BatIM Five Trials

Chapter Seventeen

"How about we have some fun. Have you seen those grinning demons? How about we remove them? I have the perfect tool to make this errand even more fun!" The cylinder rotated once more for Jade's fourth task to reveal an axe. Right in plain sight.

Jade walked over to it, signs of her ever-worsening exhaustion starting to show in her steps. Three errands and a hurt shoulder did not help with the tedious tasks, especially when she decided to take the stairs, had to fight Butcher Gang members and searchers, and got chased by the Ink Demon, which she decided to call Inky for short inside her head, twice more.

Picking up the axe almost felt like being reunited with an old friend, since this was the weapon she was most comfortable with out of a pipe, wrench, syringe and especially a plunger. She gave it an experimental swing, though causing another surge of pain to ripple through her injured shoulder, she still smiled. She headed over to the lift where Boris was waiting, holding the pipe she once had.

"You'll find them on Level K. Be thorough, destroy all of them." Alice's voice rang out as the two of them looked at each other.

"Jade, you look exhausted! You're taking the elevator." Boris insisted out of concern for his friend.

"But Boris, I can handle the stairs-"

She was cut off by the wolf shaking his head, walking over to the buttons and pressing the one for K. The elevator lifted up, and Jade silently thanked Boris for saving her all of the stairs. The elevator was much quicker than she herself was anyway. Soon the elevator arrived onto Level K, and already Jade spotted a cutout. Stepping out of the gate, she looked at the cutout for a second.

I'm not sure. . . I've got a bad feeling about this. . . alas, this was one of the cutouts which stood between her and freedom. Her and getting Boris out of here. She took a deep breath, raising the axe slowly as she did so, then brought it down toward the cutout, blade first. The cutout broke into pieces and crumbled to the ground.

The strange aching returned to her healed injuries, though mild, as she heard whispers inside her mind. From their tone, since she could not distinguish what they said, sounded a bit fearful. This did not sound good at all.

Despite this, Jade continued on anyway, seeing as if she wanted to get out, she had no choice. She almost ran into Inky twice, catching the ink web ahead of her soon enough to turn back and go somewhere else. During those times she had to resist the instinct to run, seeing as that made noise and the demon would be able to hear it. Either way, she managed to evade the demon for the time being. Finally, she had gotten back to the large Heavenly Toys room, whose size still awed her immensely, but she could not let this get in the way of her task. It seemed a whole jumble of cutouts were in this room, a majority of them being along the couches. As she headed toward them, the pain in her scars got worse, to the point she had to limp again.

What the heck is off this time? She thought as she glanced around for any signs of danger. Does whatever is doing this know something I don't? I need to know what it is, I might need it to survive. Nothing revealed itself, so she shrugged and limped toward some of the cutouts, having to go around a fence for the rest. The cutouts fell apart as they were hit by the axe, it was almost becoming a rhythm for Jade.

"Ah, now that was fun!" Alice spoke after the last cutout was in pieces of its former glory. "Oh! But I neglected to mention! He hates it when I do that. I would hide if I were you~" Alice punctuated her warning with a menacing chuckle. Jade was terrified, to say the very least. She bolted toward the Miracle Station in the room, but before she could get there, the familiar ink web pattern tangled around the area it lingered. Inky was just on the other side. Jade knew he'd hear if she went to get in, so she turned the other way and ran. Her efforts were quickly proven futile as she heard a roar behind her. He heard her turn and run.