Chapter 86: The Deal with the God?

The freezing wind of the Himalayas was completely gone.

In its place was a suffocating, metallic heat that burned Anise’s throat with every desperate breath she took through her oxygen mask.

’What is happening? It is all my fault! I should have listened to Rob! I should never have come here. We had many chances to return. He kept warning us, but we did not return back. It is all my fault. All because of me!’

The cavern was bathed in a nauseating, blood red light. The glowing runes carved into the stone floor pulsed like a dying heartbeat.

SQUELCH. BLUB.

Thick, steaming crimson sludge poured endlessly from the top of the cracked obsidian altar.

It flooded the floor, soaking into the ancient grooves.

But the blood was not the true horror. The true horror was climbing out of the shattered walls.

GROOOOAN.

’They are the missing climbers. Men and women who had vanished on this mountain decades ago.’

Their skin was pulled tight over their bones, gray and dead.

Their eyes were vacant, glowing white orbs that reflected the hellish light of the runes.

And they were all moving toward them.

"Anise! Stay behind me!" Robert screamed.

He stepped in front of her, gripping his ice pick with both hands. His broad shoulders shielded her from the advancing horde.

He was terrified, she could hear it in his voice, but he did not back down. He swung his pick with everything he had.

THWACK!

The sharp steel buried itself deep into the chest of a dead porter. The corpse did not even flinch.

It simply reached out with gray, frostbitten fingers, ignoring the weapon entirely, and clawed at Robert’s heavy winter jacket.

CRUNCH.

Robert kicked the dead man in the knee, snapping the frozen joint backward.

The corpse collapsed, but it just kept dragging itself forward across the jagged volcanic rock.

"Can’t they just die? Why keep coming up again and again? Die you rotten corpses!!" Robert shouted, his voice was filled with fear and rage.

They were surrounding them. Dozens of them were forming an impenetrable circle, cutting them off from the tunnel leading back to the blizzard outside.

Anise stood backed against the icy rock wall, paralyzed by sheer, unadulterated terror. Her mind was moving haywire.

The logic and science she had dedicated her entire life to studying were completely useless here.

They had walked into a supernatural slaughterhouse, and it was entirely her fault.

’I cannot do anything to help him. I am so powerless!’

She watched Robert swing again, his movements growing sluggish from the lack of oxygen and the bone deep cold. He was going to die here.

They were going to drag him into that bleeding altar, and she was going to be forced to watch.

Anise fell to her knees on the hard stone. She clamped her heavy, gloved hands together and squeezed her eyes shut against the blinding red glare.

"Please," she sobbed, praying desperately in the dark confines of her own mind.

"Please, somebody help us. God. The Devil. Whatever ancient thing lives in this mountain. Please. I will do anything. Just save him."

The noise of the cavern abruptly vanished.

The groaning of the dead, the scraping of ice picks, Robert’s frantic shouting, it all faded into absolute, profound silence.

’I hear you, child.’

The voice did not come from her ears.

It resonated directly inside her skull. It was not male or female.

It was vast, ancient, and impossibly heavy.

It rattled her teeth and made her very soul vibrate.

"Help him," she begged the voice in her head.

"Please, save Robert."

’I can provide you the power to protect the love of your life, the Voice proclaimed, echoing with the absolute authority of a god.’

’But power requires an equivalent exchange.’

’You shall come to me.’

’You shall serve my purpose.’

"What do I have to do?" she asked without a single second of hesitation.

She did not care what the cost was. She did not care if her soul was damned. Robert had to live.

’Push the man toward the cave exit. Do not let him linger. Then, stand before the bleeding stone and chant the verse I bestow upon you.’

A string of impossible, alien syllables was violently burned into her memory.

The language defied human vocal cords, but she understood the cadence perfectly.

’Do this, and he lives. Fail, and you both feed the stone.’

Anise’s eyes snapped open. The suffocating noise of the cavern crashed back into her ears.

The terror that had paralyzed her limbs was completely gone. It was replaced by a cold, sharp, and absolute resolve.

She looked at Robert.

He was panting heavily, shoving a dead climber back with the shaft of his ice pick. He was fighting so hard for her.

She stood up. She stepped out from behind his protective shadow.

"Anise! What are you doing? Get back!" Robert yelled, his voice muffled and frantic behind his mask.

She looked right into his eyes.

"You have to live, Robert," she said. Her voice was eerily calm amidst the chaos.

She raised her hands and placed them flat against his heavy, insulated chest.

She felt the ancient, supernatural power granted by the Voice surge through her veins.

It was a terrifying, burning heat that pooled in her palms.

She shoved him.

SHOVE!

A massive, invisible wave of kinetic force erupted from her hands.

Robert was lifted entirely off his feet. He flew backward through the air, tumbling head over heels.

He sailed completely over the reaching, grabbing hands of the undead horde.

CRASH!

He landed hard near the jagged lip of the cave entrance, far outside the circle of the dead.

She did not wait to see him get up. She turned her back to the exit and sprinted directly into the horde.

"ANISE! NO!" Robert screamed from the entrance.

She ignored his desperate cries.

She shoved past the frozen corpses, slipping on the bloody floor, until she reached the exact center of the chamber.

She stood directly in front of the massive, bleeding obsidian altar.

’This is the only way Rob! Please live! I will always keep you in my heart!’

The thick crimson sludge splashed against her boots.

She turned around to face the cave entrance one last time.

"ANISE!! ANISE!! STOP!! NOOO!!"

Robert was struggling to stand, screaming her name. The dead were closing in around her, their frosted hands reaching out to tear her apart.

Through the blinding crimson light, through the swirling dust and the chaos, she found his eyes.

She pulled her oxygen mask down. Tears streamed down her freezing cheeks.

She mouthed the words to him. "I love you."

Then, she turned back to the altar, raised her hands, and chanted the alien verse.

HUMMMMMM.

The moment the final syllable left her lips, the air inside the cavern violently warped. The dead stopped moving entirely.

They all turned their vacant, white eyes toward her and began to screech in terrifying agony.

SKREEEEE!

The bleeding runes on the floor flared to a blinding, impossible brightness. The power inside her hit a critical mass.

KRA-KOOOOOOM! 𝗳𝗿𝐞𝕖𝘄𝗲𝕓𝗻𝚘𝚟𝕖𝐥.𝚌𝕠𝕞

A supernatural shockwave of pure white and bloody red energy exploded outward from her body.

The force was absolute.

’Goodbye, Rob!’

She saw the shockwave hit Robert, blasting him safely out of the cave mouth into the howling blizzard outside.

RUUUMBLE. CRASH!

The ceiling of the cavern caved in. Millions of tons of solid ice and ancient volcanic rock collapsed directly on top of her.

The screaming of the dead was silenced by the deafening roar of the mountain falling apart.

---

Everything went entirely, perfectly black.

Anise was floating in an ocean of warm nothingness.

There was no pain. There was no freezing wind, and there was no suffocating scent of old blood. She felt completely detached from her physical body.

Then, very slowly, sensation began to return.

She felt soft, woven fabric beneath her fingertips. The air she breathed was not thin and freezing. It was rich, warm, and smelled strongly of burning incense and sweet myrrh.

She heard the faint, melodic chanting of a choir echoing in a vast, open space.

’Where am I? Did I die?’ she thought.

She forced her heavy eyelids open.

Her vision was blurry at first, completely overwhelmed by bright, golden light. She blinked rapidly, waiting for her eyes to adjust.

She was not buried under the ice of Mount Everest.

She was lying on a raised pedestal carved from pristine white marble. Above her stretched a colossal, vaulted ceiling painted with magnificent golden frescoes depicting winged beings and glorious battles.

Sunlight streamed through massive, intricate stained glass windows, casting vibrant arrays of color across the polished stone floor.

This was not a hospital. This was a temple. A citadel of impossible grandeur.

"Praise the Light," a soft, reverent voice whispered nearby.

Anise slowly turned her head. A woman stood beside the marble pedestal.

She was breathtakingly beautiful, with flawless pale skin and long, flowing silver hair.

She wore pristine white robes trimmed in heavy gold thread. In her hands, she held a wooden staff topped with a glowing, golden crystal.

’What has happened to me? Is this the working of that voice? Did that voice sent me to a safe place?’

She looked at Anise with eyes full of absolute, profound awe.

Anise tried to sit up, her muscles feeling strange and incredibly light. She looked down at herself.

Her heavy, torn climbing gear was completely gone. She was dressed in a simple, elegant white tunic.

Her hands were clean, completely free of the frostbite and grime of the mountain.

"Where... where am I?" she croaked. Her throat felt dry, but her voice echoed clearly in the massive hall.

"Where is Robert?"

The woman dropped to one knee on the marble floor. She bowed her head with utmost submission and respect.

"You are in the Grand Citadel of the Holy Temple, Champion," the priestess proclaimed, her voice trembling with religious fervor.

She raised her head, looking at Anise with tears of joy shimmering in her eyes.

"The prayers of the Holy Alliance have finally been answered. Welcome to our world, Hero. We have waited so long for your arrival."