Light of Epertase 01: Legends Reborn Read Online Free

He focused the last of his strength on the torch dangling from his fingers. It was his last hope. With every bit of air in his lungs, he shoved the flame against the tentacle that was wrapped around his neck. The beast flinched. Rasi thudded to the ground as the tentacle released and retreated to its master. He heaved his torch at the monster’s chest and it shied backward.
    Rasi struggled to lift his injured arm but it weighed a ton. He dug deep to painfully crawl away from the rashta. Two more tentacles curled around his waist. They squeezed out what little air he had left in his lungs. He was weak, no longer able to hold his head up. The tentacles dragged him along the floor like a piece of dead meat.
    The orange blur of his torch antagonized him from just out of his reach. He wanted to give up. And that’s when he saw it, almost screaming, “I’m here for you.” Something better than any treasure he could ever imagine, better than the torch. It was his chance, his salvation – the bonespike. He outstretched his weary arm and touched the weapon’s rough surface with his fingertip. He wanted to smile but hadn’t the strength. The tentacles tightened around his waist as he clenched his fingers around his precious spike.
    The creature lifted him into the air before lowering him toward its snapping razor teeth. Rasi shifted his weight, leaning away from the rotten stink of its breath. He grimaced and squeezed his weapon. He waited until he was at the creature’s lips. It opened its mouth for the killing blow.
    Rasi thrust his weapon upward. The beast wailed. The tentacles released. And Rasi once again slammed to the ground.
    He forced his head up just enough to see the head of his bonespike jutting from the roof of the rashta’s mouth. The beast stumbled back, shaking its head back and forth. One of its tentacles twisted around the exposed part of the weapon and yanked it free, spraying blood like a fountain from the gaping wound. The creature staggered, then crumbled onto its side. Its wail was so profound that it hurt Rasi’s ears. The tentacles flailed above as the rashta seized in a growing river of red.
    Rasi, no longer strong enough to put pressure against his wounded shoulder, let the plasma pool around him and ooze into the dents and cracks along the floor. You may have gotten me, he thought, but I took you as well, you bastard.
    The world faded around him like a view through frosted glass. Please let me stay awake long enough to watch this monster die, he begged the gods. The creature gasped with full-blown spasms until the seizing slowed and the dying, agonal rise and fall of its chest ceased.
    With the creature’s death all but assured, Rasi’s inevitable tomb was now silent. He chuckled to himself, struggling to keep his head awake.
    Through blurry, blood-soaked eyes, he watched the creature’s tentacles continue to stir on their master’s carcass. One by one, they ripped from the creature’s scaly flesh and scurried along the cave floor toward him. He was too weak to fight, too weak to move, too weak to care. They swarmed his body until he was buried beneath their hot flesh. One of them twirled around his injured shoulder and tightened. He winced. Another dug into the muscle on his back, which he was sure would be the last pain he’d ever feel. He welcomed death. Another tentacle burrowed into his back while he lay helpless. He shivered from the cold, despite the tentacles’ radiating heat, while they ripped into the flesh on his back.

C HAPTER 4

S TRAPS
    So cold.
    Tired.
    The pain seemed to let up a little, or he’d simply become used to it. He forced his swollen eyelids open. The light of the remaining torch on the wall burned through his blurry vision. His fallen foe appeared to move in the shadows, but as Rasi’s eyes cleared he saw it wasn’t the creature who moved but the bristling maggots infesting it.
    Rasi’s shoulder itched deep into his bone. His back tickled with the sensation of