Descent
They called it the Black Maw for a reason. Further beyond Hollowform it lied, yet another cliff face. Sharp stalagmites jutted out of the sides of a gaping hole of surprising magnitude, like fangs on a beast. This was where the Fall had truly begun. Amongst the city of dragons, deep below the surface. Light went to die there, even before the calamitous events. If the moles were still around today, they'd enjoy the darkness.
They probably still did too. Those shifters, while having met their demise long ago, favoured it, for then there was the element of shock. After all, shifters came in all shapes and sizes.
Godric peered back. Khalida had bid him farewell after stocking up his supplies. A worn satchel by his side, a map and quill for marking down his environment as he explored, a rusty lantern without fuel, and a small compass to point him north toward Hollowform if he ever had the need to come sprinting back. He didn't feel he'd ever see the faded settlement again, though. It was all a short-lived memory, and so was the cheetah. Just another person to forget about. She'd be forgotten like the shifters dying to his claw.
A sharp wind caught him off-guard; he shivered restlessly. He stirred from his position. If there was one thing good about delving into the dirt miles below him, it would be that the winds would stop enjoying their constant attack on his spine. He'd had just about enough of the surface.
Godric kicked a small pebble from the top of the cliff face, attempting to discern the distance from his position to the bottom of the Black Maw. He waited an eternity, yet he never heard the stone clack against the bottom of the mouth.
He looked back once more. It'd be the last time he'd see the surface in a while. Not that there was much to see. The gloom, the featureless stone, the scattered remains of the long deceased. In spite of the ghastly chill, he felt he'd miss it. All this way, and now to dive into the bottom of the world, into the abyssal plain awaiting him.
He turned back. Closing his eyes, he leaped backwards, allowing whatever lay at the bottom to cushion his fall.
A crack, reverberating against the stone jaw. A mangled, limbless form. His bones slotted themselves back together, grinding. His organs, once entirely ruptured, replaced by ones created new.
The pain he felt across his form pulsed with an agonising, constant thumping. After so many dives into the unknown, he'd become accustomed to the agony such a painful landing produced, though. It was better than floating for hours, only to tire himself, and trying to control himself without source of light would end in him colliding with the ground at a force similar to this.
He fumbled in the darkness. Stories told of dragons with the ability to breathe fire, and a vast variety of other elements. He'd never seen it himself; all myth and superstition, he believed. If anything, the supposed elements were washed away by the emptiness flooding the Black Maw, or they'd descended with the Fall. He wished he had that fire at this moment.
Minutes of clutching onto rocky walls passed, and he felt an exit. A faint echo came from the direction he faced, more stones being kicked along. Tiny feet scuttling amongst the dirt and rock. Not the feet of the shifters; more bug-like.
His horns scraped along the ceiling. One already lay halved atop his crown, and the others were in the process of breaking down. Smashed under the Collector's mallet. The pain. A small price to pay for the amulet, though. It was the single thing he desired, and only to part with his appearance was nothing.
There was a hiss. Something coiled around his leg, but he was quick to pulverise it beneath his paw. Sticky, the creature was. A fluid coursed down his leg, winding. He couldn't tell what, but he had a fair idea.
He peered down, a faint glow attracting his eyesight. The creature was bright. Yet another glowworm, now splattered against his leg. Quite big, he realised; the varieties down here were feeding on those bloating mushrooms, clearly. Nice texture, bad aftertaste.
Godric pulled the lantern from his side, applying the ooze to it instead. He saw more clearly, for the first time, the muzzle of the endless tunnel before him, opening into a room of surprising size. Moving forth with speed he never utilised, he took off into the caves, for the first time excited, if only slightly.
A staircase descended by his side; shattered stone slabs, faint yellow in colour. Unless his lantern was distorting his vision, they were a remnant of Warfang. The outline of a spire in the centre was distinguishable, affirming his beliefs. Warfang had been merely a few hundred yards from Hollowform, but the great dragon city had been swallowed by the calamity in the sky, and Hollowform had been made long after that. This tower stood still, frozen in time, despite its clumsy angle.
He noted the figures resting atop its fragmented peak, next to a contraption resembling a lever. Shifters. Their golden eyes were visible beneath the cave's inky cloak. They stared straight at him, but didn't bother to make a move. Funny, they were. None looked the same, they all had different personalities, but they way they shambled mindlessly about and the tasks they continued to perform despite the Fall made them unintelligent. Like the Husk themselves, they were yet more husks. These ones were watchmen.
"They're but shadows of their former selves, that clichéd line goes," he murmured to himself. He felt the same applied to himself at times.
The shifters turned away from him, facing each other, mumbling about something from the obnoxious sounds their little traps produced. Pointless garbage, no doubt. If a shifter ever spoke, it was always of incomprehensible gobbledegook. It probably all meant something at some point, though. Back when Warfang stood tall, the proudest city built by those moles.
He paced down the staircase, and around the spire in the middle when he reached it. He spotted an outcropping at the edge of the area, yet a strange set of mechanical spikes blocked the way in a circle carved into the stone wall. His paws couldn't tear them out, not with his strength. A large creature like him was nothing without a decent meal.
There was no other way through, he realised. Behind that gate was where his destination stretched on. Coincidentally, he'd seen a gizmo at the top of the spire earlier. He exhaled, made the walk back to the spire, and began treading up the slabs.
The spire's decrepit spiral staircase cracked and cried for mercy beneath his paws. Nobody had walked on them in a long time. The shifters hadn't moved an inch since their placement there. Placing a paw to the wall showed they were brittle with age, caving in and revealing the bare insides. A soot covered his claws. Warfang, once strong, now having fallen apart by the seams. Its residents had suffered a fate akin to this spire long ago.
How long had it been, he asked himself whilst moving up those steps. It wasn't like there was anyone to tell him.
This time didn't matter, he remembered. The only time that mattered was time spent reaching the Husk.
He stopped, a figure standing below him, small and juvenile. A child, if not for the golden glow. Its eyes were more expressive than most – a sadness lingered within them, but he wasn't fooled by its artificial nature.
"H-Have you seen N-Necahual, Daddy? Sh-She was right here."
Godric pushed it to the side. He reached the top of the steps, and forgot the shifter was there immediately.
The shifters looked at him again, but didn't pay him any mind. He set the lantern down when he noticed a pack next to one of the bearded shifters. It was more ancient than the others, more of a skeleton than the rest of them, yet its hair grew wildly anyway. The others seemed to be missing any sort of fur.
Godric rummaged through the leather pack, finding nothing useful. Bread moulded by age, but nothing of worth. Once more, the shifters didn't pay him attention, unlike most. He shrugged, reaching for the lever next.
A screech, like that of a banshee's, pierced his eardrums, and swiftly he found a mangled jaw attempting to shred his paw up. He grated his fangs before kicking it off with a sudden jerk of movement. The others stood, screaming and carrying on.
He didn't allow them the first move; his tail caught a shifter rushing towards him, claws outstretched. Its brickle body disintegrated under his tail spike. The stench of shifter blood filled Godric's nostrils. He tasted it on his tongue, whatever was left of the contents of his stomach desiring an escape.
Bone crumbled to dust beneath his agility, and it was barely any time at all before they'd been dispatched. He breathed a sigh, wiped the crimson trailing down his arm away, and pulled the lever.
There was no sound, not from the gate nor the lever. No click. Of course, he'd expected the lever to open the spikes protruding from the ground, but the electricity once coursing around the streets of Warfang was no longer there.
He shrugged, now clueless as to what to do. No way forward. The gate simply had to land in a place that made the rest of the cave inaccessible. It'd take forever to bend that thick steel he'd seen.
He lifted the glowing lantern again and noticed a vague form on the ground next to the lever. Two pudgy arms and legs, and a soft stomach. A plush toy, one that looked like a child. Intrigued, he lifted it to eye level.
It would've been cute, the sopping, miserable little thing. A child probably had it. All these shifters were once denizens of the Dragon Realms. The particular kid who owned this was no different.
A gentle bump against his flank alerted him, but only when he turned to see a kid did he lay down his guard. Not hurting anyone. As innocent as a child. Even with those keen fangs, she seemed harmless.
"H-Have you seen N-Necahual, Daddy? Sh-She was right here," it said again.
He peered at the plush, then back at it. Softly, he set the toy in its outstretched paws. A smile spread across its mouth. It nuzzled and hugged its little companion.
Even he found himself smiling over the kid's happiness, however fake it was. Soon, it waddled off, back down the stairs, to wherever its home stood.
Somehow, making the long deceased happy made him feel the same.