CHAPTER 189

"Is that all you have? Mortal puns? Stupid jokes?" Her arms and torso were covered in red and white paint smears now, and Mike suppressed a grin. When she tried to rub it off, it just created long streaks of grime that sparkled when the light hit the smashed monocles just right.

"I'm just trying to buy myself some time," he said, then struck his best martial art pose. Though inexperienced in the art of self defense, he dug into the mental intent of the act, and felt his mind connect with the beach around him.

When the queen ran toward him, he swept his hand dramatically in front of him. The sand of the beach erupted, blasting into the queen and smashing her into a grove of nearby palm trees.

He dramatically made a fist, and the beach followed suit. It was almost ten feet across, and as the queen pulled herself out of the trees, it slammed into her hard enough that one of her wings crimped, and he heard her shout something he couldn't understand. He summoned another sand hand and then put his palms together, willing the beach to grind the queen like a stone in a rock polisher.

A blast of lightning hit him in the chest and blew him across the ground. He tumbled backward and landed on his feet, raising his hands for the inevitable followup. It was another blast of lightning, but he summoned a steel rod from the sand, and the lightning hit that instead.

"So, maybe I was hasty," the queen muttered, her upper body free of the sandy prison. She had her fingers pointed like a gun at him, and a nasty looking storm cloud swirled overhead.

"Did you think this would be easy?" he asked her.

The queen ignored him, her eyes scanning the beach. He sent another sand fist at her, but she raised her own hand and created a barrier of stone. He tried a stone fist, but she countered with a piece of paper that covered the fist and caused it to implode.

"Clever girl," he muttered with a hint of annoyance.

"I am older than the Dreamscape," the queen said, then summoned a bubble to surround her. "What you do here is nothing more than cheap parlour tricks compared to its true potential. I thought I could pressure you a little at a time, make you think you had a chance, then frustrate you to no end."

"So you're toying with me."

The queen smirked. "I believe the cliche you would use is 'blowing off steam.' I have taken your measure, Mike Radley, and know what you are capable of."

Mike lowered his hands. "So...does that mean you give up?"

The queen rolled her eyes. "Your arrogance is tedious."

"It isn't arrogance. I am going to win."

"You have no idea how sad it is that you believe that." The queen vanished, then appeared right next to him. "I'm tired of listening to you."

A band of metal slammed against his mouth, and when he tried to pull it free, she yanked his hands away and then slammed him into the ground. He grunted, and she lifted him up and threw him hard into a nearby palm tree, causing the tree to snap and fall. Even though his pain was diminished, he was in agony as the bones of his body shattered and healed in seconds. She paused to lift him up, her extra hands pinching his face as if he was a cute child.

"I wanted to hear you beg, but this is far more entertaining."

She grabbed his skull and slammed him into a nearby rock. The rock broke apart, so she summoned an even bigger rock. He whimpered when he saw it, and when she smashed through him, his whole body distorted like jello, then bounced back into shape.

"You have no idea how much I've wanted to do this to you," she growled, then grabbed his arm and yanked it off. He stared in horror as she tossed it away, and then yelled when she grabbed the new arm that had formed and repeated the process.

He closed his eyes and tried to focus, but her onslaught continued. He was her hammer, and the whole world had become a nail. He was so distracted that he was unable to bend his own Dreamscape to his will. He reached out to try and find Naia, his ace in the hole, but she was centered in the middle of the house. Until the queen decided to go inside and smash some furniture with his head, he would have to hold on.

The queen was now over twelve feet tall and was casually smacking him into trees. He let the pain wash over him, his mind holding onto the idea that his real body was perfectly fine, and that nothing she did to him would leave lasting harm.

"You dare to defy a queen in her own court?" She slammed him into the ground, then pressed his face into the sand. "You miserable miscreant. I have lived many thousands of years on this plane of existence, and no creature would dare to say the things you have!"

She emphasized her point by picking him up and flying across the beach like a stealth bomber, only she shoved his face into the sand, using the beach as an industrial sander. When she lifted him up, she scowled at his appearance, then dropped him and stomped him into the ground hard enough that the world went black as he was buried beneath a foot of sand.

When she pulled him back out, she was still ranting, but in a language he didn't understand. The sand beneath her feet was turning black as if scorched with heat, and she lifted him into the sky before slamming him down again. However, the longer she went, the easier it was to disconnect his mind from the sensations of his body. After another couple of minutes, he was only along for the ride as she took out her frustrations on him.