Shahrukh

Just in a heartbeat, the stone surface they were all standing upon, which led up to the gate, completely melted into thick, bubbling lava. Amawas then pushed the girls back behind her, and they trembled in fear.

The abominations in front of them were of a completely different league from the creatures they had met; their bloodlust was so strong that they could taste it on their tongues.

The gate Guardian stuttered, took a step back, and crawled up the giant gate with his spiky legs. However, the other foe stood still, uncaring of the moving lava sea at his feet. The enforcer was truly a force to reckon with, tens of times more powerful than average executioners. Any sane being would think twice before challenging it to battle.

But Amawas was completely insane; her malicious grin found its way onto her lips. She had come prepared for this exact foe, and it had actually played into their favor sooner than expected.

The enforcer spoke, looking at Amawas.

"I knew you'd come. You are the worst being in the entire creation; I hope you know that." It had a gritty, bubbly voice as it spat on the floor. However, Amawas kept grinning at it silently.

There were still some moments before the overall chaos, before the intrusion would be announced in the entire Khandaq.

"Go, Aatish," she shouted while staying back in front of the girls, with her arm up, in case the gate guardian would try to attack.

Before Amawas finished the phrase, Aatish was already at the neck of the enforcer, her spear aiming directly at its throat with her right hand, its huge red line behind it.

She then dismissed it at the last moment before it struck the neck, a trick she learned from her appi. Aatish summoned it in her left hand, then jolted it to the far wall, extending the red merciless string made of pure condensed fire, aiming directly at its neck.

Such a trick would work flawlessly on the executioners, but the enforcer simply raised his hand, tensing the string around his elbow, and uncaringly grabbed Aatish by her neck. Aatish summoned a long dagger in her free hand and tried to pierce its eye, but before it could connect, it threw Aatish against the wall, then its sickles right at her neck while she was in midair.

And just before they reached Aatish, Amawas raised her hand up and summoned a pool of darkness between the sickle and Aatish as it disappeared.

Then she struck the enforcer on its neck, appearing behind it from another pool, nearly decapitating it. The damned creature hissed and wailed at this.

Amawas's yellow eyes burned with malicious fire hidden deep within. She then flicked her wrist as tens of tentacles of pure black fire shot at the enforcer from his left side while he was still reeling in deep shock. He raised his blood sickle high above his head, aimed at the approaching fire, enraged in mad fury, completely forgetting Aatish for a moment who was still on its left.

As a long dagger made of condensed fire passed through its left arm before he could react in any way.

Aatish then flew back. The enforcer looked much better to her now than it looked some moments ago.

Green poisonous blood filled its mouth and dripped onto the floor. Its neck had a long horizontal gash reaching its throat, its entire left arm gone, all within some thirty seconds of the fighting. The Gate Guardian at this point had become paralyzed with fear; this was a battle way above his paygrade.

Uncaringly, Amawas flicked her fingers as a serpentine shot through its scorpion skull, hollowing it out. Then she rushed to the wounded enforcer to finish the job, becoming a streak of dripping darkness amidst the flowing lava field.

There were fewer guards on this level than the previous levels, and they rarely visited the Guardian or the gate, considering it enough in any case of infiltration. His hollowed-out shell of the body slowly submerged into the lava, proving otherwise.

Amawas grabbed the limping enforcer by its face. It was still in supposed shock and pushed it against the gate as its runes lit up and it opened. Then she broke through its skull with her scythe.

**********

Amawas summoned another few of those tiny creatures, then passed them through the behroopiya, copying both the fallen Guardian and the enforcer down to the most minute details. She then raised them up.

Aatish placed her hand on the floor as it straightened, and all the fire rushed into her paw, leaving nothing but a black shiny stone behind, just like it was before. The whole battle took about forty seconds to finish. The girls, who were still standing behind Amawas, scared, had witnessed something beyond belief; they had witnessed a coordination like they had never seen before.

That ignited a spark of hope and a new spirit within them as well. They were utterly impressed by the whole battle after it ended.

Khadija could not believe that Amawas had planned to such an extent. She had a new glimmer in her eyes looking at her now.

Amawas reassembled the stone giant back, and the team jumped in. It was time to lower down until they find the artifact.

As they descended even further, reaching the fourth and the fifth gates, they witnessed an extremely macabre scene.

There were scores of dead creatures leading up to the Guardian, completely frozen in deep blue and violet ice. The guardians lay dead as well, mutilated and frozen as if a blizzard had crushed them in an instant.

It was the same scene repeated throughout until the second last gate, though when Amawas closed her eyes upon seeing something and sighed, and Aatish fell on the floor completely silent.

There sat a figure crisscrossed on the floor, with a shawl around its shoulders and a staff laid in front of it.

"This can't be," Aatish mumbled; she was visibly shaking.

Amawas released the giant, then stepped onto the floor.

"You can't be him; I saw him die!" Aatish shouted at the figure.

"Hi Aatish, that's no way to talk to your brother," the figure spoke, its voice calming like slow-falling snow.

******************

"Shahrukh?" Amawas said carefully, approaching the figure, her weapon ready in her right hand.

"Yes, Amawas," the figure replied, its manner extremely sagely and carefree.

"How... You died. We even built a shrine for you on your mountain," Amawas asked with her eyes filling up with tears on their edges, still walking closer to the new figure.

"Adaawat revived me," Shahrukh replied care-free. He looked just like them but just a bit taller in comparison.

"Will you hurt us, Shahrukh?" Amawas teared up on this, her voice crackled. Shahrukh was their elder brother.

Shahrukh sighed then stood up, lifting the staff off the ground, haze floating up from his shawl.

"Of course not!" He replied!

Amawas did not believe him.

Her steps still lingering towards him, as she clutched her weapons tighter. In just a tiny second, Shahrukh appeared in front of her and embraced her in a hug.

"It's okay," he said.

As Amawas dropped her weapon from her hand.