The Crafter's Dominion: A Dungeon Core Novel (Dungeon Crafting Book 5) by Jonathan Brooks (e ink epub reader .txt) 📕

especially not the King and Queen, who almost seemed catatonic at that point – reacted to the evil one’s words, showing that they were indeed mind-controlled, if to a lesser extent than the Royal couple.  Echo looked around and saw the angry faces on The Rebels, however, though they weren’t directed towards the one that betrayed them – they were directed towards the Chamberlain.

She felt the same way, and she couldn’t even blame Sheelagh for her betrayal; while she wasn’t entirely absolved for what she did, everyone understood why she did it.  That…thing…needs to die.

“Guards!  Take them away, if you would.”  The Chamberlain waved negligently in their direction, as if they were of no consequence.

Not yet!  I need to kill him before I’m stuck somewhere before my execution!  I won’t get another chance—but I can’t break free of these ropes, there are over 100 Royal Guards around, they confiscated my bow, there’s a barrier protecting him from arrows and bolts, and I can’t use any spells!  I can’t do it….

She began to despair, just as something strange brushed her senses.  A shadow fell over the Bowery again for less than a second as a cloud briefly hid the sun—wait!  What she sensed wasn’t a cloud, it was something else entirely.

It was the Aerie Roc above the trees, circling around and awaiting Echo’s orders.  She looked up quickly without trying to draw too much attention to what she was doing, even as she was roughly led away with shoves to her back.  While she didn’t actually see the massive bird, she was 99% sure that it was there, just out of sight.

Without waiting anymore, as she was being led out of the Bowery and any hope of ever surviving was fading with each of her steps, she threw her head back and yelled, “ATTACK!”, projecting thoughts of the Chamberlain as she did so.  The entirety of the people in the Bowery froze at her shout, the Guards looking at her and the other Rebels, expecting some sort of surprise attack that they hadn’t accounted for.  Echo couldn’t see the Chamberlain’s face because she was forcibly facing the other direction, but she could only assume that he had a similar expression of wariness and confusion.

“Guard – silence her permanently if she tries something like that ag—”  The rest of the pompous fool’s words were cut off by a branch-shaking screech, and the hole that opened up to the sunlight above was abruptly covered.

“What is that?!  King, drop the Sphere and both of you protect me!” she heard the Chamberlain scream from behind her.  Echo whipped around and out of the grip of the Guard holding her, in time to see the giant bird descending towards the Chamberlain, talons poised to rip him apart.  Suddenly, she felt another inaudible *pop* as the Negation Sphere was collapsed, and her heart sank. There’s no way it’ll survive against the King and Queen, especially with how powerful they are. 

Her heart recovered from its disappointment as she looked at the King, who was fighting his reactions, shaking almost uncontrollably as he closed his eyes with a smile.  The Queen was looking out blankly toward the middle of the Bowery at nothing in particular, but a hint of a smile and shaking in her own limbs indicated that she was also fighting the commands given by the Chamberlain.

Speaking of the no-longer smug Elf, he fell onto his back in his effort to get away, and suddenly a thick metal wall appeared above him, somehow floating in the middle of the air between him and the diving monster.  From her viewpoint, something looked wrong about the wall, especially from the side closest to the prone Elf; it almost looked incomplete as if he had run out of energy creating the barrier, though insubstantial might be the better word.  Remembering what she had heard about the Chamberlain and how he utilized Spirit energy to control the minds of those around him, she instantly knew what the wall was: An illusion.

The Roc appeared to be adjusting to avoid crashing into the wall, which would take it out of range of an attack; she didn’t want the horrible Elf to get a chance to utilize another attack, however, and the King and Queen losing their internal fight was a possibility at any time.  Therefore, with every ounce of mental capacity she held, she ordered the bird to fly into the wall, despite its natural inclination to avoid crashing into a solid object.

There was a briefest of hesitation as the bird continued to reverse its course, but then it doubled down on its dive, aiming straight for the metal wall.  “What!?  Nooooooooooo!”

Without any sort of resistance, the Roc shot right through the illusionary wall, swooped down over the horrified form of the Chamberlain, and then swooped him up with one of its powerful talons.  One of them had apparently pierced his entire body, because Echo heard him scream, just as a hundred different spells thrown out by the Guards impacted the Light Barrier in an effort to stop the Roc.  Fitting that the spell protecting him from The Rebels would prove to hinder his own rescue.

Before the screaming Elf could use any other spells to save himself as the Roc’s path took it further into the middle of the room, she silently gave another order.  “Finish him.”

Faster than she could reasonably follow, the bird’s beak bent down and struck at the distraught and now-crying Chamberlain, his screams abruptly cut off as his head was swiftly removed from his body.  The Roc then let the body go, where it slammed into the Bowery floor with a wet-sounding *thud*, even as the bird tilted its head back in mid-flight and swallowed its prize.

Brand-new screaming shattered the sudden silence, as the King and Queen sat straight up on their thrones and started yelling so loud Echo thought her