Chapter 314 The beast itself (1/2)

The city was in ruins. Forget about a hurricane, earthquake or other natural disaster, this level of destruction was far beyond that. It looked as if a meteor hand landed on the city, or if a G.o.d had stamped down with its heavenly foot. If the latter had occurred then that G.o.d had supremely flat arches because the city was just gone.

It looked as if no two bricks still stood one atop the other. Every building had been flattened, the open s.p.a.ces were strewn with rubble and the once proud, cobbled roads were broken and cracked. In the distance, the hill on which the castle had once stood, with its inner wall and high towers, there was only a ruin.

This city had been built up over two hundred years of effort and endeavour, and now it was gone. If anyone wanted to try and recreate the city, establish the kingdom of Liria once again, they would need to do so from scratch. Heck, even the job of cleaning up this mess would take a monumental effort.

Although, just because the buildings had ceased to be, didn't mean the s.p.a.ce inside the walls was empty. Oh no, it was full to bursting. With Monsters.

Across every surface, on top of every stone, they stood, stock still. As if mesmerized by an illusion, monsters of every type from the first strata stood rooted to the ground and stared in one direction, unmoving and still. The site sickened me to my core for reasons I couldn't explain. It was unnatural for monsters to act this way, as if they were mindless drones with no will of their own. These were creatures born of the Dungeon! They should fight, struggle and battle!

Silent and still they appeared weak, like slaves to a greater will than their own. Bears, frogs, centipedes, hounds, slugs, bats, apes, lizards, even a few shadow beasts were in the mix, each doing the exact same thing, staring in the same direction, even the sightless monsters, as if they were receiving the light of the sun from their G.o.d.

Or G.o.ddess, in this case.

She sat above the Dungeon entrance inside the city. When I lay on eyes of the beast it felt as if her aura that dominated the air around me grew stronger, threatening to knock me off the wall. This was supposed to be a weakened monster?! Are you kidding me?!

I'm not sure what I expected Garralosh to look like, her offspring seemed to gain limbs, heads and tails as they evolved, following a strict 'more is more' policy, but the big momma Croc did not seem to follow in that pattern. Of all of her different offspring mutations she most resembled a t.i.tan Croc. Long reptilian body, powerful front and back legs that supported her when she lay flat and would allow her to walk when she stood., with a second pair of arms below the first to help support her more heavily ma.s.sed upper body.

Rather than two heads, three heads, or the over and under jaws of the Commanders, Garralosh simply had the one Crocodile head. It was difficult to make out the smaller details at this distance, but I think she did have more than just the two eyes, I'd have to closer to be sure, something that wasn't going to happen!

One muscular croc tail extended from the back of her body, lazily sweeping back and forth as she rested.

Long ridges extended down her back, almost long enough to be called spines, from her head all the way to the tip of her tail. They were dark in colour, and gleamed like obsidian in the light. Her scales were a deep, dark green and even at this range I got the sense that they would be as thick as steel plates.

There was nothing exceptionally remarkable about Garralosh in monster terms, so long as you discounted her size.

She was huge. It defied physical reality for a crocodile to be this large. What is this, the cretaceous period?! Someone get this frickin' dinosaur out of here! My mind boggled to even look at her. She was to a Croca Beast what a megaladon was to gummi shark.