I'll admit it. I really had no idea what to expect when I saw those coffins. I expected the two demons to appear, yes. Maybe bring their bodies to life as undead rotting puppets to kill me, or perhaps drain the life out of me. Even torture. Through everything I had come across, I had thought that there were no more surprises that could shock me. I really did.
How wrong I was.
One of the coffins had just been opened. The one with the Mengyans body from so long ago. Part of me rightfully yelling out that this was a trick, yet another half told me to look inside. But in my moment of distraction, nothing happened, at least at first. Nothing rose out of the coffin. No-one moved a muscle. Not me nor the two spirits above. Instead they waited patiently. It was worrying.
Still tempted however, I slithered forwards and dared to look inside.
I was... well, shocked? Disturbed? About the only things that I felt racing around within my head. What else could I feel?
It was hard to understand what exactly it was that I was staring at, but it clicked after a few seconds. It was a skeleton of the mengyan when she was still alive. Her body. That much was clear, but it was more than that. Of all things that I thought that she could have been when she had a body. A thief, a murderer, anything would have been easier to swallow than what I could now see. Of all things, this was one that never crossed my mind. Not ever. Even a glimmer or a passing thought.
The thing about the skeleton, the only thing about it, was that it wasn't deformed, mutated or anything so twisted. It wasn't even moving. It was a normal skeleton. But the one thing that did disturb me. It was the size of it.
It was smaller than I expected. Almost the size of a child. And spirits don't exactly age when their bodies die.
That thought rattled round in my head. Maybe four feet tall but clearly held the characteristics of a child. To think, I had spent the last few days feeling nothing but anger and hate towards a sadistic killer, only to just now discover that it had been a kid this entire time. It shook me. Stronger than everything else that had been thrown my way. Did it change anything? Some things, yes. She was still a dangerous killer. And whether she had matured through the centuries I didn't know, but she was still technically a kid.
"My god..." I unintentionally let escape my mouth. The words were loud enough to trigger a response.
"God?" The mengyan asked blankly. "The gods did not cause my untimely death. The living did. Those who caused my suffering earned their own. Surely you bore witness to that passing through the once powerful city? Where spirits linger but never ascend? You can thank Bàojūn for invoking such wrath upon Talios and all who lied within the safety of its once great walls..."
The second spirit spoke.
"Bàojūn was a monster, that much could be seen. But you, sister? You are so much more..."
"Even now, you torment me with your lectures..."
"And yet you never listen. As ignorant now as you were mortal..."
The Mengyan twitched. She looked angry. Angrier than I had ever seen her. I worried that the other spirit had crossed a line.
"I am more than any weak mortal. And I shall prove it."
Without warning, the Mengyan grabbed the second spirit by the shoulders. Something she looked surprised about and struggled against. She couldn't break her grip.
"Too long have you kept me from my fate. Too long I have tolerated your persistence. No more. It is time to deal with the both of you once and for all..."
"What are you- AAAAAAAHHHHH!"
A blinding light consumed the two. Bright enough for me to cover my eyes. The scream the second spirit made was the last thing I heard before... nothing. When the light vanished, blinding darkness remained. I could see everything around me earlier, meaning that now it was darker than it naturally should have been. Yet the temperature had dropped even more so.
I slithered back from the coffin, trying to avoid the bones of the spirits victims. That's when... SHE spoke.
"Where do you think you're going?"
That voice. It was clearly the Mengyans. But it sounded... broken. Glitchy even. It boomed through the empty cave and echoed. I tried my own luck at speaking.
"What did you do to her?"
"As you've bared witness to snake, a spirit can absorb and take over the consciousness of a living soul. It already happened to you and those you care about. But when a spirit tries with another spirit..."
The cave brightened slightly. Out of nowhere, a hideous odor assaulted my nostrils. Like something was rotting. When I looked in front of me, it was obvious where it was coming from.
Viewing her all at once, I nearly yelled out in shock. Where before the spirit was... a spirit, she was now tattered and rotting. Like a body left to decompose for a few weeks. Very little brown fur could be seen clinging onto the muscular structure underneath. Where her front paws were, now rested a massive claw on the left and a writhing mass of long thin tentacles on the right. Her face, now made up of two, crocodile-like skulls. One formed the top part of her head while the other acted like a jaw bone. More bloody tentacles could be seen pouring through them, past the rotted broken teeth and through the eye holes. Every bit of the abomination struggled to control its body, but it quickly stopped writhing. The skulls looked at me, forming something of a wicked grin.
"You thought I was a monster before...?"
The clawed hand raised upwards, ready to strike.
"You've seen nothing yet..."
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Another chapter done. A short one I'm afraid but least it's a good cliffhanger, right ^^?. The next one will be a bit lengthier so hang in there. Cheerio!