The Bounty of the Grandfather
I embrace the mind of Tzeentch
I embrace the strength of Khorne
I embrace the will of Nurgle
I embrace the bliss of Slaanesh
Let chaos reign.
It was beautiful.
The orange twilight of sunset shining on the skyline of Mustafu, the twinkling of light off of windows and skyscrapers rivaled the beauty and grace of the stars of the heavens themselves. The breeze was gentle against his skin;flowing past his messy green curls like the kind and comforting caress from his doting mother, the sounds of the city stirring underneath him filled his ears in a beautiful crescendo of noise as the people fluttered about heading too and fro. He closed his eyes and inhaled deeply; the faint scent of food stalls and cigarettes wafted from below, his chest slowly and gently rising and falling as he took a deep lingering breath.
It was beautiful, a singularly perfect moment.
One to die for.
He stood off of the railing that separated him from the concrete edge of the building, a final teasing barrier to his watery rest. Would Kaachan push him if he was here, or just mock him until the tears fell again? Would his teachers stop him, or would they turn another blind eye? He sighed. He thought things would change; that he wouldn't be just another quirkless punching baghat the skills and knowledge he had would prove that he was something more, that he could rise above the statistics set before him.
He tried so hard to prevent this fate, to ensure his mother wouldn't be left further heart broken.
It's better this way.
She'd never have to worry about the mistake she birthed into this world, perhaps she'd regain the light she had in her youth. Perhaps not. He'd never know.
His foot rose and he began to fall forward; the wind intensifying as he fell, gaining momentum as the river drew ever nearer. It'd be quick. He'd made sure of it. His skull would shatter and his neck would snap: painless. Just like that he'd never again have to be the brunt of ridicule; an object of disgust; a target to beat. He could be at peace.
It was odd that in this moment, when death was so near, that he could feel so alive. The wind howled and swirled around him. His heart thundered. The feeling of weightlessness as he fell, like he was soaring. He wished this moment would never end, that it would last forever.
Would they be happy he wondered, knowing that after all the beatings and threats and bullying they did to him it was the symbol of peace that finally broke him? That the greatest hero of Japan's words led to this? The culmination of a lifetime of victimization at the hands of his old friends, he could feel anger in him welling at it all. Kaachan had so much potential to be an amazing hero.
If only he acted like one.
It infuriated him at times, how often he stepped in to stop his old friend from beating whatever pebble or extra that drew his ire. How often he'd been beaten only to limp home hiding his injuries.
His eyes closed, the water was so close now.
He just hoped things would be different after this, that he'd change in whatever rebirth awaited him, that he'd be given the strength to fight harder, the will to endure better than he had now, to feel alive like he did now.
It was cold.
The smell overwhelmed him first, of disease and offal. Rotting meat and pus filled his nose making his gasp eyes wide as he shot up covered in brown and green sludge. He looked around eyes watering before slowly adjusting as he realized that he was in a large all encompassing swamp, one that could only be a death induced figment since it had to be impossible for such a place to exist. It was a maddening incomprehensible place, trees and roots tangling and merging together without rhyme or reason; swirling swarms of flies blotted out patches of the sickly green putrid sky buzzing so loudly he feared his ears would burst. A massive man-sized frog leapt into the sludge near him splashing him causing his skin to tingle from contact with the toxic liquid, he spat out and it turned its massive head. eyes in the shape of a pyramid bore into him before it croaked and settled.
He stood resisting the urge to scratch at his skin as he looked around. Was this the after life? Where was everyone then? As he looked around he could feel himself becoming lost in the chaotic depth of the swamp; the chittering of insects surrounded him as he began to walk out of the river of sludge, the one so similar to the one he died in. Was this a reflection of Mustafu then? The towering trees a natural reflection of the skyscrapers perhaps? He couldn't be sure.
As his feet sank into the moist dank ground he couldn't help but marvel at the odd swamp, while a place of madness he didn't feel endangered. He didn't feel much of anything at all other than a numbing peace, and an odd instinctive pull forward deeper into the swamp. Eventually the sounds of music filtered into his ears, it was low and distant. A cacophony of wailing and wheezing of untold thousands. The scent of putrefaction increased tenfold; he gagged as noxious fumes filled his lungs, but he continued on until the glade yawned wide. All around, bloated and decaying monsters danced, their phlegm filled mouths opened and closed as they wheezed and coughed their diseased song. Each a unique snowflake of cancerous growths and blemishes, entrails that dangling like skirts around short, rotund legs.
But they were nothing compared to what laid in the center of the glade, a massive rusted cast iron cauldron so large and wide he thought that not even all the oceans of the world could fill it. The entity behind it however stole his breath away.
It was larger than any mountain he'd ever seen or imagined, a being of pure disease and rot with large greasy boil covered folds of fat. All around it sores and scars decorated its gangrenous form. Massive, inflamed entrails hanging freely from large rotted tears across its great frame. The being was rather jolly bouncing along to the grotesque music, hands waving as if conducting, its voice a loud hacking and wheezing booming thing that laughed before it spoke.
"Louder! We must prepare for our guest's arrival! Play your music my children let the songs of rot lead him here as was foretold!" The little green monsters that looked like miniature versions of the great thing chittered and giggled, racing around defecating and farting in excitement as the unholy music grew in volume. The demons dancing grew more fervert.
Midoriya watched on entranced with terror; until the great entity lifted its large, rotund head. Flecks of flesh the size of cars fell from the exposed folds as it sniffed the air before giving a wide and joy filled smile. "Ahh, he's here, how delightful!"
Its head scanning the glade before, toMidoriya's horror, stopping right on him.
"Midoriya Izuku, here as foretold at the appointed hour!" A decayed hand lifted as the demons cheered, parting to let him through as the massive unholy thing ushered him closer. "Come, come! There is much to discuss!"
Midoriya gulped, his body trembling in frozen terror. He wanted to run, to hide but he knew he couldn'. The time for that was long gone. After a moment's hesitation he lifted his foot from the swampy quagmire and took a shaky step forward urging the demons to cheer once more and the great being to smile.
"Wonderful! Wonderful!" It cheered.
"T-Thank you?" Midoriya squeaked out.
"No, thank you! It has been far, far too long since a mortal ventured so deeply into my great garden. Tell me Midoriya Izuku, what do you think, hmm?" The being asked in barely hidden excitement.
"It's…." He trailed off for a moment searching for words before finally continuing praying he wouldn't be killed by this being. "It's unlike anything I've ever s-seen."
The great being let out a deep wheezing chuckle, its greatblubbery mass jiggling with each deep chuckle. "That is because it is the greatest garden of all, the great garden of rot. The garden of the great Nurgle!" The demons cheered, chanting Nurgle's name, until he brought a hand up, silencing the mass. "You should be honored Midoriya Izuku. Mortals rarely have the will to explore the great garden without succumbing to my many poxes."
He stared for a moment confusion in his eyes which elicited another great chuckle from Nurgle. "T-Thank you um N-Nurgle Sir but why am I h-here?"
Nurgle let out another deep booming laugh, droplets of pus dribbling onto the ground beneath them, becaming new sickly looking growths. The nurglings chittered around him, hazy yellow eyes glowed all around him from every direction. Nurgle himself looked down at Midoriya, his large clouded eyes baring down on him as his lips split apart; contorting into a maggot filled smile that with mucus and phlegm. "Why for your ascension"
"M-My ascension?"
"Why of course, it's the only reward befitting the fervent supplication you displayed."
He blinked in confusion at that. "But I-I never prayed t-to you."
"But you did." With a wave of his mighty leporous hand, a swarm of bloated inky black flies. In their buzzing flight came the all too familiar sound of Kacchan's voice, the very voice that told him to take a swan dive praying for a quirk. The idea he followed through with.
Midoriya blinked looking up at the decaying yet regrowing Nurgle. "I-I don't understand, I…I died."
"Indeed, it was quite delightful to watch." The demon said, a fond smile cracking its pus laden lips .
"Is….Is this h-hell?" He asked.
Nurgle laughed deep and hard. The legion of deamonic diseased joined in. Their chittering was so manic that they urinated on themselves, rolling and clawing at one another. The raucous laugh faded becoming a wheezing amused chuckle, his massive gnarled and arthritis filled hands fell resting on his bulging bloated stomach. "Forgive me, I forget how naïve you mortals can be. But have you forgotten why you are here, of what was foretold Midoriya Izuku?"
"M-My ascension?" He asked eyes wide as he looked at the assembled legion, if this was hell and Nurgle a deamon is becoming like him what he considers ascension? "I-I'm going t-to become a d-deamon?"
"I'm afraid that like a sapling in poor soil, your realm is far too weak for such gifts. Should I grant you true ascension into princehood, upon your return you'd wither and be forced to return here."
"Oh I-I see." He wasn't sure if it was relief or disappointment that flooded him at that knowledge, relief that he wouldn't become a disgusting deamonic entity yet the idea that even a being like Nurgle couldn't give him a quirk seemed a cruel irony.
Nurgle lifted his great hands. "But fear not, for I am a generous God and in my infinite fecundity I am yet able to bestow upon you that which you always desired Midoriya Izuku."
He blinked in surprise at that. "But why?"
"It was your prayer, your desire that from your broken dead body that new life would be regrown. Such is MY domain, and so rare to see a mortal to pray for. Rejoice! For I have heard your prayer, and in my loving care will you be reborn and returned to your realm." He looked down, outstretching his sore and lesion covered hand in a mockery of an inviting gesture. "You need only accept my blessing and kneel."
"And if I r-refuse?"
The nurglings chittered at that, the daemonic legion took a stiff trudging step forward as Nurgle smiled his hands gesturing towards the swamp around them. "Then you will become one with my great garden, your skull used to grow the most sublime of poxes and phages. All those that could've been saved by your blessed hands, will instead die in misery and all will be your fault."
His heart raced as he looked down, he couldn't trust Nurgle. But what choice did he have? If he rejected this gift he'd be killed, but should he accept? Could he really be a hero? .
"I'd save lives?"
"If you chose to, or you could destroy them. After all I am a mighty God, and my champions are mighty indeed."
A champion? But how? "W-what would your gift d-do?"
"You'd endure, survive where others would fall." Nurgle said, clenching his mighty bulky fist for effect. "Toxins would have no grasp on your life, and like the mighty trees of my swamp you'd grow strong after the most grievous of injuries."
He took a look around at the legion once more, they were standing when by all rights they should be dead. Perhaps it was magic, the fact that daemons were different from mortals. Or perhaps it was a testament to how resilient Nurgle and his forces were.He couldn't be sure. Still the gift sounded useful, powerful even. With proper training he could outlast and survive. He closed his eyes and looked up at Nurgle. "What w-would be e-expected of me ?"
"To survive, nothing more."
He wasn't surprised at the fact he could still die, it made it seem more quirk like and not like a gift from a dark entity. He swallowed and nodded. "I accept."
Nurgle laughed and soon the chittering nurglings walked towards him; a rotted, fuzzy mold covered fruit held in its small clawed hands. "As foretold!" The daemons screamed music slowly wheezing into a disjointed crescendo as he looked at the held fruit. "Eat! Eat! Eat! Eat! Eat! Eat! Eat!" Came the chant all as Nurgle watched on with nearly palpable excitement. Soon he reached down his fingers, instantly bubbling with hives and sores as he touched the damp, decaying fruit; his fingers sinking into its squishy fuzzy structure as he slowly brought it to his lips. He nearly gagged as the sickly sweet scent of rot hit his nose, his face winced as it leaked onto him each droplet of fluid that touched him that formed infected looking boils and rashes to grow. He closed his eyes and bit into its soft and oddly fleshy skin, the slimy juices inflamed his mouth as his eyes watered in natural revulsion. Yet the daemons danced as Nurgle cackled, he swallowed and instantly began to wheeze unable to breathe. He looked at the fruit, seeing a roiling mass of bloated yellow maggots at the site he bit into. He gagged, spitting out half bitten maggots from his mouth, his hands reaching for his neck as he felt hundreds and then thousands of squirming maggots in his body. He let out a silent trapped scream while looking at his arms as he watched the squirming wriggling things move down his veins spreading across his body.
"Excellent! Excellent!" Bellowed Nurgle. "Rejoice! Arise my champion, arise and spread my bountiful gifts to your home!"
He screamed as broken bones cracked back into place, the dark scum water chilling him as burning agony filled his body as muscles rotted away and regrew stronger. His jaw snapped back into shape, teeth regrowing as he swallowed dirty and coppery blackened blood. His broken hands healed repairing themselves as he lifted himself up, his voice returning and tearing itself as he screamed wide eyed into the heavens. Wriggling maggots danced and traveled under his skin before slowly disappearing into him, by which point he felt like a hollow shattered mess and he stayed knelt in the waist high water staring into the sky alive and whole surrounded by uncaring skyscrapers. As the pain faded he never noticed the triangle of circles that formed on his right palm.
The mark of his patron.