The Corrupted Kingdom

by Jesse Galena

  A tendril caught her leg from behind. She turned, her reflexes still sharp, readying her spear to stab it into the ground. Another caught her arm, holding her back from the thrust.

  They pulled her off her feet. Her body crashed to the ground. Her free hand clawed at the stone streets, but her fingers found no hold.

  The tendrils retracted, pulling her back at such speeds her body lifted from the ground. Her hand never found a hold, her pleas slowed her none, and her eyes, though they briefly met those of her companions, held no power in keeping the darkness from consuming her.

  The other tendrils slunk back into the cave, fading into the black. The darkness lowered, sealed behind the jaws of a massive creature, muting her cries as its lips came together. Its skin was a drab brown, covered in warts and aggravated sores. Its head was round like that of a toad, but the eyes that peered out at the two remaining people were set in its head. While its face was as wide as the entrance to the cave, they knew not how big its body was. And in their fear, they cared not to discover.

  The End of the Road

  Through marshes with dread as present and palpable as the muck, over crags that sank to depths I dared not fathom, up towers guarded by creatures comprised of stone and flesh and nightmares, and through fields where the bodies of the dead remained standing and coated in ash, I found a new fear in the network of tunnels in the mountain beneath the chapel.

  A crushing darkness spanned through it. This darkness slowed my steps and pushed the air down, forcing me to gasp harder for weaker breaths. The eldritch walls seemed to embrace it, for the wet stone would recoil when my lantern drew near. The moisture itself would bead and slide away from the flame, stopping when it was free of the light's brightest point. In my morbid fascination, I heard a muffled cry from a distant corridor echo across the stones.

  I prayed to gods I believed in and those I had abandoned, hoping one would hear my plea and offer hope and peace among such trials.

  It called out again in sorrow. An almost-human murmur was nearly lost in the powerful groan. The cry sounded disjointed, as though it were two creatures attempting to make the same noise.

  The fine steel of my rapier slid out of its sheath. Despite my fear, my hand remained loose upon its handle. Blood from the creatures I had slain still lingered on the blade. I would have to remember to clean it better this time. I drew the dagger with my other hand, readying both weapons for whatever abomination came.

  I heard the sound of it running. Clomping footsteps with an edge of softness, like massive slabs of meat slapping stone. Two by two. Duh-duh, duh-duh. Quadruped. The sounds of its mushy feet and horrid cries grew louder.

  Despite its appearance when it rounded the corner of the cave, the flame of the lantern that hung from my pack did not waver. I, in fear and shock, did.

  Hunched forward to run on all four of its limbs, it was half again as tall as I was. Mounds of rounded muscle and flopping fat rolled over each other, giving it a wide girth. Its legs were thicker than my whole body and its arms not much thinner. Its hands were far broader and thicker than any human hand could be, but they were hands nonetheless. Five fingers and all.

  A thick, dark brown coat of hair ran across its back and draped partway down its sides. Other patches of stiffer material covered portions of its pink flesh. The hair wafted as it ran, giving its bulbous appearance a strange elegance.

  The hair stopped at its neck, but not from any natural anatomy. A steel helmet, straining to keep what lay within contained, ran from its head down to its neck. The ends of the helmet splintered and coiled as its neck grew thicker. A strange, steel beak grew from the front of the neck. Above it, the helmet split. Resting on short cylinders, the helmet ended in two steel faces, as though each face wore a respectable helmet of their own. The faces were weathered, scratched, and twisted by years of neglect.

  As the creature barreled toward me, I leaped to its side. I slashed at its hand while it passed, slicing its tender flesh open.

  The initial stab sent blood arcing out from the wound. As the blade slid and the wound widened, blood poured from it.

  The creature slid to a halt. It turned ungracefully, swiping at me before it fully rotated.

  The meaty hand passed me, its clutching fingers threatening to grasp my whole body if I had stepped any slower. I plunged my dagger but struck nothing, for it moved too quickly. I regained my footing as I retracted the blade.

  With another dreadful cry, it opened its hand and swiped down at me. I dove forward, landing beneath its elbow. My lantern chipped the floor in my roll, but its sturdy design held true.

  I slid my rapier deep into its leg. The crouching monster screamed. I dragged my dagger across its flesh as I slid between its legs. While it began its lumbering turn, I gouged at it with my blade, quickly leaping back to avoid a strike.

  But as it turned and grasped the wound on its leg, I saw something I recognized on its finger: a gauntlet. Worn like a ring, the gauntlet had burst around its finger. The twisted metal had melded into its skin.

  As it faced me, I could make out the details of the solid patches of brown that clung to and bubbled from its body. When it drew close, the light revealed all. Swatches of cloth and pieces of leather hardened enough for armor protruded from its flesh. They were weathered but sturdy. Its body enveloped them as they slumped back into the folds of fat and muscle.

  Would this creature fight with the veracity of the beast it appeared to be or with the cunning ruthlessness of the person it may have once been?

  It reared up on its hind legs. Its breath stuttered in pain as it wailed. The voices emanated from inside the helmet. I saw nothing move within the small slits each helmet had for eyes and a mouth. It held nothing but an empty darkness.

  Its massive fist came down. Leaping to the side, my shoulder caught the edge of a protruding rock. Uncut, I felt my flesh begin to bruise as I tumbled back to my feet. My arm hurt as I rotated my shoulder to confirm that I still could. Satisfied with my range of motion, I thrust my sword into its leg once more.

  Blood seeped from its wounds. A person would be long dead from such lacerations, but a creature of its stature held an unsettling amount of blood. The cries that bled through the slits of its helmet grew louder and more pain-stricken. What sort of face could be contained within that helmet? What gnarled, perhaps once-humanoid, features could twist so horridly to produce that sound?

  I rolled beneath its swiping hands, continuing to move until I was out of arm's reach. With a cry of indiscernible emotion, its massive fingers plunged into the cracks around a portion of the wall. With a terrible heave, the creature ripped an oblong piece of stone from the wall. It stumbled as it clomped toward me, its bare feet making heavy slaps as they struck the stone floor.

  It whirled around, off balance as it released the giant stone. As I suspected, the creature led me. Already prepared, I stepped back, avoiding the projectile.

  The creature did not stop its rotation. As it spun toward me, it stretched out its arm. I moved to avoid it, but the size of its opened palm was too great. It struck me, launching me from the ground.

  A jagged edge of the wall crushed my ribs as I slammed it. My arm and the side of my face scraped across the wall as I slid. I was breathless as I hit the ground and struggled to stand.

  It charged toward me.

  Gripping my side, I rolled under it, raising my sword as I tumbled. I slit it from neck to belly, my sword snapping off in its chest. I jabbed the splintered end into its gut as it continued to move above me.

  It cried, bleeding profusely out of its freshest wounds. It staggered, feet and hands shuddering with each step. With cries and pain of my own, I moved deeper into the cave, away from the monster. It seemed too wounded to pursue.

  Continuing inward into the cave, I felt the wetness between my armor and body. Blood. I still couldn't breathe properly. I had a shattered rib. Maybe a few. Perhaps a deflated lung. I staggered into the cave.

  "I'm not going to die,"
I said, convinced my words had meaning. "Not here. I am going to make it out of this. If I get a bit further, I can sew this up. I can stop the bleeding. I can find it and make it back."

  I heard my words echo in the empty cave.

  As I continued into the cave and the roars of the beast faded, I saw a figure before me. It was a vision of salvation. An angel stood tall before me.

  "Help me," I said as I limped toward it, staring at her crow-like face. "I am not going to die."

  I reached up, barely able to touch her solid hand. "You can help me."

  I slid to my knees, grasping her cloak as I pleaded. "Please help me."

  Part One

  She was some tatterdemalion, a dirty woman who was desperate for food and drink. She'd lost her husband. She had no money stashed in her weathered clothes. She was living on the streets, long enough to forget for how long but not long enough to be comfortable with it. Her dismay muted her bodily needs until nearly all of her functionality failed her. Her head ached as if her brain was devouring itself, and her stomached churned within her gut as though it searched for the smallest overlooked morsel of food.

  "You," she heard a voice call out.

  She turned to see a tall woman sitting at a table with three others. She was a head taller than anyone else in the place. Her straight, blonde hair was loose, falling its full length to stop just above her hips. Leather half-gauntlets with spines protruding from them covered the tops of her hands, and each hand held a separate drink. Her smile was warm. It displayed white teeth and a bit of gum.

  "You seem in need of job," she said. "No offense."

  She turned to hear the tall woman's offer.

  "We need a pack mule," the tall woman said, raising her hands as if the statement excited her. "Nothing glamorous, but no special skills are required other than the ability to walk and hold the goods we collect. And you'll get an even cut of the goods."

  "What goods?" the battered woman asked, unsure if it even mattered to her.

  "Gold, mostly," the tall woman replied. "That's what most people pay us with. But after we get some resources together, probably in a year or so, we're going for a retirement run to the corrupted land. There we can get enough gold and treasure for all of us to live pretty for the rest of our lives. Stay true, carry the load, and you'll get an even share of that as well.

  "What do you say?" she asked, her smile growing even wider. Her honest eyes shone brighter in the silence. "Will you join us?"

  She remained silent. She stared at the tall woman's blue eyes, but not into them. Her mind was too distant and busy with thoughts of hope and uncertainty to focus on anything physical. Unable to smile, she spoke.

  "What is your name?"

  "Calazi," the tall lady replied with a reassuring grin. She stood, towering over the woman before placing one of her drinks on the bar and extending her empty hand. "What's yours?" Calazi asked.

  "Lavin," she replied.

  Epilogue

  I saw the churning clouds that circled the borders of the kingdom. I saw wildlife diminish in fear of what lay near its edges. I saw grass wither as the wind blew from that wretched place. But such things would not keep me from my quest.

  I avoided the twisting spires, for the tales from the old woman were still fresh in my mind. I saw the mountain in the distance, barely making out the tombstones and unearthed coffins that crept over the side.

  I sought the text in the chapel. I sought the holy words scribed on blessed paper by ink bled from the angels. Instead, I found blasphemous images of unholy unions and divinations of unending doom and suffering. My eyes wept blood, and my tongue made its own language as it pulled itself from my mouth. The ink of the ancient scripts sang to me, rattling the spines of their books with a siren’s song. The door to the cellar, the innermost library of eldritch texts, opened before me. More songs, constructed of words and noises mouths could not replicate, pulled my flesh from my bone, tugging me painfully toward its blackened maw.

  My eyes adjusted to the dark, and I could read the words as if they were text in the air.

  I fled; the unseen holds on my flesh tore as I ran. Blood poured from my wounds. My eyes grew weaker. The visage of the physical world faded as my body wavered from the loss of blood. The sounds returned. I saw the text guiding me back. It covered the world in the lexicon of a language I was beginning to understand. I could no longer see the ground, but I saw the words show me where to step. I could not see the sunlight, but the words forged a meaning of illumination.

  I followed them. I grew to understand their song. The words made sense to my foreign mind.

  It brought me to the deepest library, but I did not turn away from its power. I could not. My lust to understand more of those antediluvian words propelled me into a glorious tomb of knowledge.

  It will teach me everything. I will know all a mortal mind can hold. Then it shall split, and I will know more.

  About the Author

  In the blackness of the night, my mind slipped beyond the confines of mortal planes. Knitted within nightmares and dreams, I found a land where I did not obey rules, I made them. I found a place where the unconventional can become standard; a spectacle beyond what eyes can behold, but not more than the mind can comprehend. May the worlds beyond be as influential and entertaining to you as they are to me, and may I be a worthy guide.

  My wife and I enjoy collecting Halloween paraphernalia, making costumes for any occasion we can think of, playing video games, buying too many Magic: The Gathering cards, trash talking over board games, and (usually) avoiding human interaction. I enjoy anything science-related that brings us closer to Ghost in the Shell, learning about dinosaurs, and sword fighting. I absolutely love tabletop RPGs and if I could only play one kind of game for the rest of my life, it would be those.

  We live in a modest quadplex in Charlotte, North Carolina, and dream to one day expand our family by owning a few cats.

  For RPG stories and ideas, reviews, other thoughts, and an assortment of fun stuff, go to my website: RexiconJesse.wordpress.com.

  To contact me, you can email me at jessegalena@gmail.com, follow me on Twitter @RexiconJesse, find me on Goodreads, Goodreads.com/RexiconJesse, or like my page on Facebook, facebook.com/jessegalena.

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