Susanoo and Tul continued speaking with Ixchel and the rest of the gods who had been trapped in the underground regions of Tollan. The rabbit goddess informed them that both Otontecutli and Cuerauáperi were safe, though the latter was recovering in the city of Chaco, to the north.
At that moment, Tul felt a terrible pressure in her chest. Her heart beat rapidly, and she experienced enormous anxiety. Someone had died. She could feel it.
“I have to… go where ch’úupalob Tania, Ana, and Menrva went,” the rabbit goddess said hastily as she pulled away from the arms of her teacher Ixchel.
“What hath happened, Tul-chan?” Susanoo asked, confused.
“Someone… someone has died or is about to die… no… I think two of them have already died,” Tul said nervously, while her fur stood on end and her legs began trembling, seized by fear.
“You sense a premonition?” Ixchel asked, surprised.
The rabbit goddess nodded.
“I have to go to Tamoanchan,” she said nervously.
“Very well. We will tell you how to get there,” Ixchel said as she turned to look at her companions. They nodded.
Then Mixcóatl approached Tul and Susanoo and knelt before them.
“I am Mixcóatl, and it is possible that you do not know me, but I have a mission to see Itzpapálotl,” said the black-faced god. “I would be honored to accompany you to Tamoanchan.”
“Of course, Mixcóatl-san. We shall all go together,” Susanoo said, giving a slight bow.
The god of the kingdom of Xicallanca stood and returned the respectful gesture of his new companion.
Ixchel, feeling Tul cold and trembling, touched her shoulder to calm her.
“You must not be afraid, little one,” the Maya goddess said to her disciple. “I am certain you will be able to bring them back from death if you hurry.”
Tul calmed beneath her teacher’s warm hand and began breathing more steadily.
“I will go without delay,” the rabbit goddess said.
“We will search for the rest of the prisoners,” Ixchel said. “If other Toltec gods join us, we will be able to win this fight without trouble.”
But as Tul, Susanoo, and Mixcóatl prepared to leap through the hole caused by the previous battle, rivers of blood began pouring from it like enormous waterfalls.
“It seems that while we are here, a very intense battle is taking place outside,” Tajín said, disgusted, as he tried to climb onto some rocks so his feet would not be stained with blood.
“It must be the other Chichimeca kings who are fighting,” Ixchel said, just as she and the others turned toward the opening and saw the sky thunder, while very strong tremors shook the tunnel’s foundations.
“WE WISH YOU LUCK! WE WILL JOIN YOU AS SOON AS POSSIBLE!” Tlatlauhaqui shouted. “YOU THREE, RUN TO TOLLAN’S MAIN TEMPLE! THERE YOU WILL FIND THE ENTRANCE TO TAMOANCHAN!”
Susanoo, Tul, and Mixcóatl nodded, and with a leap, they emerged from the underground catacombs. But when they saw Tollan, they were stunned.
All of Tollan, absolutely the entire city, was covered in extremely sharp crimson-red agave leaves. Beneath the plants, rivers of blood flowed like vast crimson torrents.
However, the true horror was not the bloodthirsty plants, but the fact that there were hundreds… no, thousands of Mayáhuel goddesses emerging from the agave plants. Their naked bodies, covered in blood and wearing devilish smiles, twisted the leaves aside to emerge like fruit from within those plants.
The gods of Orniskem were right in the middle of the main plaza, surrounded by those plants, while thousands of Mayáhuel goddesses stood before them. The other three Chichimeca gods had disappeared completely.
“Well, well. Here are the others,” said one of the Mayáhuels as she watched Tul, Susanoo, and Mixcóatl emerge from the hole in the ground.
Susanoo, Tul, and Mixcóatl looked all around them: the buildings, the sky, the esplanade, everything. Mayáhuel clones completely covered the entire place. The clones had malicious smiles and bloodthirsty eyes.
“We will not be able to pass without defeating all these hundreds of clones,” Mixcóatl said as he made a round shield appear, adorned with feathers and a white serpent coiled around his right arm.
“Mixcóatl, your time to retire came long ago,” the Mayáhuel goddesses began saying in unison to the Xicallanca god mockingly, but he simply ignored them.
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“We must needs pass through all these goddesses if we wish to reach the main temple,” Susanoo said as he drew his sword and once again took his electric form to fight.
“Wait, yuum,” Tul interrupted. “You are too tired from your previous fight.”
“Bakana!” the eastern god replied with a smile. “This is nothing to me, Tul-chan.”
But Tul was not sure of that. Besides, there was the nervousness in her heart. The enormous pressure she felt inside herself.
“Who died?” she wondered.
Although she could not feel their energies because Tamoanchan was on another dimensional plane, she could feel, could intuit, that Menrva had fallen, and the other might possibly be Ana. If that were true, only Tania would remain standing and could die as well. Even if Tul could resurrect them, there was the risk that they might see that monstrous creature Epona had seen and have their consciousness destroyed.
Tul bit her lips in frustration and, without thinking much, pointed her palm at a group of Mayáhuel goddesses while shouting:
“Kili’ich uj léets (Sacred Radiance of the Moon)!”
A white beam emanated from Tul’s right hand and struck one of the Mayáhuel goddesses directly, but to everyone’s surprise, she was able to withstand it with some effort.
“Stupid rabbit, how do you use water against a plant goddess?” the deity shouted mockingly.
Tul tried to perform another technique, but the dozens of Mayáhuel goddesses surrounding them threw themselves at her while making agave leaves appear from their bodies. Those leaves were metallic and had extremely sharp, serrated edges.
The goddesses shouted in unison:
“Yesmeteposmakuauitl (Sword of the Bloody Maguey)!”
Susanoo and Mixcóatl tried to defend Tul from the attack, but they were overwhelmed by the number of clones of the goddess Mayáhuel. Unable to stop it, they could only watch as Tul was pierced by dozens of maguey swords throughout her body, while the Maya goddess vomited blood and began convulsing.
Horrified, Susanoo decapitated one of the Mayáhuel goddesses restraining him. But the others quickly climbed onto him and pierced his back with their sharp swords. Susanoo lost consciousness and his transformation at that moment.
Near there, bloodied, filled with daggers all over their bodies, Epona, Anpiel, Freyja, and Loki lay almost defeated on the ground. The rivers of blood mixed with the blood of the gods, who could do nothing but wait for death.
“It is impossible to fight so many,” Epona said while lying on the ground, propping herself up only with both arms. The goddess had lost one eye, and all her clothes were soaked in blood, with maguey leaves buried throughout her body.
Anpiel tried to stand and attack one of the Mayáhuel goddesses, but she turned her arm into an agave leaf and pierced him through the stomach. The angel vomited blood and lost consciousness while still impaled on the Chichimeca deity’s arm.
“Hey, you! Let go of meow friend!” Freyja shouted as she used her staff to stand. The goddess had changed into her cat transformation, though, like Epona, she was covered in blood and swords pierced her entire body.
All the Mayáhuels began laughing maliciously.
The Mayáhuel who had impaled Anpiel looked Freyja in the eyes and mockingly said:
“Make me.”
Before the Chichimeca goddess could react, Freyja decapitated her with a strike from her golden staff, causing her body to rot and turn into a kind of sap, which was absorbed by the blood on the ground.
But despite saving Anpiel, Freyja was pierced by several serrated maguey leaves emanating from the countless goddesses beside her. Freyja vomited blood, but she did not lose consciousness, though she did lose her cat transformation. Even so, she kept trying to move, but with every movement she made, she felt immense pain.
Then a rain of ice stalagmites struck the Mayáhuel goddesses, but although they were wounded by the attack, they suffered no great damage.
Loki had attacked the goddesses with his final breath, but like Freyja, he ended up impaled by several sword-like leaves.
Seeing this, Epona struck her head against the ground, staining her beautiful face with blood.
“No, I do not want to end like this,” she said nervously and bitterly before her clear defeat at the hands of the goddess of maguey.
“Indeed, beautiful,” said one of the Mayáhuel goddesses. “Cloning ourselves without reducing our power or speed is our winning technique. Thanks to Uichilat’s bloody water, I can clone myself infinitely throughout this city if I so require.”
At that moment, the hundreds of Mayáhuel goddesses floated into the air, and above them, red needles appeared. The needles resembled the teeth found on maguey leaves.
“Let us end this at once,” said the Chichimeca goddess. “Though before killing you, I want to tell you that your sword friend and your rabbit friend have also already fallen before my power.”
Epona looked over in horror at Mayáhuel’s words, but she was even more shocked to see that the entire sky had darkened. It had been covered by millions of red needles, so numerous that they blocked out Tollan’s sky.
“Yeskiyauitl (Bloody Rain),” all the Mayáhuels said, making that countless number of needles fall toward the ground, where Epona could only await death.
But at that moment, lightning traveled across the entire sky of Tollan, and the needles were carbonized, falling only as a rain of ash onto the blood-soaked ground.
All the Mayáhuel goddesses looked back, just as a group of them, the farthest away, exploded like fireballs.
“What the hell is the Fourth Sun doing here?” the Chichimeca goddesses shouted, as Nanahuatzin appeared floating in the distance with his characteristic mask, seated in the air with his legs crossed.
“No… if that guy joins the fight, our chances will be zero,” Epona said, almost unconscious.
“What have you come here to do, Nanahuatzin?” one of the Mayáhuels shouted furiously. “Do not tell me you have come to fight against your mother, right?”
“The only deity I recognize as my family is great Xólotl,” Nanahuatzin replied. “You are nothing more than a group of opportunistic deities attacking a territory that does not belong to you, believing that those foreigners will protect you.”
“Chamachapulin (Plague of Locusts),” Nanahuatzin said.
At that moment, a greenish cloud covered all of Tollan. Within the cloud were countless crickets and locusts, which clung to Mayáhuel’s clones and began gnawing at them.
The scene was terrible. The thousands of clones of the goddess perished, screaming in agony as they were devoured by the gigantic plague of locusts, while blood poured from their wounds. Every time a clone died, it turned into sap.
Within seconds, all the Mayáhuel clones had disappeared, and there was no agave left on the ground. Now everything was submerged in slimy sap. The locusts then vanished.
The god of plagues then floated toward Epona, who gazed at him with uncertainty. Freyja, who had already freed herself from impalement thanks to Nanahuatzin's attack, also approached the god.
"My lord Xolotl instructed me that you should not die," the Chichimec god remarked.