Disclaimer: I do not own Sword Art Online, nor do I own the works of H.P. Lovecraft.
Chapter 7: Black Goat of the Woods
It was the middle of the afternoon as Sugu returned home from kendo practice. While her school was on its own break like Asuna's and Sinon's, her kendo club was still having meetings during the break in order to get ready for an upcoming tournament. Practice had let out early that afternoon though, so Sugu had simply decided to go home and unwind. As Sugu reached the upstairs hallway, she suddenly heard moaning and the unmistakable sound of a bed creaking coming from one of the rooms. Against her better judgment, the dark-haired girl followed the sounds to the door to Kazuto's room.
The door to Kazuto's room was open a crack, and from it Sugu could see a nude Asuna bouncing on top of her equally naked brother. By the time Sugu had arrived, Asuna's movements had started to become much wilder, and the dark-haired girl found that she couldn't help but watch as the couple inside the room hit their climax at the same time. Sugu quickly yet quietly closed the door just as Asuna had started to dismount Kazuto. Closing her eyes, Sugu leaned against the wall next to the door and slid down to the floor. Seeing Kazuto and Asuna getting it on like that reminded her of her time with Donis and how they had once often made passionate love as the couple in the room had just done.
In many ways, Sugu was still mourning the loss of Donis. The pain had been lessening over time, but the wound was still very deep. Sugu had to admit that she still hadn't quite yet moved on. Suddenly Sugu could once again hear the sound of Kazuto's bed creaking against the floor inside the room, signaling that the lovers were going at it again. Sugu got up from the floor and went to her room so that she could log into ALO and kill something.
In a clear remote meadow on the edge of salamander territory, Leafa was facing off against a large creature that was an odd combination of rooster and dragon. Its body was chicken-like, yet had membranous wings and was covered in red scales. The creature's eyes also glowed like a pair of green flames. The monster that Leafa was facing at that moment was a low-level field boss known as the Cockatrice King. It had taken only an hour and a half for Leafa's to get the dragon foul's HP down to a red sliver.
The dragon rooster opened its beak and attempted to blast Leafa with a stream of orange flames. Leafa easily dodged the attack and flew forward with her wings towards the creature. The beast fired beams of green light from its eyes as Leafa came closer, but the blonde fairy easily evaded each attack. Once Leafa was in range, she slashed the dragon rooster's neck with her sword, dropping its HP to zero and severing its head. The Cockatrice King's body shattered into blue polygons, and the standard congratulatory message appeared in the air. At the same time, a holographic screen appeared in front of Leafa, informing her that she had received the slain creature's head as an item. As revolting as it was, Leafa actually needed the head to fulfill the requirements of a quest that would grant her a certain rare item.
"Not bad!" a voice suddenly commented. "But I would think that fighting a low-level monster like that would be beneath someone of your talents."
Leafa turned around, and standing a few feet away was an imp woman with long silver hair.
"It was kind of a lame boss, but I needed to beat it in order to finish up this one quest I'm on." Leafa replied. "I don't think I've seen you before."
"The name's Nytokris." The imp woman informed her. "And while you may not know me, I know quite a bit about you, Leafa. They say you're one of the strongest sylph warriors around."
"I do pretty okay." Leafa replied. "There are others in the game who're better than me."
"There's no need to be modest." Nytokris told the blonde as she came closer. "You've accomplished some pretty great things. Rumor is that you were part of the quest to obtain the legendary Excalibur, and you even played key roles in battles against some of the Great Old Ones like Tsathoggua and Yig. The thing is though is that it seems like you've dropped out of sight a bit recently."
"I've, uh… I've sort of been dealing with the death of my boyfriend this past month." Leafa admitted. "Do you want something from me, or are you just a really big fan?"
"I'm putting together a raiding party and was hoping I could recruit you." Nytokris explained. "We're going up against another one of the Great Old Ones. Specifically, we're going after Shub-Niggurath, also known as The Black Goat of the Woods with a Thousand Young. Seeing as how you've tangled with some of the other Great Old Ones in the past, I thought you might be able to give us an edge. So, interested?"
"I don't know… for one thing, this is the first time we've met." Leafa pointed out. "Besides, I tangled with another one of the Great Old Ones just yesterday and got totally thrashed. I'm not sure I'm willing to go up against another one so soon."
"Think about it. That's all I ask." Nytokris told her. "If you change your mind, my party is meeting will be meeting in a village in spriggan territory called Blackleaf here in about an hour. Look for a tavern called The Brittle Tree."
With that, Nytokris flew off into the sky. After a moment, Leafa flew off as well to go turn in the cockatrice head to finish up the quest she had been on. As she flew, the blonde couldn't help but think about Nytokris' request. Leafa had to admit that the quest sounded a little interesting, and that she wasn't quite ready to log out. Playing the game had actually helped Leafa take her mind off of Donis for the first time instead of reminding her of all the times they had spent together, but now she needed something else in the game to do. Plus she found that she didn't want to go back and risk hearing more sounds of her brother and Asuna getting it on again. In the end, Leafa decided to finish the quest she was on and go to join Nytokris' raiding party.
The sun was beginning to set in ALO as Leafa arrived at the small town of Blackleaf on the outskirts of spriggan territory. It didn't take the blonde fairy long to find the tavern known as the Brittle Tree, and when she went inside she felt like she had just entered a medieval dive bar. The lights of the little tavern were dim, and all of the players inside had a very shady quality to them. Looking around, Leafa saw at least twenty-two spriggan players, with nine of them being men and the other thirteen being women. In the dim far corner of the tavern on Leafa's left, she saw a group of fifteen gnome players; all of them men and all of them quite burly, with at least half the group having some kind of facial hair. Meanwhile at the opposite corner of the establishment was a group of eighteen female cait siths; all of them armed with bows and arrows, and half of them wearing black masks. Leafa assumed that the group was trying to imitate Sinon.
Split between two round wooden tables towards the front of the tavern was a group of twelve undine players consisting of eight men and four women. Leafa couldn't help but notice that this particular group of undine players all bore nautical-looking tattoos on their arms and faces. All grouped together at the back of the building were twenty imps that were an even mix of men and women. Right away, Leafa noticed Nytokris sitting at the very center of the bar. Leafa assumed that the group sitting at the bar was the raiding party and approached.
"Well, here I am." Leafa spoke, getting Nytokris' attention. "That offer to join your raid still good?"
"It certainly is." Nytokris answered. "I had a feeling you'd show up. Glad I was right."
"So… just who else is joining us for this raid?" Leafa asked.
Nytokris chuckled. "You haven't figured it out yet? Every single person in this bar is going to be on the raid! And now that you're here, we can finally start to get ready."
"It's about damn time, Nytokris!" a voice interrupted. "I was starting to get real tired of just sitting here on my ass."
Walking up to Leafa and Nytokris was a male spriggan player with slightly long dark hair and a sort of black tribal-looking tattoo around his right eye. He had on a sleeveless black shirt under a piece of dark-grey armor covering his chest and back, along with black jeans and boots, and a pair of fingerless black gloves. More tattoos decorated the young man's well-toned upper arms, and slung across his back was a one-handed sword with a black handle and a silver skull decorating the end.
"Leafa, this Xavier." Nytokris informed the blonde. "He helped me get this little party together."
Xavier smirked upon seeing Leafa. "When Nytokris told me that she was going to try and rope in one of the top sylph players in the game, she didn't say how cute she was going to be. It's a pleasure having you aboard."
"Um, thank you." Leafa replied with a slight blush. She had to admit that Xavier was actually quite handsome.
"So, you got the right gear for a boss fight like this, right?" Xavier asked. "We are going up against a Great Old One, ya know. A normal sword like the one you're sporting won't do much on this raid."
"Oh crap! I don't have a tok'l-metal sword anymore!" Leafa recalled.
"It's no problem." Xavier assured her. "I actually have a tok'l-metal katana you can have. I got it from this player blacksmith for cheap earlier this morning. In fact she seemed eager to get rid of it."
With that, Xavier called up his menu screen, and a few moments later a sheathed katana appeared in his hand with a flash of blue light. Leafa took the weapon and wondered if it had been the sword that Lisbeth had forged for her before the battle against Cthulhu. The blonde couldn't help but feel a bit guilty about not accepting the weapon before, especially after how mad Lisbeth had gotten about it.
"I bought the sword because it seemed kinda cool, but it's not really the type of weapon I'm most skilled with. Xavier continued. "Consider it my little welcoming gift."
"Thank you." Leafa replied.
"I had a feeling that you two would get along." Nytokris remarked. "Now then, let's get this show on the road!"
Nytokris then called to every other player in the room and the place fell silent. In moments, all eyes were on the silver-haired imp.
"Okay! So, I think we all know why were here." Nytokris began. "If anyone has any questions though, you better ask them now."
"I actually have a question." Leafa spoke as she raised her hand. "I know we're going up against a Great Old One, but just what is this Shub-Niggurath thing anyway?"
"Mind if I field that one?" one of the bearded gnome players in the corner of the tavern asked.
"Go ahead, Brutus." Xavier told him. "Wow us."
The gnome known as Brutus nodded before getting to his feet. "The entity known as Shub-Niggurath in the Cthulhu Mythos is thought to be some sort of fertility goddess, though nobody can say for sure due to the fact that she's only been mentioned by name in the original literature. She has the title of The Black Goat of the Woods with a Thousand Young, but no one can say for sure if she truly has the form of a goat, or if she has another form entirely."
"I know this guy IRL." Xavier whispered to Leafa. "He's a total nerd, but a really good tank here."
"In this case, the whole goat description seems to be pretty accurate." Nytokris spoke. "Other parties have gone in to fight this thing and have had their butts handed to them. Everyone who's gone up against this thing says that it really is some kind of goat monster. Xavier, I'll leave giving out the details to you."
"Okay. So according to the info I was able to get, Shub-Niggurath is a pretty nasty boss." Xavier began. "She only has three bars of health and apparently a pretty average defensive stat, but she's got mobs protecting her to make up for it. Word is that she's able to summon those Thousand Young of hers to fight for her. Plus, Shub-Niggurath seems to have an immunity to fire magic, which is why we don't have any salamander players here with us tonight."
"Hey Xavier! How do we know this info of yours is legit?" asked a female spriggan with long dark hair tied in a ponytail and a black teardrop tattoo on her left cheek.
"Well Strife, considering how much I had to pay for this info, I'm going with the idea that it's a hundred percent legit." Xavier answered. "Of course if it's not legit at all, a certain info broker I know is gonna get totally thrashed later."
"Well if we get killed on this raid, then you better save a piece of that broker for me." Strife told him. "Once I get through with him, he'll go from being a broker to just plain broken."
Practically everyone else in the tavern laughed in response to Strife's comment, everyone that was except for Leafa. She was really starting to feel like she had joined the wrong crowd.
"Okay. Shub-Niggurath's lair is in a secret cavern here in spriggan territory." Nytokris spoke. "The cavern leads down to a place known as the Woods of Eternal Night. Now then, here's how this raid is going to go. My fellow imps and I will focus on taking out Shub-Niggurath, since we're the only ones who can fly inside a cave. You cait sith archers will give us cover from the ground. Undines, I don't think I need to tell you that your job will be to heal the rest of us when we need it. As for the rest of you, your job will be to take on whatever the hell these Thousand Young things are. Now that everyone knows what we're going to be doing, let's get out there!"
Most of the other raiding party members cheered, and in moments the players flooded out of the bar and took to the sky. As the massive gang of players flew to the cavern, Leafa couldn't help but feel out of place with everyone else. The undine players looked like a band of undersea pirates, the gnomes seemed almost like a biker gang, all the cait sith Sinon-wannabes were likely mercenaries, and all of the other players in the raiding party just seemed plain shady. Leafa found that Nytokris especially seemed like bad news, yet there was something about the silver-haired imp that she was just drawn to.
"So, looks like you and I have mob duty together." Xavier told Leafa as he flew closer to her. "Kinda sucks, huh?"
"Yeah, but I guess it can't really be helped." Leafa replied. "Besides, mob duty is pretty important too."
"True enough." Xavier agreed. "Well, even if this boss battle ends up being a drag for us, we'll still have a blast during the after party."
"After party?" Leafa repeated with a raised eyebrow.
"You'll find out." Xavier told her with a wide grin. "For now though, we better keep on our toes. The word is the Thousand Young are supposed to be pretty nasty."
Within a few minutes, Leafa and the rest of the small army of players arrived at the entrance to a cave in the side of a large hill. The raiding party went in and wound up in a long dark tunnel that seemed to stretch on into infinity. For several minutes the players marched downward further and further into the earth. The deeper they got, the more the light faded and soon they had entered an absolute darkness. Leafa couldn't help but be reminded of when she had first gone down into the underground city of N'kai with Donis; how they had entered a forbidden world that should never have been disturbed. Now it seemed to Leafa that history was repeating itself with this raid. The blonde was really starting to believe that she should not have joined in this raid.
Eventually the army exited the tunnel and entered a massive cavern lit by some sort of bluish-grey phosphorescent moss that was growing on the ground. The moss was bright enough to reveal that a dense and seemingly endless forest of strange-looking leafless trees. The same glowing moss from the ground grew on parts of the trees as well, making them totally visible in the darkness. The ceiling of the cavern meanwhile was so high up that it couldn't be seen at all, making it seem as though the forest was under a starless night sky.
"This place is nuts!" Xavier remarked as they headed into the forest. "Now I get why they call these the Woods of Eternal Night."
Eventually the players reached what appeared to be the center of the forest and came upon what looked to be a massive nest made of twigs. Inside the nest were piles and piles of large egg-like objects. The eggs were about six feet in height and had black shells with green flecks. Before anyone could guess about what it was they were looking at, a sound like a horrid human scream broke through the darkness. The players looked up, and flying down from the darkness above was a gigantic creature that did indeed seem goat-like, but was hardly a goat at all.
The goat creature that had appeared had three heads, each with a pair of glowing red eyes that had a mindless quality to them. Instead of fur, the beast was covered in shiny black reptilian scales. On its back was a large pair of membranous wings like those of a bat or a dragon, and growing from its rear were three cord-like tails that ended with a point like the tail of a demon. As the thing let out another horrid scream, three HP gauges appeared next to its body. Appearing above the beast's central head in white letters soon after was the name, Shub-Niggurath.
"Looks like its showtime!" Nytokris observed as she drew her sword. "Let's take this bitch out!"
With that, Nytokris and her fellow imp plays took to the air and came at Shub-Niggurath from the front. Before the squadron could get in range though, the goat-like abomination opened the mouth of her central head and fired an intense beam of purgatorial green light. Nytokris and the other imps managed to fly out of the beams path, but the attack continued on towards the ground and struck a cluster of the players that had been standing behind Leafa and Xavier. Fortunately the beam attack had only taken those players' HP into the low, and the group of undines that were on the raiding party had quickly been able to heal them. Meanwhile though, Shub-Niggurath fired another beam of light from the mouth of her right head, followed soon after by another beam from her left head.
The players were able to quickly dodge both beam attacks and Nytokris' squadron took to attacking Shub-Niggurath from the rear and from the sides, with the cait sith archers providing support from the ground. Just as the battle was really starting to get going though, Shuh-Niggurath let out a horrid scream that echoed throughout the cavern. Suddenly a large number of the eggs that were in the nest that the players had first found began to hatch. Bursting out of the eggs were several horrid creatures resembling goat fetuses covered in slimy black scales. They had mindless glowing red eyes and tiny stubs on their bodies that were the beginnings of legs. Each creature had a small pair of bat-like wings on its back that were too small for their bodies, yet they were somehow able to fly nonetheless. Most of these fetal goat creatures flew straight towards the players on the ground; occasionally firing beams of green energy form their mouths as they came.
Leafa was able to quickly dispatch one of the wretched hatchlings with four strikes from her sword. She was thankful that the creature's only had a single HP gauge. Xavier meanwhile had easily been able to take out two of the beasts at once. A few of the goat fetus creatures had flown up towards Nytokris and the members of her squadron, but the cait sith archers had easily been able to take them out from the ground. It was almost an hour before Leafa and the other ground units had been able to eliminate all of the hatchlings. Meanwhile, Nytokris and her fellow imps had only gotten Shub-Niggurath's forst HP gauge down to half. Just as the players on the ground were about to take a breather, Shub-Niggurath let out another horrid scream and more of her young hatched from their eggs and went on the attack.
"Jeez! These things are nasty!" Xavier declared as he cut into one of the attacking fetal goats. "I never imagined that these Thousand Young would anything like this!"
"This is worse than when I helped fight Tsathoggua!" Leafa remarked as she finished off another hatchling. "Those black blobs he summoned to battle were pretty bad, but they weren't nearly as bad as these things!"
The battle raged on for another four hours. When the players on the ground didn't have to deal with the seemingly endless waves of hatchlings that Shub-Niggurath kept calling from her nest, they had to avoid the energy beams being fired from the mother goat horror's three mouths. A few of the spriggan players and at least two of the gnomes ended up getting taken out of the battle by some of the hatchlings by the time Nytokris and the other imps had gotten Shub-Niggurath down to a quarter of her final HP gauge. It was at least another twenty-two minutes by the time the imp squadron had gotten the wretched goat mother's HP down into the red zone. By that time, most of the ground units in the raiding party were starting to run out of steam.
"Everyone else, stay back!" Nytokris ordered. "I'm finishing this myself!"
With that, Nytokris flew in and struck Shub-Niggurath in the side with her Queen's Punisher attack. The three-headed monstrosity's HP dropped to zero and its body shattered to polygons. Many of the hatchlings had been fighting at the time shattered into polygons as well. As the standard congratulatory message for defeating a boss monster appeared in the air, many of the players on the ground began to cheer. Meanwhile, a holographic screen appeared in front of Nytokirs, causing her to smirk.
After the silver-haired him landed with the rest of her squadron, Nytokris called up her menu screen. Materializing on her upper right arm with a flash of blue light was a black metal ring styled to look like a serpent with the head of a goat. Small red gems had been fitted into the goat head's eyes.
"Looks like we didn't lose too many people." Xavier reported to Nytokris as he approached with Leafa. "So, shall we kick off the after party?"
"Of course!" Nytokris replied. "These people deserve a good time after all the work they just put in."
"Wait, we're having this party here?" a surprised Leafa asked. "Isn't that kinda dangerous?"
"Relax. The only monsters that are in this cave are Shub-Niggurath and those kids of hers, and they won't respawn for at least a few weeks." Xavier assured her.
"I don't know…" Leafa began. "This still doesn't seem like the best place to have a party."
"Oh lighten up, Leafa." Nytokris told her. "Sometimes you just have to cut loose. Otherwise, what's the point of living?"
Within a few short minutes, the gnome known as Brutus started up a large fire right there in front of the nest. Many of the players gathered around the fire and began laughing and talking with one another, every now and then passing around a jug containing some kind of wine. The whole time though, Leafa had been standing against one of the weird trees of the underground forest. She found that she just couldn't get into the party mood, probably because the other players in the raiding party just weren't her type of crowd. The blonde found herself wondering why she had agreed to come on the raid in the first place.
Suddenly Leafa saw almost all the other players around the fire call up their menu screens. There were flashes of blue light all around the camp sight, and seconds later almost every member of the raiding party was completely nude. Before Leafa could figure out what was going on, she saw two of the undine women in the party making out with each other. Only a few feet away from them Strife, the spriggan woman who had spoken up at the bar, was on the ground on her back and being plowed by a slender male imp player with light purple hair. Meanwhile just a few feet from where they were, a redheaded cait sith archer was on all fours and being plowed from behind by Brutus. Leafa quickly realized that just about every player in the raiding party was having sex right there in the cavern. A few of these encounters even seemed to involve more than two people.
As this spectacle of flesh unfolded, Leafa saw Nytokris just sitting there on a large rock, completely nude except for her tiara and the goat serpent ring on her upper arm, smiling at the whole thing. Suddenly an undine woman with shoulder-length blue hair crawled up on all fours to Nytokris and began to suck on her left breast. Soon after, a female spriggan with long straight dark hair that went down past her back crawled up and began to suck on the silver-haired imp woman's other large breast. At the same time, the spriggan woman insirted two fingers into Nytokris' womanhood. Nytorkis let out a soft moan as she gently held onto the undine girl's head.
Nytokris then noticed Leafa watching and beckoned the blonde to come over with her right hand. Leafa started to back away, only to gasp when she felt a pair of hands take her shoulders. The blonde looked back to see that it was Xavier, who was thankfully still fully clothed.
"I think she wants us to join her." Xavier told Leafa in a husky whisper. "You're a tense one, you know that? Just relax and let yourself go."
Suddenly Xavier began to suck on Leafa's neck. Leafa quickly broke free of the spriggan's grip and turned to face him.
"Sorry! This, uh… this just isn't my kind of thing!" Leafa told him as her face turned bright red.
With that, Leafa began to quickly but calmly walk out of the clearing. At one point she glanced back and saw that Xavier had since removed all his clothes and had gone over to Nytokris and her two attendants. Leafa then began to run out of the forest as fast as her legs could carry her. Before long, she made it back to that corridor of darkness that she and the others had first come through and spent several minutes running in complete darkness. Eventually Leafa finally made it back to the surface and took to the night sky on her wings.
It was morning as Sugu walked the streets to a special meeting of her kendo club. The dark-haired girl hoped very much that practice for the upcoming tournament would help take her mind off of what happened after the boss battle. As Sugu headed down the sidewalk, she saw Shino come towards her from the opposite direction with anther girl who she didn't recognize.
"Oh! Hey Suguha." Shino spoke as they reached each other. "This is a surprise."
"Sure is." Sugu replied. "I see you're not out alone?"
"Oh right. Suguha, I'd like you to meet a good friend of mine from school, Nakuru Kitamori."
"Charmed." Nakuru spoke. "Shino didn't tell me that she had such a cute friend. How do you two know each other?"
"It's kind of a long story." Sugu answered. "Let's just say we met online."
"Well Shino and I were just on our way to do some shopping." Nakuru revealed. "How 'bout you come join us?"
"Sorry, I'm kinda busy." Sugu replied. "Right now I've got kendo practice to get to."
"Well blow it off! It wouldn't hurt you to miss one session, would it?" Nakuru asked. "Sometimes you just have to cut loose. Otherwise, what's the point of living?"
Nakuru's words sent a chill down Sugu's spine. "Uh, sorry. I really have to go. My instructor would kill me if I cut practice."
"Well… okay. Some other time then?" Nakuru asked.
"…Yeah. Sure." Sugu answered.
With that, Sugu continued on her way to practice while Shino and Nakuru went off on their shopping trip. Sugu couldn't help but be a little freaked out because Nakuru had used the exact words that Nytokris had used with her just before the orgy in that forest cavern. As the more Sugu thought about it, she also realized that Nakuru's voice was almost exactly the same Nytokris' voice, almost as if they were the same person. Sugu wondered if she had just met Nytokris' real world alter ego. If that had indeed been the case, Sugu decided that she probably wouldn't go shopping with Nakuru and Shino anytime soon.
Author's Note: I had to take a little bit of artistic license with the Cthulhu Mythos deity that appeared in this chapter. It turns out that Shub-Niggurath is a deity that's only ever been mentioned by name as part of certain rituals in some of Lovecraft's original stories and has never actually appeared. In fact according to Wikipedia, some scholars seems to think that the title, Black Goat of the Woods with a Thousand Young refers to a completely separate entity. Some people believe that this entity is in fact a male consort to Shub-Niggurath. Of course there are others who believe that the "Black Goat" is a male avatar that Shub-Niggurath takes as a way to mate with her female worshippers.
In any case, I decided to take the whole Black Goat thing literally. I even made Shub-Niggurath into one of those goats that makes a sound like a human scream instead of the regular "baahh" noise. Those types of goats are just freaky.
Anyway, I apologize if this chapter wasn't the best one in the story. The main purpose was to try and show just what kind of character Nytokris was. In the next chapter, things will get a little back on track. The actual Clash of Queens tournament is just around the corner.
Please review and let me know what you think.