Abyssal Sovereign: Throne of the Null

Chapter 5: Acid Jaws

The nest was breathing.

The black resin walls lining the underground switching station expanded and contracted in a slow rhythm, like a giant pair of lungs digesting its prey. In the center of the room, the Slag Shell Matriarch did not move. It sat upon the throne of compressed steel rails, its six venom-green glowing eyes staring straight at Tarn without blinking.

"Null," Tarn whispered, his fingers still wrapped around the hilt of the smoking greatsword. "Advance from the front. Draw it out of the nest."

The shadow of the Tomb Warden nodded silently, then stepped forward. Its shadow greatsword dragged across the resin floor, leaving a silver scratch that faded instantly.

"You are too slow, Null," Tarn muttered, his eyes narrowing. "It's not moving. It's…"

The Matriarch moved.

It did not jump. It did not charge. Its massive jaws opened with unnatural speed for a creature the size of a horse, and a burst of thick green acid shot out like a fountain forced by underground pressure.

"Null!"

Tarn's command was a fraction of a second too late. The acid blast struck Null's chest with a deafening, sizzling sound. The Warden's shadow armor melted instantly, black smoke billowing from the gaping wound on its chestplate. Null staggered three steps back, its greatsword dropping with a clang onto the train tracks.

"Damn it," Tarn hissed. "Shard, from behind! Attack the shell!"

The shadow beetle darted from within Tarn's silhouette, its six legs made of dark smoke gripping the resin walls. Shard leaped, its jagged mandibles opening wide, targeting the Matriarch's rear knee joint.

Click.

The sound was dry and disappointing. Shard's jaws bounced off the Matriarch's obsidian shell like teeth biting a diamond. The monster did not even turn its head. Its jagged tail lashed out without warning, slamming Shard against the wall with a force that cracked the concrete.

"Shard!" Tarn drew a sharp breath. "Return to my shadow! Now!"

The shadow beetle dissolved into black vapor, slipping back into Tarn's silhouette just before the Matriarch's tail whipped around for a second time. Tarn leaped to the side, his boots slipping on the sticky resin floor.

"You cannot pierce its shell, Shard," Tarn muttered, his breathing growing heavier. "And that acid melts Null faster than it can regenerate. We need…"

The Matriarch turned its head. Its six eyes locked onto Tarn.

"A new plan," Tarn finished.

He stepped back three steps, his greatsword raised in a defensive posture. His brain raced. He had watched two attacks fail. He had seen how Null melted and Shard bounced off. But there was something he had missed—something hidden behind the monster's speed.

"Null," Tarn called out, his voice calmer now. "Can you still fight?"

The shadow Warden rose from its knees, its melted chestplate already starting to reform from the black smoke. Null nodded once, then retrieved its greatsword from the floor.

"Good. You will draw it again. This time, do not defend. Let it spew. Retreat right before that acid touches you—draw it as far from the nest as possible."

Null did not answer with words. It simply lifted its greatsword and stepped forward, tapping its still-smoking chestplate with one iron hand.

"Shard," Tarn continued, lowering his voice slightly to whisper to the floor beneath his boots. "You will be the second bait. When Null retreats, emerge from the Matriarch's left side. Bite its neck joint—not the shell, the neck. The skin is thinner there."

A thin black vapor seeped from Tarn's shadow, forming Shard's head as it nodded slowly before disappearing again.

Tarn looked up at the ceiling of the nest. The black resin hung in pointed stalactites, some of them large enough to support his body weight. Between those stalactites were gaps where the station's original concrete was still visible—brown, dusty, and sturdy enough to grip.

"Crazy plan," Tarn muttered to himself. "But it's the only one we've got."

He began to climb.

His fingers grabbed the derailed train rail, pulling his body up onto the rusted train car. From there, he leaped to the resin wall, his boots finding purchase on hard bumps protruding like pimples on the surface of the nest. His hands reached the nearest stalactite, and he began to climb higher, away from the floor, away from the range of the acid blast.

Below him, Null had started its part.

The shadow Warden attacked from the front, its greatsword swinging in a horizontal arc targeting the Matriarch's belly. The monster reacted exactly as Tarn predicted—its jaws opened, green acid beginning to gather in its throat.

Null retreated.

Just in time. The acid blast shot past the empty space where Null had stood a split second earlier, striking the resin wall behind it with an ear-splitting, hissing sound. The resin melted, dripping onto the floor like wax thrown into a furnace.

"Now, Shard!" Tarn shouted from the ceiling.

The shadow beetle erupted from Null's shadow, appearing directly on the left side of the Matriarch's neck. Its jaws clamped onto the thin skin between the head shell and the body shell, pulling with all the strength the dog-sized creature possessed.

The Matriarch shrieked.

Not an ordinary scream. It was a sound wave so loud that the stalactites above Tarn's head began to crack. The monster shook its head frantically, trying to dislodge Shard, which was still biting its neck. Acid began to drip from its jaws—not blasted, but dripping, hissing as it touched the floor.

Tarn saw it.

Every time the Matriarch spewed acid, there was a pause. One and a half seconds where its neck shell opened, exposing the pulsing pink flesh beneath. It was the monster's only weak point—the only place where the obsidian shell did not protect it.

"Null, hold its legs!" Tarn commanded. "Do not let it move!"

The shadow Warden lunged forward, grabbing both of the Matriarch's front legs with its melted iron hands. The monster struggled, trying to kick Null away, but the shadow Warden had no bones to break, no muscles to tear. It simply held on, gripping tighter every time the Matriarch tried to shake it off.

Tarn climbed higher.

His hands reached the largest stalactite—pointed like a spear growing from the ceiling, thick enough to support his weight. He pulled himself up, his legs dangling in the air, his eyes locked on the Matriarch's exposed neck below.

"One and a half seconds," Tarn muttered, his arm muscles tightening. "That's all I have."

Below him, Shard was finally shaken off. The Matriarch tossed its head with final strength, and the shadow beetle crashed against the wall, dissolving into black vapor before returning inside Tarn's silhouette.

"Sorry, Shard," Tarn whispered. "But you did your part."

The Matriarch straightened its body. Its six eyes swept the room, searching for the next threat. Its jaws opened again—acid began to gather, ready to spew once more.

"Here it comes," Tarn hissed.

He let go of his grip.

His body fell from the ceiling, his greatsword raised high above his head, the tip of the blade gleaming with violet light. Gravity pulled him down, accelerating his fall, turning his body into a projectile dropped from the ceiling of the nest.

The Matriarch's neck was open. That pink flesh was pulsing, unprotected, waiting.

Tarn aimed the tip of his greatsword right at that spot.

Yet as he hovered in the air, thirty centimeters above the monster's head, something that should not have happened—happened.

The Matriarch turned its head.

Not slowly turning. Not turning with effort. Its head spun a hundred and eighty degrees at a speed impossible for a creature with a shell that heavy, its neck bones cracking with a sound that resembled snapping wood.

Its six eyes locked onto Tarn.

Its jaws opened wide—not to spew, but to swallow. That green acid did not drip down.

It dripped up.

The corrosive liquid defied gravity, flowing from the Matriarch's lower jaw to the upper jaw, forming an expanding umbrella of poison, awaiting Tarn as he hovered without a foothold, without a way to change direction, with nothing except the greatsword in his hand and twenty centimeters of space between the tip of his blade and the monster's open neck.

Tarn realized one thing in that fraction of a second. He had miscalculated.