Inferno Ascended

Glax saw his sword lying in the street's dust, on the route of the truculent robot boars.

Jumping over one of the dead leggy cyborg's legs, he landed close to his divine weapon, but in little time to get out of the way of the automatic tanks.

"Hm, shit!" He couldn't even rewind his action. He was also sure his 'Lightning Caster' sword wouldn't have much effect against the heavily armored machines. They didn't really have any electric or organic parts to be affected by electric discharges.

All he thought of doing was throwing himself at the boar, and maybe piercing the robot's skull where it really mattered.

'The more time I spend here, the crazier I'm getting,' Glax still had time to think. Without further caution or regret, he hopped over the robot boar. His chest and knees slammed into the considerably hot metal hump on the automaton's back.

'Ugh, high quality built. I bet it's a sample of the first batch.' He held on to the protruding fangs of the automaton, which stopped immediately, trying to get rid of him.

This machine, Glax immediately felt, was in perfect condition, even if it was scratched and dirty on the outside.

The boar-maton tried to knock him off its back, but Glax managed to hold on, trapping his legs around the robot's large, rotund body. When he looked to the side, he saw Alexandre doing the same, with a manic smile on his face.

The young Kroton stuck his gauntlet sharp blade into the robot's head, trying to open it as if it was a can opener.

"WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!"

"They meant me... TO LEARN FROM YOUEEE!" The robot darted down the street with Alexandre on its back, as if he were riding a very large and clumsy motorcycle he cannot control. Alexandre continued to stab the scout's head, though, while Glax's boar spun and bucked.

At the same time, Glax wasn't living the best experience of his life.

The steam was making him blind and his hands - no, really, everything - was burning. He released its fangs and landed his ass on the dirt. The animal was still humping, but stopped when it realized that it had managed to get rid of its rider.

"SONOFABEEECH, GET OFF!" Glax drew his pistol again and shot the robot twice. The first shot hit the head, but the second hit the side, and pierced its fuel tank. The boar started to smoke and spurt.

More shots hit the boar-maton.

"Thank you, Pydna!" he bolted on his feet.

"You're welcome. At least it was funny. Is your page okay?" she asked, as she approached, reloading and unloading her rifle on the robot. The machine stopped completely, losing the steam pressure to keep moving. Glax looked back, and saw a cloud of dust and smoke that covered everything, several meters away. Pydna did a damn huge hole in its tank with her shots.

"I'll be right back!" It was better to see what had happened to Alexandre, while Pydna at least immobilized the scout. Glax would return to take the antichor core later.

He ran to the end of the street, and found Alexandre lying on the floor, grabbing his own leg in the midst of all that smoke and dust. He and the boar had fallen, and Alexandre had crawled from under the heavy mechanical animal. There was something wrong with his leg, though.

The head of the scout was completely smashed, and the small globe containing antichor and the orb was exposed. Glax quickly finished the robot, collecting the orb for the clock. Soon after, he crouched down beside his cousin.

"You should just follow my good examples... And I haven't started showing them yet."

"Damn fucking machine. I think I broke something!!!" The boy gritted his teeth in pain and frustration.

"Don't worry. We have an iatromancer and several potions," Glax calmed him down. He stopped Alexandre from moving and looked at his leg. Besides the redness from superficial burns when touching the hot machine, like Glax, the boy's ankle was looking strange and slightly swollen. He might not know much about botany, but he knew something about anatomy.

Glax helped Alexandre to his feet. "We better stay away from all that smoke. I will take you to the temple."

Pydna was reloading her weapons, and asked, "Are you going to open the head of this one? I take Alexandre to the temple."

"In fact, this machine can no longer walk, so we are in no hurry. Find a high spot and check why the other group didn't show up here. I heard nothing from them." Glax wasn't sure, after all they were very busy there. But he hoped they were just having the same success as his team.

"Okay," Pydna looked around and used the monster's long leg lying on a house as a ramp to access the roof.

Alexandre was sweating from jumping on one leg, after all the effort in combat. He was clearly in pain.

Glax decided to stop with him in a shaded corner, and took off his backpack, started looking for something that could help.

Looking over to the other alley behind the street they were on, he saw a two-story house that looked like it had a business downstairs. The doors were covered with siding, but he noticed that one of the siding was loose.

"I better leave you there, safe for a moment, and go get Zotikos."

He proposed.

Alexandre frowned. Glax understood. His young cousin was too 'tough' to say he didn't want to be left alone.

"They are on the other street. It will be faster." He insisted, and the boy only nodded, the pain helping him to convince himself.

Glax pushed the siding hard, opening a gap for them to pass.

It was dark and empty inside. He found a step and made Alexander sit there. Even in the dark, he took out the bag of salves and fruit, and handed it to the young Kroton. "Hold this. If you find something that works, use it. I got it from Lady Aiopis, but I have no idea what it's for."

Glax went to the exit, and carefully closed the entrance.

Then he heard hoofbeats hitting the street stones.

"Uh-oh!"

::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

"Are you back yet? Where is Zotikos?"

"Shhhhhh!" Glax made as little noise as possible, approaching Alexander again in the dark. "Another mechanical centaur."

Glax was exhausted and preferred to avoid the confrontation right now. He didn't want to reveal the hiding place, and the centaur was patrolling the street.

He supposed the centaur would be attracted to the street where they had the fight. Pydna was at the top of the building, and saw when Glax waved at her, pointing out the danger and his spot, before going in again.

But he didn't know what had happened to the other trio.

The valosian also supposed that, like most houses he had seen, there must be some other way out.

Glax helped Alexandre to his feet again, and feeling the walls, he began to explore the interior of the store, trying to reach a side door or another way to sneak out the place.

After a few steps, his hand touched the wooden surface of a door. And a doorknob.

A doorknob with a mechanical lock!

Letting his hand slide over the object, he realized that the door was practically a safe by Stygia's standards. Unfortunately for its builder, Glax had the best cheat to handle it.

"What is it?" Alexandre whispered, perplexed.

"A locked door. With a sophisticated lock. There's something important here." Glax murmured, with some screws on his lips as he worked in the dark. He didn't really need to see what he was doing, because in his mind the mechanism was perfectly visible now.

After a few moments unscrewing here and pushing there with the tip of a dagger, he deactivated the mechanism, and the door opened with a soft click.

"Lets go in."

"Are you really going to enter a place that was locked up like that? What if it's a monster's prison?"

"You're right. You enter first."

"Don't make me laugh, Master. It hurts." Alexandre complained.

"I'm not kidding, Alexandre."

"Huh?"

But Glax was kidding, actually. He snuck inside, and drew and activated his divine sword. Alexander followed right behind him with some effort.

They entered a corridor, and a green light went on automatically a few moments after the door was opened.

"Hm. It looks like we found something interesting here, Alex!"

"Nobody calls me that, master. That sounds like a dog's name."

"It also sounds like my name!"

"Indeed."

"Uh?"

"Just don't call me like a dog, master."

"You are emotional because you are in pain. Here's a better place than outside, at least there's light. And we can see what's in the medicine bag. But after all, as they call you, besides Alexandre?"

"Alekos." The boy sat on the floor with a sigh of relief.

"Okay, Alekos. Rest, let's bandage your leg, and put on a splint."

Glax started looking for some liniment to apply that could ease the pain or minimize the swelling. There were no explanations of how to use them, but for the refreshing smell, he chose one of them. Using the scabbard of his sword as a splint, Glax wrapped a bandage around his student's ankle.

While doing this, Glax was still wondering if he should waste time exploring what this place was, or go back and find his friends, even if it meant having to fight the centaur.

He heard the creak of a door opening and the click of a trigger.

In the dark, a man with a shotgun was aiming the gun at Glax's head.