Home for Horny Monsters Ch. 094

Mike didn't hear Holly's answer. He was distracted by flashing lights through the front windows, followed by a gust of wind that made the whole house creak. When he moved to the window and looked outside, he was greeted by the sight of a moose made of ice slamming its antlers into the house.

"Looks like the snowman house of horrors has arrived." He moved away from the door and winced when the glass cracked. A second later, the fracture repaired itself, and he let out a sigh of relief. There was still a bit of magic left in the North Pole. Looking over at the couch, he saw that Holly was weeping with her head on Lily's shoulder.

"Now that's a different kind of magic," he muttered to himself, then took up his post at the window. He could sense the changes in Lily, even from here, and when he took a peek at her soul (or whatever it was), he couldn't help but notice that the whole structure looked like a nesting doll. Crimson arcs of energy were layered around obsidian gems that hovered around the succubus. At her center, a tiny silver flame flickered quietly, the crimson light folded around it protectively like a mother bird's wings.

Interesting.

He looked back out the window and sighed. The only thing left was for him to wait and see what happened next.

As Mike and the others ran through the fireplace, Grýla hurled herself forward with a speed Freyja had never seen. Sending out a blast of cold air, the goddess extinguished the flames behind her and side stepped the oncoming monster, summoning a two foot tall wall of ice for Grýla to trip over.

When the giantess stumbled over the small wall, a casual twitch of Freyja's fingers sent the wall smashing into her.

"This won't take long," Freyja muttered, the air around her swirling. Snow blew in through the front door of the Workshop, collecting into a massive spear made of ice that hovered over her shoulder. She could feel the weight of it in the back of her mind as bands of golden light wrapped around the back of the icicle.

Grýla laughed as she extricated herself from the hearth. She had cracked several bricks on the way in.

"Do you think I'm afraid of little Jack Frost?" The giantess shoved bricks away from her. "You are no longer queen of the north, for stone is stronger than ice."

The golden bands of light tightened around the twelve foot long icicle, strengthening its structure to survive the sudden acceleration as Freyja launched it forward. Grýla's eyes went wide as it penetrated her torso, pinning her to the back wall. The light faded from Grýla's eyes and her whole body slumped in place.

Freyja held up a hand, palm facing Grýla. A thin stream of golden light fled the giant's corpse and wrapped itself around Freyja's fingers before vanishing into her body.

"What the heck?" Freyja examined her hand, then stared at Grýla. The amount of divinity she had pulled out of the giant was almost trivial, far less than what had been taken from her before.

Up above, the roof creaked and she heard a growl as the Yule Cat pressed its face against the glass. It moved away and shattered the window with a massive paw.

Freyja leapt to one side, the wind carrying her out of reach as the cat's paw smacked around, trying to find her. She summoned an ice shield and raised it in time to block a claw that was nearly a foot long.

Up above, she saw one of the skylights was heavily fractured. She rode the wind upward, using the shield to smash through the glass safely and ride further into the sky.

Down below, the Yule cat turned its gaze up at her. Letting out a terrible hiss, it leapt up in an attempt to catch her, but she dodged away at the last moment. Spears of ice formed around her and she directed them to fall toward the Yule cat, driving the foul beast away as it ran for safety.

"Coward," she muttered, then gazed out over the North Pole. Though it was the same village she had known for over a century, something had changed. Shadows now hung from buildings as if made from fabric, and colors had been bleached from the city. Down below, creatures made of ice and snow lurked in packs, but they weren't alone. On occasion, she would see a shadow briefly manifest a form and crawl, walk, or slither across the main street.

"Gods," she whispered. She had seen such a phenomenon before, shortly before the fall of Asgard. The cracks in reality had become visible, allowing the void to leak through. Though the shadow creatures would be harmless for now, they would soon be able to manifest and interact with this realm without any issues.

Her senses buzzed, and she looked down in time to dodge a massive boulder that had been hurled in her direction. She used her shield to help deflect the attack, but the collision was enough to knock her out of the air current she had been riding.

Tumbling through the air, she showered the area where the attack had come from with hail the size of bowling balls. Dark shadows shifted below, revealing dozens of Yuletide lads crawling across the ground like vermin.

"Which one of you threw that?" she demanded, landing in a crouch in the middle of the street. She didn't think the Yule lads had the strength necessary for such a feat, but Grýla had been seriously lacking in divinity. It was entirely possible she had shared it with her children.

In response, another boulder rocketed out of a nearby alley. Freyja dodged this one readily enough, but was caught by a massive rock from a different direction. This one slammed her through a candy cane light pole that shattered, the air filling with the smell of peppermint. Groaning, she raised her shield in time to block the attack of a large figure who leapt off a nearby roof.

"Hello, food." Grýla opened her mouth and tried to take a bite of Freyja's face, but the goddess pushed the giant away.

"I killed you!" she cried, then braced her foot against Grýla's fat gut and shoved. The giantess grunted, then sailed through the air and vanished into the shadows.

All around Freyja, the town erupted with laughter. It was Grýla's voice, magnified dozens of times. The shadows danced along in staccato fashion, moving closer to Freyja as if trying to touch her. The goddess scrambled to her feet and jumped, commanding the wind to take her into the sky once more.

A massive paw batted her out of the sky, slamming her into a snow drift so hard that it exploded. Freyja rolled across the cold cobblestone road, summoning a sphere of golden light to protect her from the next attack. The Yulecat smacked her again, sending her bouncing down the main street like a giant hamster ball.

Freyja held tight, trying to guide her journey as the giant cat chased after her. She summoned massive pillars of ice for her to bounce off of, hoping to get enough distance from the cat so that she could release the shield and either flee or counterattack. The Yulecat was fast, however, despite its giant size. It could turn into a ball of light to chase her, a fact that frustrated her to no end.

After getting smacked around the North Pole for several minutes, she managed to trip up the Yulecat by summoning a series of ice pillars that grew taller every few feet. She rolled harmlessly between them as the Yulecat got stuck and had to climb upward to escape.

Freyja released the magical shield and fled into a nearby building. When she looked out the window, she saw the Yulecat fighting to get through the pillars, so Freyja summoned even more, pinning the feline in place.

In the sky above, a dark figure briefly blocked out the Northern Lights. It was the Krampus, cackling madly as his demented reindeer burst away from his makeshift sled like shooting stars and headed toward her. The Krampus leapt off of the falling sled and disappeared, his vehicle crashing into a nearby structure with a loud bang.

"Shit." Freyja ran through the building, which was housing for the elves. Abandoned presents and toys were scattered everywhere, and she nearly tripped over a wooden horse. When she made it to the backdoor, she shoved it open so hard that the hinges creaked.

"You're all alone, Jack." A Grýla stood on a small hill overlooking the building. A pair of distorted reindeer emerged from nearby, snorting wildly and raking their electric antlers through the air. Up above, the Yulecat leaned over the top of the building and leered down at Freyja.

Freyja stared at Grýla, her thoughts whirring. Somehow, the giantess was commanding her own army.

Well, two could play this game. Curling her fingers up, Freyja sent her mind into the aether, touching the faraway fields of Fólkvangr with her mind for the first time in over a century. She felt them there, the minds of thousands of men and women who had fallen in battle, suddenly restless in their eternal slumber.

"I'm never alone," she whispered, calling to the fallen dead. She wasn't at full strength, not yet, but the shades of the fallen stepped from the darkness around her, ready to defend their queen. There were maybe two dozen of them, weapons held ready.

"What an interesting trick." Grýla laughed heartily and stuck her hand in the snow, then ripped free a massive rock. "Tell me, Jack. Can I eat them?"

"My name is Freyja," she declared, summoning armor made of ice and snow. As a winged helmet settled across her brow, she drew a blade made of frost and pointed it at Grýla. Her soldiers all readied their weapons, their spectral forms flickering in the light. "And the only thing you'll taste tonight is my blade."

Freyja and her soldiers charged forward.

Yuki stepped out into the cold, pulling the door shut behind her. It didn't take long before something leapt out of a nearby snowdrift, all teeth and fangs. She summoned a massive spike of ice from the ground beneath the snow tiger, spearing it in place. It snarled and tried to catch her with its claws, but was forced to tear itself apart to reach her.

She dodged to one side as an eight-foot tall bear jumped down from the roof, then danced away when the creature shattered and reassembled itself, golden light holding the thing together like magic glue.

"Yeah, I know that feeling." She summoned stone pillars this time, forcing the bear into an earthen prison. It growled as it squeezed between the bars, its body bursting and then reforming on the other side of its cage. Pain ripped through her stomach, and she groaned as she leapt away from the bear.

"Ugh, shit." She gasped in agony, her hands briefly igniting with golden flames. It was divinity, and her body had absorbed so much of it from her sexual encounter with Mike and Freyja that her body was now breaking down. She hadn't known for sure until just before passing through the fireplace when the weird cramp in her stomach hadn't gone away. There wasn't going to be time for Mike to soul weave it in, or whatever the fuck he wanted to call it.

She wanted to be angry. So many years of pain had finally moved aside to allow her to pursue happiness, but it wasn't to be. The pressure building up inside her body had spread through her entire abdomen, and golden lines of power radiated down her thighs.

"Fuck." She slapped away another monster made of ice, then brought her claws down on its face. A snow python fell off a nearby roof and wrapped around her, but she shapeshifted into a fox and popped free of its muscular embrace.

She wondered how much time she had left, but not for her own sake. The moment she fell, these creatures would descend on the house. She had known the moment the fire had gone out that Mrs. Claus was gone. The magic of the home had diminished to embers, turning their refuge into a trap.

With a growl, she summoned a ball of foxfire and blew a hole in the python's head. It fell over, spasming so hard that it smacked its body into Santa's home. More ice and snow slid free of the roof, and Yuki realized she needed to lure the frozen creatures away.

Running down the street, a monstrous snowman appeared from around a large gingerbread house. She slid beneath its clawed fingers and sent several spikes of ice and stone through its body, causing its head to fall free and shatter on the ground. For just a moment, she saw it--a swirling mass of golden light, like a tiny star.

"Fuck it," she muttered, then moved to the light and inhaled it, pulling it into her body. There was pain as it heated her from within, but the snowman's shifting form crumbled and went still. If it was going to kill her anyway, she needed to make her death matter, to ensure that her friends survived.

To ensure that Mike survived.

Yuki let out a howl of rage, bringing the creatures of the North to her. The bear from before found her outside of the bakery, and she tore a hole through it, seeking out the golden light within. A massive eagle tackled her from above, but her foxfire melted enough of its face off to reveal the golden light tucked away in its icy skull. She inhaled this light, too, and the creature turned to fine powder.

Yuki summoned a storm around her, one that slowed the creatures down so that she could feed on the golden light inside of them. Her body felt like a massive pressure cooker as the divinity ran rampant through her, but she bore the pain in silence.

It was during her fight that a dark figure appeared between two buildings, lurching forward with distended limbs. Yuki turned to face the threat, her hands now blazing with golden light.

"Hello, food." Grýla stepped forward from the darkness, her skin hanging loose from her face. "It hurts, doesn't it?"

"What the hell?" Had Freyja lost? Or had Grýla run from her?

"I see you've learned the secret." To illustrate her point, Grýla dodged an attack from a snow tiger and shoved her arms down its throat, then pulled out a ball of golden light. "If you eat it, you can make it yours."

Yuki growled at the giantess. "Is that what you did to Freyja?"

"Who?" Grýla popped the light into her mouth and licked her lips, then groaned in agony. She leaned forward, pressing her hands into the snow. Golden light raced along her arms and into the ground. There was the sound of shifting rocks and soil, and another version of Grýla pulled herself free. This one, remarkably, was even uglier than the original, her skin hanging off of her like a loose sweater.

"Holy shit." Yuki stared in terror as the new Grýla turned to face her.

"That's right, food." Uglier Grýla grinned. "My body couldn't contain it, so I did what I've always done. I made a new body."

"Only this one isn't the brood of my idiot husband." Slack-faced Grýla grinned, revealing broken teeth. "I may even eat that asshole when I'm done with you."

"Whatever. I can take two of you. Three of you. All of you!" She summoned her magic and created a swirling mass of ice that circled her. "I hope you're both hungry, because I'm about to feed you an ass whooping!"

The Grýlas charged toward her, their speed unexpected. Yuki dodged the first one and smashed an ice boulder into the face of the uglier one. The ice shattered, revealing that this one was unharmed other than a bloody nose.

A third Grýla emerged from the swirling snow and caught Yuki with a punch that crumpled her to the ground. She felt her magic surge through her whole body, the divinity threatening to break free and blow her apart.

"Not yet," she cried, clenching her fists. "Please, last me just a little bit longer!" She no longer cared if she died. All she wanted was to stop these ugly bitches before they found their way to Mike.

Rising to her feet, the blow she landed on Grýla's jaw cracked her knuckles, maybe even broke one, she didn't care. Magic flared along her forearm and blasted into the giant's face, sending her sprawling onto the ground. A long arm grabbed her from behind and she bit down on it hard enough to break Grýla's gritty skin. The giant didn't react, and Yuki was taken back to the ground, long fingers pinning her forehead to the ice.

"Get the fuck off of me." Divinity roared through her body now as she summoned massive chunks of ice that barreled into Grýla, smashing her attacker into a nearby building. She stumbled to her feet, her veins on fire as another Grýla showed up.

"How many of you bitches are there?" This new Grýla had short arms like a Tyrannosaurus and a lazy eye that looked off to the side. When she lunged at Yuki, the kitsune summoned several stalagmites beneath Grýla's feet, but the giantess was unfazed. The stone shattered under her feet and she threw herself on Yuki, her tiny hands scrambling for purchase.

"I am a creature of stone, food!" Despite having T-rex hands, this Gryla's punches were brutal. Another Grýla grabbed Yuki from behind and pulled her hands behind her back. The blows rained down from every direction, and Yuki cried out in pain as a pair of teeth pierced her leg.

The divinity burned through her pores, and she screamed, releasing a wave of golden light that blew Grýla's doppelgangers off of her. The stunned giants tumbled away, crashing into the buildings.

Yuki gasped for air, fighting her way back to her feet. Her skin was glowing from the inside, and her robes were stained with blood. Her body was breaking down, unable to contain the divinity any longer.

"And now you see why I did what I did." One of the Grýlas crawled from the ruins of a nearby building with a large lump on her forehead. "That golden light made me feel so powerful, as if the earth beneath my feet was mine to command."

"But it was too much." Another Grýla forced her way through an opening in a broken wall. The bricks tumbled to the ground at her feet. "So I found a way around it."

"I made myself a new body." This Grýla's face was tilted to one side in her skull. "And when that wasn't enough, I made another, then another."

"And then we hunted." A Grýla on a nearby roof hopped down, landing on a pair of enormous feet. "We hunted the ice creatures for their golden light. Why raise an army when we can be our own army?"

"It's called survival of the fittest." This Grýla had an oversized head that lolled to one side. "Some of us are survivors, while the rest of you are food that hasn't been chewed yet."

Yuki grunted and took a step back. She stumbled, tripping over her own robes and falling on the ground. A couple of tarot cards fell from her sleeve, and her copy of Alice in Wonderland landed in the snow facedown, the pages open wide to reveal the cover.

"There can only be one queen of the North Pole." This came from three Grýlas at once. The golden light coming from Yuki cast a radiant glow on her surroundings, properly illuminating the cover of her book.

She saw that she was surrounded. Golden cracks formed along the skin of her body with the fire burning deep into her bones. The icy winds of the Arctic swirled around her, the eddies so powerful that they lifted brick and mortar from nearby buildings and cast them away. The Grýlas all hunkered down, unable to continue forward through the ice and snow.

So this is it, then. There wasn't much else to think about as her world went white. The storm carried Alice in Wonderland into her hands, but she could no longer feel its pages. There was a flash of light, and then...

"Hey, you." A pair of fingers appeared over the top of the pages, pushing the book out of the way. It was Emily, holding a cup of tea. "I take it you're enjoying the story?"

"It's unlike anything I've ever read before." Yuki closed the book and held it to her chest. "Maybe it's silly, but it feels so empowering. This little girl is confronted by a world that doesn't make any sense, yet she makes it work."

"It's a little like you, in that regard." Emily handed over the tea. "You're in a new world yourself. I wouldn't classify you as helpless, though."

"Maybe not." Yuki sipped at the tea, the taste of it long forgotten. This was a memory, just one of millions flitting before her eyes in her final moments. It was an experience she had hoped to avoid for a very long time, but she was sure that was true for everyone