The Gates of Hell

CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

The Blood King pushed his men to the absolute limit.

The fact their pursuers had almost closed the gap made him furious. It was the overlarge contingent of men slowing him down. It was their dim-witted guide, dawdling over trivialities when they could be making strides. The amount of men who died claiming this prize was irrelevant. The Blood King demanded and expected their sacrifice. He expected them all to lay down and die for him. Their families would be looked after. Or at least, they wouldn’t be tortured.

The prize was everything.

His guide, a man called Thomas, was babbling on about this being the level some other geek called Hawksworth had named envy. It was the fourth chamber, the Blood King fumed. Only the fourth. Standard legend spoke of seven levels of hell. Could there really be three more after this one?

And how did Hawksworth know? The scribe and Cook had turned and fled, balls shrunken to the size of peanuts, when they beheld the trap system after level five. Dmitry Kovalenko, he thought, certainly would not.

“You are waiting for what?” he growled at Thomas. “We will move. Now.”

“I haven’t quite worked out the trap system, sir,” Thomas started to say.

“Fuck the trap system. Send the men in. They will find it faster.” The Blood King curled a lip in amusement whilst studying the chamber.

Unlike the previous three, this chamber sloped down to a central shallow basin that looked like it had been hewn out of the very rock. Several thick metal stanchions protruded from the hard floor, almost like stepping stones. The sides of the chamber narrowed as they proceeded, until after the basin when they started to widen out again.

The basin appeared to be a ‘choke-point.’

Envy? the Blood King thought. How did such a sin translate to real life, to this subterranean world where shadows could as soon kill you as protect you? He watched as Thomas ordered the advance. At first all went well. The Blood King cast a glance back the way they had come, as he heard the distant sounds of gunfire. Damn Drake and his little army. Once he got out of here, he would personally ensure the blood vendetta achieved its cruel aim.

The gunfire galvanized him. “Move!” he cried, just as the lead man stepped on some kind of hidden pressure point. There was a crack like stone falling, a woosh of air, and suddenly the lead man’s head bounced to the stone floor before rolling down the sharp gradient like a football. The headless body collapsed into a bloody heap.

Even the Blood King stared. But he felt no fear. He only wanted to see what had caused such trauma to his lead man. Thomas shrieked beside him. The Blood King pushed him forward, following in his steps, taking great delight in the man’s fear. At last, beside the twitching body, he stopped.

With scared men all around him the Blood King studied the ancient mechanism. A razor thin wire had been strung at head height between two metal poles that must have been held in position by some kind of tension device. When his man stepped on the release lever, the poles had released, and the wire swung around with them, severing his man’s head at the neck.

Ingenious. A wonderful deterrent, he thought, and wondered if he might employ such a device in the servant quarters of his new home.

“What are you waiting for?” he bellowed at the remaining men. “Move!”

Three men leapt forward, another dozen followed close behind. The Blood King saw the prudence of leaving another half dozen behind him just in case Drake caught up fast.

“Quick now,” he said. “If we go faster we get there faster, yes?”

His men ran, deciding they actually had no choice and there was an outside chance their deranged boss was right. Another trap triggered and a second head went bouncing down the incline. The body fell and the man behind it tripped over it, counting himself lucky when another taut wire sliced open the air right above his head.

When the second group started down, the Blood King joined them. More traps were sprung. More heads and scalps rolled. Then, there was a booming clap that echoed through the cavern. On either side of the narrowing pathway mirrors sprung out, positioned so that they reflected the man in front.

At the same time there was the sound of water rushing and the basin at the bottom of the incline began to fill up.

Only this water wasn’t just water. Not judging by the way it was smoking.

Thomas shouted as they ran toward it. “It’s being fed by an acid lake. That’s when the gas sulfur dioxide becomes dissolved in water and produces sulfuric acid. You definitely don’t want to touch that!”

“Do not stop,” the Blood King bellowed as he saw men begin to slow. “Use the metal poles, idiots.”

The entire team hurtled down the incline as a pack. To left and right, random traps flicked open with a sound like a bowshot. Decapitated bodies fell and heads rolled like discarded pineapples among the men, tripping some over, being inadvertently kicked by others. The Blood King noticed early on that there were too many men for the number of poles and understood that the pack mentality would drive the less sharp amongst them to leap without thinking.

They would deserve their fate. An idiot was always better off dead.

The Blood King slowed and held Thomas back. Several other men also checked their pace, affirming the Blood King’s belief that the only the brightest and best would survive. The lead man of the pack leapt out onto the first metal upright and then began to skip from pole to pole over the rushing water. At first he made some headway, but then a virulent surge splashed up at his legs. Where the acidic water touched, his clothes and his skin burned.

When his feet touched the next pole the pain made him fold and he fell, splashing down right into the teeming basin. Furious, agonized screams echoed around the chamber.

Another man toppled off a stanchion and fell in. A third man pulled up at the edge of the basin, belatedly realizing there was no free pillar for him to leap to, and was pushed in as another man barreled blindly into his back.

The mirrors reflected the man ahead. Would you envy the man in front of you?

The Blood King saw the purpose of the mirrors and the beating of the trap. “Look down!” Thomas shouted at the same time. “Look down at your feet and not at the man ahead. This simple practice will see you safely over the uprights.”

The Blood King came to a stop at the edge of the newly formed lake. By the way the water was still rushing in, he saw the tops of the stanchions would soon be under the swirling surface. He pushed a man on before him and dragged Thomas behind. A trap activated just out of range, so close he felt the wind as the metal post blasted past his shoulder.

Out onto the poles and a quick dance in a haphazard pattern. A brief pause as water splashed ahead. One more pole, and the man in front of him tripped. Screaming, he performed wonders by managing to catch his fall by landing on another pole. The acid-laced water splashed around him, but didn’t touch him.

Yet.

The Blood King saw his chance. Without thought or pause he stepped onto the man’s prone body, using him as a bridge to walk over and reach the safety of the far shore. His weight pushed the man farther down, dipping his chest into the acid.

In another second, he was lost beneath the vortex.

The Blood King stared after him. “Fool.”

Thomas landed at his side. More men lept deftly between metal poles to safety. The Blood King looked ahead to the arched exit.

“And so to level five,” he said smugly. “Where I will emulate that worm, Cook. And where finally,” he snarled. “I will destroy Matt Drake.”