Nightmares came back with a vengeance, the haunting faces of flayed foes and smoldering corpses brought back bad memories to the forefront. The lingering night terror eventually stopped when I abruptly woke up, feeling like I had a mad drummer in my head. A Vicious frantic throbbing headache blossomed on the left side of my head. I groaned quietly, while trying to get up from where I lay. My vision slowly adapted itself to the dimly lit room. However someone had strapped me down onto a slab, with a very flimsy excuse for a mattress. I was in a very disturbing dungeon, complete with dirty rusted chains on the wall. From the next room over the familiar scent of blood and other bodily fluids assaulted my nostrils. I struggled against my cuffs but the cold iron manacles would not budge. The pain came back with a vengeance. Headache is absolutely nothing to joke around about and it made it very difficult trying to recall how I ended up here. Wrecking my brain I vaguely recalled a massage studio and pajamas wearing people? Regardless I was stuck naked under a flimsy white blanket, in a very unpleasant room with my party nowhere in sight. Melting the iron was a thing I considered, when I remembered that I could just turn incorporeal. Metal is not organic after all. Stretching my aching joints felt fantastic, which made me wonder how long I was tied up for. Once I was free to move around unimpeded, I draped the blanket over my shoulders like a cloak. If there was a creep in the next room over I hoped that I would look enough like a ghost to scare the living daylight out of them. What I saw was something else entirely. Blood, bones and body parts lay all across the floor next to a dried up husk of a naked man. To the far end of the grotesque space, I saw Kine resting against a wall. Her clothes were missing and white fluid leaked from between her legs. Calling out her name made her ears twitch ever. she slightly as she left out a cute yawn. Scratching her tummy she looked over at me and smiled brightly.
“Do you have any idea what happened to the men in the room?” my question made her put a finger to her lips and tilt her head at an angle, before nodding. She began a game of charades. She mimed sucking and various suggestive movements and a bit of struggle.
“It has something to do with sex and a struggle?”
A nod and a loud belch was her reply. Something told me that her nature as a lust fueled predator made short work of some very unpleasant people.
“Did you suck some humans dry or something?” Vigorously she nodded before doing a dramatic pirouette and transformed into her magical outfit. “I can not fault you for what you did, but be a bit more careful about eating human flesh, you never know where they have been. You should make sure to cook the meat first to kill germs.” Clearly she mulled this over before sniffing the air pulled me roughly by the arm. Since stopping her from eating people clearly did not work, I attempted to improve her habits instead. After a lot of corners and more disgusting rooms we came across a sturdy wooden door. Kine scuffed at this and placed her palm on the surface, calling forth thorny vines into the lock that shattered into a thousand splinters. Now that the door was broken we pushed on through. On the other side I came across the most disturbing site I have ever seen in my life, which is saying a lot at this point. The thing was a man, a real mass of merged men and women joined by the hip. Each body was alive and moaning in agony from numerous oozing wounds being poorly stitched together. All their arms and legs were missing as well.
“Oyh, is this your doing Jennyfer? You are the only one I know with the skills to graft people into a dismembered pillar of writhing flesh.”
“Magellan, is that you? We were getting worried when we couldn’t find you after walking up.” Shouted Nialls familiar voice as he came around to my side of the room.
“You would not happen to have my clothes? I am a bit naked and cold over here.”
“Sure, here you go.” He replied, pulling out my clothes from a convenient canister. “What the carp happened to you guys? Kine looks very satisfied and has gained another tail.”
“I believe someone tried to snuggle struggle her, and the ones she did not devour, was most likely drained until dead. She left behind several shriveled corpses.”
“Is this true Kine?” The vixen ran straight at Niall embracing him and giving us a thumbs up. “We looked up some facts from folklore, and she ticks off most of the boxes.”
“Cool. Anyhow, these ninjas are us morons who tried to abduct me, but they couldn’t not find me apparently. Also the living sculpture here is just the result of a vindictive fairy practicing her grafting skills.”
“I would applaud her, but that thing should be put out of my misery.” Said fey came flying over to our location with a smile that went from ear to ear.
“They all deserve it, besides no one can stop me.” She stated with uttermost sincerity.
“Could we get out of here now, while I still can hold it together?”
“Okay, take care now people tower, I will probably send help, probably” The humans responded with a choir of painful moans. I was in serious need of some sort of brain bleach, any kind of substance that would wash these memories away. The little content I had in my stomach at least stayed put, but it did not stop the uncontrollable hand shaking though. On the other hand patting down my pockets left me pleasantly surprised, since all my stuff was there. Sure it was not much, but it is mine and music might just calm me down. The next room over was a stereotypical laboratory for a lack of a better description. Rows upon rows of beakers lined the tables and the shelves. A giant metallic sphere discarded energy, while various liquids was bubbling away over an in unsupervised flame.
“I wonder what they were cooking in here? I’ve yet to encounter any sort of recreational drugs.” Muttered Niall taking pictures of the scene.
“I have never heard, or seen any kind of narcotics before, so it might just be a generic research laboratory for unhinged morons.”
“We’re only missing dead pickled animals.”
“People do that?”
“Used to, it is a dying practice, but a dead snake on a glass last for a very long time.”
*Slightly less disturbing than a living sculpture made by a vindictive dust tosser.”
“She got inspired by a famous Norwegian sculptor we came across in the archive.”
Other than the remarkably mundane laboratory we entered into a dojo. Niall looked around us with his head on as swivel snapping pictures before talking.
“This looks more like an antique store or a museum, than a place to train.”
“I have never seen this many weapons before. Not only are they rare, implements of harm are also illegal to use.” I replied while marveling at the fantastic collection. Kine snagged a set of daggers, and a brass knuckle.
“The moon queen loves to control her subjects, I see. Is it because she is afraid of an armed uprising?”
“Civil society had no room for violence.”
“The Mc Dojo morons did not get that memo.”
Niall then sauntered over to a long, thick staff with a blade at one end. Like possessed he grabbed the weapon and it was instantly dissolved into glowing motes. Then a bright flash lit up the room and his sword changed shape into a longer sword on a stick. Something akin to the pole-arm he snagged off the wall. On closer inspection it was the same sword only on with a really, really long shaft.
“Did you just get an absurdly elongated shaft extension?”
“Yes, yes I did, and it’s friggin sweet. Swords are decent sidearms, but a long hard rod has more reach and penetration power.”
Jennyfer flew over with a three pronged dagger weapon and touched his elongated pole. It was instantly absorbed like the one before it, which meant business as usual.
“You can finally penetrate all the way to the bottom.”
“Just the way I like it. It will go well with my new arms.”
As I looked him over I noticed that he was symmetrical again.
“Did you amputate all those assailants in order to get a matching set of arms?”
Niall nodded sand the fairy smugly smiled before replying.
“Indeed. Which means you can lose as many limbs as you want without a worry.”
“You are not reassuring me. Also, how can you be so relaxed about switching out body parts?”
“My original arms were always a bit crap and this cuts down on strength training.” Her replied while flexing his big biceps.
“I think you went a bit overboard on there mass, it just is not attractive.”
“My fox is not complaining, which is all that matters.” She was acting like her usual alof self. One thing was on my mind though.
“So about your cursed blade, did it accept a replacement arm?”
“Yes it did, however my hands is still purple and translucent.”
“How convenient. A shape shifting sword is practical enough though. I wonder why it did not work before?” Niall frowned deep in thought, until he came up with an answer.
“I have this sneaking suspicion that I was using the wrong approach, The reason it did not do that before was the nature of the weapons I used. Things I do not anchor to this world just goes back into storage when destroyed. Seems like it can’t go into a binding contract with myself.”
“Which means you spent untold hours destroying weapons without achieving anything?”
“Yup. I did it all in the name of science, and boredom.” Believe it or not, Discussion like this help my mind to wander away from the horrors these creatures leave in my wake. I am convinced that Niall is some sort of eldritch abomination masquerading as a human, while being puppeteered by a dangerous fairy and a rainbow casting demon. Is that why they are being so obtuse about the object we are heading towards? Could it be a piece of potential power that is missing from his inner demon? Reclaiming it better fix my world, or I will be very angry. More than my usual passive aggressive behavior towards the flying fiend.
Exploring the structure further yielded little of interest aside from Niall plundering a refrigerator and a cupboard. Apparently I started off within a subterranean basement, which eventually led to a fairly generic two story building. A white one with a very fancy entrance and a big Dojo sign. While exiting the premise I flung a fire spell into the entry hall before bolting. We rapidly turned around a corner gaining fair distance from the scene.
“Like clockwork the enforcers and the magical enforcers teleport into the scene.” I stated as a matter of fact.
“Clever crustacean, you might have saved the insufferable and insignificant creatures from a fate worse than death.” Jennyfer gave me a disapproving look.
“Why do you keep doing this?”
“I realized that in this reality there is no real precaution for doing whatever I feel like.”
“What?”
“Delicious, is it not? I’m not beholden to the rules of my peers around here.” Then she began cackling maniacally. Great, just bloody fantastic. She is turning into a liability and I can not do much about it. We better get to the center soon, while there still is a world to save.
The lack of action was a good thing, since I still feel a bit uneasy on legs and queasy. Only so much body horror a man can stomach each day, before going crazy. Slightly mad is more than enough for me.
My mental musings was rudely interrupted by a splash and loud cursing.
“Did you see that Magellan? Some poor fool feel into the water?” Asked Niall taking a picture yet again.
“I almost missed that to be honest. Should we help?”
“Probably, could you throw out a vine kine?” She flashed a brilliant smile and cast out a plant based rope, which was connected to her palm. The drenched woman flailing around grabbed a hold of the construct and was slowly pulled towards the ledge. With a lot of effort and some ice related trickery, we managed to pull the waterlogged woman up.
“Thank you very much, however can I repay you?”
“By being a bit more careful, there is a distrusting lack of ladders around here.” I replied with a frown, she shook my have and began to walk anyway. In the water was several round leaves that seemed to defy logic.
“I think something is actually swimming around down there, should we be concerned?” I wondered. The fairy looked at me and scoffed. “No, no, no, just stay far away from the ledge, with your luck, some woeful and wet wight will pull you in.”
“Sara agrees, apparently wind sprites hate water.” Replied Niall resting against a nearby wall.
A moment later another splash was heard, and then another one, followed by even more. Suddenly I felt an urge to jump in as well. Until Jennyfer plugged my ears. Niall was holding on to a post, until the fairy helped him as well. The fox slammed a palm into the ground and an ice wall rose up before us. I could hear my party’s voice through my earplugs while taking in the silly scene in front of us. People where willingly jump into the water. Swimming towards something sinister.
“Here we go maggots, I’ve plugged our ears against the alluring sirens song.”
“How?” I asked on bewilderment.
“It’s not the first time I’ve been the victim of an audio attack, however it is a long story and we do not have the time to deal with that at the moment. Niall looked around us and asked a very good question. “Where are the security forces?” I scratched my jaw trying to come up with an answer, I could think of none. Which means I did the only thing I could think of that might work, spell casting. Like clockwork a gaggle of magical girls warped in close to our location. I quickly hid behind a door leading to a staircase. Niall and kine went in after me, then went to lean on the ceiling.
“Magellan, correct me if I’m wrong, but the frilly one over there looks very familiar.” I looked over the edge observing the servants pulling people out of the water. “She is the one we have in store, is she not?”
“I was afraid so. She looks familiar, right Kine?” She nodded.
“Sara agrees as well.”
Jennyfer decided to interject at that point. “Interesting, it seems that the queen had some sort of cloning operation. Does that mean they have a memory backup as well?” She began to giggle like a loon, which became a! full on maniacal cackling.
“What are you laughing about?” I asked, dreading the answer. “Cloning technology, I want it, and we’re going to procure the marvelous machine.”
“That sounds rather omnius, you sure this is a good idea?”
“Yes, yes, Yes. Now let us venture on wards and let the blue skinned magical girl that fell into the river deal with that issue.” Interfering with government work was not my plan and I am fairly certain the situation was well in hand.
Njål Signing Out
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