The Demon Queen's Royal Consort-Chapter 118 – Dungeon – XXVI

The cold night wind swept across the summit of the fifth mountain. We had agreed to wait one more day before Dalia poured her blood into the chalice. Each of us had our own reasons.

Aeloria was mentally preparing himself to continue leading us through the conquest of this dungeon. One extra day was a welcome reprieve for him—a final truce before the inevitable.

Dorian and Seraphine spent most of their time resting, trying to bring their bodies back to peak condition.

I had no objection to the decision. Still, I was beginning to feel chills every time I looked toward the previous mountains. I knew that when the next day dawned, the third mountain would vanish, just like the first and second had before it.

But the real reason for the delay was Dalia's condition. Even after a full day of rest, she was still pale, and her prana core was far from fully recovered.

The early morning dragged on slowly, and everyone remained lying down in their places. Although we pretended to sleep, it was clear that some of us were just rolling back and forth on the hard, cold ground near the campfire.

I was one of those people. I used my waking hours to cultivate. Inside the dungeon, the spatial affinity was much clearer than outside, so I kept absorbing that energy into my prana core in intervals, trying to reach saturation.

From time to time, I stared at the black ring embedded in my finger. That cursed artifact whispered melancholically in my ears, asking me to return to that strange world—that world inside it.

And that wasn't all.

Ever since I put it on—or rather, since it bound itself to me—I've been feeling a constant drain. The ring consumes my energy. Not just prana, but everything. And yet, only my prana core seems to be significantly affected.

Before, both of my cores—prana and mana—would take about the same amount of time to recover. Now, my prana reserves hovered around ninety percent, while my mana core stayed constantly at one hundred.

'This damn thing is absorbing energy only from the core that was fed with spatial energy.'

You might ask: why not just throw the cursed ring away?

Well... I tried. I really did.

As soon as I woke up, one of the first things I did was hurl it down the mountain with all my strength. And guess what? Before my arm even returned to rest, the ring was already back on my finger.

That's the problem with bound artifacts. They're mysterious. No one really knows how they work or how they choose their owners. But one thing is certain: once bonded, it's a lifelong marriage. That's why artifacts of this type are handled with extreme care—or fear.

The sky began to lighten timidly on the horizon, tinting the thinnest layers of clouds above the mountains in pale orange. The silence that hung over the group wasn't just from exhaustion or the biting cold—it was the suffocating anticipation of everything that was about to come.

Dalia sat up slowly, her eyes sunken and her face still chalk-pale. Even after an entire night of rest, her slouched shoulders and controlled breathing revealed how much her body was still struggling to recover.

Aeloria was the first to break the silence.

"It's time."

Dalia nodded gently without saying a word. I stood up, shaking the cold from my body, and approached slowly, studying every detail of that stone chalice.

The object looked... hungry. Its metallic surface pulsed with a dark glow, as if calling for the offering.

"Let's make this quick," Dorian said, crossing his arms. "The less time she spends in this state, the better."

"You've got this," Seraphine said, comforting Dalia.

Dalia gave a faint smile.

"Sitting out the next fight is going to be torture. But if it means everyone gets out of this dungeon alive, it's worth it."

We took a deep breath. The moment had come.

Without hesitation, she pulled out a simple, sturdy knife, held her breath, and slid the blade across the palm of her left hand. The cut was clean, silent. She clenched her teeth but made no sound. She simply held her hand out over the chalice.

The blood began to drip.

At first, it seemed like nothing would happen. The drops vanished into the dark bottom of the artifact as if being swallowed by some invisible creature. The liquid disappeared without a trace, as if there were no bottom at all.

But after what we estimated to be the first liter, the blood finally began to pool. A shadowy, almost oily gleam coated the inner surface of the chalice.

And then the ground shook.

The fifth mountain trembled beneath our feet, and all around the circle where the chalice rested, incomprehensible runes lit up in a deep, pulsing red—almost alive. They seemed to glow to the rhythm of Dalia's heartbeat—or the chalice's. It was impossible to tell.

Suddenly, the entire swamp below the mountain erupted.

It wasn't lava. It was boiling green mud, shooting upward in violent columns like geysers waking from a millennial slumber. Pressure and heat filled the air. The thick mist of dawn was replaced by steam and the stench of sulfur and rot. Our vision was overwhelmed by a grotesque curtain of bubbling marsh.

"Glenn!" shouted Seraphine, instinctively pulling me a few steps back as an explosion of mud splashed down just meters away. freёwebnoѵel.com

But I couldn't take my eyes off the chalice. The blood was slowly climbing the inner rim. The object pulsed—it was as if something inside was breathing. As if it was eagerly awaiting the sacrifice to be completed.

Then, the barrier around the sixth mountain began to crack.

Rifts of red light snaked across its surface like reversed lightning bolts crawling through the air in slow motion. The magical structure that isolated the mountain groaned, splintered, and finally shattered like broken glass.

But something even stranger happened.

No new barrier formed over the fifth mountain.

"What's going on...?" Aeloria murmured.

I looked to the side. Dalia was already on her knees, bracing her arm on her thigh to stay upright. Her face was even paler than the night before, and beads of sweat trickled down her forehead.

"It's done..." she whispered, before collapsing sideways.

Dorian caught her before she hit the ground.

Then we heard the roar.

Not from the sixth mountain. Not yet.

It came from the fifth.

Creatures began to emerge from the swamp—deformed, muddy, with dead eyes and sharp claws. Centipedes, grasshoppers, centurions, beetles, and many others we had never seen before. They climbed the edges of the mountain like a swarm of deranged flesh.

But not one of them dared set foot on the sixth mountain.

'As if they know something far worse awaits them there...'

Dorian already had his shield in hand. Seraphine spun her spear between her fingers, eyes fixed firmly ahead.

"We can't waste any time," Aeloria said, just as we had planned, his gaze locked on the void consuming the horizon of the sixth mountain. "This one will be the worst of all."

Dorian handed Dalia over to me, then took his position at the front of the group.

Everyone gathered around me, their arms resting on me as my spatial magic began to take shape.

The sound of the monster swarm climbing the mountain sent chills down our spines, but our resolve held strong. However, just before we leapt toward the sixth mountain, Seraphine ran to the chalice, stopping right in front of it.

"What are you doing?" Aeloria asked.

"We have to take this with us. It's the key to activating the barrier on the sixth mountain!" she replied.

Without hesitation, her steady hands grabbed the chalice. The liquid inside didn't even ripple, as if it were held in a completely different gravity from our own.

She quickly placed it in a small pouch and fastened it to Dalia's back.

"It'll be safe with her! Let's go!"

No second command was needed. Our legs tensed in perfect synchrony, just like we'd done before when jumping from mountain to mountain—we leapt toward our next objective.

'No rest. No room for error.'

And I knew—

We were heading straight into the mouth of hell.