Mausoleum of Stephan

by Januszym

A lone soldier is sent out to retrieve important documents lost during a skirmish before the enemy can get to them. Unfortunately for him the battle took place on an abandoned cemetery, where dark things dwell in shadows. This is my first story.

The Mausoleum of Stephan

Made by

It's a rainy night.

A shitty night.

Rain poured heavily on the lone soldier who walked through the battlefield. The skirmish that happened earlier during the day had taken horrible toll on St. Edgar's cemetery. Many graves have been shot up or downright decimated by the fighting and there was barely a single tombstone intact. It's hard to believe that this place used to be a tranquil patch of land once. It didn't matter to the Soldier, he had a job to do. The commander interrupted his quality time with the lads to send him out alone, in the storm, to find out what happened to the Second Platoon.

"Uppity asshole." The soldier murmured. He never liked his commanding officer. The man had an aura of arrogance around him that made standing close by an incredible feat.

The soldier started walking slowly to the bodies, lifting their helmets and checking their faces. After a long while he finally stopped, shocked by the state of one of the carcass backed up against a barely standing granite tombstone. The corpse's insignia indicated the man to be a captain, but the tremendous amount of blood made it hard to see. What grabbed the Soldier's attention wasn't the chevron, it was the way the man died. Unlike most men in the cemetery who died due to gunshot wounds or shrapnel, the Captain's torso has been brutally gored into minced meat and torn pieces of skin. Upon closer inspection he noticed that his ribs were engraved with symbols the Soldier hadn't seen before. It took him all his strength and willpower not to puke inside. He shifted his sight away and started to go through the Captain's belt and the remains of his pockets. A long search later he found out what he was looking for. In his arms he clutched a small bloodied book. This however wasn't an ordinary book, for the contents of it could topple the status quo of this war. The war that took so many lives and resources.

"So much death." The Soldier thought to himself. He's been on the frontline for so long he forgot many things. He forgot how a kiss felt, he forgot the singing of birds, but worst of all, he forgot what peace meant. There was never a day without atleast a single bullet fired since he arrived. He wished things could change. He wished to come home to his family but most importantly, he wished for some peace.

His train of thought had been interrupted when he noticed something was wrong. An unnatural fog had covered cemetery, rendering the Soldier blind of his surroundings. It made his hair stand still.

"I don't remember fog this fog being here before." The Soldier thought.

Suddenly, he saw something move in the fog. He quickly leveled his rifle at the approaching figure, feminine from the looks of it. She was slowly approaching him, making him extremely uneasy.

"Stop right there!" The Soldier shouted at the silhuette. "Identify yourself."

Nothing. The figure kept creeping up to him. When it got close enough the Soldier noticed a curved object in her right hand.

"Stop or I'll shoot!" The Soldier shouted again, hoping the figure would listen. Only thing he heard from it was a faint giggle escaping the figure's lips. Not wanting to take unnecessary risks, he fired. Only for the figure to disappear.

"What the fuck..." Were the only words the the Soldier could say before something heavy hit him on the head. He dropped on the ground instantly, the world around him becoming black.

The Soldier woke up suddenly, his head pounding. He tried to grab his head, but to no avail. A set of heavy chains kept him pinned to the stone table. He tried struggling and pulling with all his might, but it was of no use, the chain wouldn't budge. Defeated, the Soldier stopped moving and instead tried to remember what happened before finding himself strapped to some fucking stone table.

"Okay. I was sent to retrieve the intel by my asshole superior. I found the mutilated body of the Captain and grabbed the codes from him, then the fog happened and..."

Something, someone knocked him out, no doubt it was working with that silhouette.

"I'm going to have a long chat involving a bludgeon with that someone." Soldier grumbled.

"I don't think the bludgeon will be necessary." A calm feminine voice responded, causing Soldier's blood to shiver.

"This voice..." He thought. Each word spoken carried an echo with it and if you would listen closely, you could hear something akin to a moan hid behind every word.

The figure exited the shadows and stepped into the light. It was hard to make out her face due to the hood that obscured it, but it hadn't stopped him from examining the rest. Her figure was clearly feminine as shown by the way she walked and the... rich tracts of land she possessed on her ribcage. The light black robe she wore was richly decorated with all sort of heinous objects. Eerily glowing vials, skulls of small woodland critters or symbols which he never seen were proudly dangling from her belt, but what attracted his curiosity the most was the tome that she cradled in her arms. Said tome looked to be ancient, the leather cover lacking in many places and barely holding the brown pages together with the help of a black metal chain. It reminded the Soldier of that book he saw once while watching a movie with his girlfriend.

"Ekhem." The figure coughed, clearly trying to get his attention. "My eyes are up here." She said seductively. Although you could hardly call such an eerie voice seductive, she managed to pull it off.

"Hey lady, why the chains?" The man asked, completely ignoring her tone.

"For safety my dear." If there was any sarcasm in her voice, he hadn't noticed it. "We wouldn't want you to run off, now would we?"

"She's either crazy or she works for the Colonials, though I highly doubt the latter."

"I'll have you know that keeping a soldier of the Grand Warden Army captive against his will is a crime and will be treated as such." The man, now more prisoner than a soldier told her. The woman simply chuckled while looking at him.

"You're adorable when you're trying to be threatening, you know? Besides, I don't think your friends will even care about finding you." She acknowledged him, gloating as she did.

Her general behavior, choice of attire and most of all, her voice made the man extremely nervous. To be frank though, being chained to a stone god knows where with no clear way to escape and the only person around resembling either a madman or a cultist would make everyone nervous.

He swallowed before opening his mouth. "Might I know what have I done to deserve being... restrained?" Prisoner asked, his choice of words as careful to not anger his captor.

"Well." The woman started as she lowered her hood, letting a mop of long blood red hair flow freely. "I needed a man like you for quite some time."

The Prisoner was confused to say the least. "Like me? What's so fucking special about me? I'm just a grunt who survived longer than others." "Care to expand on that statement?"

Another chuckle escaped her lips, this one much lower in tone. She looked him in the eyes, the piercing emerald green meeting the two icy cold sapphire ones. It was the first occasion her captive got to see her face. It made him freeze instantly.

"Yo.. mouth?" The Prisoner asked, clearly not being able to comprehend the macabre image in front of him. The woman's small, pale face, probably once could be considered beautiful, now resembled something akin to grotesque painting of Francisco Goyas. Her mouth looked to be sewn shut first and then have the stitches removed in a brutal fashion. Droplets of blood occasionally dripped from the holes as she moved her tongue around, licking them. Most people would empty their stomachs right now and that was exactly what Prisoner tried to do. Unfortunately, being forced into lying position while facing upwards made it incredibly difficult. After a brief struggle with his own digestive track he finally managed to contain the situation and mutter few words.

"What happened to you?" Was all he could muster.

The woman grinned from ear to ear as she heard those words, creating an even more disgusting image to haunt his dreams.

"You like it?" She asked, her voice mischievous and seductive both. "I can make one for you, if you so desire. My Master had shown me." She ended the sentence with a hint of pride.

"Your master must be a great with the needle then." Prisoner sarcastically said.

Little did he know, he should not have said that.

In a span of a few seconds something flashed through his view, horrible pain following closely behind. The woman now brandished a curved blade of dark brown metal, an unnatural green glow emanating from it, but he hadn't noticed. The feeling of hot red liquid flowing all over his left cheek took all of his attention.

"FUCKING BITCH" The Prisoner screamed. He tried to cover his bleeding cheek with his hand, but the chains once again denied him.

"NEVER MAKE FUN OF MY MASTER AGAIN!" The woman shouted, clearly furious about slandering her mentor's name. She was preparing herself to strike him with the blade again, this time aiming for the throat. But before she could deliver the killing blow a hand reached out to stop her.

"ALICIA!" An unnatural sounding voice reverberated across the room. Unlike the woman's voice which only hid a barely noticeable trail of something else this one was closer to a cacophony of tortured beings, all screaming together to create a mere excuse for a word . It was haunting. And beautiful in a weird way.

"M..m..Master?!" The woman, now known as Alicia shouted in surprise. "You're..."

"Barely able to move as you see. Even with runes you carved out I have a hard time controlling this carcass." He turned himself in the direction of the now wounded Prisoner. "Why did you cut him?"

Alicia stood silently in place, the blade hid in the robe. "He was slandering your name master. I had to punish him." She said uneasily.

"I see." He said as he approached the bleeding man, before carefully placing one hand on his face. When he made sure that the hand was positioned right over the injury he began chanting.

The horrible pain started fading away as a sense of tranquility overcame him. The sequence of syllables wasn't said any language Prisoner has ever heard. It closely resembled German, yet was strangely different at the same time. To make matter worse, the distorting echo that followed every word wasn't helpful in the slightest.

The chanting kept up for several minutes and the pain was becoming less horrifying with every second of it. Finally the Prisoner felt the hand moving away from his face, followed by silence. The agony he felt just a moment ago was nothing more than a distant memory. He tried to open his mouth and thank whoever stopped that crazy bitch and healed him, but he was unable to. He tried speaking again to find that his lips wouldn't move. The sudden realization drove him into panic. He opened his eyes and...

The Captain. Over him towered the same dead man he found on the cemetery, both his eyes and the weird markings glowing an opulent shade of rotten green.

"Impossible!" The Prisoner shouted internally. "I checked the man's pulse. HE WAS DEAD!"

"So was I" The corpse said, causing him to freeze in fear. "I am nothing more but a vessel for something more." He lowered his head to stare straight into the Prisoner's eyes. "And soon you too will share this fate."

"MMMHHM!" The Prisoner tried to object, but his mouth once again refused to open.

The corpse grabbed his jaw rather violently. "Now now." It said. "We wouldn't want to cause another injury on such pretty face, now would we?" He looked at the woman, reminding the Prisoner of her existence "Alicia."

The woman shifted uneasily. "Yes Master?"

"The vial please." He pointed at a small pouch hanging from her belt. "And open the tome."

Alicia gasped. "B.. master. We'll do the ritual here?"

The carcass chuckled silently. "Of course not my dear." He looked at the wriggling prisoner again. "We'll need to move him first."

"O..of course master."

"MOVE ME?! WHERE!? I WANT NO PART IN THEIR FUCKED UP PLANS! I NEED TO GET OUT!" The Prisoner thought. The sheer mention of anything closely related to dealing with these two made him increasingly scared about matters of his life and sanity. If only he could get out of those blasted chains.

"You'll see in due time my friend." He heard the corpse say, voice devoid of emotions. "And don't think about escaping those chains. I made sure they'll contain the strongest of men easily."

"Fmmkmm yhmmmu" The Prisoner managed to blurt out despite being gagged using some vile tricks. He quickly decided it was a mistake however, when a fist impacted his face with terrible force, just barely not destroying his nose.

"Language!" The dead body shouted clearly irritated by words his captive used. "People these days are so vulgar, wouldn't you say Alicia?"

"Yes master. Very immature too." The woman agreed. It was strange, to be honest. The very same person that acted so spunky before was gone in a flash when the Captain made his existence known. It hadn't felt right to the man. The Corpse emanated a chilling aura that caused every hair on his back to stand on end.

"Enough of mocking around." The Corpse declared, grabbing the blood red vial. He looked at the Prisoner and snapped his fingers, allowing the man to regain control of his mouth.

"Drink up." It said as it forced the opened vial between his lips. The substance carried a distinct metallic taste and despite probably lying in a pouch for God knows how long it was hot, burning even. He hadn't tried to stop it, for he knew it would do nothing. With the last droplets of the potion gone from the bottle, the corpse straightened itself and brought out the bayonet from his belt, quickly slashing at his palm.

"Alicia." It said to the woman, not bothering to turn its head. "Begin."

She started going through the pages quickly, her focused eyes searching. After a short while the swooping of pages stopped signaling that Alicia found what she was after. A small smirk appeared on her face. It wasn't a pretty sight to see.

The chanting began. It was again in this alien language the Prisoners couldn't understand, and somehow the supernatural echo in her voice becoming more apparent with each word.

" Remmi rüf thcielleiv redo ethcöm se hci eiw egnal os rüf ,Driw redef enie eiw thciel os rim rov tkejbo seseid sad os ,Nehcam uz gignägkcür ehcsnüw settog mu tfark eid rim big ,Negidnebel ned tim Negidnebel eid ,netot ned tim netot eid."

The Prisoner watched as her eyes and hands became engulfed in sickly green flame, which quickly began to spread. First it overcame the tome, then her robe and at last the stone table he was chained to. The woman grinned, her mouth becoming once more bloody. With a flick of her palm every object, the fire touched became airborne, including herself. She looked at her "Master" and found an approving look on his face.

"Well done." It said, examining the now lifting hunk of stone. "You've made progress since the last time."

"Thank you master."

The Master grabbed the flying tome and flipped a few pages, his eyes focused. He too started chanting in that unknown language, only his chanting was quiet. So quiet in fact, that Prisoner could not hear it. Not that he could of course. The panic attack caused by seeing his prison catch flames effectively made him cut off from the outside world. When it was finished, a small purple orb appeared in its free hand. The carcass walked up to the prisoner and pressed the orb where his heart was located, causing the Prisoner to scream in pain. A surge of electricity erupted throughout his body, shredding nerves and burning hair and ultimately causing him to fall into unconsciousness.

"Bring him into the main chamber. I'll join you soon." The Corpse said to the woman.

"Yes master." She obediently answered before leaving with the now unconscious man on the levitating table.

The corpse straightened itself out, grabbed the same bayonet it used before and looked into its reflection. The man's features weren't pretty by any means. A shaggy beard, a broken nose and a multitude of scars adoring it's face would give children nightmares at night. It wasn't worth keeping a body like that. He situated the bayonet by the neck and without hesitation, sliced. Yet instead of blood, only stale air came forth. The eerie flames in his eyes disappeared as he collapsed, his legs turning to dust along with the rest of his body. Somewhere deep inside the complex, a scream of agony was heard.

Darkness.

It was all he could see. After losing his consciousness to a surge of electricity they moved him somewhere else. Somewhere horrid. There was no sound, no light and no smell. It seemed his captors decided to prolong his misery by keeping him locked up in a room full of nothing.

"This is a great fucking day." He said, breaking the silence. "An asshole of a Commander sends me out alone to get kidnapped by a fucking psycho and a dead man returned to life. WHAT AN AMAZING DAY IT WAS!" He screamed with fury. He wanted to break free, to get back into the camp, to forget what transpired here but most of all he wanted to take revenge. He wanted to snap the neck of his commanding officer, the woman who slashed his face and everyone that caused him to abandon his previous life.

His murderous train of thought has been derailed by a sound of doors opening. Inside came the woman a torch in one hand and a small urn in the other. She was smiling as usual causing the prisoner to feel even more anger towards her. Oh what he wouldn't give to rip head off and defecate down her neck. She placed the urn on the ground and removed the lid, causing the man to look inside. What he saw inside made his blood freeze.

In front of him lay a rotten, beating heart. God knows how long was it there, but if it was never removed from the urn which probably predated the whole complex altogether. She took the organ out of the container and held it out like some kind of relic.

"Beautiful is it not?" She asked him, entranced by the organ. "The heart of Stephan."

"Who?" The man asked, baffled.

"The man who will stop the pointless war that's happening all around."

The Prisoner chuckled upon hearing that.

"What's so funny?" The woman asked, arm reaching inside of her robes.

"You know." The Prisoner started. "I don't think a rotten piece of meat can stop two superpowers duking it out for so long."

Her arm retracted from the robe. She grinned at him with the same disgusting smile.

"That's why we need you." She said.

"You keep talking about how you need me and all..." He spat on the ground before continuing. " you need me, that corpse needed me but I honestly don't get why. I'm just a simple soldier."

"You want to know?" She asked him vexatiously.

"Yes. Yes I fucking do." She answered, aggravated by his lack of knowledge.

She showed him the organ. "This isn't just an ordinary heart my dear. It belonged to a great man known by the name of Stephan the Facilitator. You must have heard about him."

He tried to remember anything regarding that name, but nothing seemed to pop up.

"I don't think I did."

Her expression turned serious for the first time since they met. "You've never heard about the most powerful ruler in history of these lands?"

"Nope."

"Are you an actual imbecile?" She asked, amazed by what she heard.

"Not really." He answered." I just don't like history that much."

She sighed. "Too bad. You simply don't know who's going to possess your body. A shame really."

Prisoner froze for a moment. "POSSESSED?!" He shouted. "HOW EVEN?! Possessions aren't real."

"Oh really?" The woman asked sarcastically. "Then what about your friend from earlier hmmm? You won't tell me he simply shrugged off getting his belly torn open by me and decided to switch sides, do you?"

"You did this to him?"

"Of course I did! He was the only man left alive and master needed to bait you out." She explained. "So I waited for him to contact his friends and then slit him open. You would be surprised how well I can mimic other people's voices." She said with a lot of pride.

"You're a sick fucking animal, you know that?" Prisoner told her, disgust evident in his voice.

The woman cackled at the remark. "You're really adorable, it's a shame Master needs you for his plans. I wouldn't mind having such a funny pet." She said the last part rather seductively. "But enough of fun. It's time to get to work!" She brought out her knife and raised it over her head in a flash, aiming for the heart.

"MAY THE SOUL THAT I FREE ACCEPT THE VESSEL BEFORE IT!" She shouted, bringing the burning blade down.

The heart exploded in a fiery inferno, knocking back the woman and her knife with green flames, which started spreading near instantly. Soon the dark room was enveloped in eldritch fire, changing the place. The walls started phasing out of existence, paving the way for a great burning field ridden with carcasses of both men mutilated in ways most foul. Yet that wasn't what scared the Prisoner the most, oh no. Over those bodies walked a creature out of this world. The green flames of eldritch energies covered him from head to toe, spreading to every dead body he walked over. Yet this wasn't the worst thing. The worst thing was that the creature walked towards both people. Terrified he looked over at the woman, only to find her kneeling on the ground, praying in that incomprehensible language of hers.

Panic struck the heart of the Prisoner once more. He knew that whatever the creature wanted from him wasn't good. But he couldn't escape. For each time he pulled the chain, the chain became twice as much force. For every time he tried to squirm his hand, the braces became twice as tight as before. After a couple of tries he was effectively frozen in place, not being able to move his arms or legs.

In his erratic behavior he failed to notice that the apparition stood before him, taller than any creature he had seen. Without a warning it grabbed him by the throat, pinning it to the stone. It spoke something in the same profane language as before, pointing at his heart. The Prisoner suddenly felt pain, a horrid pain that slowly started expanding throughout his body, numbing his senses. It first crippled his chest, then his arms and legs and at last his head. The last thing the Prisoner saw before his demise was the creature's face, adorned with a predatory grin.

It was his face.

Two men in green uniforms walked slowly through the night, rifles safely on their shoulders. They were on patrol duty, a day like any other for them. Scout the Cemetery Junction and go back to HQ for happy hour. Or so they thought. One of them stopped and urged the other one to do the same.

"Do you smell it?" He asked his companion, searching around for something.

"Smell what?" The other one inquired. He inhaled deeply, his lungs filling with air. There was a certain stench in the air, as if something decomposed not long ago.

The terrain around them was slowly becoming more and more engulfed in fog, sending shivers down their spines. The first soldier grabbed his rifle from his shoulder and readied it against the place where the fog was the thickest, confusing his comrade.

"There's something out there." He said, looking at a direction of the cemetery.

"Are you sure?" His companion asked, earning him a nervous glare.

The man's behavior caused him to shift uneasily in place. He decided not to take any chances and prepared his own weapon.

"Attention whoever's out there! Come out immediately or we will shoot." He shouted, a fake courage present in his voice.

Something was wrong. The rotting stench became more and more powerful with each second. They surely weren't alone.

Suddenly, a small silhouette appeared in the fog, slowly walking towards them. They took aim in unison, not willing to take any chances. After a short while the figure emerged from the fog, presenting itself to both men.

It was a woman, that much they could tell. Her face was obscured under a hood made from black wool. She reached into her robe, causing both soldiers to aim for her head. It earned both of them a small giggle.

"What's so funny." One of them asked, confused by her actions.

She brought out something small from her robe. Upon closer inspection it turned out to be a bloodied cross made from two femur bones tied together. Upon closer inspection one could see weird marking all over the bones.

She pointed the cross at the ground beneath two men. "Feast." She said.

What happened next no one could have predicted. The ground beneath the two had burst open, rotten bodies attacking them. The sudden surprise attack caught the completely unaware, allowing the undead horrors to pin them to the ground and devour quickly. As their flesh was being torn from their bones and their screams filled the air of the night, the woman in front of them laughed. She laughed and laughed until the two men were nothing more than shredded meat and bitten bones. She pointed the cross behind her causing the undead creatures to walk in that direction. When the last carcass disappeared beyond the mist she walked up to the mangled bodies, an ancient tome in hand. She began chanting in language long forgotten, eldritch energies gathering around the bodies. The chanting continued for few minutes, causing the air around her to become energized. When she was finished, two long chains of ethereal chains of green flame shot out from her right hand, impacting the bodies. A horrible shriek pierced through the air as their souls were forcefully inserted into their decaying bodies. The corpses stood up, ethereal chains dissipating into the fog around. The two men stood up, green flames enveloping their glassy eyes.

The figure pointed her symbol in the same directions as before, causing the corpses to obediently start walking.

"Master will be pleased." The woman said to herself, content with the prey she caught today.

Unknown to her, a figure wearing a dark grey jacket with a gasmask saw the whole thing from a tree it was situated on.

"I have to warn Bear." It thought, waiting for the three figures under him to disappear.

It was a very interesting for Chatter to say the least.