"The smell of rotting fish is almost unbearable…" the Vestal whispered.
"You'll have to get used to it, Sister. It only gets worse the deeper we venture," the Crusader responded.
Four adventures bunched together around the small campfire, trying to remain covert, but the darkness all around left them feeling powerless. The black coves were uncomfortably humid and the floors were coated with a disgusting and slippery slime. It was as if they were in the stomach of some drooling beast. Worst of all, constant eerie melodies and ethereal bass notes reverberated from deeper within.
"It wasn't always like this. The last time I visited these lands was about ten years ago. The hamlet was a bustling town. There were no monsters and no bandits," the man with a red bandana muttered.
"Yes, what Dismas says is true. I used to be a lawman around these parts, but my family was forced out of town. I saw firsthand the horrible things that happened to the hamlet," another man said, stroking his dog's head.
"What a strange coincidence. Brother Reynauld and I visited this area ten years ago as well. We were sent by the church to investigate reports of undead," the Vestal whispered.
"So we all are bound to these lands. Thus, it is our duty to cleanse them," Reynauld declared.
"I don't mind getting rid of more of those smelly fishmen. The way they stare at you with their eyes is unnatural," Dismas said, shaking his head.
"Let us do just that, after we camp for the night, of course."
"Good idea, Osmond. Your hound will keep watch during the night, right?"
"Of course. She's steadfast."
"Good night, then."
The adventurers had chopped through legions of Pelagics, but their wills were growing weak. Even the hearts of experienced adventurers like theirs were vulnerable to the inevitable build-up of stress.
"Agh!" the Vestal yelled, pulling a spear tip out of her arm. "What are we doing here? This is hopeless…"
"Remain stern, Sister! Listen! Do you not hear the melodies? They are as strong as ever. That means our prey is near," Reynauld pointed out.
Osmond put a finger to his mouth and waved over his companions. He had found an ancient doorway. On the doors were carved two tentacles holding an arc or strange tiara of sorts. Judging from the sounds, it was clear that the source of the mysterious singing was in that area.
"Ready?" he whispered.
The rest of the party nodded. Reynauld opened the door and they filed in one by one. In the center of the dark cave was a giant mermaid, except this mermaid was anything but beautiful. Her top half was also fish except for her scaly arms with webbed claw-fingers. She had a large dorsal fin on her back and a starfish in her long silver hair. Her face looked like a cross between that of a fish and an old man. An esca dangled from her forehead, giving off a tiny light. In her left hand-claw was an oversized conch. She shrieked at the sight of the hideous red-fleshed creatures.
"It's the Siren. Attack!" Reynauld yelled. The party began their assault on the mutant mermaid. Dismas sliced at her with his wicked blade, leaving a small gash on her side.
"Sick 'er, girl!"
The Houndmaster's dog barked twice and rushed at the Siren, taking a mean bite out of the big fish. She howled in pain and began to glare intently at Dismas.
"She's up to something! Watch out!" Dismas shouted.
Dismas saw the Siren's features change drastically. Her top half suddenly transformed into that of a beautiful, fully grown maiden. She sang and whispered sweet nothings into his mind. He felt compelled to help this gorgeous, poor young mermaid fight off those terrible fleshlings he once considered allies. However, before he was completely entranced by her spell, he looked up at her face. It was a face that he had seen a long time ago, and it kept him anchored to reality.
"No!" the Vestal cried out.
The Vestal raised her mace, and an explosion of dazzling light blinded the Siren. With her concentration broken, Dismas saw her once again in her natural, horrific form.
"Thanks for the assist. She tried to enchant me with her music," Dismas explained, aiming his pistol at the Siren.
"Enchant this!" Reynauld yelled. He smited her with a mighty blow from his longsword. She recoiled from the blow, but brought the conch to her mouth and blew. Out of nowhere, a Pelagic fishman had appeared in front of his queen with a barbed spear.
"More reinforcements are on the way! Let's finish this before more get here!" Osmond shouted.
The Siren turned her attention to Osmond and sang at him. He saw the same beautiful version of the Siren as Dismas had just seen, but it was the face of the Siren once again that broke her hold over him
"What? Is that… is that Sidney?" Although her hair was now grey, the features of her face were unmistakable.
Sidney had mysteriously disappeared from the hamlet ten years ago. Some time after that, the melodies started to emerge from the cove, drawing in poor townspeople to their dooms. Osmond had always wondered what became of that unfortunate little waif, but now it was clear: the aquatic devils had remade the poor girl in their image. She was their queen, and their slave!
"We must put an end to this tortured soul's life!" Osmond exclaimed, now knowing the dreadful truth.
The heroes and the Siren and her guards traded hefty blows. She called out monstrous tentacles with teeth from her conch to rip the skin off the adventurers. The adventurers responded in kind with steel, bullet, and fang. She and her horrors were threatening, but not threatening enough to defeat the adventurers who had crushed hundreds of skeletons, swine, and slimes in the past weeks with ease. Before long, Reynauld delivered the final blow, thrusting his longsword straight through the Siren's chest.
"Hideous matriarch, vile queen of the the aphotic depths! You have no place in the sane world!" he roared, twisting his blade in the beast.
The Siren screeched in agony and fell to the slimy cove ground. Reynauld pulled his sword out and stepped back. Osmond looked at the poor beast. She was coughing and spitting out a strange blue fluid. He walked to her side and kneeled next to her.
"Miss Sidney. It is you... I'm sorry."
The Siren turned to look into Osmond's eyes. For a brief moment, he saw something human.
"Ossss..." she gurgled. "Ssss… mooond."
"Damn it all, it is you! Curse these damn fishmen!"
The life in her eyes began to fade. She coughed once more, spewing out an sickening amount of body fluid.
"Thank… you…" she hissed. With that, the Siren turned over and expired.
"Our duty here is done, Osmond. Take some joy in that, my friend. Seafaring trade can resume again now that the routes are safe," Reynauld commented. He saw Osmond staring sadly at the body. "So you knew this wretched thing?"
"Yes… her name was Sidney. She lived in the hamlet as I did."
Suddenly, the huge body of the Siren seemed to disappear, leaving behind the body of a girl. It was Sidney, without a doubt.
"Osmond, it seems that the powers that be want us to give her a proper burial. Shall we take her?" the Vestal asked.
They laid her to rest under the great withering tree in the hamlet graveyard. Gold was tight, and the residents of the hamlet weren't willing to pay much for a forgotten girl's funeral. The best the heroes could do was for a tombstone was two wooden planks tied together with rope to form a crude cross. Osmond took it upon himself to dig her grave, but Dismas felt it was only right to help. Reynauld, Dismas's unlikely battle brother and companion on the road to the hamlet, aided the two of them as well. It was a sobering experience, digging in the silent graveyard, the land of the departed. The Vestal said a few words before they lowered her into the ground and buried her.
The four of them and the rest of the heroes of the hamlet, although cautiously optimistic, knew somewhere deep within their hearts that death was an ever-looming threat. They knew that most of them would and already had ended up in the graveyard, covered in the poisoned earth, awaiting merciful oblivion. The waif's fate was just one of many similar stories of tragedy and doom that would inevitably repeat until the inescapable end. The heroes sought victory, a hollow and ridiculous notion. Though they would achieve some successes, they were trifling, at best. The cycle would repeat itself. Corruption would spread, and evil would blossom anew. As long as there existed the unfathomable heart of darkness, nothing they, nor anyone, could do would deliver humanity from the ravenous clutching shadows… of the Darkest Dungeon.
END