11 Scene of Carnage

"All is lost, for the terrible beast is now here to devour us all!"

"Stay out of the shadows, for the love of the Divines! it is lurking there!"

Cries of doom and despair prevailed everywhere around the palace. Servants, scribes, and others who could not possibly fight the demon on their own were running for their lives. Those who could bear arms were holding their positions, hoping, at least, to drive the monster back into the oblivion it came from.

"All able men and women, regroup immediately and wait further orders. I repeat; regroup and wait for the orders to engage the enemy! Do not dare wander alone out there if you want to stay alive!" Said the platoon leader through his comm-link.

Despite their willingness and efforts to fight back, another poor soul among them, alas, just fell prey to the talons of the terrible foe, leaving her hand-cannon and bloody remains on the scene. The rest of men and women with war-gears soon gathered up in a formation. With their hand-cannons and plasma-bolts held high and aimed at the front, they were looking for any trace of the beast near them. The leader of the group, too, was trying hard to get a visual on his target, aiming his plasma-bolt here and there. Soon, the demon finally showed itself out of the darkness; every available cannons and bolts immediately opened fire at their target. Yet, there were only the fumes and burnt ashes left behind, not the body of Glen-gohr, after the volley of lasers and plasmas. Two of them in the back row were then snatched away from their ranks. The monster was apparently playing tricks on them, as if they were nothing more than its toys to be played with.

Soon, in about six to seven minutes, the tech-warriors would arrive here as reinforcements. Their vicious enemy seemed to know well where to hit first, for the very location they were in was right on the opposite side of where the barbarians were mainly stationed. They had no other options but to hold their ground, waiting for their saviors who were yet far away from them. "Curses upon the architects and craftsmen who had built the palace this large!" So said the leader to himself.

Then again, Glen-gohr did not waste a minute to prey upon its victims; another head was cut off and rolled on the ground. One of the soldiers near him screamed at the terrible sight he just saw, and then jumped out of the formation in surprise. He soon joined his beheaded comrade as Glen-gohr came in shortly and grabbed him into the shadows. This was a living nightmare, indeed, to every men and women out there. The abomination strangled them by their necks with suffocating terror it was causing.

Their reinforcements would eventually arrive. The barbarians they hired would somehow drive the devil away from their home. They only hoped, with all their hearts and souls, to greet them while they were still breathing here and now.

Rothgarr, in his silk gown, was being escorted to the safety with a few guards and knights accompanying him. Still heavily drunk, He could move his feet only by the help from his assistants. Farth, the royal jester, was following them from far behind.

"Take me to the demon! I shall face Glen-gohr myself, for it is my very own soul, not yours, that he wants to take with him into eternal damnation! I demand you; take me to where that abomination is!"

"My lord, pray you come to your senses, for your precious life and health are both in grievous peril now! You must move on; you need to stay in safety until our knights and the barbarians somehow manage to kill it..."

Upon hearing one of his attendants, he could no longer hold himself. He roughly pushed away the servants on his left and right, and then shouted at them with thunderous voice.

"It? Thou just called him, 'it'? Thou imbeciles of no worth at all, dared to call him just as you would do to a mere, earthly creature? Each and every one of these retards, I could say for sure, do not truly know anything about the history, the very history between myself and that wailing monster named Glen-gohr!"

"Master, I beseech you to calm yourself and head onto the safety with us! ... Guards, you come at once and help us escort Lord Rothgarr!"

Soon two men in arms came to assist Rothgarr, who was yet under the heavy influence of alcohol, and his servants alike. They kept on moving further down into the underground panic room. While being practically dragged away by his own underlings, he kept looking around everywhere he could in search of Glen-gohr. He was the one, he thought, who should be facing the demon, not his innocent servants. He was the very person who, in the first place, had to take up the responsibility for all this carnage. He should not be running away from what he had to do by his own hands.

"Let go of me; I order you! I shall sooner or later butcher you all for your disobedience!"

Meanwhile, Gael and a squad of tech-warriors and tech-maidens under her command were running along the hallway to aid the soldiers in trouble. It would take, as she speculated, only a minute or two until they reach their destination.

All the sudden, glimmering shapes, seeming like some spooky holograms, appeared near them. These half-transparent specters then started to follow Gael and her squad members along their way. As they were about to ignore them and push onward, the images multiplied. Gael, sensing something fishy out among the atmosphere, ordered her squad to halt for a moment. Shortly after, they, the very representations of ill omen itself, virtually filled up the entire place the barbarians were in. The holographic ghosts soon began to let out their voices.

"All is lost, for our hopes and dreams are no longer among us."

"Embrace the shadows, then he shall welcome you heartily."

"What were you savages doing when we were being swallowed by that terrible demon?"

"Curses upon the architects who made this palace large enough to be our graveyard. More curses upon those who failed to save us. Dire curses upon the names of our lords, Aelthred and Rothgarr, who thus led us into the eternal doom!"

One of the shadows rushed into where Gael was standing. She tried to blow it up with her shell-loaded knuckle. However, as soon as she punched it in its face, the hologram disappeared. Instead, she heard a scream, in both terror and utmost agony, from the rear of her squad. Now, there left only a lower part of her sister's body still standing on the ground, with her torso completely torn away from it.

"Enemy inbound; incoming!" Shouted a tech-warrior, alarming his brothers and sisters.

Glen-gohr finally showed its self, out of the holograms it had created. Though its body was partly concealed in the shadows wrapping him, Gael, along with her squad members, now came to have a visual contact on the foe. Glen-gohr licked its talon covered in fresh blood of her battle-sister; a grotesque scene to behold. Yet, Gael smiled lightly. In return, so did one of the bluish holograms on its face. Soon, the holograms went wild as if they were all gone berserk, and the shadows near its presence dispersed as well. The beast shrieked aloud, with its horrible mouth split wide open. The time for a deadly combat was nigh.