Chapter 143: Chapter 139: A Moon God is abducted by a Sadist.

 

The first thing Armin felt when he awoke other than the pounding of his head, was the cold stone floor he lay upon. Grunting from the pain of the hangover he was suffering from, he struggled to get to his knees. Wincing he opened his eyes and looked at himself in the dim light coming from a series of candles lining the room. He was wearing his robes and shorts but nothing else and he did not see the rest of his clothes in this dark stone room in which he had awoken in. Standing painfully, he rubbed his face and tried to recall what happened last night.

As it had been a full moon last night, he was required to oversee several ceremonies honoring him. After he had finished with that Cagey came around and despite his protests dragged him to a party with some other gods that was hosted by Naphat. For most of the party, he remembered having to drink bottle after bottle of wine. Now his head was paying for his dumbass actions. As much as he cared about Cagey he was getting a little tired of being swept up with her party lifestyle. At some point he must have blacked out and now he was here wherever here was.

Extending his senses out around him, he looked the room over. He could feel that he had at least not descended to Mantara as this place still felt like it was somewhere on the gods plane. Still it had a foul feeling to it that he did not recognize nor like. This was the kind of place Eramis would have burnt to the ground had she known about it. Aramin frowned as he thought of his sister, things between him and his sister were a bit rough at the moment.

For the past week he had been busy helping Eramis from the fallout of what had happened with Alacanar. Surprisingly despite her temper, his sister had been civil if a little cold with him. She had found out about his relationship with Cagey, and things had blown up between them. While it hadn't come to blows like he had feared it was still pretty stressful between them. Eramis had been taken aback when Aramin had stepped into defending Cagey and had been distant since then. Still his sister had to learn for once and all that he was not the clumsy little brother he once was. He was a man with his own life he wanted to live and more importantly a lover that he wished to be with.

Armin took another look around the room. It seemed to be made out of a mixture of black stone and some kind of metal struts. The candles that lit the room were dripping melted wax that smelled like burning fat. The room only had one exit, a wooden door that had what looked like screaming faces in the grain of the wood. Other than himself he could not feel anything living in the room or the surroundings. Not wanting to find out who the owner of this place is, Armin reached out and attempted to rip space open to leave. However, the power he sent out to do so fizzled out almost instantly. It felt like something was blocking him from leaving.

This set Armin completely on edge. At first he thought he might've accidentally come here when he was drunk like the other times he had gotten lost. Yet since something was preventing him from leaving perhaps someone had brought him here. Going to the door, he pushed it open and found the hallway beyond was completely in the dark. Even the candlelight from the room didn't penetrate that inky blackness. Not in the mood to play around Armin raised his hand and created a glowing orb of moonlight that floated next to him. It took more effort as whatever was preventing him from leaving was also pushing hard against him using his powers.

With the aid of the moonlight ball, Armin was able to see the hallway beyond, though not as far as he liked. The hallway was built of the same materials of the room, yet it had a sense of dirtiness and foulness that upset him deeply. Stepping through the doorway, he heard something giggle from up ahead with a loud snapping sound. Whatever it was fled from the light, so he did not get a look at it. It even seemed to elude his senses somehow. Though when he did extend his senses into the darkness it felt like he was dunking his head underwater muffling everything.

Along the walls were metal doors that were either rusting away or bloodstained. Probably both given the nauseating smell of iron and rot. There was also an unpleasant sweet smell that made his stomach churn. Together with his hangover Armin feared he would lose the contents of his stomach upon the floor. Stopping in front of one of the metal doors Armin looked at it more closely. It was blank, and it only had a simple handle on it. Grabbing the handle, he frowned as the handle broke it off in his hands.

Sighing, he tossed the handle down and then struck the door open. The force of his blow sent the door off its hinges onto the floor in the room. Beyond the door was a small room that was lined with rusting plates of metal. On the back wall was what Armin thought at first was a person, but upon closer inspection was some sort of doll. The doll was wearing some sort of shiny suit that was then wrapped in barbed wire. Notably it's head was missing likely due to the fan it the doll seemingly had been forced into.

Not feeling the need to step into the room, Armin scrutinized it with his sense looking for any hint that would be able to tell him where he had been taken or at least who had brought him here. Other than a strong sense of evil throughout the room he didn't really find anything. Though he did get some sense of something divine about the doll, he wasn't about to enter the suspicious room because of it. As he began to turn away, he noticed a golden gleam in the middle of the room.

Looking at the floor, he could see what appeared to be a golden ring. It was small to the point that he actually thought it was meant to be a toe ring rather then one for a hand. This appearance of the ring confused Armin for a moment as he was certain that the ring had definitely not been their moments before. Narrowing his eyes, he felt that this was some sort of ploy to get him to enter the room. Yet his senses were telling him that there was nothing dangerous within the room at all.

Being cautious he looked down and picked up the handle he had previously broken off. Aiming for the ring, he tossed it underhand, and as soon as the handle struck the floor spinning blades came down from the ceiling and from the walls. They buzzed and sliced everything in the room including the doll which was cut into pieces several of which came flying out making Armin have to dodge. The blades kept going so Armin moved on only to stop and pick up a piece of the doll. The piece of clothing attached to it felt incredibly smooth and like nothing he had felt before. Yet it was on the doll incredibly tight. Sadly as he had no idea what it was it gave him no clues as to the identity of the person behind capturing him.

Dropping it, he continued onwards down the passageway. Passing by another door he could hear voices coming from inside. Wanting to catch whoever was behind it off guard, Armin kicked the door down. The room inside was a twisted version of a bedroom like he had never seen before. It was lit by torches that glowed an unsettling pink color. In the center of the room was a large four post bed that had a shiny pink covering on it which was apparently liquid proof as he could see a puddle forming on it.

On top of the bed was another doll this time with it's head on, and several more dolls were surrounding the bed. Despite having heard voices coming from here, Armin did not see nor sense anyone inside the room other then these strange dolls. He could only assume that the voices must have came from either them or something was playing tricks with his mind. He began to suspect the later when he returned his attention back to the doll on the bed and was startled to realize he could recognize parts of it.

It was a female doll that was wearing a pink dress and boots that looked to be made of the same material on the bed. The dress was hiked up exposing itself, however it had no apparent genitalia. Despite the lack, he did see some sort of liquid dripping out of it creating the puddle on the bed. What startled him the most however was the glasses on the head of the doll, they were nearly identical to the ones that Cagey liked to wear despite the doll lacking eyes. The doll even had its hair styled like hers and was wearing a green lipstick on its fake lips. The doll's arms had been placed behind it's back wrapped into barbed wire that was tied to the corners of the posts. It was positioned in such a way that it appeared to be showing off to the dolls surrounding the bed.

The dolls around the bed were wearing black outfits similar to the first doll he had seen. Barbed wire and chains tied each of them in various poses of gravelling and apparent self-pleasure. Again Armin could feel some sort of divine energy within the dolls but nothing that suggested that these things were alive let alone had any semblance of intelligence. The malevolence in this area however was thicker than before and he could feel that it did not feel like the energy signature of the whisperer.

While he was tempted to go in and inspect this fake cagey doll, he was no fool given the last room he had seen had been a trap. As such he just considered leaving when he heard something shuffling down the corridor. Glancing that way thinking that whatever had laughed was coming back, he didn't see anything yet he was absolutely certain something was watching him from the darkness. He sent down a pulse of energy down the corridor and found there was nothing he could sense. As he did that he then turned back to the room and was shocked to see all the dolls heads had twisted to look at him.

Some of the dolls heads had contorted in such a way that some had their heads completely on backwards now. What disturbed him most however was the doll on the bed had freed it's arms and had its hands in a come hither pose. The liquid leaking out of it had increased into a stream, and he was disgusted when the warm stench of piss came to his nose. It's head was tilted in such a way that it suggested that it knew it that he was watching pee and it enjoyed his attention.

Infuriated and disgusted Aramin coalesced a ball of pure moonlight into his palms and pitched it into the room. With a bright flash it sent purifying energy throughout the room. The dolls inside began to shriek in agony despite not having any mouths to scream. They seemingly melted away into the floor disappearing before his eyes. Sending his energy out he inspected the room closer and found the dolls had not gone far at all. He could feel that divine signature coming from just underneath the floor as the dolls were hiding away. He cast a blessing into the room that would hopefully keep these dolls restrained for the moment.

It appeared that whoever produced these dolls was in fact quite evil. What's worse was this entity was not corrupted but appeared to be evil for the sake of being evil which Armin completely despised. It also seemed to be able to draw inspiration for their sick methods of torture from his own mind. He jammed the door shut and placed another blessing on the door to make doubly sure of the dolls being trapped. The malevolence in the door twisted on this act causing the door to let out a whine as it contracted. Deciding to ignore the remaining doors, he continued onwards to the end of the corridor. At the end were two sets of stairs, with the left going down in a curve and the right going up.

Before deciding on which to take, Armin sent his senses down both to investigate them. Despite finding resistance at either staircase, he was able to tell that the left led into more darkness, and the right led into a lighted area. Taking the right staircase he began to climb albeit with some difficulty. The stairs were all at varying heights forcing him to keep an eye on where he stepped lest he lose his footing and tumble backwards. Ten minutes of climbing he found that the stairwell began to light up with a nasty green light that made his orb of moonlight shrink against it. A minute later he found himself stepping into a very similar hallway to the one he had just left, though down this hallway were candles producing a green light.

There were no staircases leading up at this end so it appeared at least that this was the top floor. He decided to walk down the hallway taking a moment to look at the green lit candle. The candle holders were doll heads that looked to be stuck in the walls facing up the candle coming out their mouths. An unpleasant smell was coming from the candles as well, sort of like sweat from an unclean armpit. He passed several more metal doors that were not rusty like the ones below. He did hear voices and other things coming from behind him, though mostly things that made him wouldn't want to see what was beyond them. As he passed an especially loud door, it flung itself open nearly crashing into Armin.

Looking inwards to the room the first thing that came to his mind when he saw inside was that it was a torture chamber. A rack and table on one side of the room contained numerous tools and implements obviously designed to cause pain, and from the bloodstains on some of them obviously well used. There was a triangular sawhorse on the other side, along with numerous chains, hooks and shackles hanging from the walls. Notably he didn't spot any dolls within the wall and did not sense any trace of them. A little creeped out he attempted to shut the door only to find it had somehow welded itself to the wall leaving the room open. He quickly turned to leave the area not wanting to be anywhere near.

He was stepping away when he felt something touch his legs and before he could look down found himself yanked off his feet and into the room. Within moments dark chains had grabbed him and pulled him up to the back wall making him spread eagle in an uncomfortable way. Armin grunted as he struggled in an attempt to free himself from the chains and felt the hooks on them dig into his skin. The chains were made out of some dark divine energy that refused to break under his power and seemed to begin to even seal his power into his body.

Continuing his struggles despite not getting anywhere he heard a series of loud click-clacking sounds. It sounded as two people were approaching the room and indeed two female dolls came walking in. One was the fake Cagey doll from earlier and the other had a plaid skirt and a white blouse, though notably both were made out of that same shiny material. Also of note was the skin of this doll was darker almost like it was tanned by the sun. At that thought he realized with a start that this doll was actually meant to represent his sister in some way. "Who are you? What do you want?" Armin called out angrily towards the pair as they approached him.

The dolls, of course, did not respond at least not verbally. They simply paused and cocked their heads at him, seeming as if they were observing some kind of art. They then went to the rack and table. The faux-Cagey doll picked up something that looked like a ball with straps on it from the table and approached him. However, his concern was raised when he saw the faux-Eramis doll pick up a wicked looking knife that screamed evil to him. As they approached with a playful stride, Armin doubled his attempts to free himself. The Cagey doll got right into his face and grabbed him by the head. Weakened by the chains he found her grip intense and was now unable to move his head to avoid her other hand.

The doll shoved her fingers into his mouth leaving a bitter taste on his tongue then it was replaced by the foul taste of the ball as she stuffed that ball into his mouth. The straps seemed to automatically stretch around his head locking his jaw open. He could now only make muffled noises and could feel his saliva start to run down his chin. The fake Cagey stepped back leaving the other to rip off his robe exposing his body except for the shorts he was wearing. The black haired doll reached out and ran it's hand down his chest. Painful scratches emerged as he realized that it had some sort of claws that emerged from it's fingers. Yet that pain was nothing compared to when the fake Eramis began to run the blade she held down his chest.

The gag muffled his screams she made short cuts on his chest like she was making tally marks using his skin as paper. With how the chains were weakening him, he found he could not harden his skin against these cuts. Each cut seemed agonizing as the dolls took their time slicing him up. Blood from his wounds began to puddle on the floor below and had soaked his shorts. While the Eramis-like doll was busy making what appeared to be a drawing of a horse in his flesh, the other one went back to the table and picked up a black leather pouch and brought it over to them.

Trying to keep himself distracted from the pain he tried to focus inwards. While he was doing that the doll opened the pouch and grabbed a handful of a black ashy substance. She slapped that onto his chest, creating a cloud of dust. Then she rubbed it on his chest mixing it with blood and drool. If Armin thought the cuts were bad enough the instant the powder touched his skin he roared in agony. It caused an intense stinging sensation that began to leech a foul dark energy into his body. Despite being weakened he still thrashed against his bonds desperate to relieve himself from that awful sensation and he found his eyes blurry from the tears that came.

Through the tears he could see that the pair of dolls stepped back and stood stock still in a look that said they seemed to be just admiring their work on him. Seeing that they had stopped for the moment he gathered his remaining strength and pulled on the bonds. His arms screamed in protest as the metal did not even bend. His felt like his arms would break before he broke the restraints. He relaxed at that point and then took a moment to think about his next move. While he was doing that he heard something slapping down the hallway every so often a giggle came as well.

Seconds later a hunched over doll came limping into the room. Unlike the dolls with their featureless faces, this one had its face cracked open and a disgusting long tongue was hanging down trailing against the floor. It also was not wearing shoes, and its feet were making that odd slapping sound. Her clothes looked familiar and then Armin realized that this doll likely was supposed to represent Melinoe. For some reason whoever was behind this seemed love tormenting him with women he was familiar with. Armin also saw that it was holding a large pair of scissors, and he was startled when the Eramis doll ripped down his shorts.

Then he could feel its lifeless cold hands grab onto his junk and yank it painfully forward as the doll with the scissors came ever closer. He realized with dawning horror exactly what it was coming forward to cut. Yet at the same time he had seen the Melinoe figure he had gained a new idea. While he usually represented the bright side of the moon, he still had access to the dark powers of the moon as well. Due to his nature, he never touched it often, in fact it had been over two hundred years before he used it last.

Still Armin now found himself having little option but to use it. Reaching deep within himself he opened a tap to that dangerous energy that flooded into his veins which he then forced to attack the chains. The chains obviously resistant to purifying energy could not resist the insidious energy which entered them, causing them to rust away. Seeing that the Melinoe doll was prepared to cut he cursed and broke free from his restraints.

He brought his fist down the fake Melinoe blasting it away, making it fly against the wall. The dolls let out a screech as he wrenched himself from the chains and then charged at him. As he had freed himself from the chain's influence, he found his powers returning to him. He sent out a burst of cleansing energy out from himself causing the dolls to attempt to flee. Grabbing onto the one with the long tongue he concentrated and poured more of the cleansing light into the doll causing it to jerk limply.

Soon he could see it's fake skin start to crack, and then began to wither under the light quickly turning into a mound of dust and a small object fell out of its chest. Looking around he saw that the other dolls had long fled from the moonlight. He glanced down at his chest, while the cuts did not appear to be lethal, they still stung and despite him being free were taking longer then normal to heal. He took a closer look at the black stuff the doll had rubbed on him and found it appeared to be a mixture of ash and salt. However something had desecrated the pure nature of both leading to it's foul nature. He used a rag torn from his robes to wipe off his chest and dressed in the tattered remains of his clothes.

He then turned to the remains of the doll. The nasty feeling had not gone when it was destroyed in fact it seemed even worse now. The dust resembled the ash and salt mixture though it was a finer mix. In addition from the chest of the doll had fallen what appeared to his disgust to be a heart. More specifically it seemed to have once belonged to a god his senses were telling him. What really disturbed him was that it was still slowly beating attempting to power a body that was no longer there. The flesh of divinity would keep going until the divine energy within was drained, which meant that whoever was the controller here was powering the dolls with divine body parts.

Gagging in disgust, he quickly undid the gag and emptied the contents of his stomach onto the floor. Feeling better he took a moment to think. He had felt divine energy in each of the dolls he had encountered so far. That would mean the monster behind this had killed multiple gods, though by the age of this heart it was long ago. The taint that had infected this heart would have taken centuries to get to this degree. He said a prayer over it and purified it as best he could. With that done he took a blade of moonlight into the heart to end it's beating and suffering. Unfortunately, this would not affect the other parts of the god this heart came from.

When he was done, he exited the room and sealed it like the one before. He continued down the hallway now wary of the other metal doors. The noises behind them got clearer as he went. Some sounded like a tortured cat while some were sounds that would only come from a brothel. One room had a voice similar to that of Eramis begging him to come inside and come inside. Ignoring them, he finally reached the end of the passageway. He found that the door at the end of this hallway was made similar to the door he had seen in the first room here. Within the wood he could even see the faces frozen in the process of screaming in the grain.

Notably unlike all the other doors that he had seen in this place, this one had a large thick wooden bar across it barring the door from opening. Getting closer Armin found a menacing presence behind this door sending chills down his spine. Most likely the thing behind this nightmare lay behind this door, yet he felt if he entered the room he would be placing himself exactly where it wanted. He debated going around for another way out when he looked back. Frowning he saw that long hallway that he had just walked down was now in fact shorter. The stairs that had been there originally were now replaced with a wooden door similar to the one he was in front of only lacking the door bar.

Armin had not sensed any manipulation of space around him, yet that was his first thought. Yet as he watched the door slowly in fact began to move towards him with a grinding sound. The wood of the door began to bubble and darken. Soon faces from the grain pushed upwards somehow stretching the wood and opening their maws and bloody wooden spikes emerged and the door sped up towards Armin. Clearly this was meant to be a threat to force him to open the door or risk being impaled by the approaching spikes.

Not wanting to play it's game, Armin attempted to stop the approaching door but he felt his power recoil from the sheer evil nature of the door. The spikes themselves proved impossible for him to break. It was as if he was pouring a drop of pure moonlight against a sea of evil. His efforts only seemed to speed up the door, he could even feel the hideous nature of the door wanting to taste his blood upon the spikes. Seeing that he had little option at this point, he gritted his teeth and threw open the bar and opened the door. He barely managed to jump inside before the spikes rammed the space he had been seconds before.

As he entered this room, the door quickly slid shut behind him with a loud thump and chains wrapped around it obviously blocking his way out. This room looked to be similar to the room he had awoken in except the candles were producing green light and were being held by various doll parts. At the far end of the room were a desk and a chair on which he first assumed a doll was sitting at. However, as he got a closer look, he realized with some horror that it was actually a body of a person. Or rather body parts of multiple gods and goddess all sewn together in an attempt to make a facsimile of a woman. The parts were mismatched and he could see rotting puss leaking from where the parts were sewn together.

Carefully extending his senses towards the thing Armin found that he did not sense anything living in it nor strangely anything dead. It felt as if all lifeforce had been ripped away just leaving parts behind that were still powered by the remains of the divine energy. As the desk was empty the only thing of a particular note was this body. He noticed that it had on a set of underwear that did little to provide decency to it. As he was looking, it began to move with odd jerking motions. Armin caught a glint of something moving above it and realized this thing was in fact moving because of thin wires stretching from it to the ceiling.

Following them up with his eyes, Armin found they went into darkness, there appeared to be no roof above them. While he could not see the puppeteer he in fact could still feel the pure evil radiating off of it. The body jerked to a standing position and a foul voice crawled it's way out of its mouth despite it not moving. "I'm still working on this particular toy of mine so please excuse it's rough edges." The thing waved towards itself. "So how are you liking my playhouse so far? I had hoped you would have stopped in a few more of the rooms. I quite like to play with others and have made so many games for you. I really recommend trying them out. I'm quite sure it will help you come to enjoy the suffering as I add you to my collection."

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"I do not know what your collection is and want to be no part of it. I'm done playing games with you, so who are you?" Armin asked towards the darkness above.

The puppet let out a distorted laugh and said "Ah I feel bad you don't remember me Armin. Though I can't blame you, it was a long time ago, when you were but a tiny, little baby. Plus the meeting between your parents and I didn't go quite well. I'm guessing your sister might remember me. I am Dolores, the goddess of pain and ecstasy. Your mother and I went quite far back, a real rivalry between us. When I got her, her screams were exquisite to my ears. It's a complete shame that I was only able to save her heart. The other parts I unfortunately just had to recycle given how damaged they were." The voice sounded sad at that part and Armins stomach flipped in disgust.

The evil just poured out of this goddess and he could not believe a word it said to him. It had already shown it had some ability of reading his memories, or worse it had been spying on him. However it had gotten its information, it was clearly deriving some sort of pleasure from antagonizing him. "So am I supposed to believe you were around before the war of the gods? How exactly did you survive that?" Armin said as he carefully began to trace the power back to the original source.

"I was, in fact I was on the opposite side against your parents when the war started. Though it really could hardly be called a war of course. Did your parents not tell you what happened? Though I must admit I did not get to see the full end of it as I was forcibly sealed away with my collection for eons. Do you know how bored I was playing with the same old toys over and over? I was so glad to find one day my seal was broken. It was unintentional, but no matter I was now free to add to my collection. Though I seem to have lost more power than I like." The puppet croaked out as it moved closer to Armin.

"You were sealed away? Where? And who exactly broke you free?" Armin asked, trying to keep it distracted as he slowly narrowed its location down.

"I was sealed away in a deep dark hole underground underneath one of the Great Ones' own temples. I guess they just wanted the added strength to the seal to keep me away. It is rather funny, however, I was sealed away because of the sleeping god and it is in fact the same one that broke my cage open if only a crack. The god realms have changed greatly since I was here. All the potential new toy's I could play with why when I saw you I knew I had to take you first. In fact you should be thankful I got you first for my collection, as when I grabbed you I saw that you were about to be attacked by an odd puppeted god. In your poisoned state you would have surely perished, and I can't have that not when I still need a chance to play with you."

Armin frowned at her words. Could she have seen a god being puppeted by the Whisper? "How exactly would you know the god was being puppeted?"

The monster in front of him giggled and said "Silly, I'm a doll master. It's easy to see when something is dancing along strings once you know the signs. It was going to make a mess of you, and I couldn't have that so I brought you here and detoxed you so you can have all the fun you want in my playhouse."

Dolores made the puppet dance in front of him in a joyful dance. Armin found he managed to get a solid lock on where Dolores was hiding within this place. Focusing on her location Armin sent a burst of pure moonlight at her. He knew he had to strike first or she would likely get the drop on him once again. While he did not see the beam strike her, she screamed seconds later causing the walls to shake around them. "HOW DARE YOU LITTLE PIECE OF SHIT! Here I was being a pleasant host and even allowing you full free reign of my playhouse, and you attack me? You are going to be a pain in my ass like this aren't you. What a shame, I had hoped you would be my playmate for a bit, but now I see I'm going to have to take you apart and build some new toys"

While the puppet was speaking, Armin was firing off a flurry of beams at the hiding Dolores. Which was made harder by her incredible speed. The stitched up corpse laughed and said "Fool, this is my Playhouse. It bends to my whims and imagination." The room itself began to fall apart, and a tidal wave of liquid slammed into him causing him to tumble and fall eventually landing in a wading pool of what he soon discovered to be piss. The overwhelming stench of ammonia assaulted his nose as he stood. Darkness surrounded him, despite the moonlight orb he had created floating near him. He could see at most three feet away. Casting his senses out he barely managed to dodge to the side as hooked chains came flying at him from multiple angles.

He had lost track of Dolores when he took the tumble so he had to guess blindly where she was and sent blades of moonlight towards her. For several minutes both of them sent attack after attack at each other with neither landing a good blow. Though Armin found himself getting more and more on the defensive. Seeing that he would soon be overwhelmed he grabbed onto one of the chains and yanked it pulling a doll along with it. Armin smashed his fist through its body sending it tumbling through the yellow liquid.

As he did that several balls of black liquid shot towards him. He managed to dodge most but one managed to catch him in the arm. Soon it had spread out covering his entire left arm in that strange ultrasmooth clothing he had seen before. "How do you like it?" Dolores' voice crowed out coming from multiple directions. "I managed to recreate this version of latex by one of my followers who had seen it in the sleeping gods dreams. It's an astonishing material that I love. It fits so tight against my toy skin and feels so smooth. It simply enhances all my toys like nothing else. As another benefit, it cuts out the need for strings."

When she said that Armin suddenly found he had lost control of own left arm as it rose up and smacked him in the face. Startled he realized that it was then attempting to grab his throat to strangle him. While he fought with his own arm, he sensed several more of those blobs hurtling towards him. He quickly created a shield of moonlight to block them and focused on getting the latex off his arm. Frustratingly it seemed stuck to his skin somehow, so he eventually just poured power into his arm and blasted it off his skin that way. As it came off it felt like it ripped some of his skin off as well.

Dolores let out a cackle and said "Don't worry I'm going to flay more of your skin off before the day is through. I think I could use a new leather purse."

"Go fuck yourself you psycho bitch." Armin said and cast out a beam of super hot moonlight into the pool of pee. While it did punch a hole through causing the pee to start draining, his real intent was the steam that rose up. This allowed him to use a trick of the moonlight to cast himself invisible.

"Oh that's original" Dolores said sarcastically. "I may not be able to see where you are at the moment, but then I hardly needed to. I am the true master of this Playhouse, and your role is simply a plaything to my whims. Come along, I have so many games to play with you."

Dozens of chains began to fly around the room in an apparent effort to find him. He had to leave the light of the moonlight orb, so he had to remain on guard as he moved. He was searching for Dolores. Each of the chains was attached to a doll wielding them. He eventually found the pieced up body. Taking his chance he grabbed one of the strings and pulled on it dragging down a young girl.

Lighting up the area he grabbed onto her and delivered a series of punches to her skull. Eventually however the face cracked and his fist went right through as the skull shattered into pieces of china. "Hey that was my first puppet." Dolores said, sounding melancholy. "That will take me forever to fix. Well, I was growing bored of it anyway, maybe I can use your head as a replacement. Good thing I got you now."

As he was now in the open again, Armin began to dodge several more chains. Unfortunately, it seemed that chains were now popping up in an effort to cage him into place. Dolores started a childish giggle as the chains began to close around Armin. Running out of options, he made the decision to pull out one of his final trump cards. Reaching up he poured all of his power into the air above. Soon the area stilled and a massive image of the moon appeared overhead.

"Wait a moment, are you doing what I think you're doing? Stop that at once!" Dolores said shrieking as the power built up.

Armin, focusing on pouring his power into the sky above, felt a sharp prick on his finger as he raised his arm. A single drop of his blood fell upwards into the giant moon above. As it hit the white moon, suddenly the moon rippled and turned a dark red. As it turned a threatening aura of destruction pressed down upon the room and it began to shake. "Stop! Not in my playhouse dammit!" Dolores cried out as the room began to pull apart under the pressure of the moon. Red beams of moonlight began to sear the ground, and anything that got in their way was burnt to a crisp. Gritting his teeth in a struggle to contain that power he began to lower his arm down and draw down the moon.

Doing so he yelled out "I am the Master of the Moon, governor of it's fate. Let the flames of purification descend once more." Armin yelled over the raging power over him and clenched his fist severing his connection before the power could tear him apart. The moment he did so the blood red moon exploded and the whole area went so bright that he had to close his eyes briefly. Not even a second later the exploding power slammed into him knocking him to his knees. What tore through him was not the cleansing feeling of purification but rather the harsh and rough feeling as the purification energy ripped it's way into his very being. Already in fragments his clothes stood no chance against the assault and turned into ash.

For several eternal minutes he could only grit down and suffer through it. The energy made no difference between good and evil, pure or impure. It simply scrubbed ones being with its flames. Only the flames of purification within the Well of Purification burned hotter. He could only groan as it tore through him. Yet as bad as he had it, he could hear Dolores screaming in agony. Her wails grew in intensity until it sounded as if she had torn her throat apart screaming. After a long while the fires began to let up. Though it would not stop it's horrific cleansing of anything in the area nor would it ever truly stop doing so. Armin had forever consecrated this area, and it would burn anything and anyone that should enter it.

He had learned this technique long ago and considered it forbidden and not for casual use. He had seen what happens to mortals who wandered into the area and it was not pretty. It was one of the few times his sister was disappointed in him. Yet this was in the divine space so while a god would still be affected, they could still survive the encounter. His skin raw and tender Armin stood looking at the carnage he had caused. The walls were in the process of falling down and the entire room was lit in a harsh white light. A thick coating of dust coated everything in the room, and he guessed this was what remained of the dolls.

As he looked around, he also could see some hearts and other pieces of gods slowly withering under the purifying energy. Yet he failed to spot anything that would have been Dolores. Seconds later he discovered why, as a crack opened up and the monster doll crawled up and out of it. It's flesh and has been seared off leaving mostly bones. The head, however, was still intact and said "Why that was surprising Armin. I underestimated you and this completely changes my plans for you. I had assumed the technique of drawing down a plane of your power had been lost completely. Though I guess I shouldn't have been surprised as your father was the only one I have ever seen master that skill."

Armin growled out "So you still live."

"Yes, barely, but I live. Had you managed to complete it fully, I would have been in real trouble given how weak I am at the moment. Though I must admit that did hurt really badly. Being sealed up I had long forgotten the taste of pain like that. It brought me to such a state that I almost came. I must thank you for the experience."

"Why don't you show yourself? I still have plenty of pain to bring to you." Armin said, scowling.

"Really tempting, but I prefer to be the one dealing the pain. So I will have to pass on your generous offer. I think I have had enough fun for a while. Guess it's time for me to do my job and go look to see if any of my followers made it to this time. I hope so, because it's a pain to start a cult from nothing." Dolores said then giggled at her attempt at a joke.

"I will not let you spread your foul presence in the world again." Armin said reaching down into his failing reserves of power for another attack.

"Oh silly Armin, don't you know? You are just a toy to me in this playhouse. Plus you have your own problems, you need to solve. You should find that puppeteer and get rid of them. I don't want another puppet master ruining my toys before I even get to them. So tata and goodbye Armin, I'll play with you again later." Dolores' voice echoed loudly around the chamber and a blast of energy slammed into Armin casting him through a crack in the wall.

"Mark my words Dolores I will deal with you!" Armin yelled as he was sent from Dolores' realm and into the realm of the gods. He felt space rip once more around him and then he was flying through a wooded area. Several branches broke his fall, and Armin crash landed ass first onto the ground below. His entire body felt sore and his power was running on empty.

Taking a look around his senses told that he had landed within Naphats space. In fact he was close to where the party took place last night given the remains of some cups of wine nearby. As he stood painfully, he heard some footsteps and saw a few gods coming towards him. At the lead were Naphat and Cagey. Naphat said "Oh there you are dude. We got really worried about you bud. Cagey here couldn't find you when the party was starting to wind down."

"Yeah I was looking to take you back home. Are you okay Armin? Why are you naked and what happened to your chest?" Cagey asked.

Armin looked down and realized he was indeed naked. However given that his power reserves were so low he couldn't muster up the energy to create any clothes at the moment. He opened his mouth to speak, but Naphat beat it to him. "Looks like you got a nasty case of sunburn too man. Did you get into some of my stash last night? I don't mind sharing man, but some of my mixes are potent beyond belief dude. One of my top tier blends made me think I was a duck and I swam on a pond for several days."

"Er no... I think I simply just had too much to drink last night." Armin said. He made a snap decision not to tell them what had happened to him. He saw a flicker of doubt on Cagey's face, and it hurt him to lie to her, but he had to make certain what the truth was. If Dolores hadn't been lying to him, someone at the part last night was under the influence of the Whisperer and could still be now. The other gods were eyeing and joking amongst themselves, he could not trust anyone here at the moment.

"Oh yeah, I was surprised at how much you drank. For a while there you were drinking everyone under the table. Several kegs are empty because of you." Cagey said.

"Yeah, that was a mistake on my part. Got a pretty bad hangover so I think I will just go home for the time being and get some rest."

"Oh okay. Do you want me to come along to make sure you get home?" Cagey asked. The gaze in her eyes told Armin exactly what she wanted to do when she got home with him.

"No thank you Cagey, I am confident in finding my way home. I will talk to you later, once I feel better." Armin said.

Cagey looked a bit crestfallen and said "All right. Feel better okay?"
Naphat said "If you want I have some herbs that I find are good for a hangover dude." Naphat began patting down his clothes.

"Thank You Naphat that will be unnecessary." Armin said. He opened a hole through space and said "Good Party Naphat, Cagey I will call on you later." He stepped through the portal and began to move through space. He debated briefly on going directly to Eramis, but decided to stop off at Jack's personal space. He needed a rest and wanted to be sure he was safe.

 

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