In the round plaza they were in there was only one way forward, an archway leading... well somewhere.
As the trio walk through the arch, they are greeted with yet another crossroads. To the left a large road with knights patrolling it could be seen and a couple feet to the right a staircase stretched up to a doorway.
The top of the staircase had a crossbow hollow staring into the sky.
Nia: "Right is always right!" she says pulling Waifu in front of her.
Waifu holds out her shield almost as a reflex to being grabbed.
Nia: "Now block that hollow's attacks." she said pointing forward.
Waifu: "Ok!" she says with nerves smile on her face.
Waifu walks towards the hollow with Nia and Ligma following closely behind. Getting closer the hollow notices them and takes aim at Waifu.
Waifu raises her shield in preparation for the attack and after a second the hollow launches the bolt from its crossbow, the bolt bounces off Waifus shield leaving no visible mark.
Waifu then charges forward with confidence now that the hollow has to reload. Seeing this the hollow runs through the doorway to avoid getting close to its target. Although it got away from danger it also lost sight of them.
CRASH
Waifu heard a loud noise behind her and looking behind her she finds that Ligma killed a hollow that had snuck up behind them. The crashing sound she heard was Ligma's mace crashing into the hollow's skull.
Ligma: "Keep going it's been taken care of." she said shaking the blood off her mace.
Nia: "I got distracted by Ligma where did the hollow go?" she said turning back around.
Waifu: "Oh... it ran through the doorway."
Nia: "It's running then." she said running after the hollow.
Getting up the stairs she finds a short hallway with a low celling being held up by thin pillars. The hollow was about halfway down the hallway and had its back to Nia. It seemed to forget about the encounter.
Nia: "Dumb ass hollow." she said walking to the hollow.
Nia got right behind the hollow before it finally noticed its visitor. It tried to raise its crossbow to fire but Nia grabbed the crossbow and pulled it up letting the bolt go into the celling.
The hollow tried to pull its crossbow back and run but Nia's grip was too strong. After she watched the hollow struggle, she looked at it with a twisted smile before decapitating it with her axe.
Nia: "Some people feel bad for hollows but not me, I only hope you can feel fear." she said turning around.
Looking behind her she saw Ligma behind her and Waifu was still climbing up.
Ligma: "That was a bit much don't you think." she said putting her hand on her shoulder.
Nia: "Like you're one to talk." she said shrugging her hand off and moving forward.
So, the trio continue forward up another small staircase at the end of the hallway. Upon reaching the top they are met with a doorway that leads to a small open courtyard in a rectangular shape. In the back middle of the courtyard there was an entrance to a small tower that stretched to the top of the wall.
Waifu: "This tower looks familiar." she said scratching her head.
Nia: "Well looks like that's where we're going."
So, Nia heads into the tower with Ligma and Waifu following closely behind. Entering the tower, they find a strange device with a lever to the left of it.
Ligma: "Oh it's an elevator, I used to have them at the church, but this one is clearly of lesser value being made of wood." she said walking on to it.
Nia: "So how does it work?"
Ligma: "There is a pressure plate in the middle of it." she said pointing at it.
Waifu then grabs Nia's hand before walking onto the pressure plate. Upon stepping on the pressure plate the elevator shakes a bit and dust falls off the ropes before the machine slowly takes them up.
Nia: "Unhand me Waifu!" she said ripping her hand from her.
Waifu: "You don't have to be so mean about it." she said crossing her arms.
Nia: "Next time just use your words." she said looking at Waifu.
Just as Nia finishes her sentence the elevator stopped having arrived at the top. At the top they are met with a similar looking room as the bottom one, but this one had a closed caged door.
Ligma: "Quit arguing we are here." she says stepping off the elevator.
Waifu: "something about this room rings a bell." she whispered to herself stepping off the elevator.
Nia goes over to open the door and when opening it there is a click sound that only happens once.
Ligma: "What was that?"
Nia: "Hell if I know." she said looking at the door.
Suddenly Nia was covered in a shadow as a big hollow with a great axe stood in front of her. Reacting quickly to the threat she backs up as the hollow ducked its head to enter the tower.
Ligma: "How many damn hollows are up here?!" she said clutching her mace.
Nia then looks at the hollow with DeJa'Vu. She shook her head and concentrated on the fight, now was not the time to remember the past.
Waifu: "Nia!"
Hearing Waifus cry she looked up and saw the hollow stumbling forward with its axe raised high above its head.
Nia grabs her axe with both hands and strikes the side of the axe as it drops down. The strike required precision and exact timing, too soon or late and she would of took the full force of that hollow. The force of Nia's strike caused the axe to fall to her left and it threw the hollow off balance.
Nia used this opening to decapitate the hollow with one strike.
Ligma: "Damn I remember when those ones caused a problem." she says walking up to Nia.
Nia: "I know where we are... This is the tower that Waifu said didn't open from this side." she said peeking outside.
Ligma: "If that's true then the bonfire is close." she said looking at her clothes.
Waifu: "Yay so we can finally put some clothes on Ligma!" she said looking at Ligma.
Ligma: "It's not like I'm naked!" she said chopping Waifus head with her hand.
Waifu: "Ow... wait if that's true Nia then we have at least one halberd hollow and two dogs to fight."
Nia: "Yea... wow I'm surprised you figured that out." she said looking back.
Waifu: "It's not like I have dementia, I'm just a little slow!" she said crossing her arms.
Nia: "It doesn't matter, here is the plan we will ignore everything and run to the bonfire." she said with a serous expression on her face.
Ligma: "Fuck it I'm in."
Waifu: "What!"
Nia: "If we get hurt while running resting will heal us up so I see this as an absolute win."
Ligma: "And plus you have a shield so you should be fine."
Waifu: "Fine but under one condition that I stay in-between you guys while we run."
Ligma: "That works for me I'll take the back."
Nia: "If that's all then let's not waste time."
The trio exit the small tower and run up the stairs to the left once at the top they don't see the halberd hollow it must be up the stairs on the other tower. Once reaching the top they make a U turn now running towards the tower they all met on.
In front of them stood the two dogs from before. Upon seeing them the dogs run at them ready to jump at any second.
When the trio reach the dogs, Nis slashes the big one with her axe while running sending it flying into a group of praying hollows. The smaller dog jumped at Waifu but before it could sink its teeth into Waifu it was hit by Ligma's mace sending it crashing into the other dog.
With the dogs out the way the trio was able to run to the bonfire uncontested. The trio easily run up the stairs and make it to the bonfire.
Ligma: "It doesn't look like we were followed." she said looking back.
Nia: "That worked out better than I thought, I was sure one of us would get hurt."
Waifu: "Can we rest now?" she said catching her breath.
The trio sit at the bonfire and Ligma's clothing is instantly mended to its original state.
Waifu: "Hey Ligma your clothes are back!" she said looking at her from across the bonfire.
Ligma: "I always had them!"
Nia: "Just calm down we need to rest to get our strength back."
The trio rested at the bonfire a while gaining all of their strength back.
...
Nia: "If everyone is rested, we should go back down the elevator." she said standing up.
Ligma: "By now every hollow we killed has gotten back up." she said standing up.
Nia: "Thats just something we have to deal with."
Waifu: "I'm ok with that I feel much stronger after that rest." she said flexing her arms.
Ligma: "Good to see someone is excited." she said dropping her posture.
The trio head back down the tower on the right side away from the bonfire. Reaching the bottom they see a familiar sight, hollows praying, undead dogs wandering aimlessly and a larger halberd hollow wandering the stairs of the tower across from them.
Ligma not wanting to fight right now looks around out of boredom and to the left she sees that the railing on the wall was broken. Looking over the edge she found it dropped directly in front of the smaller tower with the elevator.
Ligma: "Guys I think I just saved us a lot of time." she said looking over the edge.
Nia: "What... oh I see what you mean." she said walking over to Ligma.
Waifu: "So we are dropping?" she said with a smile on her face.
With out hearing Ligma's response she jumps down and lands perfectly at the entrance of the tower. Luckly the axe hollow that normally wondered right here had already gone up the stairs.
Following Waifu, Nia and Ligma also jumped down landing without much problem.
Ligma: "Don't make it a habit to jump from high places without warning." she said looking at Waifu who had already gone in the tower.
Waifu: "Ok but we should go before that hollow gets back." she said stepping on the elevator.
So, the trio get on the elevator and Nia steps on the pressure plate sending them down. Reaching the bottom the trio go back to the crossroads with Nia at the front, along the way they run into the hollows from before.
Nia easily kills the crossbow hollow as it had its back turned and the other hollow Ligma delt with minimal effort.
Now the trio were back with only one way left to go (to the left with the knight patrolling the road).
walking forward they walk down a couple of steps and are meet with another split paths. The right path was a huge staircase that stretched down and a path to the left that had two hollow knights patrolling. The left path also led into a cathedral and the right path led into some kind of huge building with an equally huge door at the base of the staircase.
Nia: "We go right." she said walking to the right.
Ligma: "I should have known." she said slightly smiling.
Walking down the staircase the trio spot two spear hollows guarding the bottom. The hollow to the right was closer than the left one so it noticed them first and put up its shield in response.
Nia notices that the shields the hollows are holding are made of wood, so she prepares a fire ball. She unleashes the fire ball at the hollow to the right. Upon the fire ball hitting the shield in started a small flame but slowly erupted into a fire consuming the shield.
The hollow naturally scared of fire dropped its shield on the stairs.
Ligma grew impatient and didn't exactly want to sit and watch Nia slowly kill these hollows, so she went to the left one.
Nia ran up to the defenseless hollow and dodged its spear before slashing into its stomach and then decapitating it.
Ligma now face to face with the left hollow swings her mace at its shield that it hid behind. The impact caused the shield to splinter before Ligma would then crush the hollows skull with two decisive blows.
Ligma: "I think we can finally leave this wall." she said taking a breath.
Nia: "There is no guarantee that this path will lead out the tower." she said wiping her axe on the hollow's cloths.
Ligma: "Where else could this massive staircase lead but out the wall."
Nia: "Well I hope you're right Ligma." she said walking down the stairs.
The trio made it to the bottom of the staircase to the entrance of this giant room. They looked in amazement at the size of this place. At the end of the room was a massive door that blocked their path.
Nia: "If this isn't an exit then I don't know what is." she said with a relived look on her face.
The trio walk into the room making their way to the other side. There footsteps echo as they walk in, the wind ceases its movements in the building and the dark sun that once illuminated the outside was absent leaving only a couple of windows and torches to light the room.
Ligma: "How are we going to get that door open." she said taking in the size of the thing.
Waifu: "With magic!" she said confidently.
Nia: "If that doesn't work ill just brute force it, no door is going to stop me."
The door was now right in front of them, Nia reached out her hand to touch it but stopped when she felt a chill go up her spine.
Ligma: "Ni- Nia."
Nia turned around to see what Ligma wanted but instead of seeing Ligma facing her she was looking at where they came from. Waifu was also looking back her eyes sunk into her skull and she started to shake.
Nia the looked at what they were looking at and there she saw it. It was huge, it had to be at least 16ft tall. It looked like a knight contorted out of shape crawling on all fours like a beast. It looked like it was cold to the touch, and it carried a huge mace with some type of Icy smoke coming off of it and the armor itself looked like it was growing long grey hairs.
There is no present door or pathway it could have been hiding in its like it appeared out of nowhere. After Nia noticed it let out a horrifying scream that could take down armies with the terror it instilled in a person alone.
The trio coved their ears when it did this.
Nia: "FOCUSE! WE CAN'T LOSE OUR NERVE HERE!" she said taking out her pyromancy flame.
Ligma looks over at Waifu and shakes her shoulder to reassure her. Waifu looks over at Ligma not with her usual smile but with a face of determination mixed with fear.
Nia: "Waifu! Get as far away as you can and start casting your strongest spells at it."
Waifu looks at Nia before running to the left wall.
Nia: "Ligma! Stay with me and heal me or yourself if we get hurt!"
Ligma: "Ok!" she said now with an uneasy smile forming on her face.
They don't know it, but the name of this knight was Vordt. Vordt slowly crawled to Nia and Ligma, every step was followed by it momentarily dragging its limbs on the ground.
As Vordt drew closer the tension grew thicker until he was only 20 ft from them.
Waifu: "Come forth HEAVY SOULS ARROW."
A blue light darts towards Vordt hitting him directly in the right shoulder. Vordt feels this and truns its gaze to Waifu but before it could start to run Nia launched a fire ball at his left shoulder.
After this Vordt losses its little patience and with imposible speeds given its size jumps forward and slams on the ground in front of Nia. The impact causes the floor to crack and dust to rise.
Nia stumbles back from the impact of the strike but keeps her footing.
Nia: (damn I didn't even see it coming)
Ligma the runs up to Vordt's left arm the one holding its weapon and strikes it with her mace. When her mace meats the armor it cracks a bit before Vordt grabs Ligma by her left leg and flings her into the wall opposite of Waifu.
Vordt turns its gaze to Nia, but she is gone. Then he suddenly feels a burning at his neck. Looking down he sees Nia with her hand placed on his neck.
Nia: "Behold the queen of fire and her unmatched FIRE! COMBUSTION." she said unleashing her fire directly onto Vordts neck.
Waifu: "AGAIN!" she says firing another heavy soul arrow.
The blast hits him in the face this time. Vordt a little overwelled by the attacks jumps back but as he jumps back, he pulls his mace back and thrust it at Nia.
Nia tried to dodge but the spike at the tip of its mace caught her clothing ripping some of it off as well as ripping into her side.
After this attack a bright light is seen to Vordts left. It was Ligma she recovered from the hit and healed herself. Although her cloths were not dirty and torn in some places she was at full strength.
Waifu: "AGAIN!"
Yet another heavy soul arrow came barreling towards Vordt hitting it this time in its right side. Vordt Is now growing angry at Waifus attack as it looks in her direction.
Nia holding her side with her left-hand strikes Vordt's left arm with her axe. The strike caused Vordt to recoil for a second. Although the axe barley penetrated the armor Vordt seemed more hurt by this attack than any other.
Nia: (This axe... I knew something was off about it)
Vordt quickly recovers from this, if they had caused any damage, it was clear he wasn't about to let them see it.
Ligma runs over to Nia and quickly cast heal.
Ligma: "HEAL!"
A bright yellow light burst from Ligma closing Nia's wounds and recovering her health.
Ligma: "Any plans!?" she said catching her breath.
Nia: "Not really I'm just going to beat the hell out of it until it drops."
Ligma: "That sounds good to me." she said twirling her mace.
Nia: "Stand by with a heal when I get hurt."
Ligma nods her head readying her talisman.
Nia then runs up to Vordt with Ligma following close behind. Vordt sees them coming and raises his mace above his head to strike but another blast from Waifu hits him in the face obscuring his vision. In this opening Nia slides under Vordt and slashes his back legs causing him to drop. Ligma Stops in front of Vordt and prepares a heal spell.
Ligma: "Unfaltering prayer!"
As Vordt regains his vision he looks back he sees Nia about to strike again but Vordt grew tired of this and if he let it continue, he would surely be defeated. So, he jumped back far away from the trio's range.
The trio the watch as Vordt slams the spike of its mace into the ground and lets out the same howl he did at the beginning of the fight. After ten seconds of howling Vordt looked back at the trio his eyes now had a blue glow to them.
Without wasting a second Vordt franticly crawls towards Waifu blowing past Nia and Ligma. Ligma caught on to what he was doing and chased after it but couldn't possibly catch up.
Within seconds Vordt was feet away from Waifu and before Ligma could get to her Vordt grabbed his mace with two hands and slammed it down on Waifu.
Waifu was too scared to move but was able to raise her shield to protect her.
.
.
.
It wasn't enough, Vordts hammer came down so hard it crushed Waifu under her own shield. Dust was lifted into the air upon the strike hitting the ground and Nia was unsure what just happened she could only wait until the dust settled.
A second latter Nia saw Ligma run out of the dust screaming something, it was unclear what she was saying but it was clear that she was crying.
Nia tried to run to Ligma but as she took her first step Vordt come barreling out the smoke and just as Nia was about to reach Ligma, Nia watched as Ligma was grabbed by the left leg and violently slammed around until her leg was separated from the rest of her body.
Vordt threw her around like a toddler having a tantrum and breaking a toy.
Ligma's body landed next to Nia, her eyes were bloodshot, and she coughed up blood.
Ligma: "N- Ni- i- a..." with that Ligma turned her head over and died.
Nia turned over to this monster who was now close enough that she could feel his icy breath on her face. In that moment Nia the queen of fire felt a primal fear take over her body. Every fiber of her being was telling her to run away... but she didn't.
Was it pride, was it anger? Not even Nia knew the question to that anymore, all she knew that despite her body screaming at her to run she wanted to kill this thing even if it costed her to hollow.
Vordt now in an even more animalistic state prepared to bring his right fist down on Nia. Nia didn't try to avoid the attack.
As his fist mad contact with Nia, he surprisingly felt her catch it, and not only did she catch it she was slowly pushing it back.
Nia was using all of her strength to repel Vordts attack and once she gained enough leverage, she used her axe to hack into Vordts arm.
The cut was deep and so painful Vordt recoiled and took his eyes off of Nia. Nia took this chance and using all her might she plunged her axe strait into Vordt's face.
Although Vordt's armor was resistant to slashing Waifu blasting Vordt's face had weekend his armor allowing Nia to crash through his helmet delivering the final blow.
As Vordt received this death blow he let out one more cry before collapsing.
Nia Stood there her head empty without a thought as Vordts body disappeared. The silence was only broken when suddenly by the big door from before a bonfire appeared.
Not seeing any other plan of action Nia walked to the bonfire but when she got there, she already saw Waifu sitting there.
Nia: "Waifu? I thought you died." she said grabbing her face.
Waifu: "Oh yea actually I did die but I came back isn't that great!" she said walking up to Nia.
Nia didn't let it be seen but she was glad Waifu was back.
From Behind Waifu suddenly the bonfire roared as Ligma appeared without a scratch.
Waifu: "Ligma!" she screamed before jumping into her arms.
Ligma Had a puzzled look on her face when Waifu jumped on her.
Ligma: "I'm glad to see that your happy stranger but how do you know my name?"