Inferno 7008

9 THE BLIGHTED GOD'S RECKONING

"Greg?" said Sofia. The thing in front of her very -obviously- was not Greg, but its voice sure sounded like Greg.

She had only a second to be confused, because Castopher was yelling some kind of incantation. The knights raised their spears and swords, and suddenly every tip and blade flashed with white lightning.

"Prepare for obliteration, spawn of the Pit!" shrieked Castopher.

"Throth!" yelled Greg. "The drums!"

Sofia was vaguely aware of some kind of shaman standing nearby, holding an enormous drum in his hands. He rapped it once with a stick.

BRRRUUUUUUMMMMM.

The swords of the knights, formerly flashing with enchanted lightning, went abruptly dull. Castopher's chant died in his mouth.

"Black sorcery," he gasped.

"Behold the power of the Drum of Kyrthen, dispeller of sorceries!" bellowed Throth, the black-eyed shaman.

The tentacle-bat-thing hovered above the pit, its arms upraised.

"Listen!" It yelled. "This is probably going to be hard to believe, but I am not the Blighted God! Really!"

"Enough of your abominable lies!" spat Castopher, staggering to the front of his knights. "Magic or no, we will slay you, venomous spawn of the unutterable deeps!"

"Please don't!" said the Greg-thing. "I want to kill the Blighted God too! I think we could help each other out!"

Castopher squinted. "Your lies do not decieve me, scum of the Ancient One's loins! Land before us, that we may challenge you to rightful combat!"

"Okay just wait a second," said Greg. "I've been working on a trick that I think just might convince you!"

The bat-wings flapped. Greg's eyes suddenly glowed a deep red. Castopher froze in place for a long moment.

Castopher staggered.

"Unbelievable," he gasped.

"Should we charge, or what?" muttered one of the knights.

Castopher raised his arms. "Knights," he cried, "this is not the Blighted God! This is the 47th reincarnation of Alharazed, Slayer of the Un-Thing!"

*

Greg was impressed at the speed with which the knights set up camp. It felt like only moments later that he was sitting in a tent with Castopher, while two knights stood guard outside the door.

"I do not pretend to understand the implications of your transformation," Castopher muttered, thumbing through an ivory-bound tome. "The ability of the Blighted God to inhabit living beings is well known, but these vessels are always cast aside to rot soon after, their bodies quickly decaying into putrid instruments of disease."

"It had something to do with necromancy," said Greg. "Anyway, much as I'd like my old body back, this one has some advantages."

"And you truly believe that you can dig down to the Blighted God's kingdom," Castopher marvelled.

"Sure. The tribals are pretty good diggers, as it turns out, and they like the idea of destroying the big bad guy."

"To think that the path of Alharazed would tend this way," Castopher mused.

"Right," said Greg. "Um. Anyway, I don't suppose you know any magic digging spells? It would be really nice if we could... y'know, move this along. I'm kinda worried about my friends. And also I have a job to get done."

Castopher frowned. "I was trained in the arts of holy warfare," he said, "but somewhere in this tome is a spell that will help us, I am certain of it..."

"Um, another thing," said Greg. "I think your prisoners are buddies of mine. I'd really appreciate it if you could set them loose."

"Impossible. They are servants of the Blighted God."

"I don't think so," said Greg.

"They were planning to consort with Garant, a practitioner of evil magic," said Castopher.

"I, uh, doubt they knew what was going on. At least I really doubt Sofia did."

"Fine," said Castopher. "We will release one. The other we must keep, in case you are mistaken."

*

Sofia was having a hard time keeping track of what was going on.

First there was the whole confrontation with the tentacle-monster-thing claiming to be Greg. Then the knights were suddenly erecting camp, and she was hung by the ankles from a pole near the central bonfire, Natalia dangling beside her. In this state of discomfort she endured what felt like several hours.

Then one of the knights let her down, wrapped a white cape around her, and led her to the edge of the pit, where the tentacle-bat-thing was sitting and looking weirdly nervous.

"Hey there," said Greg. "Long time no see."

"Am I free?" said Sofia shakily. "How did you get Greg's voice?"

"Yeah, you're free," said Greg. "Let me just explain real quick. See, after you sent me to Hell, no hard feelings by the way, it's all cool, some guy rescued me from being on fire and gave me a magic sword, but told me I had to rescue this princess named Kitra, and then he died, and it was like, well, it would be kind of uncool not to do it after all that, and also what else am I going to do? So then I ended up meeting this guy called the Duke of Filth, who has the Princess Kitra prisoner I guess, and he told me he'd let her go if I did a thing for him, which was finding a guy called Corvel the Burnt who was apparently hiding out in this forest. So then me and this friend of mine called Dalile came here but then I was killed, I guess, and ended up dead in the underworld, but then I met this babe named Ithuria who says she knows Corvel the Burnt, and I figured she could help me find him if I could get out of the underworld, but then some necromancers caught us and they sent me back here somehow, only now I'm in this demon body for some reason I don't really understand. So now I'm trying to dig back down to the underworld so I can save Ithuria and Dalile so I can find Corvel and then the Duke will let Kitra free and then I'll be square and maybe we can figure out how to get back home. Yeah?"

"Okay," said Sofia, sitting down.

"So that's the situation," said Greg. "How are you doing?"

Sofia thought about it for a while.

"I think I'm pretty confused," she said. "Are they going to let Natalia go?"

"I'll try to convince them," said Greg. "I think they're pretty stubborn."

"Yeah," said Sofia. "A bit."

"On the upside," said Greg, "I think these army dudes are going to help me kill the Blighted God."

"That does sound helpful," said Sofia.

"Yeah."

"So," said Sofia after a while, "it's weird that this is my main concern right now, but how did you convince that guy that you were his friend?"

"Oh yeah," said Greg. "I showed him a mysterious vision. It's a trick I've been learning from Throth. He's like the head shaman of this tribe."

"A mysterious vision," said Sofia.

"Yeah," said Greg. "Check it out."

He raised one arm.

Sofia suddenly found herself somewhere completely different. Except that she wasn't really there, she realized: she was inhabiting someone else's mind, Greg's mind, but it wasn't really Greg either. She was in a flourishing garden surrounded by ivy-crusted stone walls; willows trailed their branches in still pools, and flowers spread petals on the grass. The eyes she was looking through belonged to a tall man in silver armour, and beside her was a startlingly beautiful woman in a dark orange dress, her hair flowing down her bare shoulders.

"What is troubling you, Alharazed?" said the girl softly.

"Don't trouble yourself, Kitra," said Alharazed. "Let there be no shadows in your mind. Not as there are in mine... The demented visage of the Un-Thing will not leave me."

They kept talking for a while, about nothing that Sofia understood, and wandering around in the garden. And then another man came around the corner and saw them.

It was Castopher, the leader of the knights.

Sofia came back to herself with a jolt.

"What does it mean?" she said.

Greg shrugged.

"I'm not keeping up at all, to be honest," he said. "Actually I have no idea what's going on."

*

It was the next day, in the depths of the pit, that they cut though the last layer of dirt and struck the layer of corpses.

Greg and Castopher descended into the deeps to see what was going on. The darkness of the pit grew more and more absolute, and the stench of decay more and more potent, until at last even Greg's infernal nostrils couldn't take it anymore and just shut down. Castopher muttered something and an ethereal light materialized above his head.

At the pit's bottom Throth waited, holding a lantern and gazing into the deeps with a look of the utmost digust.

"There," he said.

The dirt ended there, and was replaced by calcified grey corpses, packed together so tightly that they appeared denser than the earth itself.

Cleaving through the stack of corpses was the hole cut by the obsidian sword as it ascended from the depths. A faint green miasma rose from the pit.

"The Blighted God dwells beneath here, I'll bet my life on it," said Castopher darkly.

"I guess we'd better dig through, uh, them," said Greg.

"No need," said Castopher. "I have the necessary enchantments. I will summon my knights."

Shortly thereafter the knights of Castopher were huddled at the end of the ramp, staring at the packed corpses, while Castopher muttered an arcane chant.

"Is this making you uncomfortable?" Greg muttered to Throth.

Throth seemed taken aback. "Me? No, I have seen far worse depths of decay and horror in the service of the Blighted God."

"Fuck," said Greg. "That's heavy, man."

"INCANTEM LUX!" shrieked Castopher. The corpses dissolved with a wet splot sound.

Greg stared down into the abyss.

From far below, in the utmost blackness, rose a shimmering green mist. It stank of decay.

"The court of the Blighted God," said Castopher. "Knights! Descend!"

The knights charged into the abyss, dropped out of sight, and Castopher leaped after them, shrieking in an unknown town.

"Oh boy," said Greg. "That did not look like a good idea."

"Follow me," said Throth, and plunged into the darkness.

*

"Did you hear that?" Azarak mumbled.

"Couldn't say," said Wendick absently.

"Sounded like a pop," said Azarak.

"Sensory perception is an illusion," said Wendick. "Pure falsehood."

They were lying in a huge pile of books, their robes in disarray. Ithuria's lips were still attached to Wendick's cock, almost absentmindedly. Dalile was standing in the corner and staring at the wall.

"Look at that ass," Azarak said, staring at Dalile's ass. "For centuries I envisioned the perfect bottom - conjuring it up in dreams that I tried, and failed, to realize - and then it appeared before me, completely under my control."

"Beyond belief," said Wendick tranquilly. "Almost certainly a falsehood of the senses."

"Does it matter?" said Azarak. "After all, perception is still - hello, what's this?"

The ceiling had just caved in, quite loudly, breaking several bookshelves and filling the room with debris. In the wreckage stood a trio of knights brandishing swords that burned with lightning.

"Perish, scum of the Blighted God!" they roared in unison.

"Hm," said Wendick. "That's a new one for me."

Azarak waved his hand lazily. One of the knights popped like a balloon, spraying the others with gore.

"Phew!" said Wendick. "Good trick!"

"AIII!" screamed the knights, charging.

Two swords cleaved into Wendick, cutting his body into three pieces.

"Remarkable," said Wendick's head.

"Let the Great Mother devour the world," yawned Azarak. The other two knights reeled drunkenly for a moment, and then impaled each other on their swords.

"Am I apart?" said Wendick's head. His fingers waggled.

"Who knows?" said Azarak. "Who can know anything, really?"

*

By the time Greg arrived, Azarak was gone. Only Wendick remained, still staring blankly at Dalile's bare bottom, surrounded by the ruins of the tower.

"Where's Ithuria?" Greg demanded, flapping his enormous wings.

"Where is anyone?" said Wendick. "Are we not simply drifting through infinity, on the back of the void?"

"I mean like physically," said Greg, "not philisophically."

"I suppose she's with Azarak," said Wendick. "They left in a hurry."

"Also," said Greg, "how are you still alive."

One of Wendick's shoulders shrugged.

"Magic," he said.

"Right," said Greg. "Could you remove the mind control on Dalile, please?"

"Did I ever have it on her?" said Wendick. "Did I ever -"

"AAAAAAAAAGH," said Dalile, collapsing on the floor.

"Dalile!" said Greg.

*

He tried to explain what had happened as they dashed through the blighted castle.

"And then," said Greg, "we floated down into the darkness, and then we were here, and Throth had giant insect wings."

"You look different," said Dalile numbly.

Greg looked at himself. "Yeah," he said, "I seem to have a new body or something. The wings are nice. Have you seen Ithuria?"

"I don't know who that is," said Dalile.

"What do you remember?"

Dalile thought for a moment.

"I think I was in a blood rage and I killed a bunch of things," she said. "That's about it."

"Probably for the best," said Greg.

*

The throne room of the Blighted God was a chamber so vast that it appeared to have no boundaries, thick with toxic miasma that choked and blinded those who breathed it, the floor slick with ooze and dried gore, tendrils of dessicated matter dangling from the unseen ceiling. Upon his rotten throne the Blighted God sat, as big as twenty men, staring down at the two figures before him.

One was a comely girl, pale-skinned and slender, her naked skin uncovered, staring dully at the floor. The other was a necromancer in tattered robes who looked quite anxious.

"My Lord," said the necromancer, "holy knights have breached our realm somewhere, armed and actually alive. I think they mean to kill you."

The Blighted God raised an enormous talon.

"I WILL SCATTER THEIR LIVING FLESH ACROSS MY REALM, UNDYING AND IN PERPETUAL AGONY," he said.

"Good idea," said Azarak. "Only I think they may have the Drum of -"

"The Drum of Kyrthen?" intoned a distant voice.

A drumbeat rattled the silent corners of the hall. Azarak cowered. The naked girl started, looked around for a moment, and then fainted.

"WHO ENTERS MY DOMINION?" demanded the Blighted God.

"The swords of your destruction," intoned a voice.

Figures emerged from the fog: warriors in white, their spears and blades flashing with arcane lightning.

"I, Castopher, pronounce your destruction, spawn of the abyss," said the figure.

The Blighted God laughed.

"THEN PERISH, WORM," it roared.

*

When Greg and Dalile reached the throne room, they had to climb over a pile of dead knights.

"What is happening in there?" said Dalile.

The roar of battle and the crackle of lightning was deafening, but nothing could be seen through the miasma. "I, uh, dunno," said Greg. "Maybe we should wait it out."

"Then your allies will certainly perish," said Dalile.

Greg sighed.

"Fine," he said. "FOR KITRA!"

*

In the encampment on the surface, a few watchful knights were gathered around the fire. Nearby danged Natalia, naked and gagged, one knight prodding her idly with his spear.

"Do you hear a rumbling from below?" said one.

"No doubt the sound of the Blighted God's reckoning," said another.

"Hm," said the first. Then he made a choking sound, because an axe had just emerged from the back of his neck.

"BY THE GOD OF SUNLIGHT," roared the knights.

"DIE, SCUM," roared Ragak.