"What will happen now?" the girl looked in horror at the approaching giant black figure. "He is coming straight at us!"
Then she grabbed the Cursed by the hand.
"Come!" she said. "It's time to feed the demon!"
She led him to the dungeon of the mansion, where, according to her, a demon lived underground, whom their family fed and with whom they had made a pact.
In the night garden, someone was behind the trees. Tall figures peered from behind the trunks and watched them.
"Who are they?" the Cursed asked as they walked through the garden.
"The spirits of the garden," the girl replied. "They help take care of the mansion."
Inside the house, she led him into a room beneath the ground floor, where various terrifying creatures hung on iron frames along the walls, bound in chains. Some of them moved and writhed as if in unbearable pain. In the center, in the floor, there was a black hole of an underground well.
"This is the Carousel of Death, as my father called it," the girl explained, taking hold of a control lever with one hand. "All the monsters that broke into our estate and tried to harm us hang here in chains. When we need to fight an external enemy, we feed the creatures to the underground demon, and in return he gives us powerful weapons for battle."
She pressed a button and turned the lever, and one frame with a thin creature began to move along the overhead beam toward the center of the room. When it hung above the well, the chain mechanism opened, and the horrible creature fell down into the black darkness. After some time, wild screams came from below, and then a single deafening low roar that drowned out all other sounds—and then silence.
A wind rose from the well, and several strange shards flew out of it. Black and sharp. The girl stepped forward and gathered them. Then she handed them to the Cursed.
"Take them. These are the demon's teeth. When you throw them into the ground beyond the estate, warriors will rise from there. They will fight the external enemy and destroy its new wave."
Beyond the estate, the darkness flew and raged.
The Cursed did not go out—otherwise the darkness could devour him and anyone else who stepped outside. This was not the time for such actions. The wrong time. He saw how the protective symbol on the gate was gradually fading even more. He swung his arm and threw the demon's teeth beyond the fence.
The darkness outside screamed as if it had received a terrible wound from a sword strike. Black smoke stretched along the ground, and from it rose strange warriors clad in armor. Their armor was covered in long spikes, and on the swords they raised there were terrifying growths. The warriors went into battle against the raging darkness and began striking it with their blades.
From the darkness emerged enemy black warriors with spikes, who fought against the advancing ones. A terrible battle of demonic forces broke out. The black warriors were losing, taking heavy blows. Their armor was breaking apart. Then the darkness retreated. The warriors of the estate fell apart into pieces.