Donovan, with a shaken breath, stared at Kalika as she reverted to her usual indignant attitude. Behind him, Charla followed and stumbled over Pellock's remains, reaching Donovan as the chamber was sealed behind them, with the echoes of war raging on behind it.
Nervous Charla glanced at Kalika, then just as quickly hid behind Donovan, unwilling to face her, herself.
Hearing the shuffling of feet behind Kalika, Donovan peeked to the side, finally noticing Cyrus to his own surprise. "So he's here too?" Around Cyrus, he saw several more bodies and dark, misty remains of several older-looking demons.
Donovan gulped. Finally mustering up the words. "Kalika, whatever you're thinking about doing, you need to stop it now!"
"Stop?" Kalika became silent, a frown deepened, and her eyes narrowed on him. "Why are you here? No- wait. How did you get here?"
Growing exhausted, Kalika sighed. "You know what. Forget it," she turned back to the barrier, ready to enter. "I'm not wasting any more time than I need to in this dream."
"KALIKA NO!" Donovan lunged and grabbed her wrist, stopping her from entering. "Whatever they want you to do, don't do it! The entire city is in chaos with all those sludge monsters roaming around. And I'm not a hundred percent, but I think it's connected to you and that black round thing there!"
Kalika tore her wrist from his grasp and sneered. "And?"
"What?"
"It's not like their lives matter. They're just a figment of my dream, just like you and Bjorn were.
"This isn't a dream, Kalika!!"
"Heh. And how would you know anything? The answers are simple. You just want to keep me anchored down in this damned world."
"That's not true!" Donovan suddenly reeled over, feeling a tension in his heart. Trying to save face, he bore through it and looked Kalika straight in the eye. "A-and you know it's not true either. For god sakes, Kalika. You need to stop pretending this is all a dream!"
Kalika flinched.
" I'm Real!"
"Shut up."
"This room is Real!"
Shut up!"
"Everything around us is real!! And I don't like it either, but this is our reality! Not some Dream-"
"SHUT UP!!" Kalika pointed her dagger at Donovan's neck. Her face contorted with rage as she furiously glared at Donovan.
"I didn't want to have to say this to you. I wanted to give you more time so you could adjust."
"Shut up! Just shut up!"
"Y-you can't hide forever! I know you're hurting inside, But Me, Bjorn, Zelak. Even Charla. None of us can help you if you won't even talk to us. I still want to help you, Kalika. So please, just lower your knife so we can talk."
"H-help me?" Kalika began to chuckle at the thought. "Help me how? By being some inanimate object that does nothing but twiddle your thumbs. Or just so you can toss my woes aside like some worthless piece of information?"
"[Kill him.]"
"Zorbian's right… I should kill you," Kalika muttered.
Charla, watching Kalika, stood in shock, sensing an immediate change. Moving fast, she grabbed Donovan and pulled him from Kalika's attack.
Donovan rolled back to his feet and raised his pipe, blocking another of her attacks. All the while, Kalika pushed Charla aside.
"This thing?"
"Rrrr!! J-just noticed? I had it fixed yesterday."
"Hmph!" Kalika kicked Donovan in the gut, then slashed and clashed her dagger with his pipe again and again in a blind fury. The attacks became heavier and her speed faster.
"Rrah!" Finding an opening, Donovan pushed away from Kalika, stumbling back. "You would've known that if you came back to the inn- Ack!
He dodged Kalika's thrown dagger and turned back to find Kalika gone. He whipped his head around, searching for her. "Where did she-"
"
Shocked, Donovan looked up, finding Kalika hurling down to smite him
He jumped out of the way and nailed himself to the chamber wall. "Shit!"
"Kalika, we don't have to do this!"
"Shut up!!"
Donovan jerked her head, letting Kalika drive her dagger into the stone wall, then ducked as she forcefully sliced through the black wall.
He grimaced and attempted to run, only for a sludge hand to grab his leg, pinning him. Thinking fast, he tossed his pipe to the side and dug into his pockets.
In an instant, Kalika's blade swung true, but struck and cracked an invisible barrier, shocking her. Seconds later, Donovan coughed blood as he tried to maintain composure.
Using this moment of shock, he aimed a crystal in his hand and shot a massive burst of wind, blowing both him and Kalika away,
He tumbled to his back and slid across the ground, past his pipe. He stood to his knees and prepared himself. But to his surprise, Kalika simply stared at him like some alien being.
"Donovan." Cyrus quietly called. That woman. She was once human?"
"S...sort of a long story, but yeah, I thought that letting her believe she was in a dream was for the best. But now-."
Donovan suddenly erupted in a violent cough. He glanced up, and to his shock, Kalika was slowly manifesting a small dark ball of magic in her hand.
"K..Kalika?"
"Don't let it touch you!" Cyrus warned.
Donovan dodged at once, letting it hit the chamber wall behind instead. In pure horror, he looked back at Kalika, watching as she channeled a new dark magic ball again. "Th…That magic…"
However, just before Kalika could shoot it, she froze, and the magic dissipated.
Irked, Kalika glared at Cyrus. "Stay out of my way, old man."
"You said something about your friend being somehow tricked. If you can, I'd like you to elaborate." His gaze slowly shifted to Kalika. "Tell me exactly what your plan is for that core. Don't tell me you plan on taking its power Kalika."
Suddenly, from the ground below Donovan and Cyrus, dark puppets emerged by the dozens. "Crap!" Donovan rushed past Kalika and snatched his pipe from the ground, spewing fire into the growing crowd of sludge puppets.
Alarmed by the attacking puppets, Cyrus attempted to push the monsters away to no avail.
"Duck!"
Cyrus duck, letting torrents of fire cleanse around him.
"Donovan! Watch out!" Charla yelled.
Acting fast, he turned and blocked Kalika's attacks. One after another, Kalika slashed at Donovan like a raging storm. "Damn it! Why can't you just listen to me!"
Charla pulled Cyrus aside as the attack became more reckless and unpredictable than the last. But eventually, they froze, hearing a stab.
Donovan dropped his pipe to the ground and hunched over. He winced and shortly after, fell to his knees, feeling an even more powerful throb in his heart. "S-surely you can feel it too, Kalika. The throbbing in your heart."
Kalika kicked Donovan to his back by the disintegrated remains of one of the elders.
"What? You want me to look inwards? Is that it?"
"No! The pain. The actual pain. The penalty of our contract, don't you remember? If you go through with this, I'll die. Kalika."
Kalika froze, and her lips trembled. She quickly steadied herself, returning to her indignant demeanor. "Wh-who cares?"
"I care! I don't want to die! Not here! Not when we can still get to the surface and finally escape."
"Now you're telling me more lies?" Kalika, with a deafening coldness, approached Donovan.
Cyrus moves to use his blood, only for a Kalika's dagger to shoot straight into his eyes. A screamed in pain, and several dark puppets captured and pinned Charla and Cyrus to the ground.
"Ch-charla!"
"You're pathetic." Kalika grabbed Donovan by the collar of his breastplate and pulled him in with her dagger to his throat.
"I'm not lying! All this time, I supported you and tried to get stronger. L-look, Kalika I don't want to hurt you." Donovan mustered. "I promised Tilus that I'd look after you. For better or for worse. But… if worse is some god taking over your body, I can't just stand by and let that happen."
"Hmm!?" Kalika shook.
"[He lies. It's the dream trying to keep you from escaping."
A sudden burst of wind pushed Kalika and Donovan apart.
Kalika landed back on the ground as Donovan crashed back into the round chamber's wall.
"[Don't hesitate. Kill him!]"
"Shut up!" Kalika dashed at Donovan in a fury and prepared her dagger.
Donovan, forcing himself up, raised the green crystal with eyes, tamed beyond Kalika and blades of wind.
Kalika, evade the blades with ease and a growing bewilderment. "That Wind magic? It's like Lily's." She clenched her teeth tightly. "You're going to have to do better than that!"
"That wasn't for you."
As if on cue, Kalika's body froze at once, with her daggers just inches from Donovan. Her glare turned back to the newly freed Cyrus and Charla. Slowly, more of the dark puppets oozed and poured from the chamber walls.
"Thanks, Cyrus."
"Don't thank me. I should have realized sooner that Lyra wouldn't go along with destroying that core."
Suddenly, Charla pull Cyrus from an attack and was forced on the run from the growing army of sludge monsters.
Seeing this, Donovan eyed his pipe that laid far from him. He then turned to Kalika, dagger whipped out a white cloth from his side, and used it to grab Kalika's dagger.
"What are you doing!:
"I'm putting an end to this madness myself! That's what." Donovan, with all his strength, pulled the dagger from Kalika's grasp and wrapped it inside. "Hopefully, what that guard said was right," he thought.
"Charla! Catch." The sealed dagger flung across the chambers and was caught in Charla's grasp. "Don't let anyone take it from you!"
Charla nodded held the wrapped dagger closer to her chest as she led Cyrus through the narrowing path of puppets.
"Damn you!" Seconds later, Kalika unfroze with Cyrus, faltering and clutching his bleeding eye.
With a snarl, Kalika raised her hands expectantly. But to her surprise. Nothing happened.
Her eyes flashed with recognition and sneered. "Angel skin? How annoying. NO. This dream is trying to keep me here."
Unexpectedly, Donovan tackled Kalika to the ground, pinning her wrist to the ground. "No Kalika. I really don't want to say this, but everything you, me, and everyone else have been through is real!"
Donovan tightened his grip. "Look… before I ever joined the army, I lived under that same roof as a bunch of other shitty people. My father treated me like garbage, and my stepmother and sister, even worse. You probably have a lot on your mind. A-and you probably want things to be better now, but please, just wait a little longer. We'll get out of this pit together, just like we planned."
Kalika frowned, feeling Donovan's grip weaken.
"So please, just wait a little longer, and I promise, we'll have escaped this place…"
"And if we don't?"
Donovan gasped, unsure how to answer. "Th-then… Th-then you can do whatever you need to, to escape."
"You're an idiot, you know that, right?"
"[Kill him! Kill HIM!]"
Donovan chuckled at Kalika's remarks as Zorbian's voice grew even louder. Slowly, Kalika pushed Dononvan off her, and she stood over, watching as the puppets around them had everyone completely surrounded.
The sludge monsters grabbed Donovan, trapped Charla and Cyrus, and took Kalika's dagger back to her.
Kalika raised her dagger and channeled a darkness into it as she glared coldly at Donovan.
"Kalika?"
"You really are annoying at times. You know that, right?" Kalika said.
With a single swipe of her blade, she killed the sludge puppet, freeing Donovan.
"[KALIKA!!!]"
Acting fast, Donovan shot blades of wind into the horde, freeing Charla and Cyrus. In a hurry, he ran past Kalika, grabbed his pipe, and cleared the chamber of the Zorbian's minions.
"Thanks, Kalika."
Suddenly, Kalika fell to her knees, hearing a voice in her head becoming louder and louder, all angry, all thirsting for blood. Demands and commands, flung at her, like an order from an ignorant king to his subject until silence took hold at once, clearing Kalika's mind.
Unexpectedly, Zorbian's voice returned. with a steady and cold statement. "[Fine. If you won't free me. I'll make you do it.]"