Nina’s [Wooden Spoon] cracked against The Collector’s hollow skull. The force was felt through the Dungeon and the surrounding neighbourhood. Centuries of food cultivation and the blood of endless enemies combined with the tiny Lich's strength, punting The Collector straight into the Dungeon wall.

  BOOM

  But the beam of pure envy was already loose. And leaping into its path to shield brave Brody and Alex was the roaring Steward of Sun and Shade, Petal Gravewhistle.

  “A Steward of Sun protects the living!” Petal bellowed. “and a Steward of Shade damns the envious!”

  He caught the beam in the chest, suspending his reinforced porcelain body as it shattered from the blow. The magic swept into his hollow innards and carved out something vital. Petal screamed in horror, and as the Skill cut off, he crashed to the floor.

  Upon the impact, Petal shattered into a dozen melty pieces.

  “No! Petal!” Alex rushed in as Snu crashed into him, Giat hot on her heels toward the injured Brody.

  "You're alive," Snu said as she engulfed him with her giantess form. "I thought..."

  Nina descended toward The Collector, who was dragging his hunched frame off the wall. His skull was caved in where she’d struck him, revealing the endless pit where a brain should have been. It was an open drain pulling in loose canned goods.

  “No done with you yet,” Nina said coldly. “No even close. Is hard to kill a Lich, but we make it work.”

  She smacked him again with her spoon. His body flung brutally into the wall from the concussive hit. That one had shattered his femur.

  “Wait!” The Collector shrieked, shambling upwards and looking, only to find no exit. He yanked Mr. Mystical’s silver ring upward. “I’ll destroy this! You hear me? He’ll never forgive you if you lose it!”

  He held it up to the spiral in his head, voice wavering as he realized he was being surrounded.

  Beepy trip-flipped through the air and skidded to a stop beside Nina, cracking out a loose [Volt Whip] by his side. Zippy landed next with a hard clank, unfolding his two [Ancient Paring Knives]. Aria stumbled down off Zippy’s back and planted her hands fiercely on her hips.

  “Hey!” Aria shouted extremely loudly. “Don’t you dare, buster! Or we will make this way, way worse for you! The Paladrones do not mess around!”

  Together, all three struck a synchronized trio pose.

  The Collector blinked his remaining working eye at the small doll yelling at him, and that was the exact moment Mary and Jemin blasted through the doorway with two gnomes.

  “Alex!” Mary shouted, before noticing her drones close to a leaky Lich. “Aria! Beepy and Zippy! Back! Get back from him! He’s too powerful!”

  The Collector’s looked wildly between Nina, the little creatures, the Dungeon Bosses, the humans, and the reptile man. Cornered on all sides, he stiffened in realization. If he died here, they would pry apart his hoard and own what was his. That was unthinkable to the Lich consumed only by collecting.

  “No,” The Collector hissed. “You will NOT take my Collection…not ANY of you! If I fall, it all comes WITH ME.”

  “Behind me!” Nina roared as front detonated from her spine. Two vast, jagged ice wing burst outwards from her back, growing and filling the room with cold. “He cast his —"

  “SHUT UP, SALOPE!” Bitch

  Nina’s wings grew as The Collector leaned forward, his head cracking further like an egg to reveal the sucking void inside.

  The Collector then spoke a sentence unique to him. A Skill shared by all Liches, though each one was vastly a different shared effect. It was an incanted Skill that permanently devoured their Essence, stripped Levels, and began to cut the very contract they had with the System itself. It was a sentence of annihilation and destruction of the self. And self was truly the only thing that anchored a Lich to existence.

  The spoken Skill slithered over Alex’s mind, too monstrous and large to understand. He clutched Petal’s cracked off hand as Snu squeezed his arm brutally while shooting to her feet. A silver ring clattered to the floor.

  Finally, with the sentence spoken, The Collector cast his [Unmaking].

  A boundless howl of hunger screamed out of The Collector’s skull. The drone brothers instantly communicated as Beepy’s arm blurred to crack his [Volt Whip] into a lasso to snare all three Paladrones. Zippy shot off and parked them behind Nina and her wings of ice. Snu released Alex, and Giat released Brody. Both Dungeon Boss sisters sprinted toward Freeda, who was already stepping into position behind her friend. The three women met and nodded sharply, pink Essence forming around them all.

  Nina lifted her spoon and spread her wings wider, placing herself squarely in front of everyone else as the [Unmaking] began to unravel The Collector.

  Seven decades of pilfered goods pulled from the bottomless collection and shot from The Collector’s skull. Couches and dressers, photo albums and broken watches, cards, keys, keepsakes, and even a sedan erupted out of him. Every scrap dissolved into a black sludge to feed the three-foot blast pouring out. The air itself warped around and was erased in its path.

  It slammed into Nina, but she held firm and glowed frosty white. Her wings rooted to the floor with icicles as the attack burned across her, dissolving her body as she reassembled herself. The beam should have devoured her and blasted through the entire room and Dungeon. Instead, the tiny Lich stood inside the annihilation, spoon raised, refusing to give the Skill anywhere else to go.

  Alex clutched the broken bit of Petal Gravewhistle as Brody crawled toward him.

  Mary and Jemin stared open mouthed at the display from the shadow of Nina’s wings.

  The Dungeon Bosses charged their return attacks behind Nina.

  Zippy and Beepy planned on how to stab the meanie-bo-beanie.

  Aria tried to peak around and was pulled back by Zippy.

  A little chip of a porcelain eyeball the colour of rusted leaves blinked awake. His ear, ten feet away behind a can, heard something beautiful and haunting. Nina was singing.

  “Amore burns hotter than flame,

  Call out its name, call out its name,

  Life is a dance and love is the beat,

  Stand by my side, amore, my ice and your heat”

  It was death and life wrapped together, haunting and beautiful and sung from the mouth of one half of a Lich whose entire self was cemented in love. Food was her vessel and just the way she gave back to the world. The [Unmaking] peeled her apart, bone and spirit, as she willed her reassembly. It hurt down to her being and scraped against the souls in her wedding ring. But she kept singing against it.

  The attack was slowly overwhelming her, pushing her wings back inch by inch. She only had to hold and pray she was stronger that the desolation of a rival Lich whose only love was taking. All her attention was focused on protecting the people around her. Once the attack slowed, she could charge her own. For now, protection was her goal. Her song just barely rose over the howl of annihilation as ice began to melt from her fingers.

  “Now!” Freeda roared.

  Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

  All three Dungeon Bosses leapt from behind Nina and attacked together.

  Twin razored pink crystals flooded from Snu’s and Giat’s summoning. Snu’s were pure pink and heavy while Giat’s were like little spears. The sisters shared their [Lust Launch] Skill. Freeda called forth her [Infinite Sale], and sharpened poster board flung out. Their attacks crashed into The Collector and ripped into his form.

  Chunks of his frail muscle and sinew blew away, but The Collector’s [Unmaking] could not be stopped. He was cemented onto the floor, goods turned to envy.

  Freeda cracked into her Domain and tried to spill him down into her Dungeon’s depths. The concrete splintered away beneath his feet, but The Collector hung in the air and kept firing, floating above a hole that went deep into the bowels of her Dungeon.

  Snu put everything she had into her Skill. Every bit of emotion she could attach to her Skills made them all the more powerful, and someone was trying to kill the boy she was falling in love with. Her attacks were more powerful than Giat’s. On the surface her sister might seem pricklier, but they both knew that Snusana possessed the more brutal temper. So, she tried to tear the Lich limb from limb. But the Lich would not fall or relent.

  “It’s no enough!” Nina yelled as more of her [Frostborn Madonna] melt. “We need more! I need to cast, but I have to protect you all! More attack.”

  The women Dungeon Bosses shoveled more Essence into their attack. The bots communicated and planned how they could help. Any other than standing while Nina was slowly obliterated. The wall behind was blasting away and revealed the next room. A storage closet where Freeda kept her charges of coat hangers. She flexed the against the edges of her will and began to summon them to wake.

  “Brody,” Alex turned to his friend and copy. “I’m going in. I need to help. I won’t let him take Nina down.”

  He handed Brody the arm of Petal Gravewhistle, who’s fingers were twitching and went unnoticed by the boys, and stood up. If he could just flash over to Zippy, grab his [Ancient Paring Knife], and flash over the hole Freeda created…that might work. It would likely shatter his core. But Nina had given the opportunity of a lifetime, and he would gladly give up his connection to the System in exchange for her continued undeath.

  Brody went to grab Alex but stopped himself. He could feel what Alex was thinking and found it noble. If Alex perished, he didn’t know what would happen to him. He’d already come from nothing, and part of him wanted to join his link to reality.

  Alex began hobbling toward the crouching drones. His ankle felt terrible. “Zippy! Get your knife ready! I’m going in!”

  “No you’re not!” Jemin yelled back as he wrapped his arms around Mary. “Don't do it! There has to be another way!”

  Snu’s head snapped over, and he saw the fear in her eyes at what he was shouting. She was about to speak when he interrupted her.

  “I have to! The Skill is too strong!” Alex prepped his [Phantom Step], feeling his Core screaming. He could handle one. One would get him to the knife. It would damage something, but he could manage another jump with a cracked Core to shatter it on the second jump. “Zippy! Hold it out.”

  The blue drone looked at Alex sadly but held one knife out.

  Here goes nothing. I have—

  The Dungeon shook once. Not from The Collector’s [Unmaking] or Freeda modifying her Domain. It was a tearing crack overhead, like someone had broken a giant beam. A bolt of white ripped across the ceiling, followed by a deafening explosion. Rebar and concrete burst apart on the ceiling of the Dungeon and scattered debris down.

  Through the explosion, a thirty-pound comet of glowing fur blasted down from the shattered roof and landed in the Dungeon like doom itself had come.

  Emilio, his fur infused with white energy and standing on all ends, touched down lightly despite his speed as debris rained down. He did not wobble or skid. Lightning flashed over his grey coat as everyone in the room felt energy roll across the space and buzz their metal teeth fillings. The cat hissed as his flashlight eyes swept the room in a search. He looked at the roof, The Collector spewing forth a Skill, Nina and her ice, Mary and Jemin, the Drones and the Gnomes and the Bosses. Then his eyes finally found Alex standing there covered in dust.

  His righteous gaze softened in recognition. He slow blinked in greeting. Then he saw the shattered porcelain scattered across the ground. Brody held the cracked hand of Petal Gravewhistle, and Emilio did not see the rusty eyeball nearby blinking weakly. His fur rose even higher as he spun and directed his attention on The Collector.

  Static suffocated the room as Emilio cast forth his most powerful lightning strike through the roof into the endlessly hollow skull of The Collector. It was time to enact his revenge and final hunt.

  A giant strike of lightning was pulled from the cloudless sky, and Emilio bent it to his will.

  The bolt found the hole he’d blasted in Freeda’s ceiling, ramming itself downward and bending toward The Collector. It speared into his skull. Bone exploded outward in chunks as Emilio drove it deeper inside, forcing his might into the endless collection of dusty good stored inside the Lich’s source of power.

  Thousands of hoarded goods were incinerated in an instant. The power destroyed spirals of trinkets hoarded over seven decades and every foot it reached, it burned hotter and more destructively. Hellfire erupted from the skull cavity as Emilio kept pulling power from himself and the air into the Skill. The lightning thickened and solidified into a white beam of pure feline rage boring straight through The Collector’s collapsing hoard.

  Emilio’s brilliant attack fought against the twisted envy as the Dungeon shook around them. Nina’s wings began to crack from taking the onslaught. The Collector kept howling as the [Unmaking] kept pulling his power out of him uncontrollably. Emilio pushed himself harder against the prey he had to deal with.

  “My turn, my turn!” Aria screamed.

  Before anyone could react, the little doll sprinted across the floor and leapt toward Emilio. She landed belly-down across his [Murder Mittens] and cast her [Thrice This].

  Her Skill connected with Emilio’s, and two more cracks tore from the sky. Cosmic light was yanked and immediately joined the first. Both bolts bent toward his skull and joined the destructive search Emilio was committed to.

  He was connected to the lightning. Every trinket and thing he crushed was only to find the source of his prey. He knew that the body The Collector wore was not the source of his power. And like most slippery little creatures, Emilio knew that to end this thing, he would have to claw his way to the bottom. But nothing could hide from Emilio, the [Hidden Demigod of Felines].

  Nina sung against the attack to protect everyone as the Dungeon Bosses peppered The Collector’s skeletal remains. Still his skull spewed forth as Emilio dug deeper, destroying more in his search. With Aria’s assistance, his Essence drained extremely quickly. This enemy had damaged his most loyal follower and attempted to harm his Companion. Why wouldn’t they understand? Emilio loved Alex, and that meant Alex was his.

  Emilio ripped and teared, carving his lightning deeper into the rotten heart of The Collector’s hoard. He refused to stop and let his prey crawl and slink away again.

  Then he felt it.

  There was something twitching inside the mess. It was just a little wiggle, but he knew a desperate thing trying to hide from him. Emilio’s lightning wrapped around it and told him exactly what it was. It was just a coin, that was all, but it was the home of this enemy’s soul.

  Pathetic.

  He seized the phylactery with all three strikes and braided them into one beam of pure vengeance. Driving everything he had, every ounce of Essence, every shred of loyalty, he crushed and melted apart of the coin and the envious soul that lived within.

  Finally, with a final gut grunt, Emilio erased The Collector’s soul from reality.

  Brilliant white light detonated from the Lich’s fading body and cascaded outward.

  It washed over everyone, burned through the room, and blasted a beacon straight through the ceiling into the sky. Because of where he stood, the silhouette of a very chonky cat was cast in the pillar of light over the whole city.

  Photos taken of the light signal in the sky reached the number two post on the internet for the week, beaten out only by the photo of the same cat captured by a twelve year old shortly before. He came to be known as the CatMan and his whereabouts and origins were fiercely debated for decades to come.

  The [Unmaking] stopped the instant the Lich was killed. There was nothing left to unmake. In a massive explosion of undead Essence, envy, and rage, it flung out. Everyone’s brains immediately turned off and dropped them unconscious from the force of a Lich’s death to protect their sanity. Everyone except for Nina and Emilio.

  Nina turned to Emilio, putting away her ice wings, and feeling everyone alive in the room with her Lichiness. Emilio regarded her and sat down, looking over the destruction. There was nothing left of The Collector. Not a single speck had made it through his final attack. He also wasn’t concerned.

  He knew that everyone in the room was still alive as well. Everyone but his prey. He looked over to the bits of Petal and saw The Eternal Gnome reassembling, however slowly, and this time with the metal from the Dungeon. Excellent, that. Alex and Brody were knocked out, their mates sleeping soundly over each other. Snoring. The remaining people were sound asleep and would wake eventually.

  Nina sighed, staring over her shoulder at the destruction.

  Emilio noticed the block of ice that held some manner of glowing human thing was melting.

  “Well,” Nina said to Emilio. “Grazie mille, Gatto. Can you now help and go find something before everyone wakes up? They be fine. Sleep for now. No bad damage. You ever see the unspace?”

  “Meow?” Emilio tilted his head at her. No, he had not. Was there more he needed to protect his pack from?

  “Si,” Nina waved her spoon and pointed at Mr. Mystical’s melting ghost form. “We have to move quick, so say yes or no. He is broken, and is also the only one left who knows where something forsaken is. We need. So, you help?”

  Her voice sounded weird when she said those words. None of his concern. He thought for a moment and decided, that yes, he did want to help Nina. She had helped Alex. And yes of course, he understood her language. All cats do, they just pretend.

  “Meow.” Emilio agreed and waddled over to Nina to rub his body over her floating leg.

  “Can you…carry this ice?”

  “Meow.” Emilio disagreed. He was The Ruler of Sun and Shade, the [Hidden Demigod of Felines], and she was a mere Lich. Of course he could carry the ice with his will.

  But why would he?

  He pattered over to a sleeping Alex to lick his face clean and check on Petal as Nina swore under her breath. She had to move quickly if she and Nino were to complete their Domain expansion.

  She started to unfreeze Mr. Mystical. Just enough so that he could consent to what she had planned. And for unspace directions. That place was a mess. Just like the location where Nina planned to expand their Domain.

  END OF BOOK 2 OF DUNGEONS & DELIVERIES - FRANCHISING & FRIENDS

  Stay crispy, you beautiful people.

  T, SagaScribe