanoid monster mouths.

The monster turned towards me, walking slowly until I was within his arm's reach. The arm, which now lacked a hand, was raised once again.

"MEET~AGAIN"

I wanted to close my eyes, but I couldn't do it, my fear was so much that I couldn't even blink. Maybe it recognized my fear, as I could hear chuckles and laughter coming from every and all the mouths in its body, and then the arm was swung down at me. My legs finally gave up as I saw it coming towards me...Im dead aren't I?

I was sure that I would die, but before the arm reached me, something crashed against the monster's neck. It was the feline, who was somehow alive, the blow from the charge deviated the arm trajectory and hit the ground instead, the cracks that originated from the previous clash between the two monsters enlarged as a result, and before long, the entire ground crumbled with not only me, but my friends above it too.

Below was nothing but darkness and falling debris, at my sides were my friends who like me were paralyzed with fear and shock. As I fell, I lost sight of them and nearly after, everything started to turn black...I could only hear faint laughter before I fainted.