Day: 22
Days Left: 5458
Lives Saved: 0
Flailing her arms out to cling onto the rock, Corinna hurtled down the mountainside. A three-fingered clawed hand caught the young woman's wrist, and she swung, knocking into the rockface. Corinna gazed up at Harmony, who was attempting to heave the young woman back up. Her other hand clawed at the earth, her talons slowly sliding and scraping down.
"Harmony!" Corinna screamed, seeing the cracked and broken face of the golem appear above.
A hard clay fist rose and struck down, bludgeoning the back of Harmony's head.
The chimaera stumbled forwards and tumbled off the edge, her grip on the young woman slipping.
Corinna fell and dropped a few feet, her eyes instinctively shutting in fear. Then she stopped and hung in the air, something sharp pierced into her right wrist. She gasped and shrieked as she saw the fangs of Harmony's snake-tail embedded into her arm, preventing her from falling.
Harmony herself clung to the top of the summit's edge, her talons digging into the earth desperately as the clay golem attempted to pry them off.
It pounded at the chimaera's talons with its clenched clay hands, causing them to bleed and one of the claws to snap. Harmony let go of the edge with one hand and swiped at the golem's feet, her snake-tail swinging from the movement and weakening the snake's hold on Corinna. The fangs tore upwards, shredding the young woman's skin, then bit harder and tighter, refusing to let her fall.
Corinna chomped down on her bottom lip to prevent herself from screaming out. A trickle of blood slithered down her arm from her wrist. Every single movement Harmony made, the snake-tail would jolt and swing. The fangs were losing strength every second now, slowly rising up to her hand. If she didn't die from the fall, she would die from the blood loss-
No.
She remembered.
She couldn't die in the Abyss.
So why was she hesitating?
It's just pain.
It's just pain.
It's just pain.
You can get through this.
Spotting a ledge on the cliffside nearby, Corinna knew what she had to do.
With gritted teeth, the young woman swung her body hanging from the snake-tail, rocking it side to side. Upon realising Corinna's plan, the chimaera helped, swaying her tail towards the edge whilst distracting the clay golem to prevent it from noticing.
Once the young woman had caught onto the ledge, the chimaera's snake-tail released its fangs from Corinna's wrist and dropped back to Harmony's side.
Though her wrist bled and her grip on the ledge wavered, Corinna endured.
Though the burns on her legs scorched as they banged against the rock, Corinna endured.
Though she wanted to scream out and let herself drop and that be the end of it all, Corinna endured and climbed back up to the summit.
With the chimaera's snake-tail now free, it lashed out at the clay golem, drawing it away from the edge so that Harmony could pull herself up. The golem was considerably smaller than when they had last met which Harmony theorised was due to the fireplace explosion. Now standing only at a measly four foot, the chimaera easily towered over it, yet the golem's face remained in its ever fixed forlorn expression. It attempted to howl and groan but silenced itself as the cracks spread across its face from moving its jaw.
Though it knew that its defeat was soon arriving, the golem continued to fight. As its skin and clay were stiff and hardened, it moved slow and restricted. Harmony effortlessly avoided its attacks by stepping to the side, then ducked as Corinna swung the cricket bat at the golem.
The impact smashed the golem's head off, leaving a headless torso. As Harmony wrestled and restrained the still active headless body, Corinna retrieved a cut square piece of the duvet and wrapped the clay head inside, then hurled it off of the cliff.
Remembering Corinna's plan from before, the chimaera assisted the young woman and pulled at the golem's arms, prising them away from its body. Catching the two severed arms, Corinna wrapped them also in a duvet square and cast them off of the mountainside.
With no more duvet squares left, Corinna made one final hit against the clay golem's middle and shattered it into two pieces. Harmony pushed one of them off the edge, and Corinna the other. On her hands and knees, Corinna gazed down at the unseeable bottom of the mountain, where the scattered remains of the clay golem continued to fall.
She stumbled up, then collapsed back down into the chimaera's warm embrace.
"Harmony..." Corinna spluttered, clutching onto her wrist. Though the wound was not deep or life-threatening, it still continued to bleed profusely.
The chimaera scooped the young woman up in her arms and carried her down the mountain back to the cave, and replaced the makeshift door.
Though she wanted nothing more than to lie down, Corinna wasted no time and rummaged through the cave, trying to find anything to bandage up her wrist.
Still standing at the door, Harmony touched her throat, somehow sensing that there was something there. Something that she once had and lost but now regained. She swallowed. Her jaw opened and closed, hesitating. It had been so long, and now it had finally returned.
Finding nothing she could use as bandages, Corinna sat down on the cave floor. Steadying her trembling hands, she readied herself to tear a piece of her white dress when she heard something. A voice...
"Corinna."