The pale yellow moon hung low and huge in the sky, glowing down at me as I advanced along the path. The well-worn dirt road cut through what almost looked like the result of an earthquake, chunks of earth raised up in random clumps on either side of the path. Some had old trees and I could see the roots lancing like groping fingers out of the upheaved earth. Byrgenwerth, in the distance, reminded me of a miniature Smithsonian Museum. The central dome and the small structure footprint around it were reminiscent of many different designs from America and, I guess, brought over from England.

A rustle and rush of air caused me to turn, something was already in motion. I hacked at it, tearing off a limb – a leg, I think – but that didn't slow it. It perched on my shoulders with too many chitinous, spindly limbs. I looked up into a pulsating mound of eyes, a colossal mushroom structure of gray-black chitin into which were set dozens of twitching dull-yellow orbs solid in color except for the suggestion of black pupils beneath layers of cataracts. It shrieked, a sound almost too high to hear. Through the tinnitus, I could vaguely hear things. Hissing voices, whispering things I couldn't understand.

It felt like water flooding a plastic box, sealed so nothing could escape: the pressure grew more and more intense until finally the box ruptured, and so did my head. Blood gushed from my eyes, ears, nose and mouth. I fell back and the creature fluttered off of me. Through the red haze of my bloodied sight, I could see a monster that resembled a fly. It wore ragged robes, a loose white cassock almost, torn apart by its deformed body. Wings, torn and barely functional, helped it to leap and manage its descent. Protruding from its back was a pair of what looked like spider legs, long and spindly like an orb weaver. Its arms were emaciated, the same gray-green-black of the rest of its body. It only had one leg, but a spider-limb substituted. A thick, segmented tail rested on the ground.

I breathed heavily, feeling dizzy. Tinnitus screamed in my burst eardrums and I snarled. I tackled the thing before it could right itself, driving my spear into its monstrous head. I couldn't stand the sight of this abomination. I stabbed into every pulsating, convulsing eyeball to blind the monster. Clear fluid and rich red blood flew into the air. Its multiple insectoid face-tentacles, perhaps meant for melting its food, twitched piteously.

I finished my enemy, but felt the impact as a second one of these monsters landed on my shoulders. It screamed into my ears and the world stuttered. I saw a graveyard of ships materialize in the lake, a massive white whale beached on the shore. Just before my skull exploded like a grenade, I looked to the sky and saw a second moon hiding behind the first. Glittering and opalescent, it stared down at me…

I awoke at the lantern the Little Ones had set up after I'd killed the robed snake-men. I opted to return to the Dream. I needed something to swat these flies.

(BREAK)

"Gehrman, I made it to Byrgenwerth. Well, almost," I clarified as I approached the old man in the Workshop. "I didn't get to the building itself. I ran into these...things." I did my best to describe them, and watched his eyebrow rise.

"For once, lass, I've no idea. I'm a Yharnam lad, and once the beasts started attacking, I defended my home. Eventually Byrgenwerth cut contact and Laurence ordered the door sealed. When I'd last visited Byrgenwerth it was a shadow of its former self, true enough, but no monsters were present." He let out a heavy sigh. "I can't say I'm overly surprised, however… Master Willem was obsessed with eyes. He believed that we lacked the ability to see the world as the Great Ones do. He theorized that those who developed eyes on their brains would be able to see more of the truth. If they fell to this belief, let obsession become mania after the Church locked them out…" Another sigh.

The people there had been Gehrman's friends at one point… "Do you have any suggestion on how to deal with them?"

He nodded. "Ask the birdbath things for Ludwig's Holy Blade. It has reach and weight, perfect for slapping creatures out of the air and crushing beasts into the ground."

"...When they jumped me, they screeched in my ear. It made my head explode, and I...saw things."

Gehrman's expression softened, empathizing with my pain. "Ah, Taylor, this is why we old hunters caution against gaining knowledge too quickly. If you cannot comprehend the knowledge you're being given, it bring misfortune and suffering. Count yourself lucky that death was all you received."

"I saw a beach. There were ships sunk in the water, masts sticking up. It reminded me of home, a little." I didn't notice yet how Gehrman's fingers gripped his chair's arms like a vise. "And there was some white whale beached on the shore."

He went ramrod-stiff, what little color left draining out of his face. "Speak no more of this, Taylor. Look no deeper. Please, girl, I beg of you. Do not fall into that pit of despair. Let that knowledge wash off you like a morning rain."

I bit down the reflexive insistence to know more. Gehrman, Doll, Valtr, they'd all warned against learning too much too quickly. "I...I'll try," I replied. Giving him a pat on the shoulder, I went out to talk with Doll.

The Little Ones presented me with a two-piece weapon which Doll showed me how to use. It was rather like the Kirkhammer in function, and I wondered which had come first. The primary weapon was a long and rather narrow sword, which Doll said was alloyed with silver. It had an elegant upward-curving crossguard and the central part of the sword (the flat, my echoes provided) had dark filigree. I gave the sword a few experimental swings: it was a little shorter than my extended saw-cleaver or spear, but much lighter. That was both a plus and a minus, since it could be swung more easily but wouldn't have as much impact.

The sheath, which was to be worn on the back, was where the real havoc began. The whole thing was solid metal and ridiculously heavy, and the sides were sharpened. The sheath itself was a blade, and I could slot the sword into it! The crossguard locked in so that the sword didn't snap off, and the whole thing transformed into a four-foot beast of a greatsword. It was so heavy only a hunter could wield it, and I could easily see myself slapping the bug-men out of the air with it.

For safety and paranoia's sake, I'd taken to keeping the coldblood (blood echoes in physical form, somewhat like how Caryll runes could be made physical, I figured) on my person until it was time to use them. That way I didn't lose them if a beast got lucky enough to kill me. I used that coldblood along with several more blood stones to enhance the holy blade and slung the weapon across my back while the saw spear rested in the holster strap on my hip.

(BREAK)

I entered the grounds, greatsword already drawn, and when I heard the fly-man I spun and swung! The foot-wide flat of the blade caught the monster and bore it to the ground with a trembling impact. I lifted the sword off and twisted my grip, bringing it back down edge-first. It juked aside and I ended up lopping off its left arm, which still clutched some odd rock.

As the first fly dodged backward, the second still managed to somehow get the drop on me. It started to scream and I screamed back, swinging my sword to lop off the top of its head. It dropped, twitching and still trying to move, but for the moment I could safely ignore it. The first fly rushed me, leaping again, and I lunged forward. We swapped positions and then I thrust, running it through with my enormous new sword. I hefted it up like a flag on the end of a pole, then brought it down onto its fellow to kill them both. My lost echoes returned to me and I stooped to examine the arm I'd severed. The rock in its rigor-mortis grip was oddly embossed with the crude symbol of a spider. The Byrgenwerth spider, I recalled. I guess that note Siobhan found was at least somewhat accurate. Now I just had to figure out what the spider was. A double-check and the other fly man was holding a similar stone. Definitely a cult, then. Something very, very bad had happened here.

I found another lantern and recorded my position with the Little Ones, then headed further along. I came to a closed gate and a relatively short wall, only eight feet or so. Nothing for me to leap, nowadays. I tried the gate first and, shockingly, it didn't bulge. Even putting my full strength behind the pulling and pushing accomplished nothing. "Sturdy bastard," I muttered.

I leapt the wall and was reminded of summer camp. There was a thing, I could never remember the name, but it was a semi-inflated giant balloon-thing that they set up on the lake. One person would climb onto the edge and wait, then a second would jump from a diving board. The impact would push the air aside and launch the first person.

This felt like that, first being the one who landed into the rubbery surface and then getting launched back. I barely landed on my feet, looking at the invisible barrier with concern. Off to my distant left was another gate. I supposed I could try that one…

Another two fly-men welcomed me, but I knew their tricks by now and easily swatted them. They weren't capable fighters, but then again I suspected that those robed snake-men kept anything from coming to disturb them, so they'd probably never practiced. All the better for me.

Byrgenwerth was oddly beautiful, now that the monsters were dead. The paint wasn't peeling, the small hedges and flower pushes were still well-kept. The ground was a near-mosaic of tiny and intricately-placed cobblestones, flowing into gentle steps down to the edge of the placid lake. Above the lake was a sort of...elevated pier, I suppose, a balcony extending for dozens of feet out from the top floor of the building until it rested over the lake. I could see something over the edge of the low protective wall up there. I thought it might have been a miter, the one Willem wore perhaps?

I tried the side door and was once again stymied. Well, I could always try the other side, or maybe they had a front door. Descending the steps, I was confronted with something that made my brain skip a beat. Up until now, the monsters had all been humanoid or some sort of animal monster. Even that disgusting abomination that had attacked me and sucked my brain had been mostly human in appearance.

This thing, however… My first reaction was that it must be a full-grown vermin. It was colossal, resembling an immense and deformed silverfish. Dozens of legs and more than ten feet long, while it reared up another ten feet or so in front of me. A strange glimmering flower extended from the front tip of its...head, I supposed, like an anglerfish. An enormous toothy maw split its front like a zipper. It scuttled toward me and I let instinct and experience take control. Keep away from the teeth, stick to the sides. When the damn thing started spewing acid out of that vertical mouth, I knew I wanted to avoid being in front of it at all costs. It twisted, pointing that flower down and somehow unleashing jets of flame from it.

I could feel it weakening as I battered it with my sword, then it raised its little flower to the sky like a conductor's baton, weaving it back and forth. I could feel the ozone in the air. Then a goddamn fireball plummeted out of the sky and crashed into me.

I went through the steps again and this time, when I got to the vermin, I went for the flower first with my greatsword. It shrieked in agony as I severed its flower and, without access to its fire magic, was easy enough to deal with. I continued my journey around the other side of Byrgenwerth and unlocked the gate, then went in through the open door.

I don't know what I'd been expecting, but this cramped little place wasn't it. Byrgenwerth was supposed to have sent out numerous search parties, had dozens of students...I doubted more than a dozen people total could even comfortably stand on this first floor, and that's without taking into account all of the books and jars piled on the floor. The jars, of course, had eyes or other organs preserved in embalming fluid. Because of course.

I paused in my disbelief. When I first arrived in Yharnam, I'd seen an entire street simply deleted from the ground. Gehrman admitted the city could be screwy, with the old workshop suddenly attached to Oedon Chapel and sticking out into midair. Perhaps a significant amount of Byrgenwerth had been...taken somwhere.

I ascended the enormous spiral staircase at the center of the building, and only my sharpened senses let me hear the clinking whip. I ducked down, my hat suffering the attack as a threaded cane lashed over me. I blind-fired twice with Evelyn before leaping to the side.

A woman stood there, wearing a tricorn hat and a metal visor obscuring her eyes. Her robes were pristine white, and she carried something similar to the flamesprayer in her left hand. She didn't speak, just attacked. I transformed the holy blade back into its sword form and parried as best I could, then shot her in the chest. Before I could go for a claw attack, she depressed her sprayer's trigger and some sort of white fog spilled forth. It burned and felt like being punched: the surprise forced me to stagger back. Her arm lashed forth and I heard her make a jellyfish noise. My brain interpreted. I call forth the Memory, Firstborn of the Formless, the Holy Medium. Ebrietas. Luminous tentacles crashed into my chest and hurled me against the enormous double-doors that led out to the balcony/pier, which didn't so much as shake. The threaded cane wrapped around my throat and, with a flick of her wrist, she decapitated me.

The next time was almost a straight shot to her. I killed the couple of fly-men between me and this robed woman, then I was a storm of aggression. I managed to land a shot and drive my claw into her, hurling her back in a hurricane of blood. She stood shakily, robes soaked through with her claret. Her hand went to her sides. For a moment, I thought she was surrendering.

"We call the watchers to turn their gaze upon us," she said softly, "feel our sorrow," her arms raised as if doing a jumping-jack, "and weep with us!" She crossed her wrists over her head, fists and teeth clenching, and a barrage of stars ended my life.

(BREAK)

Whatever this woman was, she was in my way and I needed more power, better equipment, or both to bring her down. My hand found the strange pumice stone in my pocket. That man in the Forbidden Woods had said it would lead me to something helpful… Might as well try. I moved past where I'd killed the two blood-maddened hunters with my lightning and rage, finding my way down a sloping hill. There were several gunmen set up on the ridges but they were easy enough to dispose of. More difficult was the pair of huntsmen's assistants clad in armor and wielding halberds.

The good thing was that, unlike the woman, they were slow. One hit would deal grievous damage to me, but they just couldn't land that hit. It took some time, working my sword into the joints of their armor, but slowly I bled them until they could no longer dodge. With both of them decapitated, I moved further. There was a church, or perhaps more of a wayshrine, built into the mountain. There was a large basin in the center, maybe for holy water or burnt offerings, I couldn't say as it was currently empty. Holding the stone, I headed for the doors on the other side. But I found them barred. Instead, a strange vortex grabbed me up and I felt spindly but incredibly strong fingers clutching me. I was raised up, held before something. I could feel it examining me.

Briefly, I got a glimpse, and it was the most horrifying thing I'd yet seen. Countless eyes set into a head like a stinkhorn mushroom, looking at me with clinical detachment like a child examining a bug and deciding whether to squish it. A long and emaciated body, multifarious arms with far too many fingers and two thumbs, all of this creature a sickening amniotic black.

I screamed.

It squeezed.

"Oh Amygdala, Amygdala… Have mercy on the poor bastard… Hah hah hah!"