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Star-Spawned Horror
A void, a void of shadow dotted with purple stars and light, all spiraling from a point in the far-off distance. "Where are we?" Vesli hissed, his every instinct screaming at him to get out now while he could, that something very bad would be there soon.
"I don't know," Caillot muttered, the Occultist trying to step forward only to move far more than he apparently intended, gravity not working as it should in this endless night, "I never even heard of anything like this." Caillot seemed more panicked about that than anything else as Aela grabbed his ankle and pulled him back down.
"A way in means a way out," Bird nodded at her own logic, mask bobbing in a way that could be considered comic in a different situation, "Just have to find it." The others murmured noises of assent, picked a direction and set out. It didn't take long for Vesli to realize two distinct things about the realm they had fallen into. The first was that they had to stay focused to avoid floating off, if their minds wandered then their bodies would follow suit. The second was no matter how far and no matter what direction they traveled, the void stayed the same. The center of the spiral never moved closer or farther away, the fog banks stayed exactly the same in shape and distance. Only the twinkling purple stars changed but they did that regardless of whether the group moved or not.
Vesli worked to calm Rir as they walked, his bestial partner's every snarl telling him to grab the pack and run, that something far worse than they were was close by and didn't like them intruding in its territory.
Caillot spent the entire time clutching his cauldrons and skull focus, muttering prayers and pleading with the Beast that he worshiped.
Bird never stopped writing notes, looking about at the void with the intent of a scientist who had the chance to answer questions nobody even knew could be asked.
Aela however was near frantic, the superstitious woman shaking, her eyes flitting left and right at the practically unchanging landscape around them, "AAAAAARGH!" The Hellion finally screamed out, dropping her glaive and falling to her knees as she and her weapon floated "I can't take this anymore! I-"
A piercing shriek cut her off, the sound resembling a pig being tortured as Vesli jumped out of his own skin, Rir taking his place instantly. "Not good," Bird muttered as she traded her journal for a bomb, "That sounds very not good."
Growling, Vesli sniffed the air, almost hurling as he recoiled, the stench of death and putrid rotting flesh assaulting his sensitive snout, the screeching growing louder as the group finally saw the source. It towered over even Rir, charging like an ape, writhing tentacles lashing out in search of items to grab, a multitude of unblinking eyes dotting its face as the rotted flesh around it's muzzle pulled away to reveal a mouth like a horse, spines dotting its back as its gaze locked onto them.
"Aela get up," Caillot urged as Bird began to frantically throw bombs at the new horror, all of them knowing the basic rule of the Hamlet being: 'If it has tentacles, it wants to eat you'. The Occultist gave Aela a frantic look. "We need you!" Knowing if that thing got in close at the very least Aela was done for Vesli and Rir let out a savage roar, drawing the creatures attention as they charged, their gate unsteady in the strange environment of this hellscape.
Almost lazily, the creature backhanded him away with one of its large front tentacles, moving through the void like a squid through water, its mouth snapping at him hungrily as it followed after him. Forcing himself to stop flying back through the ether, Vesli lashed out slamming the chains stilled attached to Rir's wrists to strike the shambling horror in the face as it reared back, outraged that anything had dared hurt it. Instincts screaming, man turned beast dodged, just barely avoiding a cloud of noxious green gas as the beast reared up, expelling the cloud from its mouth and pockets on its stomach.
From the congealing pockets of the cloud small tentacled creatures began to form, like plants from the gardens of Tartarus itself. Snarling, Vesli glared at the trio of enemies, a still nervous Aela taking her place beside him as Bird prepared a stronger bomb and Caillot began his incantations.
"Killing your fears good way to overcome them," Bird supplied helpfully to the slightly shaking Hellion, "Bombs are helpful, things don't like explosions. Most also can't live without their head."
"Good advice," Aela grinned, her shakes slowly becoming weaker as she now had something she could fight to focus on rather than the swirling abyss. Grunting, Vesli grabbed the barbarian and hurled her at the small tentacled demons, allowing Rir to charge a moment later. Rir snarled as he grabbed the closest of the small tentacles summons and began to savage it apart, crushing it in the beast's powerful jaws. Pushing past the pain of its barbed tentacles gouging furrows in his face, Rir finished crushing the tiny monster, spitting its corpse out as Aela hacked at the other smaller one.
Turning to kill the big Tentacle-Fucker, he was met with a green cloud as the beast screeched again, the cloud once more settling and growing more tiny monsters. Coughing, Vesli wretched, the cloud filling him with a sense of wrong, his intestines churning at the horrid feeling left behind. He was forced from his bile induced daze when one of the tiny beasts waddled its way over and lashed out with the tentacles, cutting into his flesh as he and Rir howled, their claws cutting into the soft larval flesh of the creature while Aela began strangling hers with her bare hands.
The screech of the Shambler announced another wave of the toxic cloud, it was only Caillot's tentacles grabbing him and Aela that saved them from breathing in more of the demon birthing gas. Quickly, Bird began pouring medicine down his and Aela's throat, muttering about dissecting this tentacle beast, possibly while it was still alive.
Seeing Caillot smash the two newest summoned tentacle beasts together Vesli growled, irritated that they kept being made. "It keeps making more. Like Necromancer skeletons. Focus on big one, then kill tiny pests," Bird deduced as she threw a bomb of poison made from Rir's bile into the eyes of the massive shambling horror as it screeched and flailed, not able to properly aim its cloud this time.
Vesli charged at the temporarily blinded beast, ignoring the small forming tentacle demons as he slashed and bit at the big one's rotted hide, quickly giving up on biting after the first piece of rotted flesh touched his tongue. He could do without the taste of decay in his mouth, thank you very much.
As the man clawed and Aela slashed the tiny tentacles continued to lash at their backs and the big one kept screeching, swinging its giant arm like tentacles to attempt to crush them, only the relatively slow speed of the ten-foot demon keeping them alive.
Vesli's scream eclipsed any that the monster they faced produced, a result of the barbed tentacle of the small tentacle creature piercing through the back of his knee, drawing out blood as Vesli looked back to see the horror had grown bigger. Aela had drawn forth her belt knife and was hacking at the tentacles embedded in her legs, eyes like black dinner plates.
"Vesli!" Bird was at his side in an instant, stabbing at the creature attempting to render his knee obsolete, Aela having almost gotten rid of the tentacles embedded in her own leg. "Iah!" Rir tried to warn the doctor away, her gaze too intent on the tentacles within him, but he was too late. With yet another screech, the Tentacle-Fucker brought down its giant arm tentacle on Bird, her scream clawing at Vesli's ears as he saw her flung away, her arm bent in a way that shouldn't be possible, the sound of breaking glass and bone mingling as cracks lightninged through her lenses. Neither Vesli nor Rir could even tell if she was moving.
Roaring, both charged, dragging the surprised little monster with them as they pushed through the pain and slammed into the chest of the giant monstrosity, clawing at it with blood induced fury. A yelp tore through Rir's lips when his arms were grabbed by the tentacles spouting from the beast's face, the multitude of tendrils wrapping around his wrists, his throat, his face, even his horns. Frantically Vesli began to struggle, attempting to break out of its grip as its biting jaws drew ever closer, the tentacles squeezing tighter and tighter as he was forced to stare into those red eyes.
His head began to swim, unable to look away from those eyes as the corners of Vesli's vision began to turn black, light and clarity flickering in and out. The snap of one of his horns being broken off barely fazed the man as his body struggled to stay alive, Vesli's throat unable to even draw in a breath around the vice of tentacles around his neck and the beast's mind pushing against his own. Its thoughts were alien, beyond his own understanding.
Why even fight Vesli lamented as he hung there limply, his fading vision almost entirely filled with the mouth of the horror before him I can't win. He could feel himself shrinking from Rir back to Vesli, the tentacles tightening even further around his neck, more moving from where his horns had been to squeeze his torso. Crack after crack signaled the damage to his rib-cage. His mind vaguely noticed Aela trying to hack at the tentacles with her glaive, Bird being attended to by a frantic Caillot.
Why do they even fight? Vesli could feel himself dying as some tentacles left his chest to grab Aela's glaive, snapping the weapon before the Hellion was brought beside him, her own struggles and gasps fading slowly as she was forced to stare into its eyes. Why…even… everything was a dark fading blur, but one sound clearly pierced through, a scream of undeniable rage.
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Bird on the ground, mask cracked, arm broken, shoulder broken, ribs broken, unconscious or dead.
Vesli, strangled in the grip of this horror, one of the horns of the fearsome Rir broken off and kept in the demon's grip like a trophy.
Aela, her struggles growing weaker and weaker as she was given the same treatment as Vesli.
One word summed up Caillot's existence in that moment, his rage, his passion, the heartbreak of what was happening to his friends blazing in his eyes.
Enough.
With a yell, the Occultist let loose like never before, tentacles springing out from the ether around him, their red as bright as the blood upon his hands as he charged with single-minded fury. The tentacles obeyed his will, grabbing the smaller demons and crushing them into paste as the large shambling horror turned towards him. Drawing his knife, Caillot began stabbing away at it, his screams dying out as his voice cracked but his rage pressed on. The Occultist's knife broke out of his grip, embedded in one of the beast's eye as it reared, noxious clouds billowing from its mouth in tiny waves as it tried to take its ravaged face away from the assault.
Refusing to let the Shambler get away, Caillot grabbed Rir's horn, still in the grip of a tentacle, and wrenched it away. Rearing back, the Occultist slammed it down, again and again as the creature's grip grew weaker and weaker, its tentacles around his friends going slack as their limp forms dropped to the ground. Eventually the horror lay still, its twitching subsiding as it breathed its last. Feeling a smaller tentacle lash at his back Caillot turned and didn't even hesitate as he swung his arm, the tentacles of the Beast mimicking him as they broke the bodies of the smaller fiends. Frantically, Caillot crawled towards his unmoving friends, the void fading around him, back to the Weald.
Note: We now return you to your irregularly scheduled updates. Please enjoy this cliffhanger while you wait!
