Hubris - 15. Beneath the Temple

Crowe never hit the bottom. In one blink of the eye he was falling; in the next he watched his feet being dragged across a hard stone floor. His palms scraped against the ground. He tried to lift a hand but his limbs were not his own. Strong fingers gripped him by the back of the hair, dragging him along behind them like an unwilling puppy. Human shapes loped after him, milling along a meandering corridor. Even through the alarms ringing in his head, the practitioner could hear their voices: “Hamon, Hamon, Hamon…” All around him the sounds of bare feet and chains scraping against stone.

“Ugh.” Crowe let out a low moan. An urgent voice shouted in the back of his mind to move. He had to act. The others were in danger. He reached for his staff but his staff was gone. Petras staff. It was gone. The coil of grief that unfurled inside his chest surprised him only a second before he shoved it to the side to deal with it later. Pushing through the pain, Crowe reached behind him. With all the strength he had in him, with all the will he had to survive - and he wanted to live - he dug his fingers into the hand that had him by the back of the hair.

He was answered with a scream of pain and fury. His assailant reached him. His back slammed flat against the ground. Already his assailant advanced towards him, foul breath hissing angrily behind its mask. Large breasts swung before Crowe like sagging cow udders. “Hamon, Hamon, Hamon…” Hands that looked as if they had been blackened by fire reached for him, clenching and unclenching.

Crowe scrambled back on his hands and feet. Before the practitioner could summon his mana, the woman was on top of him. Large fists slammed into his face like battering rams, knocking him back down. Unseen hands pulled him by the legs; the one still smarted from where Tannhaus had clung to it to keep from falling. Thankfully the woman with the sagging tits and massive meat hooks was gone before she could start welling on him again. Swarms of Hamon’s servants swarmed him from all sides. Hands lifted into the air, carrying him on a sea of twisted limbs. Before he could find another opening to escape through chains looped around his arms and legs, shackling him to steel rings grafted into the wall. He cowered against the wall, bruised and sweaty and frightened. The crowd of occultic worshippers pooled in the center of the large chamber in which he found himself in. They congregated on the floor, hopping, crawling, reaching for the ceiling. With each passing second their movements and antics grew more frenzied until he realized they were no longer dancing but fucking. Limbs twisting over limbs, bodies writhing in a single multi-limbed mass so it was impossible which was man and which was woman. Moans of pleasure broke through the chants. The practitioner watched stupidly, unable to believe what he was seeing. The overwhelming stench of bodily odors and exchanges made his eyes water and his gorge rise.

“Twin o’rre!”

A familiar form, darker and larger than the rest crawled across the floor - were they still in the temple? - towards him. Or tried to. Chains dragged along the floor behind him, kicking up motes of dust. Large hands reached for him. Crowe’s heart jerked in his chest. He threw himself in the lycan’s direction, desperate to bridge the distance between them. They reached for one another, fingers outstretched. All Crowe needed was another inch of chain and they could be touching.

A shift in the air broke through the chamber. A ripple of silence passed through the gyrating crowd of savages. Somewhere within the walls Crowe detected the steel clanking of ancient gears turning after millennia of no activity,

activity. A slit in the wall opened.

A tall lean figure stepped out of the opening, moving with the dreamy grace of a sleepwalker. The practitioner recognized the pale gleam of short-cropped blonde hair.

Lagerof.

She stood tall in the dome of infernal red light that pulsed at her back, glittering eyes blacker than the husk of a beetle. Her pale breasts were little more than nubs, her ribs showing beneath pale flesh stretched thin. Black veins tunneled through her skin, forming tributaries that branched off like lightning. The savages kneeling on the floor in worship, reaching for her as if one touch would bless them for all the Iterations to come, had them too. Black spittle fell from their lips like death-rain.

Lagerof raised her hands to the ceiling. Silver bands jangled around her wrists. She opened her mouth, releasing a single long, high-pitched, tortured shriek. The savages jumped in excitement, milling about on the filthy floor like pigs in mud. The sound pierced Crowe’s skull. He wanted to cover his ears but the chains wouldn’t let him reach far enough. Needles of pain were being driven into his brain. When the screeching ceased his ears popped with relief. Lagerof looked at Crowe. Cracked lips peeled back from yellowing teeth in the imitation of a grin. “It was you who did not heed my warning, herald. You should have stayed away.”

Crowe glared at her in defiance. He reached for his inner fire but fear choked him like a vice, putting it out before it could start. Here he could feel the full power of Inferno pressing in on him, invading him. His skin wanted to crawl away from the places where the red light touched it.

Lagerof spread her arms out, a showman making a grand entrance. The temple shook around her, stone walls groaning with life. Crowe shrank away from the light. Somewhere the throng of a horn sounded. Somehow he managed to push himself into a kneeling position. I have to do something or I’ve doomed us all!

Lagerof turned her piercing eyes on Tannhaus. A glimmer of something human appeared in the black pinprick of her eyes. A slight softening of the mouth. A hint of recognition perhaps, gone as quickly as it had appeared. “Gregor, I knew you would return to us. We are the family you never had.”

Gregor clenched his eyes shut, shaking his head. “No,” he muttered as if through will alone he could transport himself to safety. “No, no, no.”

Lagerof’s smile was almost knowing and intimate. “The only time you ever felt like you belonged anywhere was when you were with us. When you were something more than just yourself. You shake your head in denial but you know deep down inside by yourself you are nothing. Even compared to the foolish herald you are but a mite. With us you become more. You become something worthy of respect.” She held out her arm to him, turning her wrist towards his mouth. A dagger appeared in her hand. She brought the blade to her milky flesh. His stomach churning with dread, Crowe realized she meant to infect the scientist the same way the practitioner had cured him: through the transference of blood. Black ichor dripped from the wound. “All you need do is drink from me…”

“Don’t listen to him, Gregor!” Cenya croaked. The old woman’s eyes burned with a fierce determination that Crowe wished he could match. “You can be more than your father’s expectations.”

Lagerof turned her feral grin on the ancient practitioner. “Cenya,” she said with something like respect. “You are almost as old as the temple itself. I should bow to you in respect. But I am afraid your time is at an end.”

Another wail pierced the air. The temple shook so fiercely Crowe feared the quakes would turn his bones to dust. Black dots danced before his eyes. He blinked, trying to understand what he was seeing. The walls of the temple were not falling but melting like wet paint dripping down a canvas. A rent in the ground opened up beneath Lagerof’s feet, revealing the blackness of the Void - the immaterial from which Monad had created the material. A spire made of ancient black stone sprouted out of the hole like a reaching sunflower. Lagerof stood atop it but she was no longer Lagerof. Instead, the demon Crowe had seen in his dreams the night before watched prisoners and worshippers alike through the jagged holes carved in the steel headpiece it wore. The tip of the spire broke through the ceiling of the temple, popping it open like a blister.

Crowe squinted against the fiery red light of Inferno. Flecks of ash caressed his cheek. Flashes of yellow lighting whipped through acid clouds in the sky. Tidal waves of wind battered at him, kicking up clouds of dust. The wall that both restrained him and kept him upright crumbled. For a moment it seemed freedom was within his grasp. Before he could yank his arms free a large chunk of mortar rolled on top of the chain. A scream of terror made him look up.

Two hulking figures dragged Cenya up the steep steps of the spire. She looked tinier than ever sandwiched between their broad shoulders. Her shoulders sagged. Her head hung low. All the fight that had led her to the temple for the sake of her village had been in vain. What chance did a crippled old woman, practitioner or no, stand against the immortal evil that peered mercilessly at her from the top of his throne?

Rake struggled against his chains, calling her name in weak defiance. The demon held up a single limb, showing off its clawed fingers. Pointed razorblades caught the red light of Inferno. A high-pitched keening sound pierced the air. It took Crowe a second to realize the mouth making the sound was his own. He tugged furiously at the chains; a frantic rat clawed at his belly, fighting to break free. Tugged until the rings of steel encircling his wrists bit into the flesh deep enough to draw blood. He would amputate his own wrists if that was what it took to break free.

The two occultists reached the top of the spire with Cenya in tow. They dropped her in front of the demon before stepping back with a reverent bow. Down the steps they receded with a nod from their master, their duty carried out for the moment. Cenya crumbled before the titan. Her shoulders shook with unsuppressed fear. She rested on her shoulders, bringing her leg and stump into her chest. Gone was her staff. The realization - followed by a ripple of despair that made him cry out in frustration - swept through him and he pressed both feet to the stone until it was the only thing that kept him standing and pulled until the nerves in his wrists screamed in protest.

The demon turned his full attention on the old woman. He tossed his immense head back and let out a laugh that made the ground shake and the crowd of worshippers gasp in awe. His arm shot out, clawed fingers closing around Cenya. He lifted her limp body effortlessly into the air. Knowing her doom was close at hand, the old woman did not fight. The demon made a pulling motion and Cenya’s dress came loose with a tearing sound. In her final moments Cenya was naked as she’d been in her first moments, sagging flesh exposed for all to see. Respect

would not be afforded to her in her final moments. Fingers darkened with smears of shit and blood and black filament pointed at the dimpled folds of her flesh. Mocking laughter rang through the clouds of soot that billowed through the tainted air. Razor fingers sliced through the air once more with an audible hiss. Another tearing sound, this one like the parting of silk or leather.

With a single swipe of his claws, the demon opened Cenya from the top of her head down to her pelvic bone. Her body twitched in a mockery of life, held aloft by the demon’s hand. Tendrils of red ichor so red it was almost black - the practitioner’s mind refused to think of it as blood - spurted from the crude split of Cenya’s ruined corpse. Still cackling as if no feat of cruelty could bring greater joy, the demon flung Cenya’s corpse to the side. For a moment it soared through the air before slamming into the ground with enough force to turn bone into dust.

No, no, no - this can’t be happening.

But it was happening and he was the only one who could bring the nightmare to an end and he was stuck. No! I didn’t come all this way just to die here!

Rake on the ground in a heap, sobbing. With the loss of Cenya he’d lost himself. Would the man ever be the same again? Would any of them be the same?

No time to think. He set his heels against the stone once more and began to push, He would die trying to break free if that’s what it came down to.

Another screamed split the air followed by - “Twin o’rre!”

Now it was Barghast’s turn. Already four of the occultists, one for each limb, hauled the lycan up the spire to meet his feet. A cry of despair ripped its way out of Crowe’s throat. A sudden and incendiary fury billowed into life within him. He turned the fury not onto the demon, but onto Monad. If I lose the lycan, you lose everything if you do not help me. I will not save your people. I will not search for you, I will not find you if you do not help me. Mark my words, my lord, if the Okanavian dies there will be no hope for this Iteration. His fingers clenched around the chains. With a single furious tug the chain broke free from the stone with a metallic snap. The steel blazed with celestial fire. There was no time. Already the demon’s servant had reached the top of the spire. Even the towering Barghast looked insectile in the shadow of the demon.

“No!” Crowe boomed. Chains dragging through the ash behind him, he sprinted up the steps of the spire three at a time. Already the demon reached for the Okanavian, hungry grin spreading from ear to ear. The practitioner had but seconds to reach them before it was too late.

Before those razorblade fingers could close around Barghast, Crowe swung the chain at the demon. Steel links whipped through the air before thwacking against the demon’s headpiece hard enough to turn the creature’s head to the side. The mask came off with an audible pop. The demon’s head whipped back around to face him. Black eyes bore into his from the pits of a face ravaged by countless wars and endless conflict. Lips marred by pits and craters from where blades had pierced them peeled back from rows of razor sharp teeth. The mouth stretched open, revealing an endless cavern that stretched back as far as the eye could see.

“Get away from him!” Crowe snarled.

The demon swiped at him with his claws.

Desperation and fury propelled the practitioner into the air. He pivoted out of the way, looping the chain around the demon’s arm. He leapt up, using the demon’s momentum to swing through the air. For a moment he dangled high above the ground. One fall would shatter every bone in his body on impact. Crowe wasn’t afraid. To have his bones crushed by a fall would be a far better one than the fate Cenya had suffered - better than the fate they would all suffer if he did not prevail.

He didn’t fall. His feet slammed into the demon’s chestplate. The momentum of his body combined with the impact of his attack sent the demon and practitioner flying over the edge of the spire. He thought he heard Barghast cry his name but the sound was lost by the whoosh of air in his ears. For a terrible moment it seemed they fell towards a ground that had no bottom. He slammed into the demon a second before the demon hit the ground. The demon’s immense body absorbed the waves of impact that otherwise would have proven fatal to the practitioner. As such the sorcerer rolled onto his feet, unharmed. He pivoted out of the way, narrowly avoiding a swipe from the demon’s claws.

Already the demon lunged after him, steel fingers slashing through the clouds of soot that billowed up from the ground, stirred into life by their passage across the ruined earth that was now all that remained of a previous Iteration. Crowe danced and pivoted out of the way. Razors flashed towards his head. He ducked between the demon’s legs just in time to save his scalp from being cleaved from his skull.

Swing. Clang. Dodge. Swing. Clang. Dodge.

The demon drew back, pausing in thought. Crowe could feel the entity reassessing him, finding a new avenue to attack. The practitioner ignored the throb behind his eyes. Barghast, Rake, and Tannhaus and the people of Timberford were depending on him. He would not let another soul suffer the same agonizing fate as Cenya. The two opposing figures stopped circling each other, coming to a stand still.

“Even if you defeat me you might lose this battle but you will lose the war.” The demon lifted a hand towards the ruined sky. “Once this world was called Gehenna. It was a beautiful world much like your own before the whore Elysia destroyed it and Hamon laid claims to its remains. Even Metropolis, the city from which your people were born, lies in ruin. The cogs still spin with electricity but there is no one to direct the current.”

“You are wrong, demon!” the practitioner spat through clenched teeth. He spun the chain over his head, feeding his mana into it; it spun faster and faster, gaining momentum. “Metropolis still hovers in the sky. Someone still guides. Monad sleeps but there are those who are still loyal to him; there are those who want to bring this nightmare to an end. Your master only wants to keep it going. He wants to keep us trapped in an eternal cycle of suffering! Well I say it ends!”

Before he could swing the chain a dark shape dropped onto the demon’s back. Barghast roared, clawing at the creature with extended claws. Muscles and veins bulged beneath his fur. Each strike drew ropes of black ichor. The demon spun in an attempt to shrug the Okanavian off. Barghast dug his claws in as far as they would go, clinging to the demon’s back like a mosquito, using his teeth to tear and rend. Crowe continued to swing the chain, putting everything he had into it. Pressure built behind his eyes making his skull feel tight; soon it would build until a steady ache. Cramps tightened through his belly. He pushed it aside.

There’s no time to be weak, Petras whispered. There’s no time to be afraid.

The demon tossed his head back with a roar of determination; with a great shrug of his shoulders he threw Barghast from his shoulders as if the lycan was little more than a flea. Barghast curled into a ball, striking the ground at a roll. He sprung to his paws, scraped and bruised but otherwise unharmed. Before the demon could regain his composure Crowe dove into the opening. He swung the chain with all his strength. The impact of the steel biting into the demon’s disfigured flesh sent vibrations up his arms that made them groan in protest.

Fight through the pain! Keep going until there’s nothing left!

Swing. Clang. Swing. Clang. Swing. Clang.

Crowe pushed forward, driving the demon back. Each lash of the chain scattered sparks on the ground. Still the demon continued to taunt him. Fire licked the aching undersides of his arms. He felt a thin trickle of blood fall from his nose. It was time to end things. With a scream of defiance, pouring everything he had into the swing, Crowe lashed out a final time.

As the impact knocked the demon head over heels, a shockwave ripped through the air, tearing furrows into the dead world beneath Crowe’s feet. The practitioner raised his arms before his face to shield himself from the resulting shockwave that rippled through the air. He felt the world shift once more. When he blinked the black spires of Inferno were gone. Once more he found himself standing in the chamber beneath the temple outside Timberford. He’d managed to break the demon’s illusion. The floor was a cracked ruin beneath his feet. Thick slabs of stone half rose out of the earth as if seeking escape.

Laying on the ground, peering up at him with blackened eyes was not the ruined face of the demon but Lagerof. The woman shuddered, spasms making her broken body vibrate. Around them the walls shifted, the material world settling in through the illusion. An eerie hush filled the temple but for the dry rasp of her voice. “You will fail, herald,” she wheezed. “You always do. Iteration after Iteration, lifetime after lifetime. It’s merely a fault of your function, for you are nothing more than a puppet of your creator.”

“And you’re any different?” Crowe snarled through clenched teeth.

“We revolted against our creator cycles ago when we realized him for the fool he was!” Lagerof spat, her jaw twisted at a wrong angle, an image that seared itself into the practitioner’s mind. “World after world, civilization after civilization, race after race…beautiful to behold at first but rotten at the core. And so you seek to usher in a new Iteration of the same.”

Crowe steeled himself against the words. Let the demon spin his lies in the guise of an innocent. “I guess you’ll have to wait until the next Iteration to find out, won’t you?” He stooped down, reaching for a fallen blade. As he drew the blade across his wrist, Barghast hunkered beside Lagerof. His enormous paws enclosed around her head, holding it in place. Lagerof tried to wriggle away but her broken body was in no position to resist for her back had been crushed. The practitioner only winced slightly at the bite of the blade.

“It won’t matter in the end,” Lagerof chattered. “Bennett left you. Petras left you. Everyone will always leave you…”

He ignored the waves of revulsion that passed through him as he pressed his wrist to Lagerof’s mouth.

“May you find splendor in the Eternal City,” he grunted. He paused as if listening to another voice whisper in his ear though he heard no one else speak. “Monad may sleep in the Void, but he is not deaf and he is not blind. He hears you, sees you. I free you from the chains of Hamon’s tyranny…”

The words became lost in the echoing bell that filled his head. The ground seemed to dissolve beneath his feet. He stood on unsteady legs. He felt a sigh of relief stir through the temple. It passed through the crowd of masked occults who had frozen as if caught in the bindings of a waking dream.

Lagerof was the first to convulse. Her eyes widened. Violent tremors shook her body to its core. She fell on her hands and knees, vomiting up thick black puddles of black ichor. Her fit started a chain reaction. A choir of gagging heaving sounds filled the chamber bringing with them the unpleasant smell of human expulsions. Crowe stumbled around half blind from exhaustion. He grabbed the edge of a basin to remain standing.

“You did it,” a dumbstruck voice said. “You did the same thing to them you did to me.” Tannhaus looked at the practitioner with a mixture of awe and terror that made Crowe’s skin crawl. “Who knows how long these savages have been down here…they could be as old as the temple itself, preserved by Inferno…and you cured them…”

Gregor’s scientific musings faded to a dull murmur. The sorcerer had no interest in what he had to say. I want to leave this place. I want to feel the sunlight on my face. He searched the gloom for a familiar set of amber eyes.

He didn’t need to search far. “Twin o’rre!” was the only warning he received before he was pulled effortlessly into the lycan’s embrace. Before he could utter a word another arm looped under his legs, crushing the practitioner against his solid chest. Then they were off, racing through a labyrinth of tunnels. Crowe closed his eyes to ward off a wave of nausea; only when he felt the night air on his face did he open them.