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SM/DC Chapter 112 : Azarath - 2
🕑 Added 2025-05-07 22:23:46 +0000 UTCArthur and Kara soared over the shattered city , their silhouettes blazing against the haze-choked skyline. As they closed in, the temple loomed a white monolith at the heart of the decay, untouched by time compared to its surroundings, but steeped in a pressure that made the soul itch.
Arthur landing with a heavy thud, cloak swirling behind him in a wave of dark energy, Kara descending beside him, boots skimming the ground with a soft hiss of displaced air.
The temple doors towered above them, ancient, etched with Azarathian runes that shimmered dimly in reaction to their presence.
Arthur narrowed his eyes, fingers twitching slightly as the air shifted.
“The magic I’m sensing is growing stronger,” he muttered, his voice lower now. More focused. The kind of tone he used right before things went sideways.
Kara glanced around, raising a brow. “I sense nothing.” She squinted at the door, then added with a smirk, “Unless you count ‘bad feeling’ as magic.”
Arthur let out a short breath through his nose, somewhere between a laugh and a sigh then stepped toward the doors.
And suddenly he bumped into an invisible wall, he raised one hand and pressed it flat against it, a raw force that surged into Arthur’s arm and nearly pushed him back.
But he held firm.
“It’s sealed,” he said, studying the magical construct now spiraling beneath the surface of the door. “Why do I feel like this is new..”
Kara floated a few feet off the ground, arms crossed. “So can you break it, or do we knock politely?”
Arthur grinned faintly, the shadows around him coiling tighter, flickers of blue light dancing along his eyes.
“I think I can break it.”
Arthur’s smile was faint barely there but the way the shadows coiled tighter around his arms and shoulders said enough. He raised his hand toward the barrier. The swirling magic before him cracked and pulsed in defiance. And then he unleashed it.
Ruler’s Authority.
The air trembled. A crushing weight slammed down on the seal like a divine hammer. The barrier screamed, resisting. The symbols along the door flared brightly, fighting back. Arthur’s boots slid an inch across the stone from the pressure. His jaw clenched, muscles tensed. The force he was pouring into the barrier wasn’t just raw strength it was control, precision, willpower.
A ripple of power burst out from him, and cracks began to splinter across the seal.
But it still didn’t break.
Arthur growled low, focusing harder. “Break damn you!”
The shadows roared outward in a wave. The air exploded with pressure, dust howling from the impact as if the very dimension was protesting. With a deafening crack like thunder striking a mountain, the seal shattered in a flash of blinding light.
BOOM.
The blast knocked dust and debris into the air. Arthur staggered back slightly only to find himself shielded by a blue figure. Kara stood in front of him, eyes glowing, cape fluttering from the impact. She looked over her shoulder, concern in her voice.
“You alright?”
Arthur stepped past her, shadows still fading from his form. “Don’t do that again, Kara.”
She blinked, confused. “What..?”
“This was nothing. I won’t break after something like this,” he said, calm but firm, voice echoing inside the now-open temple entrance.
“No, I didn’t mean..” she tried to explain, stepping forward.
“I know,” Arthur cut in, not looking back. His tone softened, just a little. “You’re afraid I’ll disappear again... like last time. That something unexpected will take me.”
He stepped inside the temple, shadows trailing behind him like a living cloak.
“But I assure you it won’t happen again.”
Kara stood there, fists clenched. Her lips parted, but the words tangled up with the emotions rising in her chest.
“No, that’s not what I... Damn it, Arthur!”
She followed him in, eyes stormy with worry, anger, and something deeper. Arthur had said exactly what she was too afraid to admit and it hurt more than she expected.
Kara drew in a breath, ready to speak, to finally say what she’d been holding back since Cadmus.
But Arthur suddenly tensed, head snapping toward a distant corridor within the temple.
“There it is again…” he muttered. Then louder, “Something up ahead.”
Without warning, he broke into a run, boots echoing against the ancient stone.
Kara blinked. “Arthur, wait! I was trying to..!”
“Follow,” he called back, not even slowing.
Kara let out a heavy sigh, shooting after him in a blur of red and blue. “Sure. Why not. We’re sprinting through haunted temples now.”
The halls of the temple were a maze vaulted ceilings covered in old runes. Some halls were collapsed, others filled with strange statues whose eyes seemed to follow them. Magic clung to every wall like smoke.
But Arthur didn’t stop.
He was drawn to something ahead. A presence, multiple.
Finally, they reached a massive set of stone doors etched with the same language as the barrier he’d just broken. They were slightly ajar. voilet light flickered from the chamber beyond.
Arthur slowed as voices drifted out muffled, but clearly… familiar.
“…I’m telling you, Z, someone just cracked that bloody seal. Felt it like a punch to the gut. They’re either stupid powerful or stupid stupid.”
A second voice responded, dry and unimpressed. “So which one do you think they are?”
“Can’t tell yet. Give it a second. If the next thing we hear is screaming, definitely the second one.”
Arthur blinked. “I know this voice…”
Kara raised a brow. “Wait..is that Constantine?”
Inside the chamber, a faint shimmer of voilet sealing magic could be seen circling the walls and floor. Within it, sitting on opposite ends like prisoners in a magical time-out zone, were John Constantine and Zatanna. Both looked tired, mildly annoyed, and very much trapped.
Constantine had one leg propped up on a conjured rock, lighting a cigarette that immediately fizzled out from the sealing ward.
“Oh, come on! Third one this day,” he muttered, chucking it away.
Zatanna sat cross-legged, arms folded, watching him with a disapproving look. “You really think someone broke into Azarath for fun?”
“You clearly haven’t met the kind of lunatics I have. I’ve got at least two guesses who’d do it just to annoy me.”
“Correction.. you annoyed them first.”
Arthur pushed the doors open fully now, stepping into view. Shadows coiled around his form, eyes glowing faintly. Kara floated in beside him, cape fluttering behind her.
“Nice to see you haven’t changed,” Arthur said.
Constantine looked up and his expression shifted from surprise to a smirk. “Well, I’ll be damned. Shadow Boy himself.”
Zatanna rose, her eyebrows lifting in recognition. “Kara?”
“I didn’t think we’d see you here,” Constantine said, glancing to Kara. “Or you, sunshine. Did the party invite say ‘bring your own Kryptonian’ or something?”
Kara rolled her eyes. “Hi to you too, trenchcoat.”
Arthur just exhaled through his nose, shaking his head with a tired half-smile. “Let me guess, you two poked too deep into Azarath and got yourselves locked up by whatever’s running this place?”
Zatanna gestured to the glowing seals. “Not entirely our fault. We were trying to help Raven but..”
Constantine snorted. “Yeah, well, turns out she didn’t like that.”
Arthur stepped closer to the seal, eyes narrowing. “Hold tight. I’ll get you out of there.”
Constantine leaned back casually. “Take your time. Not like we’re going anywhere.”
Zatanna added, dryly, “But do hurry. He’s already tried starting a poker game with his own shadow.”
Arthur didn’t miss a beat. “You know,” he said, a faint smirk touching his lips, “I can arrange that poker game.”
Constantine blinked, genuinely interested for a second. “You can?”
Then his face twisted as realization hit him. “Oh, bugger me sideways..of course you can. Bloody necromancer. Don’t you dare go conjuring my corpse for a laugh.”
Arthur chuckled softly, “Relax, John.”
Arthur turned his attention back to the seal but something from earlier pulled at him. His brow furrowed slightly as he spoke.
“Wait… what did you mean just now...when you said she didn’t like that?”
Constantine blinked, caught off guard. “What, that? Oh. Raven. Who else?”
Arthur’s expression hardened. “Raven? You mean she..”
“Yeah, she did this,” John gestured up at the glowing runes. “Trapped us here herself. Not a warning, not a goodbye. Just ‘poof’ sealed like amateurs in a cursed bottle.”
Kara took a step forward, stunned. “Wait, Raven did this to you two? But why?”
Zatanna sighed, almost apologetically. “She didn’t trust us. Said we’d mess things up said he would mess things up.” She jabbed a thumb at John.
“Oi,” John muttered.
Kara frowned, clearly unsettled. “That’s not like her…”
Arthur said nothing for a long moment. Then: “No that’s very like her. Scared and desperate. Facing problems on her own..”
