Chapter 4: A Giant Feast
"Great Gods! Why are there so many of the damn blighters?!" Erik snarled, igniting yet another Royal Solider Hollow with his flames, before bashing its skull in with the ladle. Venturing deeper in the castle, Erik had been ambushed by numerous Hollow and ended up dying at least twice more to their attacks. He soon learned that the glowing green fire was a pile of souls; his own, in fact, from when he'd been killed. It seemed they lingered for a bit, oddly enough. Why the Hollows didn't take them he didn't know, but when he touched the emerald flames they returned to him. Currently Erik had gone full circle. He'd found some keys, and opened some doors, one of which led straight back to the ladder that lead up to the bonfire he'd been at before. There was sparingly little of use for him. Some armor that looked rusted and worn was unlikely to defend him, plus it was heavy. He did grab a dented but still usable metal shield though to replace his broken wooden one. The most useful items were small stack of Amber Herbs and Green Blossoms, which he'd giddily stuffed into his pack, some of the so-called "Human Effigies," a bunch of Titanite including a rare Slab and some of the Twinkling variety, a few vials of Aromatic Ooze that could be used to enchant weapons or add flavor to a meal, a shard of green glass that looked like and reacted to his Estus Flask, and another magical ring that quickly restored his stamina. The latter he put on his fingers almost instantly. Most important of the items he found was a seed that seemed to be made of petrified wood. His eyes had widened when he saw that. A Seed of a Tree of Giants! His ancestor had only ever found a few of these himself, and used them all in incredible dishes. This one large seed could be used to cook the most elusive of foods; Souls themselves! Everyone could absorb souls, though only certain people could use them, aside from the Undead. And if it could be consumed like that, why not cook it as well? And so Donovan had made a name for himself amongst the lords of Drangleic for being able to actually cook and prepare the essence of life itself. Erik would not be beaten, though! He could do the same, all he needed was a large supply of souls to work with.
And Erik had found souls, lots of them, some in clumps on strangely unmoving bodies, others from vanquishing his attackers. The silver ring Melentia had given him helped here, dragging more souls out of the victim than usual. Not sure how it worked, but he didn't really care.
Traveling and wandering led him through the castle, and after meeting an odd man who claimed to be a traveling cartographer, he was pointed in the direction of where the "call" urged him forward.
Now, Erik had made it to an odd looking contraption. It was hooked up to chains, and lowered and raised itself by tapping a panel with one's foot, where gears and levers would move it. Riding the strange device, he was lowered to a deep, earthen corridor, where a Royal Soldier Hollow had jumped at him. Badly wounded, he swallowed a mouthful of Estus, gasping in pleasure as his wounds knitted themselves back together. He was out now, though. He didn't particularly want to head back up to the bonfire, either. It seemed that whenever he rested at the flames, the Hollows would reanimate, as if influenced by his actions by the fire. One more thing to hate about Drangleic.
He had a number of Lifegems though, and they would do for now. Walking ahead, he was soon stopped in his tracks by a swirling vortex of fog that seemed to block off the corridor. Confused, he raised a hand to touch it, and instantly regretted it as the mist latched onto him and dragged him through!
Pulled through the grey vortex, the mist clung to him and pushed at him, forcing Erik to the other side. Whatever that stuff was, it was both warm and freezing, with a consistency like thick smoke and pudding all rolled into a single substance.
Once through, Erik stumbled for a moment, caught off guard, before straightening up. All at once his vision blurred, and waves of red slammed against him.
Blood lust! Overwhelming blood lust! And it was all coming from the cyclopean being lying impaled and battered on the floor of the cave in front of him. The creature was tall, easily standing over twenty feet in height. Its skin was ash grey and mottled like the bark of a tree. In the center of its head, there was not a single facial feature, just a vast, gaping pit that likely served some wholly esoteric purpose. It was a Giant! There could be no mistake! Erik had heard of them and seen pictures before, but to actually see it in the flesh? It was awe-inspiring and terrifying all at once. With a moan, it staggered to its feet, wrenching itself free from the pillar that had impaled it. How long had it been down here, Erik wondered. The war against the Giants had been bloody and fierce but also relatively short, less than half a decade in fact. The King of Giants was slain by an unknown warrior during the final assault of Drangleic Keep, and without it the rest either fled or were routed. This Giant must have been down here since the battle at this very castle, so centuries at least! And it still lived!
All his thoughts quickly dissipated as a massive fist swung at him, and the chef threw himself to the side in panic.
"Stop, please! I don't want to fight you!" Erik cried, weaving away from another blow, this time a heavy stomp.
"I feel your anger, but the war is over! You're people have left this land! Please, return to them!" Erik attempted to appeal to the Giant again, but failed. Instead, it lashed out with its fist again, trying to bludgeon the cook into paste. He dove between its legs in response, and ended up rolling in a jumbled pile of rubble. Erik winced at the pain, but shook it off. The fists of the Giant would likely hurt much more, so he had to keep moving. A guttural, booming roar sounded, and the Giant pivoted, swing its arms like a blade in an attempt to strike the Undead who'd intruded on it. The blow struck the rubble at an awkward angle, and it reeled back from the force of its own impact. Erik had already started running as he witnessed the wind up, and as a result was far enough away to peer back and observe what happened next. With a groan of grinding stone, the teetering wreckage that had stood in the corner of the cave collapsed, toppling down onto the Giant and pinning it beneath tones of stone, wood, and dirt. It screamed, struggling to escape but it was all in vain. The weight was too much, and the Giant much too weak from its old wounds to do more than twitch. It moaned, a pained sound of loss and agony, and Erik winced as it boomed about the cave.
The beast was stuck, trapped once more, yet there was no way out for the Undead. The strange fog that had pulled him in still stood, and he doubted it would let him go easily. He could try climbing the rubble to escape, but that looked to be a dangerous idea, especially with a Giant pinned under it. What did the fog want? Erik looked around, swallowing a lump in his throat. Suddenly, he knew. The only way he was getting out was if one of them died. It might have just been his imagination, but a tickle of vindictive amusement entered his mind, and the chef was certain it was not his own.
Trembling, Erik raised a hand, and a flickering orb of flame danced to life. He stepped forward on shaky legs, staring at the Giant that lay helpless before him. He could do it. A few Combustions to the face and the dagger could do it, especially seeing as it was injured and unable to move.
The Giant, sensing his footsteps, twisted its head to stare back at Erik, the dark empty void for a face somehow conveying a host of emotions towards the Undead.
Anger. Fear. Longing. Pain. It was transmitted to the young man, and he whimpered as he came to a halt, staring back at the Giant. He dropped his hand, and the fire extinguished itself without his will supporting it.
"No. Not like this," Erik growled, and he threw off his backpack and began to root through it, rattling the items around inside. A quizzical grunt echoed forth from the Giant, who could only stare in confusion at the human.
They were enemies, weren't they? It was kill or be killed, the atrocities committed by both sides leaving that the only option. He'd heard the human as it dodged. Something about the war being over, and his kin fled? If that was true, then why spare him? He knew what the damned King's brother had done, what his wife had done! What they all had done! He knew what happened to prisoners of war that fell into the human's hands. The combatants in the frozen north had told stories of how the corpses of their comrades were dissected and turned into necromantic effigies by the sorceries of the Chaos Keepers! The King of Iron had peeled away their skin and fused it with molten metal to create his hideous Ironclad Golems and Smelter Demons! And Thrice Damned and Cursed Aldia had used their souls to build his facsimile Dragons in a vain attempt to rekindle the First Flame! All the Giants knew this, and more, which was why they'd invaded and fought to the death! But here was a human, barely more than a child, who refused to finish him off and send him to the beyond.
Why? None of the other Monarch Candidates had any qualms. They killed him, took his soul, and then he was forced to return to a pain filled life when they failed in their attempts. Over and over and over! Death, life, pain. Numerous cycles had happened, and not one had felt anything but eagerness to slay him. Why was this human so different?!
While the Giant had been lost in its thoughts, Erik had begun removing a set of cooking equipment all made of thick black metal. A pot, pan, skillet, knife, and mortar and pestle. Each crafted from the finest Titanite. It was the legacy of Donovan Potts, items he'd collected on his trip through Drangleic long ago. With these, one could cook the impossible. With these, it was possible to prepare anything! He had little water, but he only needed a bit. He poured the contents of his water skin into the pot, while he heated the water with his pyromancy. He had neither the time nor the materials to make a fire at the moment, so with extreme care he got the water to a rapid boil. Then, he removed the Seed of a Tree of Giants. As it appeared in his hands, the Giant stirred, peering at it. It knew what that object was. When a Giant perished, its body became like a miniature Arch-tree. In time, this corpse-tree would bloom and produce a single seed. This seed was filled with a Giant's soul, and could be used to birth more of their kind. But it had other uses. Aldia used them as pseudo-eggs for creating his fake Dragons, and a sorcerer or priest could use one a medium to control monsters for a while. What could this human possible want with it?
To the Giant's shock, the human raised the Titanite forged knife and began to delicately slice it open, peeling back the shell and revealing the pulpy innards. Erik than threw these bits and pieces into the boiling water and watched closely as they were cooked. The Giant was even more confused now. It became even more so when it saw the next item the chef removed!
Slowly, with almost reverent care, Erik removed a glowing blob of white flames from the inside of his own body. A Large Soul of a Proud Knight! Here, in his hands, was the legacy and essence of a man who was worthy and noble. Perhaps he had died during the siege of the castle. Maybe that was why he had found it in a locked chest. He wasn't sure, but there it was, flickering brighter than any other soul mass he'd picked up. Now, though, he lowered it into the pot of water, and gently let it slip into the bubbling pulp of the Seed of a Tree of Giants. Now came the hard part.
"In life, you were worthy," Erik intoned, repeating the word's in Donovan's book. "In death, you are nourishment. Man or beast or plant, life leads to more life, even in passing."
The water started to glow bright white as the soul seemed to react to the words, and it began to break apart, drifting and melding into the remains of the Seed.
"I am no knight, yet I handle death. I am no doctor, yet I handle life. I am no sorcerer, yet I handle magic. I am no artisan, yet I handle creation. I am a chef, and I handle the fires that bend the world. From the First Flame, I draw my existence, and from the hearth, I continue it. I am a chef, and I what I take, I return in kind. A Feast of Souls, for a worthy being." His words carried through the cave, and they reverberated in the mind of the Giant. This… was magic of a different sort. No staff, save a ladle. No spell, save the recipe. As a Giant, it had no need of mortal food, it was sustained by water and sunlight and souls alone. And yet it hungered, in a way it had never felt before. So very hungry!
Erik calmly lifted the pot, and carried it over to the Giant, ignoring the lingering heat on the handles. The insides had transmuted into something incredible! The soul had been absorbed into the Seed's pulp, where the two materials infused each other and became something new. There were now thick strands of white, silky thread in place of pulp, and they glowed with an internal light and purpose.
Soul Noodles, the first of the Four Divine Dishes his ancestor had created. The soul would seep into the Seed's pulp, and when combined with the solemn Oath of a Chef spoken as if it were an actual spell rather than a family motto, it created a unique alchemic reaction in the two substances. The "noodles" were light and fluffy and shining bright as polished silver, and a scent of pure nostalgia wafted up from them. The Giant moaned piteously as it caught the scent. Was this what the human had wanted? To torture it with food it could not consume?!
"Last of the Giants, I do not want to fight you. I do not want to kill you," Erik said loudly, holding back his flinch as the large, empty hole turned to stare directly at him. "The war is over, and your people lost. But I do not hold the devastation you caused on your head. I do not know why you attacked. None alive do. In the past, there was a tradition in Lindelt, knowing as Breaking Fast, where a priest would share his table with commoners as a sign of appreciation. It was also used as a peace treaty between enemies, because who would dare soil good food with blood?"
Erik gulped loudly, swallowing his nervousness, and continued. "Giant, I do not know if you can forgive what we did to you and your own, whatever it was. But I hope that this food can mend our bonds." He raised the pot, as if to tip it into the hole on the Giant's face.
"Legends say that you need only souls to survive, so I offer these to you. Let us Break Fast together, and close old wounds." His piece said, Erik pours the Soul Noodles into the Giant's face-hole, leaving only a few inside for himself.
There was a long pause, as if the world had suddenly stopped. And then the Giant sighed. Flavors rushed through him, and the taste of souls filled it with memories of its home. If it could weep, it would, but instead it settled for a whimper that ruffled Erik's hair. Such kindness!
This boy was naïve, pure, and innocent. He would not last long as such in the wastelands of Drangleic or the shadows of the dying flame. And yet more than anything, the Last Giant wanted this boy to succeed the Throne of Want, and usher in a new era! With one final groan, the Giant transmitted these hopes and dreams and thanks to the young Undead cook the only way it could. With a burst of light, its body disintegrated into motes of glittering energy that coalesced into a large, goldish-white flame that appeared before the man who let it have one last meal. It offered up its own soul to the child in hopes that he would perhaps save the world.
The rubble crashed down, no longer supported by the Giant's form, and Erik flinched back, shocked by the sudden turn of events. Slowly, he put the pot down and reached out to grasp the Giant's soul. As his fingers closed around it, he was filled with strong, powerful emotions that emanated from it. He absorbed the gift into himself, before wiping away a tear.
"I promise you, I will do what I can," Erik whispered, before bending down and grabbing the last of the Soul Noodles with his hands. He stuffed them into his mouth to keep himself from crying, though it didn't work as the taste brought tears to his eyes. His skin glowed for a moment, and his flesh reverted back to normal, his appearance of humanity restored. He barely noticed, and he turned to the exit, which was finally fog-free. Packing up, Erik could only wonder at what he was getting himself into.