Building Harem Town 3, page 3
“Nice, Aleia,” I praised. “Do it again.”
“Should I fly, Jack?” the fairy hissed.
“Let’s see what they can do first,” I told the fierce little strawberry-blonde. “I don’t want you up there alone with that thing right now.”
“Got it,” Aleia responded, but I could tell she was itching to fly up there and kick some gargoyle ass. I knew she might be strong enough, but I didn’t want to put her in further danger, especially if those talons could get close to her delicate wings.
The fairy continued to aim rocks at the flying gargoyle’s crotch, but he adeptly dodged them this time.
Meanwhile, Nicola continued trying to spar with the other gargoyle. He produced a stone sword of his own and brandished it at the brunette, and when she struck out with her sword, he easily parried and pushed her backward.
“Unfff,” Nicola groaned.
The gargoyle’s lips spread wide in a terrible grin that showed all of his stony teeth, and each one looked like they’d been polished and filed into spear tips.
“I said you were stupid, and I was right!” the creature laughed. “Come at me again, little girl.”
“She’s just like the other one,” the flying gargoyle called from the air, and he spat down on the ground. “Weak.”
Without warning, the creature swooped down far enough to brush the top of Nicola’s head with his sharp claws.
“Fuck!” the brunette screamed, and she frantically checked her head for any blood.
The gargoyle was already flying back up to a branch of a tree, and when he landed, he became almost invisible. The other was snickering and swooping around my priestesses now, and Nicola grasped the hilt of her sword in both hands while she attempted to stab the bastard in the face.
Then the gargoyle touched down to parry with her again, and their swords clashed with a deafening ping. The creature grinned the whole time as he stared into Nicola’s face without blinking, but she bared her teeth back at him without backing down for even a second. Then her opponent locked his blade with hers, and his gray biceps rippled as he shoved her down to the ground.
“Did you see his eyes?” the brunette gasped. “They’re flashing from gray to black.”
“I’ll look out for it, but get up!” I urged the dark-haired beauty as the gargoyle smirked and kicked at her with one of his six-inch talons.
“I got this!” Penelope yelled, and she lunged behind the creature and slashed her golden blade through his neck.
The naiad’s sword hit directly where the gargoyle’s neck met with his shoulder, and the stone actually cracked open from the impact. When a chip of rock broke out, I saw something really creepy.
The towering beasts were hollow.
“Hit it again!” I screamed at the naiad.
Nicola leapt to her feet as she brandished her sword at the gargoyle once more, but he held his hand to his cracked neck as he stiffly raised his stone sword with the other. Then the tip of the brunette’s blade hit him directly at the center of his chest.
The creature’s neck tilted precariously on his shoulders, and a web of cracks spread outward, but the monster just grinned his hideous grin.
“You stupid women,” the gargoyle muttered, and he pushed off with his legs, flapped his giant gray wings, and shot himself up into the air. “You weak trophies will never win against our kind.”
“What do we do, Jack?” Penelope asked in an anxious voice. “We need to bring them back down to the ground.”
“I’m gonna have to fly,” Aleia interjected. “There’s no other way.”
“Hang on,” I said as I began to address Nicola, who was aiming her bow. “They seem to have a weak spot around their groin. Aim there.”
“I’d like nothing more than to crack open that beast’s crotch,” the brunette snarled, and she let her arrow fly. The weapon slammed into the gargoyle’s groin, but curiously, the hit was deflected by his stony skin and didn’t leave a mark.
“Jack.” Aleia stared up at the sky. “I’m the only one with the power to do anything about this.”
And then, in a flash, a gargoyle swooped down, and before any of us could react, he snatched Penelope by the shoulders with his talons and lifted her into the air.
“Aaaaghhh!” the naiad screamed. “Someone help me!”
“Go, Aleia,” I immediately ordered. “Get our Penelope back.”
“Got it,” the strawberry-blonde said, and she set her jaw and shot up into the air. It appeared the beast was trying to fly away with the naiad, but Aleia chased him down and grabbed a hold of one of the monster’s wings.
The gargoyle turned and hissed at Aleia, but her super-strong hand on his leathery appendage twisted his body as he tried to escape.
I saw small streams of blood running down the naiad’s shoulders where she’d been pierced by the hideous monster’s talons, but she kept a fierce expression on her face as she attempted to kick upward and strike the gargoyle in the face.
She was a long ways off, but I admired her spirit.
Then Aleia finally managed to grab the naiad by the waist with one arm while she gave the gargoyle’s leg a hard shove, and she wrenched Penelope free and deposited her safely on the ground.
A split second later, Nicola loosed an arrow, and it went flying into the gargoyle’s legs, but the wood only splintered against the stone.
“Shit!” the brunette screamed.
“Aim for the crotch again,” I suggested, and the brunette sent another arrow at the gargoyle’s groin. She got a direct hit, too, but once again, it didn’t seem to hurt the beast. “What the fuck? Are they changing forms?”
“Are they what?” Penelope gasped. “Wh-What do you mean?”
In the air, Aleia swung her sling and shot a stone at the gargoyle. Her rock hit him in the eye, and his head cracked back like his friend’s, but this time, the muscles in his neck seemed to stretch, and his head rebounded almost immediately.
“Now it can stretch,” Nicola said as she stared at the beast. “What is going on?”
“It’s not that easy to kill us,” the monster snarled.
“Sometimes we bend, sometimes we break,” the other beast said with another evil grin.
What the fuck did that mean?
“I think they’re shifting forms,” I told the priestesses. “Sometimes they’re harder stone, and sometimes they’re made of… I don’t even know what. Flesh? They’re going back and forth. When they close their eyes and stay still, you can probably break them. But there has to be a way to tell when they’re in their more animal state.”
“Their eyes!” Aleia gasped, and she fluttered down closer to the other women. “Nicola, you mentioned their eyes before! I think it has something to do with that. Sometimes they shine more than others. When they’re stone, they’re a dull gray. When they’re… more like animals, they glimmer black.”
“Great observation, Aleia,” I praised the fairy.
“Then watch and tell me what to do, Aleia,” the brunette said. “Look at its eyes for me.”
“Hmm, maybe not so stupid,” the first gargoyle muttered, but when Nicola shot another arrow, it splintered against his body again.
“It must be in its stone state!” the fairy called out as she jetted through the air. “Look, it’s eyes are gray!”
The other gargoyle immediately reacted to her words, and with a strange, birdlike shriek, he plummeted downward toward Aleia.
“Aleia, no!” I shouted, but she swerved, and the beast missed.
The huge gargoyle flew with such force that he slammed down to the ground, and when I saw his shoulder split open, I internally grinned with satisfaction.
Penelope immediately jammed her sword down into the crack that had been left behind, and while the creature didn’t appear to be mortally wounded, large chunks of granite cracked off and showed a bit of his hollow interior. The naiad brandished her sword and growled at the gargoyle.
“His eyes are still gray,” the blue woman snarled.
“Just keep chipping away for as long as he’s on the ground,” I told Penelope. “But be prepared for him to jump up and attack.”
Then I saw Aleia slam her sword into the other beast’s foot, and a sort of black goo began to ooze out.
“So, you do bleed,” the fairy snarled.
“That must be a sign he’s in a flesh form,” I told the women. “Otherwise, they just crack.”
The monster’s lips were curled into a tight grimace of pain, but I saw a gleam of resolve in his black eyes as he soared higher up into the air with a flap of his wings.
“Hit him now!” I told Nicola. “His eyes are black! Penelope, get the one on the ground!”
The brunette immediately shot another arrow toward the beast, and this time, it pierced its leg and sent a stream of gooey black muck seeping out. Penelope loosed an arrow toward the creature on the ground from short range, too, but his eyes were still gray, and the projectile bounced off. Never one to be deterred, the naiad quickly drew her bowstring again, and she watched carefully to see if the gargoyle’s eyes changed color.
Suddenly, the cracked beast ahead of her shot upward into the air, and it appeared his wings were still working. The two gargoyles both grinned as they flew on either side of Aleia, who held her sword in her left hand and her sling in her right.
“Get him, Aleia!” I encouraged the fairy.
“Don’t mess with me,” Aleia gasped. “I’m. Really. Strong!”
The strawberry-blonde swung her sling over her head, and her rock flew out toward the gargoyle with the cracked neck. His head tilted just a little bit further to the side, and his eyes flashed black in anger.
As we all watched, the animals hovered in the air and morphed over and over from their stone form to their animal form. Their eyes turned from gray to black repeatedly, and while I didn’t want to waste arrows, I knew the women might lose a few as they attempted to get their timing right.
“Watch for the shiny black eyes,” Aleia called down to Penelope on the ground. “When you see them shine, you need to strike.”
“I understand,” Penelope panted as she stared up at the gargoyles.
Then she pulled her bowstring taut and took aim at the gray beast Aleia had just hit. Her first arrow hit him in the chest, but he’d turned to stone again in the time it took for the arrow to reach him.
“I got this from below,” Nicola said.
As if he’d suddenly been reminded of her presence, the other gargoyle swooped down and aimed its giant claws at the brunette.
Nicola reacted immediately, and she pointed her large blade into the air at exactly the right time. With its black eyes glimmering, the sword impaled the gargoyle directly in the center of his belly, and huge strands of steaming black goo began to stream out and splatter the dark-haired woman’s head.
“Poor Nicola,” Aleia groaned as the monster fell to the ground.
The gargoyle was clearly injured, and his eyes were closed, and he stayed perfectly still and silent as the women gasped for breath around him. Now that he was strewn on the ground, the sheer breadth of his wings and his sinewy form was startling, but the gash in his abdomen was still starkly visible, and I knew we were so close to finishing this bastard off.
“Is he dead?” Penelope breathed. “Did you get him, sister?”
“I don't know, he seems to be stone again,” the brunette growled. “That black shit stopped oozing out, but I really hope he’s dead.”
“He could be faking,” I warned the women. “Don’t let down your guards.”
Thunder had been barking his ass off and running in circles, but now, he jumped on top of the stony gargoyle and started trying to bite straight through the rock.
“Thunder, I’m not sure that’s going to help right now,” Nicola sighed, but then she looked at the black slime on her sword with pride. “I got a good hit in, didn’t I?”
“You really fucking did,” I confirmed. “Now, let’s take care of the one in the air. The one on the ground is bound to come back to life, so you should keep your sword at the ready for when he does. We’ve got Aleia with rocks, and Penelope with arrows to handle the other one.”
“Yes, Jack.” Nicola nodded, gritted her teeth, and positioned her blade directly over the gargoyle’s throat.
I thought I saw the stone start to twitch for a moment, but if the gargoyle’s granite eyelids fluttered open at all, they immediately closed again when he saw Nicola’s threat.
The gargoyle in the air started to climb higher and higher, and Aleia pursued him. The fairy was no longer directly above Penelope and Nicola, and that made me a little nervous, but I also thought she could handle it.
“Nicola, Penelope, watch the gargoyle on the ground,” I commanded. “Aleia, you totally got this.”
“I got this,” the fairy snarled. I’d never seen her hands work faster as she loaded her sling, and just as the gargoyle turned back to his animal form, she slammed a rock into his chest.
The beast was thrown backward several feet, but as Aleia smiled with pride and loaded her weapon again, the monster came charging at her with his sharp teeth bared. He held out his stone sword toward the fairy, and right when I was about to shout out to her, Aleia whipped her sword from her belt and deflected the gargoyle’s blade.
The fierce little fairy had struck the monster so hard, she spun him around with his huge wings spread out in the air, and he flew backward by several feet. With swift, agile hands, Aleia swung her sling over her head again, and this time, she hit the gargoyle’s shoulder.
“Bitch!” he yelled. “Stupid fairy.”
The gargoyle tried to switch back to his stone form, but his flickering gray-and-black eyes wouldn’t stay one color or the other. It was like his injuries were too severe for him to change his form, and my phantom heart leapt as I realized this was it.
This fucker was going down.
“Give him everything you’ve got, Aleia!” I ordered. “He’s weak!”
“Unghhh!” the little fairy shouted as she swung a rock directly at the gargoyle’s face.
It hit him square in the jaw, and the bone, or rock, or whatever was underlying his hideous face cracked open. A splash of shimmering black goo spilled out before the monster immediately regressed to total stone, and he started to plummet toward the ground.
Then his stiffened body hit the forest floor, and it shattered into dust and tiny shards of splintered stone while the strawberry-blonde cheered.
“Yes, Aleia!” I shouted. “Now there’s only one left, and he’s hurt, too.”
Nicola and Penelope were standing with their swords over the frozen gargoyle’s neck, and the fairy descended to the ground beside them.
“Well, since it’s what everyone’s doing,” Aleia giggled as she held her sword to the beast’s neck as well.
“He’s still alive,” I reported as I saw a brief twitch in his eyes. “Don’t let down your guards.”
Just as I said this, a sinewy arm shot out and grabbed Nicola by the calf. The gargoyle’s chest heaved as it attempted to breathe despite the gigantic gash in its body, but it began to sputter and ooze black goo out of its mouth and wound now.
“I’ll get you for this,” the beast growled as it slammed the brunette down to the ground. For one heart stopping moment, I thought she might have hit her head, but she immediately jumped back up into an offensive position.
“Slit its throat!” I commanded the priestesses, and Penelope brought her sword down and cut a deep gash across the gargoyle’s neck. The black blood sprayed all over the naiad’s pale-blue body, and she jumped back and gagged.
The monster laid on the ground as black blood oozed out of its throat and onto the ground. It gurgled like it wanted to speak for a moment, but then its black eyes rolled back into its head, and as it finally shifted to a completely stiff, granite state, I knew it was finally dead. The drops of blood that had spilled on the grass solidified into stone as well, and they rested like little gray pebbles next to the gargoyle’s fallen body.
“Gods, those things were tough,” Nicola gasped. “What were they?”
“I think they were gargoyles,” I explained.
“Real ones?” Penelope gasped. “I thought those kinds of monsters didn’t exist!”
“It looks like they do,” I replied “But let’s get out of these woods as quickly as possible. There could be more gargoyles lurking around in these trees.”
“Do you want me to carry them?” Aleia asked. “It would be easy for me.”
“Then I’d have to carry Thunder,” Nicola laughed as she gestured to the animal sitting at her feet. “I think we can walk, don’t you, Penelope?”
“Yes, I want to walk,” the naiad agreed, “provided that’s alright with you, of course, my lord.”
“Yeah, it’s fine,” I told the women. “Move quickly and head straight to the convent. I’ll keep an eye out for any more threats.”
“I’ll walk with you,” Aleia decided as she loaded her sling once more just in case. “I’m glad that’s over. We’ve had way too many battles in the last day.”
“Yes, there does always seem to be a battle,” Nicola sighed. “But those gargoyles were really strong. Those different forms were like nothing I’ve ever seen before, and they’re way bigger than the goblins we just fought. It was hard to keep watching for their eyes, too.”
“They definitely had some tricks up their sleeves,” I agreed. “The whole changing form thing was pretty wild.”
“Well, then we’ll just have to get stronger,” Penelope chirped in a cheerful but determined tone.
“But did you hear what they said about the girl?” Aleia asked as she lowered her voice and scanned the treetops. “Jack, that sounded like what you were talking about.”
“It did,” I agreed. “And we’re still going to have to come up with a plan to rescue her. Those gargoyles are tough, but at least we know who we’re dealing with now.”
“I suppose that smoke was their camp in the mountains,” the fairy pondered. “At least, it seems worth investigating.”
“Good thinking,” I said. “We’ll handle that tomorrow. You’re all so brave, but I know you got hurt a little in that fight. Are you okay, Penelope?”
