Talias Story Part 3. What lies in the Dark...

Talia stood panting over Grundy's body. For the first time since she had been turned into a vampire, she just couldn't control her breathing. She knew she was dead and that she didn't have to breathe at all anymore and yet she couldn't control herself. It was just an instinct she hadn't got rid of yet. Grundy lay like death in front of her and was buried under a few tons of stone. She hadn't thought of anything better against this monster. For over 30 minutes she had threshed him like a beast. At first she had tried tactics and finesse, then she had tried speed and weapons. In the end, she had even tried brutal senseless violence and all that had brought absolutely nothing. Grundy had lived up to his name. Throughout the fight she had meticulously avoided getting hit by him. But as the fight progressed her attention and stamina had diminished. And once he had gotten hold of her she was beaten back and forth like a rubber bag. Grundy had beaten her like a sledgehammer against some of the columns and then carelessly thrown her into a corner. No normal person could have survived something like this but fortunately Talia was no longer a normal person. But her undeath was no protection against massive pain. Even though her body was regenerating, Talia wasn't like her Master or Vicky. Her healing powers were not even close to the two.

However, this ordeal had revealed a way to defeat Grundy. From now on she concentrated on using his power against him. For 5 minutes she avoided his angry attacks and let him do massive damage to the supporting structures of the room. She used the breathing space of the fight to regain her strength. Since she only had to dodge Grundy and insulted him, she had enough time for it. When the moment came when the construction could no longer hold its own load, she guided him directly under one of the thickest pieces of debris. Thanks to her speed she was able to avoid the wreckage. Grundy did not have this luxury. As he was gradually buried under the tons of debris, Talia could hit his head again and again. Even now it was not easy for her to defeat the man. But after she had hit a stone on his skull over and over again to process the zombie's head into porridge. Uncertain if he was really dead, she only carefully withdrew from Him. But now the next door opened without any problems and she could enter the next circle.

As she walked through the corridors of the fortress she could feel her left hand trembling and her breathing still going uncontrollably fast and jerking. Confused about her condition, she took a moment to breathe deeply. She hadn't experienced anything like this since Dracula had transformed her. Then she realized it. She had never used so much power without feeding immediately afterwards. She realized that she had underestimated this journey a little. For the first time she had to struggle with blood loss and blood deficiency. She had not desecrated her master out of respect. Grundy, on the other hand, had something liquid in his body but it certainly wasn't blood. Just the smell of that mush had disgusted her and the idea of drinking that stuff was even worse. The fight and the healing had come at a price. She now understood much better what it meant to be a vampire. Since she had an almost unlimited blood supply, she had never noticed these disadvantages.

Slowly her body calmed down again and she could suppress the trembling. Now she recognized the real danger of these 5 chambers. One was wearing oneself out. As if one would strike with a blade again and again against a stone. Even the best blade would sooner or later become a blunt or break. This was the real danger for her. She could defeat any enemy she had against her here. She was clear about that. But all in a short order. That would become more difficult. Without a regeneration phase she had to divide her powers much more precisely. Unfortunately she was aware that there would be no more people from here. The inner sanctum was not allowed to be anyone except her father and herself. That meant she had to save her strength for the final fight.

And just as she was staring into a yawning void. Normally there should be a bridge. An ancient stone bridge that led directly to the Pit. But her father had probably destroyed the bridge. Without the ability to fly it was an extremely tricky riddle. The gorge in front of her was about 20 meters and as a child she had always thrown stones down. She had no idea how deep it would be. She looked around a little and thought about what she should do. They couldn't fly, but she was fast. Maybe she was fast enough.

"This is crazy... Talia... this is crazy! That's crazy!" she said to herself as she went back as far as she could to make a run for it.

Then she ran off. As fast as she could. The world around her just froze as she felt time itself overcome by her. With a huge sentence she pushed herself off the edge and tried an impossible jump. Still in the air, however, she realized that none of this would help her. She already knew at the jump that she would miss another meter. Unable to change anything about the fact, she concentrated on getting hold as quickly as possible. But then she fell on the ground underneath her that looked different. But before her mind had grasped the connections she hit on something hard. Since she hadn't expected any resistance yet, she hit the ground twice hard and felt her right leg breaking due to her speed. The bone bored itself out of her knee like a bullet and protruded 4cm out of her body. Screaming in pain, she slumped to the side just to realize she was falling off something. Instinctively she grabbed it and felt a kind of edge. The pain was overwhelming but her fear of falling into a bottomless abyss gave her a power she never thought she had. With clenched teeth she pulled herself up again and then lay on a massive object. Her blood slowly dripped onto the invisible something and she recognized the symbols of the old bridge.

"You miserable asshole just made her invisible," she growled half laughing half angry. With a violent jerk she pushed the bone back into her body and took her katana to make the leg seem rough. Unfortunately this would hinder her even more. Her body would heal. Without question. But that didn't mean he would heal RIGHT. Her bone would grow together incorrectly. Later, she would have to break her foot again to have it fixed, but she didn't have that luxury here. She limped across the bridge to the last door after a few minutes. Swearing and angry at herself, she went on. It was inexplicable to her that she hadn't immediately seen through such a simple trick. A simple deception. A simple way to trick someone. She was now sure that a part of the bridge had been removed directly at the edge so that one could not feel directly at the edge whether the bridge was still there. The trap was as simple as it was ingenious.

After the fight with Grundy and the labyrinth she had expected an extremely complex trap and would never have thought that it was so simple. She hadn't even thought that her father couldn't have escaped from the grotto if he had torn the bridge down. However, she also knew that the final confrontation would soon come. It was only 200 meters to the grotto. She had certainly been here 1000 times to watch her father regenerate his strength in the pit. She went through everything she remembered. She tried to identify the last trap. There were countless possibilities for her father but also some that Talia could exclude already now. Her father would not use a trap that would be a danger to the source. So she could rule out booby traps, as well as any heat or fire based traps. She strongly suspected that it would be another metawesen.

But not in her worst nightmares could she have imagined what her father had prepared for her.

When she finally came into the chamber of the grotto she could see the green shimmer long before through the corridors. She knew every inch of this cave very well. The ancient inscriptions pointed to ancient Egypt, a country her father knew only too well. Born in Persia, he had always been interested in Egypt. Even Talia didn't know exactly how old her father really was, but she estimated it to be a time around the birth of Christ. Some hints he had made suggested this.

How he came to discover the secret of the Lazarus Pit was also one of his many secrets. However, this pit was many times older than he and Talia was sure that even her father didn't know all the secrets of magic in it. If it were so he would never have made the mistake with Red Hood. It was clear that the pit was built by someone in ancient Egypt. Or at least Egyptians had been here and artfully extended the cave. There were no hieroglyphs or the like but 2 statues of Anubis, the god of the dead. Both statues had been maintained by her father in all these years. Perhaps he feared that the magic of the place would disappear. Talia didn't really believe it but she didn't live as long as he did.

The grotto itself consisted of the large pond with its green glowing liquid and a brick bridge that ended in a staircase leading right into the grotto. Her father stood on the opposite side of the grotto and looked at her snobbishly before pulling on a chain. Right beside her a big door opened and she could see 2 red glowing eyes opening in the darkness.

At first she thought of a captured werewolf, but the scream the creature threw out thundered in her ears like nothing comparable. Whatever that was in the darkness.

It wasn't a werewolf.

It was huge.

It was damn angry.

And to her horror she had to realize that it was faster than she was!